For too long we've been suffering the tyranny of lowest-common-denominator fare, subjected to brain-dead summer blockbusters and manufactured pop. Why? Economics. Many of our assumptions about popular taste are actually artifacts of poor supply-and-demand matching - a market response to inefficient distribution.
The main problem, if that's the word, is that we live in the physical world and, until recently, most of our entertainment media did, too.
How does Anderson see thing things changing (and at such a rapid pace)?:
[That was] the world of scarcity. Now, with online distribution and retail, we are entering a world of abundance. And the differences are profound...
...With no shelf space to pay for and, in the case of purely digital services like iTunes, no manufacturing costs and hardly any distribution fees, a miss sold is just another sale, with the same margins as a hit. A hit and a miss are on equal economic footing, both just entries in a database called up on demand, both equally worthy of being carried. Suddenly, popularity no longer has a monopoly on profitability.
I believe The Long Tail effect is changing political advertising as well. Whereas traditionally you saw a political television ad somewhere between once to ad nauseam depending on that particular side's media buy -- the winner usually being the one with the heaviest donor list -- you can now watch political ads on YouTube, send them to friends, embed them on your webpage.
This means the ads are blips or daggers in the night. They're available for download as quickly as they hit the airwaves, if not before. Perhaps pre-release to the web will become a focus testing exercise done for more and more political spots to see if they'll work on TV. Makes economic sense -- the campaign isn't reliant on an onerous media buy.
So if the ads are being increasingly viewed on the Internet, by those in different markets than the targeted media buy, by those with an interest in a political race, by those who find entertainment in the free market exchange of ideas, slams, and (lest we forget) smears, will they automatically have to improve?
Here's two ads that are noteworthy for very different reasons.
Bob Casey has been ahead of incumbent Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) for months. Santorum has a huge donor supply, and has made a very slick, entirely fictionalized mise-en-scene for a fear-oriented attack ad accusing his poll-dominating challenger of corruption. Via Will Menakar at TPM Cafe:
This new ad just out from GOP Senator Rick Santorum's campaign attacking Dem challenger Bob Casey is really a doozy -- one of the most negative ads we've ever seen. In a scene reminiscent of Goodfellas, actors playing Casey donors puff on cigars -- while sitting in a prison cell. The ad intones that a "Philly businessman," a "New Jersey developer" and other Casey donors (none named) are under investigation or have been indicted. Casey's response? The figures apparently referred to gave to previous Casey campaigns before being investigated; two others have given to Santorum, too; and a fifth is dead. Amazingly, a Santorum rep has even admitted that none of the men apparently being referred to has given to Casey's Senate campaign.
At a different end of the spectrum, this single issue ad by VoteVets.org slamming incumbent Sen. George Allen (R-VA) for his lockstep votes with the Bush White House against body armor funding for U.S. soldiers in Iraq, while not explicitly advocating challenger Jim Webb (who happens to be a former Combat Marine).
While both ads are clearly skillfully produced, the VoteVets ad has a kick-ass reality to it -- a young Iraqi vet with just enough charisma and an AK-47, out in the desert shooting holes in two vests, one with modern body armor "made for today's weapons" and one like a sieve.
These ads are getting around in a huge way on advocacy blogs, and I think they're a welcome political media education for professionals and consumers alike. It takes even the most negative smear out of the shadows and brings under-reported issues to light. Internet video as the explosive next big step forward in expanding our nation's free political discourse, and maybe expanding our democracy.
And as for maybe the Longest Tail of all, here's the television campaign ad that kicked off the modern era, Johnson (D) vs. Goldwater (R), 1964 Presidential Election, the legendary "Daisy Girl".
One sixty-second ad and...boom.
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