{"id":2586,"date":"2022-06-07T20:07:02","date_gmt":"2022-06-08T03:07:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/?p=2586"},"modified":"2022-06-07T20:07:05","modified_gmt":"2022-06-08T03:07:05","slug":"the-undertow-the-high-flying-oil-industry-fears-demand-destruction-should-the-arts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2022\/06\/the-undertow-the-high-flying-oil-industry-fears-demand-destruction-should-the-arts.html","title":{"rendered":"The UnderTow: The High-flying Oil Industry fears &#8220;Demand Destruction.&#8221; Should the Arts?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/apocalypse-ga65c29138_1280-1.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1000\" height=\"563\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/apocalypse-ga65c29138_1280-1.jpg?resize=1000%2C563&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2587\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/apocalypse-ga65c29138_1280-1.jpg?w=1000&amp;ssl=1 1000w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/apocalypse-ga65c29138_1280-1.jpg?resize=300%2C169&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/apocalypse-ga65c29138_1280-1.jpg?resize=768%2C432&amp;ssl=1 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px\" \/><\/a><figcaption>Image by <a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/users\/desa81-1282089\/?utm_source=link-attribution&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_campaign=image&amp;utm_content=2273069\">DeSa81<\/a> from <a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/?utm_source=link-attribution&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_campaign=image&amp;utm_content=2273069\">Pixabay<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Oil prices are at a record high. And profits are rolling in. But there&#8217;s an intriguing phenomenon in the oil industry called &#8220;demand destruction.&#8221; It means when prices get too high for too long, consumers invest in alternatives and don&#8217;t return. The arts have faced their own version of demand destruction when COVID shut down live performances. Is there anything to be learned from how the oil industry approaches what sounds like an existential threat?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div id=\"buzzsprout-player-10756152\"><\/div><script src=\"https:\/\/www.buzzsprout.com\/1585927\/10756152-episode-4-the-high-flying-oil-industry-fears-demand-destruction-should-the-arts.js?container_id=buzzsprout-player-10756152&#038;player=small\" type=\"text\/javascript\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Rough Transcript<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Hi: I\u2019m Doug McLennan, and you\u2019re listening to ArtsJournal\u2019s The Undertow, our new more-or-less weekly podcast exploring stories underneath the stories in the world of arts, culture and ideas. The premise of the podcast is that there are ideas percolating just under the culture that drive what you see and hear. Sometimes it\u2019s easy to connect the dots. More often though, the context or connections are not so direct. And context is the great shaper of how culture evolves. \u00a0This podcast is an ongoing attempt to try to make sense of some of them and see where things are going.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This week\u2019s story begins outside the arts. Way outside, actually \u2013 in the oil industry. Despite record gas prices and record profits, the oil industry is obsessed with two existential threats: the first is \u201cpeak oil,\u201d while the second is an intriguing concept called \u201cdemand destruction,\u201d which I know sounds kind of apocalyptic, but an intriguing idea about the health of markets. What does this have to do with the arts? Stick around and find out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But first \u2013 if you like what you\u2019re hearing, please subscribe to the podcast through whatever services you get your podcasts. Our audience has been doubling with each episode so far, and this is episode four. So subscribe and that way you\u2019ll be notified whenever a new episode drops. Back in a moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">****<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So the oil industry. Gas prices are at record highs, and you\u2019d expect there\u2019s nothing but sunshine and butterflies for the guys who work to pull it out of the ground and collect the profits. And sure, Exxon earned $6.1 billion in profits in the first quarter of 2022 alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But there\u2019s a website I visit regularly \u2013 don\u2019t ask why &#8212; that covers the oil industry. It\u2019s called OilPrice.com and it covers what you\u2019d expect with that name \u2013 the worldwide prices of fossil fuels. Did you know, for example, that the oil industry is a bit like the wine industry, full of exotic varietals wholly defined by the ground from which they\u2019re sprung? Not all oil is the same. Brent crude from the North Sea above the UK and a little left of Norway, fetches one price \u2013 a premium in fact \u2013 because it is high quality and easy to refine, while oil taken from the dirty Alberta tar sands sells at a discount because it is \u201cdirtier\u201d or lower quality and more complicated to refine. But you\u2019re probably wondering why I\u2019m talking about oil prices in a podcast ostensibly about culture. Bear with me for a moment \u2013 I\u2019ll get there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anyway \u2013 you would probably expect that the oil industry would be giddy with the meteoric rise in worldwide oil prices. Oil was going for about 60-70 dollars a barrel for most of 2021, and spiked to well over $120 as Russia went to war on Ukraine in February. Record profits began piling up. Currently, the WTI Crude price \u2013 which is the West Texas Crude benchmark &#8212; is hovering around $115-$118. And that translates into prices at the pump of well over $4 a gallon in most of the US. In some places on the West Coast, the price is over $6 a gallon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But if you follow OilPrice.com, there\u2019s a lot of handwringing about something called \u201cdemand destruction.