transparency as product.
Wired is doing something very interesting with Storyboard, a beginning to end blogging of an upcoming peice on Charlie Kaufman (the dude who wrote Adaptation, among other screenplays). In doing this, they are increasing reader involvement with the peice, advertising the upcoming issue containing the peice, and creating a new revenue stream from the article itself (advertising on the blog). This is both creative and innovative. And I wonder how well developed it could be in other creative media.
For example, imagine if an established band decided to liveblog the recording process, etc, of an upcoming record. They could post half finished lyrics, snippets of vocal and instrumental tracks, videos of rehearsals and discussions, explanations of the process, etc. While the money generated by advertising wouldn't be absurd, it would serve as a great introduction to the record. For certain bands with a large enough following, people (read: Me) would be willing to pay some small monthly amount to get a password and login to access the page. You could include it in the physical copies of a release, offering the feed for the next upcoming record. Throw it in a greatest hits package, for example.
Print media isn't dead. Music isn't dead. But we have to change what we're selling, and how we're marketing it. That said, I'll admit the idea wouldn't work outside of an established magazine, an article on an established personality, with an established audience. But figuring out how to transfer old media success to new media success seems like an important step in figuring out how to create new media success stories from whole cloth. Transparency as product might be a part of that future.
