Jukeboxes, Microbrews, and...Indie Games
by Rubes · 07/18/2006 (1:01 am) · 1 comments
I was listening to NPR on the radio on the way home from work today, and I heard this story:
Find a Niche: 'The Long Tail' of Sales
It's an interview with Chris Anderson, the Chief Editor (I think) of Wired Magazine. It's summed up this way on the NPR web site:
Chris talks about the new paradigm of product distribution and sales, like on the internet, where large numbers of products can be offered at little to no expense due to the low overhead. Most of those products won't become bestsellers; most in fact will end up at the bottom of the sales charts -- the "Long Tail", as he describes it. But because sellers are now capable of offering huge numbers of products at almost no cost, the size of the Long Tail is increasing. Interestingly, when you take all of those products in the Long Tail and add their sales up, as a group they can represent an enormous figure. So now sellers can effectively offer large numbers of niche products, and they can still do well when the whole group is taken into account -- selling less of more, as it were.
He used digital jukeboxes and the emergence of microbrews as examples. Even though individual songs or individual brews may not sell in large numbers, offering enough of them can provide substantial income, as long as they can be provided cheaply enough. And even if those songs or microbrews are targeted at niche audiences.
All I could think about as I listened is how this can, or will, affect the indie game scene.
This can really be a good thing: as more and more publishers and distributors come to this realization, it can open up markets for the small developers. Larger companies might realize that it really can make sense to take chances on smaller games, niche games; games small in budget but big in creativity. If each one doesn't cost much, it could make sense as a whole if enough are offered.
That said, most of those developers (or singers, or brewmasters) will still find that they are lost somewhere deep in The Long Tail, and sales for that person or company may never be enough to pay the bills. But Chris points out that most of those individuals -- like many indie game developers -- aren't necessarily in it to pay the bills; they still keep their day jobs. That's not true across the board, of course, but the important thing is that the market opens up even to the small, independent developer, where perhaps there was no market before.
It's a similar argument to one that I read recently on Gamasutra in an interview with Ron Gilbert (he of Monkey Island fame):
The Grumpy Gamer
I was particularly interested in this article because Ron talks a lot about adventure games, especially those old text-based interactive fiction games which -- it so happens -- is what my project is based on. But he brings up some great points about the game industry in general. Things like how the big game companies are really only interested in big budget blockbusters now, much like the movie industry -- we've heard it all. But he does talk about how the movie industry has adapted, with companies like Miramax appearing -- small companies, owned by the larger ones (Disney), created specifically to fund the smaller-budget flicks. And that's maybe what the games industry needs -- a big company to spin off a smaller company dedicated to funding and publishing small-budget games, niche games. The market for these niche products is out there, he believes it. Someone just needs to step up and take the chance. And perhaps, if they create a long enough tail, they can do really well that way.
I'm hoping so, at least. Our project is as niche as they get, but I'm convinced there's an audience out there for it. The market just needs to move in the direction to support us Long Tailers.
Find a Niche: 'The Long Tail' of Sales
It's an interview with Chris Anderson, the Chief Editor (I think) of Wired Magazine. It's summed up this way on the NPR web site:
Quote:
All Things Considered, July 17, 2006 - The future of our culture -- and most business -- lies in niches, according to author Chris Anderson. The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More, Anderson's new book, references a statistical trend to suggest that the market for items that are not "hits" will always be larger than that for the most popular items.
Anderson's position is that the Internet's ability to offer consumers a near-limitless choice of goods and information -- and archive it all cheaply -- will change how business is conducted. While "hits" will always exist, in Anderson's view the far larger number of products that fit a particular market or audience offer more opportunities.
Chris talks about the new paradigm of product distribution and sales, like on the internet, where large numbers of products can be offered at little to no expense due to the low overhead. Most of those products won't become bestsellers; most in fact will end up at the bottom of the sales charts -- the "Long Tail", as he describes it. But because sellers are now capable of offering huge numbers of products at almost no cost, the size of the Long Tail is increasing. Interestingly, when you take all of those products in the Long Tail and add their sales up, as a group they can represent an enormous figure. So now sellers can effectively offer large numbers of niche products, and they can still do well when the whole group is taken into account -- selling less of more, as it were.
He used digital jukeboxes and the emergence of microbrews as examples. Even though individual songs or individual brews may not sell in large numbers, offering enough of them can provide substantial income, as long as they can be provided cheaply enough. And even if those songs or microbrews are targeted at niche audiences.
All I could think about as I listened is how this can, or will, affect the indie game scene.
This can really be a good thing: as more and more publishers and distributors come to this realization, it can open up markets for the small developers. Larger companies might realize that it really can make sense to take chances on smaller games, niche games; games small in budget but big in creativity. If each one doesn't cost much, it could make sense as a whole if enough are offered.
That said, most of those developers (or singers, or brewmasters) will still find that they are lost somewhere deep in The Long Tail, and sales for that person or company may never be enough to pay the bills. But Chris points out that most of those individuals -- like many indie game developers -- aren't necessarily in it to pay the bills; they still keep their day jobs. That's not true across the board, of course, but the important thing is that the market opens up even to the small, independent developer, where perhaps there was no market before.
It's a similar argument to one that I read recently on Gamasutra in an interview with Ron Gilbert (he of Monkey Island fame):
The Grumpy Gamer
I was particularly interested in this article because Ron talks a lot about adventure games, especially those old text-based interactive fiction games which -- it so happens -- is what my project is based on. But he brings up some great points about the game industry in general. Things like how the big game companies are really only interested in big budget blockbusters now, much like the movie industry -- we've heard it all. But he does talk about how the movie industry has adapted, with companies like Miramax appearing -- small companies, owned by the larger ones (Disney), created specifically to fund the smaller-budget flicks. And that's maybe what the games industry needs -- a big company to spin off a smaller company dedicated to funding and publishing small-budget games, niche games. The market for these niche products is out there, he believes it. Someone just needs to step up and take the chance. And perhaps, if they create a long enough tail, they can do really well that way.
I'm hoping so, at least. Our project is as niche as they get, but I'm convinced there's an audience out there for it. The market just needs to move in the direction to support us Long Tailers.
Torque Owner Tom Bentz