\u201d The idea goes something like this: The price of oil is determined by worldwide market demand, so that when there\u2019s a disruption in production &#8211; like sanctions on sales of a major producer like Russia \u2013 the price shoots up. But if the price consumers pay goes up too much, those consumers start cutting back on their consumption and demand goes down, and along with it prices. This is normal fluctuation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However. If the price inflates too much for too long, consumer habits start to change permanently. Maybe drivers switch to public transit and get rid of their cars. Or stop buying SUVs and buy electric cars instead. If it really goes on awhile, maybe producers of plastics will find a material to use other than petroleum. Once habits have changed and consumers have invested in new infrastructure, they don\u2019t easily return to old habits, and it can take a long time to build demand again to former levels. The biggest recent example of this is the pandemic, where consumption of oil cratered in March 2020 as the world shut down. Two-and-a-half years later, we\u2019re still not back to 2019 consumption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The oil industry is particularly sensitive to demand destruction because of worries it will be the new normal, that we\u2019ve reached something called \u201cpeak oil\u201d another oil industry term that roughly translated means highest production ever before demand starts to permanently decline. With much of the world trying to get off fossil fuels for alternative renewable energy, it\u2019s not an idle worry. This is particularly unsettling for the industry because oil production is a longterm thing \u2013 it takes time to find and develop and refine new sources \u2013 years rather than months. So elasticity in the supply depends on infrastructure for capacity that was planned for years before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And true to form, the high prices at the pump are taking their toll \u2013 US demand for gas has declined for several weeks in a row. You can tell oil company insiders are aware of the longterm direction though &nbsp;\u2013 they\u2019re busy selling stock in their own companies in expectation this is the peak. And this notion is reinforced by news that the big oil companies are scaling back rather than investing in new production. The CEO of Chevron said this week his company will never build another US refinery.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So yes \u2013 good times for the immediate shortterm in the oil industry. In the longterm, these spikes in prices are driving demand destruction and a transition away from fossil fuels. And despite the sticker shock at the gas pump, this dramatic boost in prices is good for fighting climate change. And don\u2019t you feel better about that? Heh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Enough about the oil industry. But I wonder if there\u2019s something useful to take away from oil producers\u2019 concept of \u2018demand destruction.\u201d There are some obvious dissimilarities with the arts, of course. Oil of course, is entirely driven by markets, and a global one at that. It\u2019s also been an essential commodity, something the modern industrialized world can\u2019t live without. Controlling access to oil has driven wars and politics. And while demand may rise and fall, the essential need for it has never been in doubt until now. And duh \u2013 it\u2019s oil. And the arts aren\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The arts, on the other hand, aren\u2019t essential. And they\u2019re less market-driven. I know we can argue a case for the essentialness of art in creating culture, community and great nations. But the point is, art and creativity will still be around even if all our arts organizations went away tomorrow. People are innately creative, and no one\u2019s going to stop playing music or making pictures, if arts institutions die. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But back to \u201cdemand destruction.