The Live 2.0 Manifesto

The following article was the lead article in the First Edition of Live 2.0, launched in February of this year at the TED Conference.  In it, I give an overview of the Live 2.0 and what I believe is the vision to which the Live Entertainment industry should aspire.  I’m reproducing it because many readers missed it the first time.  Enjoy.

It’s 1985, “Back to the Future” is in the movie theaters, “The Cosby Show” rules the tube, The Lakers and the Celtics battle for supremacy in the NBA, and Bruce Springsteen is rapidly becoming a very rich man.

And I’m helping him.

First, I take some of the money I’m earning as a part time AM radio DJ down to the music store in the mall, and buy a copy of Bruce’s smash hit “Born in the USA.” Price: about $17.50 or the equivalent of four solid hours of spinning records and reading the weather.

A few months pass, and I dispatch my friend Eric Christopherson to do an overnight campout on the sidewalk so that he can buy us tickets to the “Born in the USA” tour when it comes to town. For a show like this is, if you’re not there the minute the tickets go on sale, you’re going to miss out. Anyway, Eric makes it through the night, buying tickets for our little group. Price per ticket: about $17.50 for a mid-level seat.

So, like Marty McFly , let’s get in our silver DeLorean, turn on the flux capacitor and come back to 2009. The first thing to keep in mind now that we’ve time traveled is that $17.50 equals $35.

You should also note that both of the things I bought for $35 are still available today. You can get Bruce’s “Born in the USA” recording on CD or MP3, and you can still see a Bruce Springsteen concert.

Today, though, you won’t pay $35 for the “Born in the USA” album. Instead, the CD or MP3 costs just $10.99 on iTunes, which is a drop in value of 70%.

In contrast, the price of a concert ticket has increased dramatically. In a recent concert at The Meadowlands, that mid-level Springsteen ticket that once cost $35 now costs $65, or an increase of 85%.

Put differently, the concert ticket that used to cost the same as the recorded product is now worth six times more.

Welcome to the world of Live 2.0.

Mass communication and mass entertainment used to rule, but now all the profit is shifting to the live experience, as are the good jobs and, eventually, most of the capital.

And that’s why you and your organization want to be there too.

This is not just a phenomenon of pop music concerts:

In 1985, again in inflation adjusted terms, the most expensive ticket on Broadway cost $100. Today, it’s $150, and a new tier of ticket has been created that goes as high as $300. In 1985, the Grand Circle ticket at the Los Angeles Opera cost $120. Today, it’s more than $200. In 1985, the NBA finals broadcasts, pairing the Lakers versus the Celtics, averaged a 13.7 rating. In 2008, the much anticipated rematch far exceeded recent ratings, but only hit 9.3. By contrast, tickets in the 100 level at Staples Center went for up to $5,000 each in the secondary market.

What is this all about? It’s about technology getting so good that we feel that we’ve got all the recorded entertainment we want. I’ve got more music on my phone than I had in a wall full of crates when I was in high school. And if I want more, it’s just a few key strokes away. As wonderful as that is, it doesn’t make me value it more.

What I do value more is a unique, live experience. You’ve heard the expression ‘What do you get for a person who has everything?’ I’d paraphrase that and say, ‘What do you sell to a society that has everything?’

The answer: a unique experience. Something you can’t download. Something special and personal. Live entertainment, in its new form. That’s Live 2.0.

What’s it going to mean?

It’s certainly going to be disruptive. One of Goldstar’s employees came to us from the record business, in part because he noticed that the size of the deals he was doing kept dropping from year to year. If you’re making your living selling broadcast media, it’s going to get tougher and tougher to get rate card for your commercial time, and commissions are going to keep shrinking. If the movie business doesn’t change, it too will continue to see its profits ebb away, especially as the bandwidth finally catches up with video, as it did with music.

Also, if you’re in the live business but working in a Live 1.0 mode, you’re going to be in trouble. If your symphony orchestra keeps programming the same way it did in 1968 (or even 1998), you might not be around forever. If you’re a hockey team and you think marketing is all about stats, standings and mindless ‘go team!’ rah-rah, you’re going to shave your audience right down to the hardcore base. If you’re a small theatre and you’re not actively cultivating an audience of fanatic supporters, you’ll never get into the black for more than a moment at a time.

But don’t worry.

If you’re a fan of Bruce Springsteen, you’ll know what a perfect example he is of the live experience. Before he was mega-multi-platinum, he was already a legend in the sandy bars and concert halls of the Jersey shore. Way back before the dawn of Live 2.0, he was famous for putting on a show that made you want to sleep on sidewalks in front of music stores to make sure you got in.

Somehow, he got it earlier than most, and as time went on, and his hit-making ability waned, the record-selling Bruce gave way to the live-performing Bruce, who’s doing very, very nicely, thanks for asking.

For us, who make our living in the live entertainment business, some of the trends, like dropping CD and MP3 sales and collapsing ad rates for traditional media, can be a little scary. But only if we insist on staying in a Live 1.0 world.

I’d like to invite you to join me in the emerging world of Live 2.0, where, like Bruce, if you’ve got talent, drive, vision and passion for the business, you’ll keep rockin’ for decades to come.