The Disruptive Effects Of Big Bang Digital Convergence

As we covered earlier digitization does not respect any defined categorization such as tech or consumer electronics. We are now seeing a collision of three massive industries Viz. the computer and software biz( US dominated),the consumer electronics sector(Asia centric) & telecommunications industry( across the world). All three groups will have a hand in building the digital wonders that are headed our way. Paradoxically, none of these industries, much less a single company, can put all the pieces together. As this article points out, convergence used to be a much talked word in the past – but most saw some combination of television, computers and an intelligent network that would give consumers much more control. Today, Video is popping up on cellphones, iPods, TiVo's and Web sites. And as for blogs, photo-tagging sites like Flickr, podcasts and the rest of the bubbling digital stew, it's clear that lots of media are coming together in lots of devices in lots of ways. This convergence spells trouble for many established companies. The anything, anytime, anywhere paradigm is really going to shift the world of media.
Old-line media companies' fears can be lumped into three nightmarish categories:
- Business-model anxiety : Newer services like Apple's iTunes, TiVo's Video from advertising-supported Web sites, Bit Torrents all these are questioning the notions of existing models.
- Creative anxiety : With facilities for production of any combination of video, text, sound and pictures for viewing on a 50-inch TV, a laptop computer or a cellphone screen. conventional media is getting increasingly puzzled about how to counter the onslaught.
- Control anxiety : With weblogs and the rise of online communities, commoners can be distributing podcasts and movies online on their own. The career prospects for hit makers, gatekeepers and even fact checkers may well be in doubt.The internet has broken down the barriers & accelerated the development of new solutions like efficient ways to deliver high-quality video signals. The primordial soup of more bandwidth, more storage, more devices and more people creating content which is inherently digital, is inherently very powerful and the speed of absorption has alighted ahead of the studied response of the old media. Covergence is cutting through the sheath of tradition of invincibility.