\u201d One could say that the arts have had their own demand destruction event in the past few years as COVID shut down live venues. In a list of industries most affected by the COVID shutdown, live arts and entertainment were right at the top of the list along with the hospitality industry. Employment was slashed in half, and for more than a year-and-a-half most live production shut down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the absence of the ability to pursue traditional arts habits, consumers went elsewhere. Just as sports club patrons went to Peloton and online workouts, and office workers migrated to Zoom\u2026 live arts consumers found YouTube, Netflix and Spotify. I\u2019d argue we didn\u2019t consume any less culture, it\u2019s just that we shifted to different ways of getting it. And eventually \u2013 in following the \u201cdemand destruction\u201d scenario \u2013 different culture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, most of your hardcore audience will return. They missed going. There\u2019s something essential about the experience for them. But don\u2019t underestimate the power of habit. Years after America Online (AOL) essentially ceased to be, hundreds of thousands of its users kept their AOL email addresses, still visited the AOL website, and some even continued to pay a monthly fee, believe it or not. Like those WWII Japanese soldiers found on remote islands decades after the war had ended and still fighting for their cause, they continued out of habit. In any model that\u2019s been around for a long time, habit is a significant driver of customers. How much of the arts experience is habit, tradition, familiarity? And what happens when those habits are broken, replaced with new ones offering different rewards?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So get out of the habit of going to the theatre. Decide the hassle of getting dressed up and going to the concert hall isn\u2019t worth it. Weigh the cost of a monthly Netflix or Disney subscription against season tickets to the ballet. Just as the oil industry has realized that prolonged high prices at the pump force consumers to develop other habits, the COVID shutdown has done the same for some arts audiences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Make gas prices cheap again, and many consumers will go back to their old ways. But not if they bought an electric car in the meantime. Flood the market with live arts events again, and many \u2013 lets\u2019 say even most \u2013 arts consumers will return, even if cautiously. But not all. The choice to come back is weighed more carefully \u2013 and on a case-by-case basis rather than because it\u2019s a habit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But there\u2019s another part to this. And that\u2019s culture and the context surrounding that culture. Our world views are shaped by the experiences of our habits, the things that are observable and experienced. When those habits change, our world views evolve. What I mean is that the person who drove a gas car adopts new value systems when he switches to an electric one. Electric car owners are part of a different culture than they were when they drove gas. What they care about has evolved, and they both see the benefits of electric, but just as important, understand the drawbacks of gas. The decision to switch might have been prices at the pump, but once they did switch, they started to see the world from a different perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Audiences used to being bombarded by content from every screen around them and having access to things they didn\u2019t even imagine they wanted access to, think differently about the culture they want to consume than they did pre-COVID. And even the fact of all the choice has changed even the ways you decide what you want to see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Overwhelming choice didn\u2019t start with the COVID lockdown, but COVID changed the calculations of that choice. And there\u2019s something else. Workers still haven\u2019t returned to downtowns, and those who have aren\u2019t there full time. It\u2019s made the experience of coming into the city less vibrant, and again \u2013 the larger habit of going into the city is also broken.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then there\u2019s this idea: Critics have been warning for some time that \u201cpeak TV\u201d \u2013 the fact that there are twice as many scripted shows in recent years as streaming companies ramped up production to fight it out for subscribers \u2013 might be upon us. And perhaps that\u2019s true \u2013 Netflix recently reported its first quarter ever in which it lost subscribers, and CNN killed its streaming service before it was even properly launched. TV production is very market-driven, viewers are reaching their limits with the number of subscriptions they\u2019ll pay for, and commercial production is quite sensitive to contraction and consolidation. It\u2019s a normal cycle of business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Not so the non-profit arts world, which never met a non-profit it didn\u2019t want to heroically save. There are some 120,000 arts organizations in America, and the number has been steadily growing since the 1970s when there was a fraction of that many. I\u2019ve heard funders in recent years wonder if we have too many arts organizations, if maybe some of those that continue on out of habit ought to be left to die. But it rarely happens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019m not at all arguing that we have too many arts organizations or that a goodly number of them should go out of business. The infrastructure that supports an arts organization \u2013 a symphony orchestra for example \u2013 takes years to build. It\u2019s an investment by the community, and if it goes out of business, it\u2019s very difficult to replace all that support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I see basically two things happening in the oil industry\u2019s \u201cdemand destruction.