You Don't Have To Be A Star, Baby
The Long Tail by Chris Anderson
The first time I heard the phrase "the long tail" was a in a job advertisement for a tech startup in early 2006. A bit of a stats geek, my first reaction was "are they talking about that little bit of a distribution curve that never reaches zero?"
Yup.
But here was the funny thing. These distributions, where you have a lot of hits or famous things or common elements drawn as a curve are pretty common. They are so common, in fact, that consultants and well-meaning people the world over spout the Pareto Principle which is more often called the 80-20 rule. You know, 20% of the companies earn 80% of the revenue, 20% of the something are 80% of something. There is an awful lot of math proving it all, and the numbers are not exactly 80 and 20. For purposes of this review, let's say that a few somethings make up the most of something else.
An example: I was in college when the second wave of Michael Jackson-mania hit. This was when Thriller blew the doors off new wave and punk and The Gloved One said, "America, we're gonna moonwalk". And if you chart music sales from those first two years, you'll find that Jackson and several others were responsible for the majority of music bought in malls and record stores and through record clubs all over the country.
Another example: Where were you when M*A*S*H or Seinfeld or Johnny Carson's tenure on The Tonight Show ended? Chances are, you were watching. If you go even further back in time, you'll find that you were watching Ed Sullivan on Sunday night or The Beverly Hillbillies or whatever.
The economics of producing and distribution entertainment made it impossible for much competition to exist. So Madison Avenue stepped up the science end of marketing and got much better at it. The world, especially the entertainment world, turned into a hit making machine that grew adept at knowing what would succeed and what would not.
That is the theory that Chris Anderson puts forward in The Long Tail. Everything was so stacked to the left of the axis, way up high, that only the sure-fire hits were carried in the stores, played on the radio or watched on television.
But then came the Internet, and Anderson tells us that the economies of scale it brings are so powerful that anyone can do almost anything because the barrier to entry has been dramatically lowered, and in some cases, isn't even material.
Heady stuff.
Who Is He, And Why Should I Care?
Remember a couple of summers ago when Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point first took the business world and then the rest of the book reading world by storm? Within several years, Gladwell's own book (although not his phrase) had "tipped", and doctors, lawyers and Indian chiefs everywhere talked about that point where a concept crossed over and became a part of society.
Get ready because all of that is going to happen again.
As Wired's editor, Chris Anderson already had a built-in audience of the tech industry's best and brightest watching his magazine and its associated web site for glimmers of news. His celebrated story on the concept took that group by storm and landed him a book contract. Anderson credits Reed Hasting's, Netflix's CEO, with telling him that the concept of "the long tail" was actually buried deep within a presentation Anderson used to give to Silicon Valley types.
As I wandered a national booksellers convention in DC this year, it seemed that everyone had a reader's copy of Anderson's book tucked under the arm. Several weeks later, The Wall Street Journal produced a lengthy, praise-filled review that assured the book's success in the business world. And soon, you'll be reading about it too.
What Anderson essentially brings forward is that the cost of streaming a video or making a digital copy of something is virtually nil. More importantly, booksellers like Amazon.com can or Lulu.com can produce versions of books or other works that are indistinguishable from something that would have taken big money to produce just a generation ago.
Anyone can be a writer, a poet, a singer, and the results can be professionally produced for a fraction of the former cost.
Another example: At this writing, Lulu.com or Amazon's BookSurge.com will take your book and create an electronic copy. For a convenience, they'll even file the paperwork for you to get an ISBN, and suddenly, you're listed in Books In Print as well as available on every major bookselling site. You're an author. No type-setting, no agents or submission letters, no delays.
But It's Going To Be Tripe With No Quality Control!
Yes it is. Anderson agrees too. By letting anyone record or write or produce crafts that can be sold worldwide at a fraction of the cost, the world invites anyone who thinks they can perform at a certain level to do so. Many won't meet our expectations. But some will, and through relevancy matching like you find on many sites, including Amazon and Netflix, you'll learn that people who liked A also liked B and people who liked A and B also liked C. The difference? The "C" choice is by a high school student in a basement room in Lexington, Kentucky who didn't have a shot at your attention prior to all of this.
There will be bad stuff in the mix, but with millions of data points (that's why it important to rate or at least let trusted sites collect data), you'll soon find that the recommendations you receive are more on the mark. And who cares if it's that kid in Kentucky or some star in their field if you enjoy it?
The Bottom Line, Dog Earred Pages and All
Anderson's Long Tail is really about how the economics of computer production and Internet distribution and marketing allow anyone to try their hand at virtually anything. The book is a little long and sometimes seems repetitive, but there are nuggets to dig out of each section. Resist the urge to fly through the pages and savor each. Or fly through them and then go back and read carefully.
Five Things To Remember From This Review
1. The book is by Wired's editor, Chris Anderson.
2. The basic premise is that computers and the Internet make it possible for people to produce and distribute things, especially entertainment, that they couldn't a decade ago.
3. This book is going to tip as fast as Gladwell's The Tipping Point
4. Silicon Valley is already beating a path to Anderson's door.
5. ..and even The Wall Street Journal has sung its praises, although at least one columnist later beat on Anderson's work.
