[I have been introduced to Seth’s Blog, by SB Bill (Hinesburg SBs. If you read his bio, you’ll see that he is a guy who is pretty impressed with himself, but then, in fairness, the same could be said of SB Bill, me, and most of the other SBs that I know personally. He makes some interesting points on inflection points and media. I truncated his post to give you a chance to watch the video on Hank and John Green. They are doing something pretty impressive. By the way, Seth may be in the Guerrilla Hall of Fame, but my goal is the Gorilla HOF. SB SM]
Bio
Hi. I’m Seth Godin. I’m a teacher, and I do projects.
For more than thirty years, I’ve been trying to turn on lights, inspire people and teach them how to level up. This blog has been appearing daily for more than a decade. One day, if we meet, I hope you’ll share with me your favorite posts. Even better, I’d like to hear about how a book or course helped you interact with the world differently and make a difference.
I’ve spent most of my professional life as a writer. I’ve published 20 bestselling books. Translated into nearly 40 languages. These books are a great way to go deep into a concept, and I think many of them stand the test of time.
Along the way, I’ve found countless detours, interesting projects designed to inspire and entertain you as you continue to do your work.
My latest book is THE SONG OF SIGNIFICANCE. The one before that is THE PRACTICE. And the one before that is THIS IS MARKETING, all three were bestsellers.
I’m in the Guerrilla Marketing Hall of Fame, the Direct Marketing Hall of Fame and, just recently, the plain old no-modifier Marketing Hall of Fame. Which is pretty cool.
You can read my free ebooks on the placebo effect and education. And there are five TED talks. I pioneered ethical online direct marketing, now a $30bn a year industry.
[Enough about Seth. Let’s hear what he has to say about media. SB SM]
Media isn’t a magazine or a website. It’s a system. We can learn to see the system and contribute to it with leverage.
There are three elements to consider in a media system that’s worth a professional creator’s time:
- A business model. There are magical cultural effects that happen when volunteers produce content that is embraced by others. Being a folk musician in 1824 might have been thrilling, but it doesn’t pay the bills. Some media systems naturally support a business model and others don’t.
- Assets to be built. This is related to the business model. Can the creator compound their effort over time, rewarding later work based on the effort put into earlier work? If not, then there’s a good reason to wait.
- Systems that are changing. Static media systems (like book publishing in the 1920s) certainly offered creators an opportunity to produce valuable work, but they were scarce. When a system is in flux, there are more chances to contribute.
Systems are changed by technology. When desktop publishing arrived in the 1980s, it changed elements of the system of book publishing. It was now possible to create complex designs, detailed reference books and illustrated books with more impact and less expense.
I saw books from Dorling Kindersley and Workman (book publishers SB SM) and realized that readers (and thus the system) needed more of them. It was a good time to become a creator of books.
The technology shift in audiobooks (every phone is a player) transformed the entire system around audiobooks. Buying Audible was a no-brainer for Amazon. Once you had a phone, you needed more audiobooks and a good way to get them.
But it’s easy to miss the signals. When the web showed up, I was one of the first users and was already running an internet company. Yet I was sure that there was no business model and missed a huge opportunity.
A few years before the web, book publishers were excited by DVD ROM, a new storage technology that would let them publish large, data-driven software projects. Other than a project I did with Fisher Price, we mostly wasted our time–I thought the media would develop, but it faded in the face of the web…
YouTube transformed the system of creating and sharing videos as a professional. When Hank and John Green began creating videos, the system was at an inflection point, allowing their effort to pay off.
[I pause at this point to let you learn about Hank and John Green. They’re pretty impressive SBs, too. Tomorrow we’ll see where Seth was heading with today’s blog posting. SB SM]