Notes from DiMe: Forget Technology, Story is the King
Last week, I got a chance to attend the Digital Media symposium (DiMe) at the Boulder Film Festival. The symposium centered around a panel discussion with various people involved in the world of digital media. The panel included content creators (Disney, Serac Adventure Films, Riptide Games) programs for content creation (Google Sketchup. Kerpoof), a VC guy and a David Rolfe of CP+B. Bios for the panelists can be found here.
Expectations
Consumers expect free. If your content isn’t free, they’ll find it elsewhere. Mashable (via Nielsen) points out how cheap we’ve all become: “nearly eight out of every ten (79%) [consumers] would no longer use a web site that charges them, presuming they can find the same information at no cost.” If content is now ubiquitous, how could we consider charging for it?
The Story
Everyone kept talking about the story and how it’s the most important part of content creation. Key takeaway: it doesn’t matter how cutting edge the technology is. If the story isn’t there, then consumers won’t stick with it. An issue that comes with this is that everyone gets to tell a story on the web. Which leads us to…
Curation
As everyone on the internet is now a content creator, curation has become a key part of filtering the web. Enter voting. Whether it be through Digg (for the internet at large) or through simple voting systems (for the children using Kerpoof), voting ensures that we don’t have to wade through the bad content.
Attention Spans
With an iPhone app, you have 10 seconds to pull someone in. With a movie, you might have 10 minutes (funny anecdote from Don Hahn on The Lion King choosing to have every animal in Africa appear in the first scene to achieve the “wow”). You need the initial punch in the stomach or, as David Rolfe said, you need to constantly find new ways to interrupt. Interruption gets harder as we multitask our way through life.
The Elephant in the Room
The theme of the conversation was story, story, story. All content creation, all one-way conversation. This notion seems terribly out-of-date. Consumers expect to be listened to, and if there isn’t a forum for conversation, they’ll move on.
Curation is a good first step, as it asks for interaction. But what about content creation that has always been one-way? My own key takeaway for any content creation, including tradional (film, TV) and new (blogs, Facebook and Twitter): Make sure you have a captivating storyline, functional if not innovative technology, and a feedback loop that opens the door for conversation. I do wonder what the film industry will look like in 2020.
Hello_BenHere:
BrandonSings:
Room_214:
MattAt214:
jo_rogel:
runquatro:
ElyseHeslin:
JamesOClark:
JasonCormier:
peterahall: