Eyes, Ears and Data

Google recently opened a new and enormous and Google-esque, massive office in Chicago, which includes an olympic sized swimming pool for ya know, all the olympians they employ. As Anderson points out in "Free! Why $0.00 is the Future of Business", Google's services such as their search engine and mail service are free, so clearly this $0.00 business model must be working for some. So how do they make money you ask?  

Advertising! About 89% of Google's $66 billion (yes, billion, with a "B") in revenue came from advertising.

Unfortunately, journalism has become a commodity, and we have become entitled to content. Yet, we don't value the hours of work that go into finding data, interviewing sources, and crafting a piece of work. Therefore, since people don't want to pay for content, advertisers swoop in to save the day.

My dad always said to me "Hija, en los Estados Unidos nada es gratis" which translates to "in the U.S nothing is free".  This can be applied to the internet and this trend towards $0.00. What is in fact selling like hotcakes is data, eyes, and ears. My media professor Lisa Dobias once told my class "your eyes and ears are worth more than what you could physically pay a company". Those impressions and views that we provide advertisers fund the content that we enjoy, or otherwise we would be having to empty our pockets. Additionally, the data that is collected from various platforms is extremely valuable in order to make more targeted advertisement which is more efficient and useful

This is why I find it so strange when people complain about those "stupid" advertisements in front of a Youtube video, or on Hulu. That same sense of entitlement that makes people not want to pay for The New York Times is the same one makes people angry in these instances.

With that anger present people install adblocking services, which in turn hurt the publishers of the content we want to consume because 1. we are not paying money for the service and 2. we are preventing them from obtaining their advertising dollars, which fund their content.

This vicious cycle in which "Information wants to be free. Information also wants to be expensive" puts us in a difficult predicament. Ideally, we would all just revert back to paying for the quality content we receive, but unfortunately I believe we are too far gone. There are going to have to be drastic changes to the way we consume quality content.

Is Disruption the Way To Go?

Once again, there is someone who is predicting the doomsday of traditional media. The inevitable rise of digital media, and so forth. Yet, I find it a bit odd that this "disruptive" media is what is being preached about, because this kind of media is what got advertisers in trouble with consumers in the first place.

I believe this new ideology that digital media is going to fix all of our problems, reach all of our consumers, and create immense profit margins. Unfortunately, I don't believe in this way of thinking, much less when we add "disruptive" to the mix.

Consumers go to a website or mobile site/app in order to consume the content that those publishers have to offer. If we, as advertisers, get in the way of that content in order to capture their attention, then we will quickly motivate users to start using ad blockers (like millions of others have already done). I definitely agree with the article, when it says "One effective type of ad for mobile is native advertising" and that consumers "look at native ads 53% more frequently than banners". The reason for that is that those ads are integrated in their content consumption and are not disruptive, annoying, or invasive. 

One large barrier that mobile has to overcome is trust and conversions. Below is a graph detailing the trust that online/mobile ads receive in comparison to traditional sources of media. 

We see that people are still more trusting of traditional media ads, which hurts conversions and online sales. Another reason for this is because although people enjoy shopping online they do not trust to purchase right from their phone. They might peruse an online catalog, read reviews or  watch product videos but they are less likely to actually input their financial information and make a purchase.

As a "millennial" and as an advertising student I do see the digital progression, yet I do not believe this is the end of traditional media, or even the complete implementation of digital media. We need to continue to provide people the quality they want to see, in a format in which they want to see it instead of disrupting their experience. 

Good Enough for Now

Apple recently had one of it's famous conferences, in which millions of viewers tune in and marvel at the innovation that is unveiled. This time around the new iPhone 6 SE was released, which looks like a smaller, not that interesting, version of the current iPhone. Yeah, it has two cameras and whatnot, but I just kept thinking to myself "I know you can do better than that". Perhaps that is my technologically challenged self that maybe doesn't appreciate the innovation of adding another camera, but it just seems like one of the biggest and most powerful digital firms can innovate a little more. They made the phones bigger, now smaller and it just does not make any sense to me. 

