I Feel the Earth Move

        As a kid, I always wondered what it would have been like to live during a time of great drama and discovery--to be there  when Columbus landed in America, say, or when the Founding Fathers ratified the Constitution. History was taught in a more black and white way when I was a kid than it is today, with a surfeit of dates and facts but little context, and in my childish naiveté I assumed that great events brought about instant change. One day you were part of one world, and the next day everything changed. No doubt movies and television also helped buttress this simple world view.

        As I grew older and better educated, my comic book sense of history became refined. Through a close reading of American history, I came to realize that one era didn't magically or easily transform into another. These were tectonic shifts--that is, they were epic--but as such they often occurred slowly, sometimes imperceptibly, over time. Some of these shifts vibrated in your bones, and others you realized only in hindsight.

        I lived through the 1960s--attended anti-war rallies, spent rain-soaked weekends camping out at Woodstock-type rock concerts, watched friends freak out on LSD--but was only vaguely aware sometime during the early-to-mid seventies that things were fundamentally calming down, that an era had passed. If there was a seminal moment, it was the resignation of Richard Nixon and the swearing-in of the benign Gerald Ford. Of course, being married and putting on a tie every morning also played a role in that perception.     

        Now we're living through another radical shift, the shift from the analog world to the digital one. It seems there's nothing gradual about it. Some days, it feels like it takes everything just to keep your balance as the plates realign.

        Newspapers are struggling to survive. Huge companies that own television stations are ordering cuts in personnel that are breathtaking. Groups of stations are taking advantage of technology and creating single hubs to service all of their production and post-production needs. At least one company is outsourcing the creation of on-air graphics to India.

        Usually the hemorrhaging of dollars in one media sector is accompanied by robust growth in another (Think radio, when television burst onto the scene). But right now, despite the explosion of digital media--from Facebook to YouTube to rich newspaper sites like nytimes.com--advertising revenues are running far behind. In other words, the old media model is still running on fossilized fuels, but no one has successfully invented all the pieces of a new, efficient, and clean media ecosystem. Hence the panic and confusion.

        I have no doubt that over time, as the various parties invested in the digital space agree on metrics and measuring and value, a new order will emerge that will  bridge the gap between the world that was and the world that will be. Between now and then, you'll see all kinds of experimentation, as savvy programmers look for ways of connecting audiences and advertisers with great content.

        The various productions of TitanTV are all designed to be advertiser-friendly:

• The Webby Award winning TitanGreens.com, which includes "Daily Greens" with Liza de Guia, a sassy and irreverent look at the environmental news of the day;
• RevYOU and Recap Theatre, where comedian Grace Randolph is your one-stop shopper for what's at the cineplex and on your television;
• And "Love Somerville," with Glamour Magazine columnist Michael Somerville, with how guys really think about relationships.

        And, we are achieving success with advertisers and station groups who see this kind of content as enhancing their brand and attracting advertisers. It's exciting to be breaking new ground: nobody has ever done quite what we're doing in the way we're doing it.

        With that excitement, of course, comes risk.  But the real risk is in playing it safe, standing still, and falling into the gaps between those grinding plates.