Monday 5 October 2015

Key points in the Digital Age & time for a Digital Audit

The digital age is considered to have started sometime shortly after 1945 (a subject really well covered in the excellent book Turings Cathedral)

However the pace of change did not "go large" until the internet came along in 1990's and started to disrupt some industries, such as TV & video based media, which had not themselves been around a long time.

Looking back the era of linear pay tv delivered by satellite to the home may be viewed with the soft nostalgia reserved for steam travel and valve amplifiers.


Recent data showing that this year, 181 million people in the US will watch video via an app or website that provides streaming content over the internet and bypasses traditional distribution (eMarketer) starts to show the pace of change.

For some the digital revolution has caught them somewhat off guard (Blockbuster for example) others have literally taken over the world - Google.

If OTT growth continues at this pace and is linked to cord cutting then many of the accepted truths about the media industry are about to get a solid going over. Maintaining control in the wild west of the internet is a very different proposition to the command and control approach adopted in pay tv.

Perhaps time for a Digital Audit to assess the risks and liabilities that are appearing over the horizon ? This is starting to look like the attempts by the phone companies  in the 90's to protect call revenues even after it was clear that the game was up.

No comments:

Post a Comment