Generative AI (GenAI) has become increasingly integrated into marketing and communication careers, and even our daily lives, with the rise of various text-to-image, text-to-video, & text-to-text tools. As digital marketers find new and innovative ways to keep up with the trends, and specifically GenZ in a quick-changing popular culture scene, how are they reacting to the rise of GenAI?
Arts and cultural organizations are becoming increasingly aware of their climate impact, and many are taking action to reduce harm. Tracking, reporting, and offsetting emissions may seem like an overwhelming feat for small or mid-sized organizations, but emerging blockchain technology may help make the process more efficient and reliable.
Advocacy, Arts & Technology, Laws & Legal, Social Media
As previously foreshadowed by Samantha in an article written in July of 2023, TikTok: Opportunity and Risk, TikTok has been under a microscope from governments across the globe for quite awhile. The analysis provided in her article is still relevant today given the recent vote to ban TikTok, and the United States House moving forward to force Chinese state-owned TikTok company ByteDance to sell their ownership of the U.S. version of TikTok, or lose access to the United States TikTok market. To fully understand the situation, this article will recap TikTok’s controversial Privacy Policy and the 2023 testimonies, and also discuss the current governmental situation surrounding the ban.
Artificial Intelligence, Arts & Technology, Data, Digital Futures, Management
Digital strategy has become a buzzword after the explosion of AI in the last 18 months. Yet, it is not about AI. AI has been the tipping point for organizations and professionals to recognize that they must update or create a digital strategy for success. Digitally-forward arts organizations already have a digital component as part of their strategic plan. Read more to understand the need for technology to be a core component of strategic plans and operations.
This month, the United States federal government is placing increased scrutiny on big tech regarding privacy, security, and market competition. While the Department of Justice files an antitrust suit against Apple for its hold on the smartphone market, Congress makes a bold statement with legislation potentially banning TikTok in the U.S.. Meanwhile, Reddit’s initial public offering may signal a move for tech companies to go public. In the world of entertainment, innovative tech brings scent to the gaming experience, and artists explore blockchain to compete with music streaming platforms.
Livestreaming has become a burgeoning global industry, recording eight billion hours of content watched in the last quarter of 2020 (May, 2021). This research projects examines the industry before the COVID-19 pandemic, how it evolved during the pandemic, and its future opportunities. From October to December 2020, over eight billion combined hours of content were watched as livestreams on the top three largest platforms, Twitch, YouTube, Facebook Live (May, 2021). Using data from industry leader interviews, a national survey, and case studies the team reveals the power and current technology limitations to livestreaming for the live entertainment industry.
In my previous AMT-Lab article, Livestreaming And Live Theatre: A Promising New Industry, I presented the data and specifics of the current livestreaming market as a whole. During this research, I found that livestreaming viewership set record highs in 2020. Not only was livestreaming able to grow during the initial impact of the pandemic, but this interest was maintained throughout 2020 and into 2021. Livestreaming, as an industry, grew by 81% in 2020. The large potential for market utilization is undeniable. Most importantly, however, is that livestreaming theatrical events offer a level of access and opportunity to arts and cultural events that have yet to be capitalized.
These last two years have forced audiences to seek out arts opportunities and engagements through new mediums. Theatre organizations around the world closed their doors, forced to look for new ways to interact with their audiences. Many turned to digital content, such as streaming and livestreaming. While these two mediums appear to be similar, they are entirely different forms of media. “Livestreaming is when the streamed video is sent over the Internet in real-time, without first being recorded and stored.”[1] It allows for increased engagement with audiences and in many cases, livestreams allow for audiences to directly interact with the host through chat features, polls, and subscriptions.[2]
Over the last week, society has faced unprecedented territory with the increasing spread of Covid-19. As communities quarantine themselves and take precautions against greater spread, arts and cultural organizations are joining in the effort by closing their doors. Amidst all of this, arts managers are coming up with creative solutions to offer their content and services to the public Now, more than ever, the arts must rely on technology to deliver their content. Below is a sampling qua starter list of virtual responses to Covid19 to date (March 17, 2020).
With so many choices when it comes to streaming video, what's an arts organization to do?
A few weeks ago, I highlighted some emerging trends in arts marketing for 2011. One of the trends was “changing media consumption”, part of which includes arts organizations streaming performances live, whether to ballparks or online.