\u201d First, the market is forcing efficiency \u2013 we\u2019ll use your product at one price, we\u2019ll use less of it at a higher price, so figure out how to make it cheaper or we\u2019ll force alternatives. And second, demand destruction is the way transition from one system to another happens. As more renewable energy comes online, we\u2019ll use less fossil fuel energy because it carries undesirable baggage. It\u2019s a net positive for the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Substitute out \u201cprice\u201d for \u201cattention,\u201d which is the real currency of creativity, and you see how demand destruction works in the arts. Attention is largely driven by platforms that go seeking it. Demand destruction killed Blockbuster Video but replaced it with something better. Demand destruction killed vaudeville and phonograph records for something better. YouTube, Spotify and Zoom inflate supply, putting pressure on everything else to compete for attention. It was recently reported that something like 85 percent of all the music streamed on Spotify is \u201cold\u201d hits as opposed to new music. When that much attention is being sucked up by access to the past, the future has a harder time competing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And true to form \u2013 that competition is stirring. Dance has actually done well during lockdown. TikTok has made dance cool again for millions. Choreographers are experimenting with video and projection, and virtual movement. New opera companies, new opera, new technology incorporated into visual and musical design. Orchestras are exploring a wider range of repertoire than we\u2019ve seen in decades. And architecture and visual art is engaging with the world in more comprehensive and responsive ways. We\u2019re not in routine anymore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In one sense, the pandemic didn\u2019t seem to change anything. As lockdowns eased, artists and arts organizations went back to doing what they do. In other, more pervasive ways, the pandemic changed everything. None of the old rules need be taken&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;for granted. Or if they are, they\u2019re immediately challenged. Experimentation and a hunger for new things with connections to what used to be familiar is the name of the game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the hardest things about trying to change something is first clearing out the old things. The pandemic cleared out everything, so there\u2019s room for the new. Demand destruction sounds like a terrible thing. But it might just have been essential to make way for reinvention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019m Doug McLennan. If you have any thoughts about today\u2019s topic, I\u2019d love to hear them. Write to me at <a href=\"mailto:TheUnderTow@artsjournal.com\">TheUnderTow@artsjournal.com<\/a>. And if you like what you heard, please subscribe to this podcast. We\u2019re still figuring out how to do this, so stick around.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Oil prices are at a record high. And profits are rolling in. But there&#8217;s an intriguing phenomenon in the oil industry called &#8220;demand destruction.&#8221; It means when prices get too high for too long, consumers invest in alternatives and don&#8217;t return. The arts have faced their own version of demand destruction when COVID shut down live performances. Is there anything to be learned from how the oil industry approaches what sounds like an existential threat?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2587,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2586","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-culture-business-models","8":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/apocalypse-ga65c29138_1280-1.jpg?fit=1000%2C563&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4ePZm-FI","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":569,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2015\/02\/too-many-artists-or-not-enough-value.html","url_meta":{"origin":2586,"position":0},"title":"Too Many Artists Or Not Enough Value?","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"February 5, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Scott Timberg's book Culture Crash makes a case that the transformation of our culture right now is killing artists' ability to make a living making art. He cites a number of reasons, but in the end it boils down to the fact that with so much free culture\/art available, people\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;changing culture&quot;","block_context":{"text":"changing culture","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/changing-culture"},"img":{"alt_text":"Print","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/INLINE_the_new_republic-624x624-300x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3292,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2026\/03\/paramount-and-live-nation-ticketmaster-won-big-last-week-heres-why-orchestras-and-theatres-and-museums-and-consumers-lost.html","url_meta":{"origin":2586,"position":1},"title":"Paramount and Live Nation\/Ticketmaster Won Big Last Week: Here&#8217;s why Orchestras and Theatres (and Consumers) Lost","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"March 12, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"Two huge culture industry deals in the past week, both in entertainment, and maybe they don't seem connected. Certainly not connected to non-profit arts. But these are exactly the kind of culture infrastructure deals that should worry anyone in the commercial or non-profit culture business because they impact us all.