The disappearing audience

Millions of people are joining the creator economy, adding to the babble of films, shows and funny videos. Where is the audience?

“We need more readers, not more writers,” says Manjari Prabhu. The desi Agatha Christie, as she is known, was speaking at a book launch in Pune earlier this year. Ms Prabhu, an author of 21 books, a short filmmaker, and TV producer was talking in her capacity as the founder/director of the Pune International Literary Festival. Her struggle is to get people to come and just listen to authors without wanting to become one themselves.

Inadvertently, Ms Prabhu has touched upon one of the biggest challenges the media and entertainment ecosystem faces in a rapidly digitising world. The boundaries between the entertainer and the entertained, the informed and the informer, the writer and the reader, the listener and the musician are collapsing. The ability to feel, touch, or talk to your media idols, to stars, or to people with expertise through social media and videos has made people want to be the creator, not just the viewer, listener or reader.

The democratisation that first the internet and then the rise of social media brought on has propelled several changes. Many were not very evident when the internet took off in 1995, or when Google search came in the late nineties, or when streaming video arrived with YouTube in 2005. Even when social media platforms like Facebook (2004) and Twitter (now X in 2006) emerged, things were not as clear. The sum of it is now hitting both the commercial and creative part of the global media economy. Of all the changes, two big ones are now playing out in their full glory.

The first is the blasting away of all the walls that separated artists and audiences. Go to X or to Instagram whenever a film is released or a show drops on streaming — the memes, comments, and reviews are overwhelming. Most ordinary people are gleefully voicing what they think is the best opinion on a book, a play, or a piece of art.  In this deluge of opinion, you wonder, where is the professional film critic? Do they even have a role to play anymore? But many who react are also waiting to be discovered — for their wit or talent. Others, bolder ones, simply make a video of their talent or skill and upload it in the hope of finding their audience.

And that is the second change. It has made cyberspace an open, global, audition theatre for anyone who wants to showcase anything. It could be about how your cat sleeps or how your mum dances. This has given outlet to so much talent, which then floods into advertising, streaming shows, short videos, music, or movies.

YouTube, the world’s largest streaming service, has about 62 million creators and 2.5 billion viewers. The brand made $31.5 billion in advertising revenues in 2023. A bulk of this came from user-generated, not professional videos. Not surprisingly, YouTube supports and nurtures the creator ecosystem like its own baby. There are websites for creators, AI (artificial intelligence) tools are being developed to make it easier to create, upload and monetise videos. YouTube shares roughly half the ad money a video gets with the creator. You see dozens of them speaking at YouTube fan fests and conferences. These are the people whom brands, political parties and filmmakers chase. The word creator then has become synonymous with celebrityhood.

The fact remains that only a handful of creators, say a Bhuvan Bam, Zakir Khan or a Rachna Phadke Ranade, reach that stage. This is not unlike any creative field where a small proportion of actors, writers, musicians, performers or lyricists, actually hit the big time. That is the nature of the creative business — only the best of the best rise to the top. And the more competitive and global the market, the tougher it becomes to break through.

For perspective, consider this: India makes between 1,700 and 1,900 films a year. Of these, only a third make money or break even — this is taking into account all the possible revenue a film could make from theatres, streaming rights, and so on. The rest simply sink. This is true for talent too — there is a pyramid and only exceptional talent, hard work (and some luck) will place you at the top. Most people remain in the middle and a bulk at the bottom. 

Take music streaming, for instance. In a March 2024 piece for US-based business publication, Fast Company, media writer Julia Selinger, puts things in context. She says that on average, musicians receive a royalty of between $0.003 and $0.005 per stream (every time someone listens to the song). That means it would take more than 800,000 streams per month to make the equivalent of a $15-per-hour job. To ensure fair payment, Michigan representative Rashida Tlaib, New York representative Jamaal Bowman, along with United Musicians and Allied Workers, have introduced the Living Wage for Musicians Act. If it becomes law, it would require streamers to create a separate fund that would pay artists a minimum of one penny for every time a track is streamed.

This push for a minimum wage for creators is being made in one of the most sophisticated media markets in the world.

This is not to discourage people from doing their thing — whether it is singing, dancing, writing or doing funny shorts. Everyone should pursue whatever interests them. But the fact is we are drowning in a deluge of programming, books, magazines, films, podcasts, music and videos. The world of media and entertainment, as we know, is facing a problem of plenty. That is why some of the largest streaming services cut down budgets last year.

Yet, every day millions more people add to this babble of films, shorts, music, podcasts etc.

Think about it — if everyone at a party starts talking, who will listen? And if everyone in the world becomes a creator, who will be the audience?

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