We have seen many obituaries for various types of media in the last few years. While the following summary statement will be an oversimplification, it can all be condensed into the impending death of newspapers, magazines, TV, traditional websites, and the subsequent rise of mobile and social media. I believe that there needs to be a clarification about these issues.

It really seems that there needs to be a distinction between the two issues at hand: that of media consumption and that of media monetization. Media consumption is far from dead. From various studies (industry and in-house RF Insights research) the media consumption is growing. Even today's Nielsen's "3 Screen Report" (click here for pdf) shows that TV viewing is at an all-time high. Social Media, while trendy, still feeds on things that occur outside of social media: hot stories, campaigns, issues, products, etc...

The other issue is monetization. Recent magazine failures are not due to lack of readers but to lack of advertiser commitments. The classified section, the key moneymaker for newspapers, seems to be a lost battle, but newspapers still have the content that is wanted and demanded by users. They just want to consume it in different ways whether it's through an iPhone app or Twitter feed. They also don't want to pay for it anymore with subscriptions or perhaps even by viewing ads (hence the short form of the online New York Times or its iPhone app). It is also worthwhile to note that monetization has been an issue for social media darlings as well. Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter are quite lost in monetizing their highly used platforms. And while TV viewing is at an all-time high, a closer reading of the Nielsen's report identifies that even the high consumption of TV content may not lead to easy advantages:

1. An astounding 29% of US homes have DVR technology. That can really doom the standard commercial spots
2. 31% of all internet activity occurs while also watching TV meaning that user's attention may be in multiple places

While these issues are not new, the point is to try to distinguish between consumption and monetization before declaring the death of various media. Is the lack of monetization sustainable? We shall see....