Yet, I am sure that people will order, anticipate, and camp out in droves to get their hands on this device simply because it is new and shiny, and it has some sort of function that is promised to make their lives easier.

We are seeing this in tech quite a bit, but as an advertising major I find it very interesting to note the evolution and retaliation that has been seen in web ads. The article points out that text ads are "not high-concept.. but are highly targeted, incredibly cheap..and make up 90% of Google's net revenue and 45% of all internet ad sales in the US" 

This "Good Enough" ideology did not work for long. Consumers were fed up with low quality, intrusive, and distracting ads and started blocking ads all-together. Since last year there has been an increase of 48% in ad block usage in the United States alone, and as AdWeek points out "ad blockers on desktop computers will cost publishers $22 million."

This is forcing the advertising industry to innovate, and innovate significantly. The people have spoken, and the only thing that the ad world can do is adapt. They must bring back quality content, value and entertainment into the equation and not just sell out for empty impressions.

Maybe with the boom of social media and the empowerment of consumers through various platforms, we, as consumers of technology can demand real innovation from companies. Until then guess we will have to continue to settle for the 6 SE, 6SE plus, 7, 7s, 7s plus, 7SE, 7C, 7C plus, 8a, 8b, 8c, 8d, and so on. 

The Price of Education

We recently discussed in class about the intentions and potential "evil" of large tech companies and when I was reading The New York Times article I couldn't help but wonder what the intentions of these major companies who are pushing the adoption of technology in schools. 

At the end of the day, we all know that the sole purpose of a firm is to maximize profit, therefore, building relationships with school districts and becoming the providers of their tech needs is a huge business deal. In the article, the U.S Secretary of Education said “As a country we spend $7 billion to $8 billion a year on textbooks. My simple question is, ‘Why?’ ” Referring to the six-year textbook-adoption cycle some states still use, Duncan said, “That’s a Neanderthal system.” 

I find this a this mode of thinking a bit ridiculous considering the residual costs of technology.  The life cycle for new devices are about 3 years before they "need" to be replaced by something newer and shinier. Additionally, the technology must be fitted with protective cases and protectors which can range in price and into the hundreds of dollars. Not to mention the new tech people that need to be hired when the technology (inevitably) fails in some fashion. 

When I was in high school I had an amazing teacher who, in her own time and without the help of the school, applied for a grant that would allow us access to ipads for our classroom. She used them in an extremely effective manner, showing us the use and power of social media. As great as this technological integration story sounds, I think the key message is the fact that the teacher made the experience great. The teacher was the one who was innovative and had great ideas to implement tech in a fun way. Without her, I wouldn't have had an enriching experience. 

Therefore when the article talks about a Los Angeles school district " cut costs in recent years by laying off thousands of teachers yet is now using bonds to finance the spending of $500 million on iPads", it makes me really sad. This only continues to perpetuate the ideology that teachers and teacher-student relationship building is less valuable than tech. 

The real investment needs to be in our teachers. I am aware that technological integration is important but it shouldn't trump our focus on long-term success that is brought upon by the impact only a teacher can have on a student. 

It's All About Value

Listening to professor Chyi's troubles with book pricing, printing, and transportation really made me value books even more than I already did. I think there is something special about holding a tangible work in one's hands that conveys the effort that the author put into it. All the time that was spent formatting it and editing it just right so that the reader could properly explore the story within. 

I think this is something that is missing from ebooks. In the text "E-Books and the Digital Future" they note that "despite all this think-big entrepreneurial optimism, many continue to doubt the worth of e-book technologies." To me, this makes total sense, because as professor Chyi pointed out, e-books seem to have the Ramen Noodle effect; they're cheap, easily accessible and get the job done. Personally, the only reason I ever opt for an e-book instead of a physical copy is if the physical copy is much too expensive for me. Besides that I see no additional value or benefit to reading an e-book. 

