A new year is always considered a harbinger of new tidings. The Guild has just finished holding the 2nd Apsara Awards-you can read more about this extraordinary event in our special segment.
I have often said that we are living in an ‘Attention Economy” and in a Digital Age. Traditional forms of entertainment like stage, films and even TV are vying for attention from newer forms.
While we are virtually flooded with various options to engage our minds , a disturbing trend is emerging. In an increasingly pan global world there is a rise in ethnocentricity and parochialism. This is reflected in our media options. There is a flurry of customized, segmented media addressing communities-ethnic, economic, political and even gender. Interestingly this is opening new vistas of entertainment. This is reflecting in our films too! Now this is one trend, which will get accentuated in the years to come.
Every week someone somewhere claims a breakthrough product or a killer app. Sifting through cyber chaff or tracking technology babble one thing becomes apparent - digital intervention in almost all aspects of our life is irrevocable and now. The much talked, much anticipated Digital Convergence is ubiquitous. From mobile multi-media devices, which have streaming audio-video to Digital theatres it is all there to experience right here in India .The consumer not only has a wider choice of content-music, news, movies, sport etc but also of means of access- Digital Terrestrial TV and Radio, Cable, DTH, Wireless, Mobile etc all with built Digital Rights Management (DRM) codes and addressing acutely segmented markets. This of course would be possible not only because of technology but also because the structure of our Industry must become more corporate, professional and progressive.
Technology and innovation always play an interchangeable role in society. Like other economic factors they too are cyclical. After a five-year downturn we are now on an upward swing. As a recent KPMG study says,” The rapid evolution of digital technologies will continue to challenge the Media Industry…traditional media business models are in transition. Marketers and media companies can ensure that they will effectively reach consumers however and wherever they decide to enjoy media and entertainment long into the future.” It is also important that we need to create Media companies of global scale. For this there has to be some consolidation in this sector. Large cross-platform deals are inevitable in the digital world. Our corporations have to be prepared for it. There are at least half-a-dozed Indian companies who can become global players in the next ten years!
Already an almost surreal scenario is unfolding itself like an Asimov story or a Spielberg film. Newer devices are accessing everything from voice to video. Multi-channel Interactive TV is taken for granted today. Digital compression coupled with higher capacity in Direct Satellite Broadcasting (often called Direct-to-home, DTH,) will increase soon the number of channels available anywhere to 500 or more. Once we move to a completely Internet Protocol (IP) based network and the last mile goes wireless in the next 2 years, we will have the power to access any content from any where on any device. In about ten years' we will have a completely digital TV system and the viewer at home will become a participant in the actual production. The viewer will be able to conquer time and space. The director’s jobs will end in the control room, and the viewer's job will begin. We have already begun to see interactivity with the viewer selecting his/her preferred option. In a matter of months we will get used to time-shifted TV and video-on-demand that no one would remember just till a few years ago all programming was as per a fixed-point chart! Telly ‘watching’ will give way to multi-sensory experience.
The almost miraculous advances in communication technology in the past fifty years are merely a pointer of things to come in The next ten! What we take for granted today, satellite Television or cellular telephone or even a humble I-Pod was a part of sci-fi a mere quarter of a century ago. We are perhaps seeing the Information age dovetail into an era where Multimedia will be a major life quotient. More bandwidth, higher digital compression (MPEG 7,21) faster microchips will all enable the democratization of the most esoteric art forms and media. Anytime anywhere has moved from being the slogan of a media giant to real time entertainment.
As Dr Abhay Vasudev of the Bangalore based think tank Future Today says
There are three fundamental forces shaping this network society
- The ability of computers to off load repetitive work from the human Brain;
- Electronic proximity-bringing distant people together;
- A new kind of middlemen kind of information brokers necessary to match up the information this person wants with the information that person has.
The art of story telling and the craft of telling it well will still remain supreme. There may not a radical change in our stories but the changing demographics and the widespread rise of the multiplexes will lead to more youth-oriented films as the young are the biggest consumers of entertainment. There will a lot more experimentation as customized delivery of content becomes easy and affordable.
Meanwhile the Guild continue to work with the Government and other stakeholders to help the Industry realize its full potential .Whether it is reduction in taxes, boosting exports, building infrastructure, reworking the Censorship Guidelines, Copyright Protection or plain networking at major global events and festivals the Guild will keep the Indian Film & TV Industry’s flag high!
- Amit Khanna
President, Film & Television Producers Guild of India
25th January 2006
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