Andrew Taylor on the Business of Arts & Culture
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Content and commerce
Posted: July 12, 2006
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Fellow blogger Tyler Green calls out the growing commerce-friendly focus of the Smithsonian Institution in this LA Times editorial. Says Green:
The Smithsonian's leaders and their congressional overseers are allowing too much of our national museum to be transformed into a series of pavilions where, in exchange for sponsorship money and other deals, corporations may determine what parts of the American story should be told.
Faced with a budget crunch and a growing need for capital improvements, the Smithsonian is turning to creative incentives for corporate funds. Green wonders at what point those creative incentives supercede the institution's public purpose for balanced and scholarly inquiry.
Of course, the line between content decisions and commerce pressures isn't unique to the museum or even the nonprofit world. Even that bastion of commercial hucksterism, network television, is struggling with the boundary, as well. KCRW's ''The Business'' devotes an entire episode to the question of product integration -- the weaving of branded moments into television content (like the whole family on ''Seventh Heaven'' chattering about Oreo cookies, or the contestants on ''Treasure Hunters'' turning to ASK.COM for clues). It turns out that network television is also feeling the financial pressure from a fractured audience and a more competitive marketplace for corporate attention.
The difference between the Smithsonian and the networks is the tenor of the struggle. For the Smithsonian, it's a question of violating public trust and public purpose...especially when the majority of its funding comes from our federal taxes. For the networks, it's a question of how much the audience will tolerate before switching attention to any one of a thousand other media choices.
Credibility and trust are key variables in both equations. It should be fascinating to watch how both the nonprofit and for-profit industries find their feet.