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Sometimes, a simple catchphrase can go a long way in helping us to understand a complex set of ideas. Such has been the case for me and "The Long Tail," a term popularized by Chris Anderson, editor-in-chief at Wired Magazine. In his landmark October 2004 article, Anderson points out the far-reaching implications of the digital economy on the entertainment industry, as physically-unlimited digital distribution platforms outrun and replace physically-constrained traditional outlets.

Does this simply mean that consumers will find the convenience of Amazon.com, Netflix, or the iTunes Music Store to be preferable to, say, Barnes & Noble book stores, the local Blockbuster Video store, or Wal-Mart?

No, says Anderson. The significance runs far deeper. The significance runs all the way to the heart of the matter: supply and demand. From his Wired Magazine article:

For too long we've been suffering the tyranny of lowest-common-denominator fare, subjected to brain-dead summer blockbusters and manufactured pop. Why? Economics. Many of our assumptions about popular taste are actually artifacts of poor supply-and-demand matching -- a market response to inefficient distribution.

Anderson's assertion is that, during the twentieth century, publishers, film studios, and music labels were fiercely loyal to a business model built around megahits and broad market appeal. But this hit-driven model has been profoundly precarious at best and has largely been necessitated by real-world, physical distribution limitations. Anderson continues:

Hit-driven economics is a creation of an age without enough room to carry everything for everybody. Not enough shelf space for all the CDs, DVDs, and games produced. Not enough screens to show all the available movies. Not enough channels to broadcast all the TV programs, not enough radio waves to play all the music created, and not enough hours in the day to squeeze everything out through either of those sets of slots.

This is the world of scarcity. Now, with online distribution and retail, we are entering a world of abundance. And the differences are profound.

Profound, indeed. By way of example, the iTunes Music Store currently offers over 1.5 million songs; your local Wal-Mart store might provide a meager 30,000. Amazon.com is able to retail 2.3 million books; a Barnes & Noble store might stock 130,000. Netflix lists over 40,000 DVDs; a local Blockbuster might provide 3,000.

The Long Tail enters the scene where consumers meet up with abundant supply. This new kind of abundance is changing consumption patterns as individuals discover the ability to explore niche genres that interest them and might never have been conveniently accessible through the strictures of a hit-driven economy. And the evidence is already here: Consumers are proving that they are interested in more than the top 100 hits. Or the top 1,000. Or the top 10,000. Their interests are spanning a seemingly infinite number of titles.

The following chart illustrates, in its simplest form, the Long Tail and the breaking point between traditional supply scarcity and the digital economy's supply abundance.

It is my belief that the effects of the Long Tail will significantly change our world as it sweeps open the doors of economic viability for a new generation of niche-oriented artists, authors, and producers; as it levels the playing field between megahits and so-called misses; and as it changes our expectations of culture at large as we realize anew that we are individuals who need not be bullied by mass-audience hype and hysteria.

So here's to the Long Tail and the promise of new beginnings on the horizon.

Being, myself, so wholly unconnected to the world of television, I must admit that it was with some relish that I received news of the potential rupture, downfall, and reinvention of this medium. Two reports of particular interest:

First, "Our Ratings, Ourselves," by Jon Gertner in The New York Times Magazine, chronicles the hidden world of Nielsen ratings, Nielsen's heel-nipping competitors, and the profound implications of audience and device fragmentation. In short, the methodologies used in the past to measure television media consumption -- thus shaping and routing the advertising dollars that underwrite the entire system -- are being challenged and called "broken" while new approaches are being sought after. Complicating the whole scene is the unprecedented "individualization" of modern media consumption, hastened by a host of un-unified technological devices and delivery platforms.

Second, "An Impending Period of Transitional Chaos for Media," by Bob Garfield on the All Things Considered radio program, takes a lighter look at the possibility of what he calls "the chaos factor" -- the scenario in which advertisers pull the plug, major television networks collapse, and economic, cultural, and societal pandemonium ensues. Easy for him to say, I suppose, broadcasting from the far-left sidelines of National Public Radio.

On a related note, recent reports suggest that men are spending more on games than on music in the United States. The BBC offers up a few details. Not to suggest that games and music are necessarily competing for exactly the same consumer dollar -- but it's an interesting milestone.

So is all of this change necessarily a healthy thing? Unfortunately, probably not. While the above reports focus on the who, how, and what of these changes, the pattern of highly-individualized media consumption -- and thus the potential for an increasingly self-centered lifestyle -- is troubling to me. Gone are the days when families might have gathered together -- even if merely around the television set. The modern individual demands precisely what he wants -- at the moment that he wants it.

One of Martin Luther's definitions of sin was, "Homo in se incurvatus." The phrase means something like, "Mankind turned in on itself."

May it not be so.