Long Tail Dead?by: Matt StollerThu Nov 20, 2008 at 09:50 |
| One of the key concepts behind libertarian techno-utopianism and the lack of social awareness in Silicon Valley is the 'Long Tail', this notion that while there is a bunch of economic activity concentrated in 'hits', there is a huge amount of activity located in millions of non-hit products. For instance, Britney Spears sells five million copies of her record, but 5000 cool independent artists will also sell 1000 copies of their record. This will lead to a wonderful sprouting of innovation and social justice for all, along with the cool inequality that neoliberals love because they can still become billionaires and keep their companies safe from anti-trust investigations.
Tom Slee has been pointing out for years that the Long Tail concept is not supported by data, and it seems like he's finally won the debate. I don't know what public policy consequences this entails, but the Long Tail concept was part of the set of ideas suggestive that the internet and transparency and its rich-friendly cousins would solve all social ills without the need for unions and government action and other stupid things progressives tend to like. The internet's very nifty and transformative, but public policies premised on utopian liberatarian concepts probably won't work. |