January 11, 2008

The Economist 2009: "From Major To Minor: How Warner Bros. Realized They Should Have Gone Digital, Not Blu-ray Exclusive"

John Paczkowski from Digital Daily pulled a great music industry quote from a story in The Economist, "From Major To Minor":

"In 2006 EMI, the world’s fourth-biggest recorded-music company, invited some teenagers into its headquarters in London to talk to its top managers about their listening habits. At the end of the session, the EMI bosses thanked them for their comments and told them to help themselves to a big pile of CDs sitting on a table. But none of the teens took any of the CDs, even though they were free. ‘That was the moment we realized the game was completely up,’ says a person who was there.”

Since we're such big fans of new media, specifically online video, here at TVSnob, we've decided to adapt this quote as if Warner Bros. invited some teens into its headquarters to ask them about their television viewing habits.

"In 2009 Warner Bros, the world's largest movie studio, invited some teenagers into its headquarters in California to talk to its top managers about their television viewing habits. At the end of the session, the Warner Bros. bosses thanked them for their comments and told them to help themselves to a big pile of DVD's, HD DVD's, Blu-ray's, and HD VMD's sitting on the table. But none of the teens took any of the discs and looked at each other in confusion, despite the fact they were free. 'That was the moment we realized the game was completely up. Those kids didn't even know what a Blu-ray disc was. Heck, no wonder sales have taken a nosedive," says a person who was there."

Expect to see that quotation in a future edition of The Economist.