Chicken or egg? The decline of our Media.

[Sterling]

9. That is certainly a big part of it.

I wonder if people's interest in such content is now permanent? Some people may find that to be a naive question but given the lengths I see being taken to find a premise for reality shows I wonder. They seem to be willing to make a show about anything these days. The most mundane things now have a show about them.

One thing I dislike in particular about reality driven content is that I see it diluting the concept of what is real talent. With shows like "American Idol" the new idea seems to be that everyone can and should be a celebrity regardless of their actually unique abilities.

I used to debate friends who worked in the music industry that music and artists that remain relevant are becoming fewer all the time. That music that will be passed down through generations like a lot of stuff created during the 50's-90's will be around for a long time to come. So much of what I see now seems disposable or near plagiarized from older music. I don't mean influenced either, just plain lifted.

The reason I see for this is that even before the music industry crash the concept of artist development was being eliminated from industry practice. In the 60's it was often music producers who found talent, brought that talent to the studio and helped the artist grow into unique talent. It is so different today and the consequences are very tangible.

I think for people who used to have good jobs at record labels it is felt in very obvious ways.
I point this next part out to people when the subject of how bad the music business has declined. In Rolling Stone magazine the back pages have for as long as I remember included the billboard sales chart. I don't know exactly when a subtle change occurred but I noticed that as where the used to include the last weeks sales numbers next to every record on the chart, now that information is missing for all but a handful of records that have moved a relatively respectable showing. Even those works numbers are dramatically lower than what was considered a successful showing less than a decade ago.

File sharing aside this is one of the reasons the industry has suffered so badly. TV seems to potentially be facing some similar issue's in the near future and I don't think that much of the poor quality content will survive as well as it does now as this process evolves.