Big Time Speakers
My work responsibilities have had me involved with some technical aspects of a conference featuring some well known speakers. Most of them have sold millions of books and are now wealthy. It may be my cynicism showing, but I’m always wary when a rich guy tells me what to do. But, (once again) that is beside my point. This event is involving some very expensive technology. Video is being bounced off satellites to scores of locations in many countries. I think it’s probably safe to assume that each of the speakers has been paid a healthy fee to participate. People at most of these sites have paid a significant amount of money and some have traveled significant distances to attend. The local MC at the site where I’m sitting spoke of “drinking from a fire hydrant.” There has indeed been a lot of good content and the overall vibe is upbeat and encouraging. The execution of the delivery has been top drawer. So I think most attendees would feel they are getting their money’s worth. But a couple of things occurred to me.
One is that the information flow is not insignificant, but it’s no fire hydrant. For the most part, each of the speeches has had one idea. That idea has been unpacked with illustrations and hit home with related stories and jokes. Not unlike a single blog entry of some of the better writers I’ve run into in the blogosphere. When I open my browser, that’s a fire hydrant.
The other thing follows on the first. Each of the speakers is older than me. And I’m pushing 50. What they have to say has been, by and large, distilled from their lifetimes of experience. Good stuff. But the mechanism of their ideas getting published in paper books, the time delays involved, and the many limitations, seem really ponderous to me. The fact that these guys have sold millions of units and the little spoken of windfall as a result of it has radically altered their financial status seems to me to be an anomaly. And I wonder if that mode will be sustainable at all. With the flood of ideas in this blog world and the immediate exposure to and interaction with them by almost anyone anywhere without having to spend significant chunks of money and time, I wonder how long selling books will make people rich.
posted by wingman at 11:43 AM
3 Comments:
There are other ironies too, about the firehydrant thing. For some reason, folks think that if you say the same thing over and over for 3 days that it is a fire hydrant. Comparing to blogs: I get the weekly "newsletter" from one of the speakers, and basically it is the same thing every week. Same stuff in a new box, or several boxes that get cycled. I read an article on there that I'd read in a publication several years ago. Now it was disseminated by email as if it had not been paper published years ago.
Maybe the thing of the future and the thing of the present have to do with a complete opposite thought process. One generation requires freshness and newness, the other gen. requires familiarity spoken from proven BIG names. I commented on this during my Peterson reading. If ALL the message from these guys was REALLY meant, then I think they'd have invited the guy who coaches a little league baseball team and teaches Sunday School to 5th graders to be at least one of the EXPERTS on leadership.
Yes, I am an ugly cynic.
I hear you. I'm not speaking so much to the death of the book, but to the end of exclusive access to the platform. And to the pre-digestion of thought before it's out there for people to discuss and bat around. A book to deliver me a wonderful story? Sure, I'll ante up for the forseeable future. I too love the feel of a book in my hands. But as a means to consume five bullet points and some supportive goodies? That's what I think may get plowed under.
Yeah. But it would give away all the good stuff for free. Better keep your day job!
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