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;arts and business&quot;","block_context":{"text":"arts and business","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/arts-and-business"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/12019-auditorium-86197_1280-1.jpg?fit=600%2C399&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/12019-auditorium-86197_1280-1.jpg?fit=600%2C399&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/12019-auditorium-86197_1280-1.jpg?fit=600%2C399&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2771,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2024\/03\/how-subsidy-for-big-tech-wrecked-the-arts-and-journalism.html","url_meta":{"origin":2586,"position":2},"title":"How Subsidy for Big Tech Wrecked the Arts (and Journalism)","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"March 5, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Companies like Netflix, Amazon, Facebook, Spotify, Apple and Google have subsidized what they offer (super-cheap or free content, faster service and better accessibility) to capture audience and attention in ways that have played havoc with culture producers and artists everywhere, whether or not they create on any of these platforms.","rel":"","context":"In &quot;arts &amp; tech&quot;","block_context":{"text":"arts &amp; tech","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/arts-tech"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/seo-441400_1280-1.jpg?fit=1000%2C666&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/seo-441400_1280-1.jpg?fit=1000%2C666&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/seo-441400_1280-1.jpg?fit=1000%2C666&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/seo-441400_1280-1.jpg?fit=1000%2C666&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":91,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/04\/creative_destruction_and_the_c.html","url_meta":{"origin":2586,"position":3},"title":"Creative Destruction And The Critics","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"April 16, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"A shameless plug for a piece on All Things Considered by Laura Sydell on what's happening with arts journalism as newspapers drop arts coverage. As I say in the piece, IMHO what's happening is not the destruction of arts journalism, but the reinvention of it. Arts journalism has often had\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/04\/creative_destruction_and_the_c.html#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"criticsthumbs.jpg","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/criticsthumbs.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":188,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2011\/12\/liquid-content.html","url_meta":{"origin":2586,"position":4},"title":"Are you a Channel or are you a Library?","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"December 14, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"TV used to be an appointment medium. It's Thursday night at 8 and you're in front of the set watching or else you missed your favorite show. Then VCR's, DVD's and DVR's progressively pecked away at the appointment schedule. Many of us now wait till a show has aired and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;culture business models&quot;","block_context":{"text":"culture business models","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/culture-business-models"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/athenaeum-library2.jpeg?fit=634%2C382&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/athenaeum-library2.jpeg?fit=634%2C382&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/athenaeum-library2.jpeg?fit=634%2C382&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2429,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2020\/08\/five-things-1-business-models-and-a-9-billion-idea.html","url_meta":{"origin":2586,"position":5},"title":"Business Models and a $9 Billion Idea","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"August 23, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"We need a significant, stable ongoing source of new funding that is politically insulated and inflation-proof.","rel":"","context":"In &quot;arts and business&quot;","block_context":{"text":"arts and business","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/arts-and-business"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/cars-2605953_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C673&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/cars-2605953_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C673&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/cars-2605953_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C673&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/cars-2605953_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C673&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/cars-2605953_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C673&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2586"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2586\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2588,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2586\/revisions\/2588"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2587"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}