Richness Vs. Reach Wurster, Philip, and Thomas Evans. Blown to Bits. Harvard University Press, 1999.

Content, space, use, and time are being confounded Modern ICTs work in many ways to confuse things that used to be certain:  The content-space connection seemingly has been broken  The space-use connection has definitely been broken  In addition, a third trend is happening: the use-time connection is being eroded  Also, the time-meaning/value connection is challenged.

The Good Ole Days In the past, these were certain: There was a fixed relationship between content and where it could be distributed; There was a fixed relationship between a physical object and where it could be used; There was a fixed relationship between use and when use could take place There was a fixed relationship between when something could be used and what its use meant. Thus: content meant something, and little else.

Breaking These Bonds Now, content, space, use, time and meaning are all independent.  Any content can be distributed anywhere  Any content can be used by anyone  Any content can be used any time  Any content can be used in any way, for any reason.  How does this anarchy affect YOU? *

Overcoming Space In the past, the amount of content has been limited by our geographical ability to distribute it. This is called the RICHNESS-REACH connection. This has now been broken. Almost limitless richness is available to distribute to everyone on earth (potentially, soon)

The Richness-Reach Tradeoff-1 Reach: Distribution Range Richness: Variety and Depth of Content In the past, the cost of communication limited the amount of information we could distribute over a given territory Today, via inter-, intra- and extranets, we can distribute almost limitless variety and amounts of information over a given range, even worldwide.

The Richness-Reach Tradeoff-2 Reach: Distribution Range Richness: Variety and Depth of Content Each distribution channel has its own characteristic Richness-Reach tradeoff curve Attempting to increase distribution range incurs costs, which lower the available richness.

The Richness-Reach Tradeoff-3 Reach: Distribution Range Richness: Variety and Depth of Content Attempting to increase richness incurs costs, which lower the available distribution reach

The Richness-Reach Tradeoff-4 Reach: Distribution Range Richness: Variety and Depth of Content The new media BREAK the relationship between richness and reach. No reasonable move to increase richness or reach will have any real cost and hence no effect on the other characteristic. *