Wine Bloggers Conference
Barry Schuler (former CEO of AOL and now VC and Vintner) addresses the crowd on new technologies and how they apply to the business of wine. The Wine Bloggers Conference is indeed up and running at full speed.
This man is passionate and can read an audience. Humor is just as important as knowledge when commanding a room.
Key take aways: Right now, we’re going through “Death Valley,” where traditional media is deflating faster than new models are being developed. Today’s new business model is “if they come, we will build it!” We’ve gone from broad to narrow to micro and now, nano casting. The message continues to get more fragmented; however, every downturn leads to opportunity. Wine Bloggers are reshaping the media industry and so long as they stay passionate, build a brand, tell the story well and continue to survive – they may ultimately thrive.
Disaggregation and fragmentation is bound to consolidate in a new form with time… Those that stay strong will be the victors who cash in on the opportunity.
3 Responses to “Wine Bloggers Conference”
Would love to know more about the contents of the conference. I know I should probably have attended but can you elaborate on the presentation?
Cheers
Barry Schuler was excellent. The basic focus was where we were, where we are and where we’re going in the way of communication – specifically, on the web. I’ll try to sum up my thoughts on this speech.
Web 2.0 isn’t social media really. Web 2.0 is when consumer habits changed – when it became fully two-way – when some people began to figure out how to monetize their efforts. When will 3.0 come along? As Barry put it, we are walking through Death Valley now given the downturn in the economy and watching traditional media get diced and reborn anew. Currently, there is faster disruption than there are newly developed models to follow – thus, a pause.
With that in mind, today’s start ups and venture capitalists seem to be operating under the premise of “if they come – we will build it” (think Twitter, Facebook, YouTube). The current business models are suffering a creativity drought. One key exception are “Virtual Goods” that are being used by companies like Facebook, where users can buy and sell credits for applications, services, games, etc. This is creative monetization.
Times continue to change but, with that we’re getting more niche focused. Example: 1960′s saw broadcasting, 1980′s saw narrowcasting, 1990′s saw microcasting and today in the 21st century we’re heading toward nanocasting. This is reshaping the media industry and shows that every change (or downturn in our case now) leads to opportunity for those who watch trends. Fragmentation breeds more niches to fill. The key now is to survive then thrive.
Thanks for the wrap up Nicholas, appreciate it – I wonder if Barry’s presentation will be made available online at some point, they are usually recorded.
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