The noisy disruption of media business models by the internet in the past decade has obscured a demographic transformation according to a briefing in The Economist [disclosure: Speed client].
As young people turn their back on traditional media in favour of social media older generations have a seemingly insatiable appetite for newsprint. But rather than trying to reverse this trend The Economist finds that many publishers are embracing the grey market.
“The clearest sign of this shift is the appearance of online paywalls. Last month paywalls went up around the New York Times and the Dallas Morning News. The websites of Britain’s Times and News of the World began to restrict content to subscribers last year.”
The same applies for the broadcast and music industries. Young people file share and watch YouTube whereas the old deem it to be too much like hard work and prefer their content delivered by subscription.
That’s a good read and what’s interesting – at least to me – is the subtext that it’s a convenience thing. The older people are getting, they just want their news/information/entertainment on a platform that just works and newspapers/TV just work for the ageing generation.
(More horrifying is that I’ve noticed this in myself. I bought a Kindle because I wanted something that just worked for reading books, I want an iPad because I don’t need to faff about with too many settings, I’m using OSX for the same reason. I want stuff that just works and gets out the road, letting me consume the content. In other words, I’m getting old.)