In class we spoke about accessibility and convenience, but we never talked about the effects that e-books may be having on the learning process. This article explores this topic and claims that “(The students with ebooks) were much more motivated to read, but they were also able to re-tell less. Their ability to answer questions wasn’t quite as strong when they were reading interactive ebooks". I have personally experienced this myself, and in my case I feel like when I have a physical copy I am immersed in the text, but when I am reading on a device I feel disconnected from the content. 

Additionally, the article makes an interesting comparison between Powerpoint and e-books when stating "“It’s like PowerPoint. At first, everyone wanted their slides to fly in and dissolve and have all of those effects. And all of that became very distracting from the message.” All of the flashy functions of e-books may take away from what the consumer was initially interested in: the content. There are also other distractions that can be accessed with a click of a button, and what started as Chapter 3 of the Great Gatsby may turn into us mindlessly watching videos of cats online. This accessibility to distractions coupled with our ever-shrinking attention span may also detract from the value an e-book can offer, which has now decreased to 8 seconds. That is less than the attention span of a gold fish people! 

There is something special about getting lost in a book, and I think many of us can see the value in that. For e-books on the other hand, we must consider what the true value actually is. Is it adding any educational value? Monetary value? Artistic value? Historical Value?

Here to Stay, But Bound to Change

The internet has become very ingrained in our every day lives. As many have pointed out in class, our morning routine may consist of checking our social media accounts, maybe visiting some online publishers, and checking our e-mails. Yet, as sophisticated and vital we may think the Web is, we sometimes forget that this life changing invention has only been prevalent for roughly 20 years, getting it's start in 1995 with only 16 million users worldwide.

This is an ever-changing environment in which there has been a revolution of change and adaptation to the needs of the consumer. Therefore, digital publishers as well as social networking sites are here to stay, given they are able to adapt to the changing climate.

Take the evolution of MySpace for example. In the early 2000's it's value proposition to users was to offer a platform where users would socialize and network. Yet, after it's decline in the mid-to-late 2000's due to the surge of Facebook and their popularity it seemed like MySpace would just turn into a memory of a distant land, far far away where we all posted silly pictures of ourselves and made ridiculous comments as angsty 12 year olds.

This was not the case. In fact, MySpace was able to rebrand themselves as a place that provides a value proposition to users of "social entertainment" and is considered one of the top 4 visited networking sites in Cha's article. MySpace was able to take advantage of the long-tail economy and find a niche marker that was in need of a platform, and provide one for them. This niche community has been able to propel MySpace back on the map and has allowed them to create major deals with various production companies in order to create a great user experience for their consumers.

This sort of rebranding is what will keep other giants like Twitter and Facebook around for a long time, if they catch the disinterest of their users early. The online landscape is constantly changing and one of the challenges that digital publishers and social networking sites face is their ability to keep up.

On the other hand, there are publishers that we need to consider. So much of their revenue relies on ad dollars as well as the traffic that social networking sites provides, and as social media sites are attempting to adapt to consumer demands publishers are often left out of the equation. Yet, I think it is important for sites such as Facebook to consider the harm that they are creating, not only for the publishers, but also for the integrated and dynamic user experience that Facebook offers. I personally go on Facebook, yes to keep up with my friends and family, but also to catch up on trending topics and the news. Without the inclusion of publishers and their content I would not be as inclined to be on Facebook as much because I am active on other networking sites such as Instagram, Snapchat and Twitter that offer me the same value proposition of keeping up with my social circle.

I don't quite agree with Seth Alpert, of AdMedia Partners, when he says "If i was invested in one of these businesses, I would want to exit in 2016" because I do not believe this is the end (or even close to the end) of digital and social media sites as we know them, but instead a transitional and adaptational period. Using metrics, research, and other sources of data it is important for social networking sites, digital publishers and advertisers to sit down and work together towards a creative solution that allows for a more sustainable digital future.