Raghav Bahl

All I can say is that the next 20 to 25 yrs will be a period of terrific 'media change' – and the Internet will be the most important medium. Yet one cannot be facile about the kind of content that will succeed. You have to keep your antennas on high alert and react to the changing needs of the consumer.

Indian media has evolved pretty much as it has evolved in other parts of the world. However, the difference was only because of the regulatory laws in India; the media wasn't free, so certain things, which should have happened automatically did not happen. However, when the media business was set free it evolved very much like in the rest of the world.

Interestingly, the difference was that all over the world there was print, then there was radio followed by television and finally the Internet; it all happened sequentially. However, in India, all of it has happened together. Print was the only business that was unregulated and hence it grew over the last 100 years. Television was stilted since it meant only Doordarshan - but when satellite TV came, it grew; that was the time when Internet happened - and as it was not regulated, it really took off almost on a par with television. The same thing happened with radio. So I would say that if you take the regulatory idiosyncrasies out, Indian media has followed the same pattern as in any other part of the world.

If you look at TV, we started with very large, broad channels serving very large sectors of audience needs - channels like Zee TV and Star Plus; but as larger audiences came in and got used to the concept of TV, and as the industry, especially distribution, got more organized, you saw the advent of segmentation. Programs started getting segmented according to taste, demographics, etc and therefore niche channels started picking up. It has happened almost the same way in the US too.

TV started with three large networks, then one more came in. And as digital technology took off, more and more channels could be broadcast over lower bandwidths; and as audiences became more sophisticated and grew in numbers, distribution platforms became even more sophisticated and started reaching more people. Before you knew it, the US had 300 to 400 channels designed to address narrow “vertical” audiences.

Internet is actually 'media plus'

The Internet is at the take off stage in India; all over the world it has already taken off. I'd say the financial world jumped ahead of itself in 1999-2000, thinking the Internet was going to be the next big opportunity and started giving it crazy valuations. Unfortunately, because of the excesses of greedy fund managers, the Internet got a bit of an undeserved “bad name” – although as a consumer phenomenon, it has really done well from the very beginning.

To labour the point a bit more, as far as consumer adoption is concerned, the Internet has done very well from day one; the advantage it has is its multi-dimensional character, which no other media has; they are all uni-dimensional, in the sense that they satisfy either the information or entertainment needs of people.

The Internet, however, can do much more; it can be used as a transactional medium - you can buy online; do your bank transactions; communicate using tools like email, VoIP and messengers. And of course, it satisfies your information and learning needs - so the Internet is actually media plus. It would be wrong to classify it as a media property; it's not just a media property; it's much more than that.

According to me it's the biggest revolution in our lifetimes; it substitutes for your shopping; it substitutes for your bank; it substitutes for your newspaper and much more. Frankly I think the world is still coming to grips with how the Internet will affect our lives? It already has, phenomenally, but I don't think we have quite seen what all it can do. With its ability to take on digital sound and video - video on demand, pay-per-view films - and the ability to project them on large screens, it may also replace cinema halls one day!

It's a big thing but I don't think we have quite seen what all can it do for us. It's really the strongest force in changing the patterns of consumer behavior that we have seen in the last couple of years. While we are lesser mortals, even the founding fathers of the Internet will not be able tell you what all it can or will do for you.

Consumer will be the 'king'

The Internet will virtually take over a part of our lives; well, for today's youngsters it already has! Gone are the days of visiting libraries for research, since students get access to everything right on their desktops thanks to Google search and other portals like that. In fact if we look back into our lives we would realize that how much we are able to do on the Internet today, from banking to shopping to communicating with friends, all of it. We can't even imagine today what all it will substitute in our lives in the years to come...if it hasn't already.

Print and TV media are bound to get affected. They are all content-cum-distribution centric activities, but in the years to come, they will have to get increasingly divorced from the “distribution” part of their business. Therefore, if a newspaper were to look upon itself as a content business, and not as “content married to a particular platform”, then it will realize that it simply has to be in the Internet space; because the Internet has taken simple content “delivery” to content “interaction” to content “manipulation” – which has elevated “content efficiency” to an exponential level, something which the Print and TV media cannot do.

So, when we say TV is merely a distribution technology that we are referring to; its video content has to be usable on the Internet, which allows one-is-to-one communication and interactivity (both these things are not possible on TV and Print media). It goes without saying that traditional video content has to undergo a phenomenal change on the Internet - and if content companies do not adapt to this change, they will die, because the Internet will become the number one content delivery platform.

Another advantage with the Internet is that, unlike TV and print, it's not a linear medium; content on the Internet can be presented in a form that enables it to be delivered individually to each person and allows that person to communicate back; so if you marry these things to content it can be customized to each individual's requirement.

Companies like ours have to keep their ears to the ground and grow with the business; grow with consumer needs and find newer ways of either consuming that content or interacting with it or customizing it to cater to consumers' needs. We need to be prepared as the consumer will get increasingly important and demanding and we have to grow with his needs, since we cannot predict them.

The fact that he needs information is a given, but the “how” and “in what manner” he is going to consume it is a great unknown. If you think you have figured it out, you are dead because consumer patterns change, consumer behavior is the most unyielding reality in any business, as the consumer evolves in ways that you and I cannot predict. We have to learn each day and change ourselves...I think we are living in fascinating times in that sense.

What will happen when today's 20 year old turns 40 in two decades?

While the trend is that the younger generation forms a big chunk of Internet users, the older lot has also started moving in, more for the sake of convenience and conducting transactions. But still, conventional media forms an important part of the older generation's lives. The question that needs answering - and I don't think anybody has the answer to this - is what happens when the younger generation gets into the 35-40 bracket; will it stay as much with the Internet, to the virtual exclusion of all other media? Or will it start imbibing media in the more traditional manner? I think the answer to this is not known.

Also, it would be too facile to say that they won't, because as kids their needs are different; their lives revolve around a small community, the outside world does not matter so much to them. But as you grow older, the outside world becomes important; it matters to your work; whatever is happening around the globe matters to you. What happens then? Information is available everywhere; but do we need to customize this kind of general information? The information then gravitates towards the public domain, in the sense that it is less customized, it's more uniform as millions of people are going to consume it.

So though today's younger generation will definitely stay on with the Internet even two decades later, the NATURE & CHARACTER of the information that they would want to consume is likely to become very similar to the kind of information that today's older generation is imbibing. It may start approximating much more to what you and I call 'traditional media'. So people who are doing an obituary of traditional media are doing it too fast.

Of course the delivery of this “traditional information of 2030” will be on the Internet, but not all information may necessarily be as customized as some would like to believe. I keep grappling with this thought.


(The author is Managing Director, TV18)

    Report sourced from www.ciol.com