RIP: Silverscreen

NBR: Silverscreen liquidates as ad budgets tighten

And so it starts. The slow death of the traditional advertising and filmmaking ecosystem.

Death is too black-and-white a phrase for it; it's more of an evolution.

But I deliberately call it an ecosystem vs. an industry. So much springs from the way advertising has worked over the past 50 years or so in the television age.

Ads and the agency system have long provided a breeding ground for talented screenwriters, directors and actors.

Ads have also subsidised free-to-air television, a model that is under threat, though not as badly as it may seem (studies in the UK show that most people with PVRs - personal video recorders like MySky and TiVo - watch the ads anyway).

Enter the disruptive technology of the internet, and the phenomenon of consumer-generated content and Generation C, the on-demand generation...

...and the professionals are left shaking their heads and wondering how to differentiate their product from the many "amateur" content creators around the world.

And that's just the macro-trend around the world. The micro-trend mentioned in the NBR article is shrinking ad budgets and profit margins are to blame for Silverscreen's liquidation.

Ad budgets are shrinking, but are marketing budgets? No. More is being poured into below-the-line marketing - cheaper, more accountable, more targeted methods of reaching your audience.

It's a good time to be creative.

And not just artsy creative, genuinely creative.

...as in, how is my vocation/craft going to survive and evolve to live in this reality?

In fact, it's always a good time to be creative.