Digital content has all kinds of interesting behavior. You have probably heard about the “search bubble”, where through endless customization and targeting, we end up experiencing the world through our interests, never distracted by opposing ideas or novel concepts.
Another aspect is the “curdling” of content around a few experts. When replicas of content are not scarce anymore, and when they can be available everywhere, there is no reason why we cannot go straight to the world expert in something. This is the “Masterclass” phenomenon. If you want to learn photography, why not pick Annie Leibovitz for teacher, or perhaps learn how to cook from Gordon Ramsay? The cost is going to be almost the same as the community college a few miles away. and the premium, well worth it.
For the consumer of content, that’s great, but it is not tremendously good for the ecosystem, as there is no “ladder” to go up on, it is a steep wall. You are either the most renowned expert of the world in something, or you’re not, and this prevents many from reaching that expert level as well.
The third particularity of digital content is that -perhaps you guessed it-, you can get as specialized as you want. So as a corollary to the previous point, you can get the expert in the specific thing that you really like. So while Annie would be great for powerful and intriguing portraiture, perhaps you want to choose a different expert because what you are really into is portraits of crying babies. Jill Greenberg may be a better choice then.
The world is your oyster, there is something for everyone. That’s alright if we just realize that it’s not the only thing.