Long Tail Theory

In 2006, Chris Anderson, Editor of Wired magazine, published his theory which was a description of the way that the Internet has transformed economics, commerce and consumption. Examples of this were iTunes, YouTube and social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace. Chris Anderson states that our culture and economy are increasingly shifting away from a focus on a relatively small number of hits of mainstream products and markets at the head of the demand curve, and moving towards a huge number of niches in the tail. In an era without constraints of psychical shelf space and other bottlenecks of distribution, narrowly targeted goods and services can be as economically attractive as mainstream fare.

What is the Long Tail theory doing to our culture?

In the online age things are happening a lot quicker and simpler.

Anderson argues that broadband has allowed us to behave in ways that fit better with our instincts. Before web 2.0, we did not have sufficient access to things, so out tasted and interests were channelled for commercial end by elite producers who wanted us to consume more of less. Now we are able to chose from a variety.