So let’s say that your organization is interested in streaming a performance live as it is happening or streaming a pre-recorded performance at a scheduled time. What are your options as far as platforms for streaming that video? And which organizations are out there using these platforms?
YouTube: The Non-option for Live Streaming
YouTube is the big name for online video, but livestreaming on YouTube will only be available for content partners. YouTube has not announced when livestreaming capabilities will go live. Approved by YouTube, content partners are people and companies that post regularly to the site and so that they can monetize their content with ads and rentals, obtain better digital quality for their uploads, and use YouTube’s Insight analytics tools.
You can apply to become a YouTube content partner to gain the above benefits. They have a special program specifically for nonprofits that currently includes arts organizations like Anaheim Ballet, MOMA, and Pilobolus Dance.
So when should you use YouTube? As of now, it’s the most mainstream choice for video, and therefore the easiest platform on which to build a community. YouTube has also streamed major events involving the arts community, like the Guggenheim’s YouTube Play Event. You might use it to post clips of the streaming event after the event is over and to host videos long-term; but right now, don’t depend on YouTube to release streaming capability any time soon.
Brightcove/Ooyala: The Gold Standard
Brightcove is the high-end gold standard for streaming. Many major corporations use it, as well as arts organizations like San Francisco Ballet and the Royal Opera House. It’s best for larger companies with highly valuable and highly demanded content as well as companies who want to fully integrate their streaming efforts with other components of their technology portfolio, via APIs, SDKs and other programming tools.
Ooyala has a similar high-end set up used by companies like TicketMaster and ElectronicArts.
Brightcove and Ooyala are great for larger companies with a lot of resources at their disposal. However, the price may not be affordable for organizations likely to use livestreaming once a year and only intend to stream to computers or existing mobile platforms—as opposed to a projector that would require higher quality video or a customized mobile platform that would require extensive development.
Livestream, Ustream, and Justin.tv: The mainstream for livestreaming
You may be thinking, “Okay, Brightcove sounds great, but my organization is not nearly as big as the Royal Opera House.” The most popular choices for streaming video amongst American arts organizations are livestream.com and ustream.tv. Both platforms offer mobile integration, easy interfaces and most any other feature you would want. Livestream even offers monetization opportunities.
Justin.tv appears to be gaining market share, but fewer arts organizations are on it, and its audience tends to skew younger and more male than the other platforms.
Organizations like Wolf Trap have streamed pre-recorded events on livestream, a necessity when subtitles must be entered. Last summer the organization’s opera company streamed a cabaret performance of two world premiere operas Bastianello by John Musto and Lucrezia by William Bolcom.
Lee Anne Myslewski, Administrative Director, described the opera’s choice to use Livestream. “We chose Livestream because the interface was the most intuitive and it seemed to work the most consistently on all platforms/browsers. (Intuitive is important!) We were also specifically looking for an integrated chat function so that the audience and the artists could interact in real time during the broadcast. The process was smooth – easy for even a non-video person to create. We did have some viewers struggle with the speed of the file and intermittent pauses, but that could have been due to any number of causes - file size, their connection speed, or traffic on the site. If we go forward with the project we’ll likely use them again.”
Increasingly, companies want to monetize online content, and a recent Pew study (good summary here by ReelSEO) shows that people will pay for it. Monetizing content can basically be done in two ways: generating revenue through advertising, or having the consumer directly pay for online content (pay per view), which can be on a one-off or subscription basis.
LiveStream requires $350 a month for their premium service, which includes opportunities for monetization. However, if you want to monetize your content with less financial commitment up front, DaCast is a sensible option.
DaCast describes itself as self-service model. In a way, all streaming services are self-service, but DaCast allows companies to monetize their content in the same self-service way that you can upload a video to YouTube. The only fees that you pay are for bandwidth, with a minimum $5 commitment. (The first 10GB are free, too.) Most excitingly, DaCast has developed a plug-in for Flash which allows users to pay directly on their video screens, rather than clicking through to another page.
The question is: could a paid model be right for your organization? As DaCast CEO Stephane Roulland said, “This is an excellent question.” Aggregated sites like classicaltv.com and Ovation are already monetizing content. Classicaltv uses the pay-per-view model while Ovation uses the ad-based revenue model. The Metropolitan Opera’s Met Player might be one of the one of the only single-organization streaming sites. The key is figuring out if your organization will break even on the fees to secure the rights and the fees to stream.
