Does success of The Artist support theory of mass intelligence?

By February 16 2012, 10:00 am 3 Comments
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The Artist scooped 7 Baftas

If you think the landslide success of the silent French movie, The Artist, at the Bafta’s on Sunday is something of an anomaly in an age of shrinking attention spans and dumbed-down media, then you haven’t been paying attention.

There appears to be something of a trend in media owners recognising that many people have a thirst for something more than that pitched at the lowest common denominator, at least some of the time.

It may seem at odds with our celebrity-obsessed era, more readily defined by umpteen variations of the X Factor, the resurrection of Big Brother, shorter written copy, larger pictures and louder headlines, but could it be the two trends can co-exist?

In a recent address in Oxford, the BBC Trust’s Lord Patten recognised that while some decry the “debasement of public sensibility and a decline in contemporary culture”, there continues to be an audience for intelligent, quality programming, and it needn’t be niche.

“It’s a false dichotomy to say that the BBC must seek either to be popular or to be intelligent,” he said. “It ought to be both.”

The sentiment would have struck a chord with The Economist’s group chief executive Andrew Rashbass, who this month talked to me at length about his group’s positioning around the idea of “mass intelligence”.

By way of example he pointed to nearly eight million visitors to the Louvre each year, and, closer to home, queues around the block for Leonardo da Vinci’s exhibition at The National.

The success of cable TV broadcaster HBO, home to The Wire and The Sopranos, was provided as further evidence, along with the time when the The Sun realised the value in buying all the tickets to the opening night of Don Giovanni at the Royal Opera House for readers in 2008.

Rashbass could just as easily identified the queues that grow each year for the Proms, and, now, the ensuing accolades for the largely black and white 1920s/30s throwback, The Artist.

All of which seems a far cry from the real life horror that is MTV’s Geordie Shore, but Rashbass cautions against putting people into silos. He said: “We’re all watching the Kings Speech and we’re all seeing Spider Man, those two things are not in conflict. We mix and match.”

The Economist has been developing its new positioning for the past few years, but we shouldn’t down-play the seismic shift it represents.

The generous, optimistic assumptions of “mass intelligence” jar with much of the elitist ad campaigns the brand spent much of the previous three decades honing.

All those witty straplines that almost implicitly required a sneer: “You can so tell the people who like don’t read The Economist’, “Is it a superiority complex if you really are?”, “Leader’s digest’… have now been replaced by provocative, topical questions designed to spark debate.

Rashbass himself describes the shift as moving away from defining readers in terms of basic, traditional demographics, towards a more sophisticated psychographic approach – one which attempts to tap into the way people like to think and try and make sense of the world, regardless of job titles.

The idea that people’s love of the arts, or knowledge and informed opinion is increasing as access to information and reference points multiply is an attractive one.

Of course, in the case of Lord Patten and Rashbass, it also conveniently extends the limits of their professional ambitions too.

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<!–[if !mso]> <! st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } –> Does success of The Artist support theory of mass intelligence?If you think the landslide success of the silent French movie, The Artist, at the Bafta’s on Sunday is something of an anomaly in the age of shrinking attention spans and dumbed-down media, then you haven’t been paying attention.

There appears to be something of a trend in media owners recognising that many people have a thirst for something more than content pitched at the lowest common denominator, at least some of the time.

It may seem at odds with our celebrity-obsessed era, more readily defined by umpteen variations of the X Factor, the resurrection of Big Brother, shorter written copy, larger pictures and louder headlines, but could it be the two trends can co-exist?

In a recent address in Oxford, the BBC Trust’s Lord Patten recognised that while some decry the “debasement of public sensibility and a decline in contemporary culture”, there continues to be an audience for intelligent, quality programming, and it needn’t be niche.

“It’s a false dichotomy to say that the BBC must seek either to be popular or to be intelligent,” he said. “It ought to be both.”

The sentiment would have struck a chord with The Economist’s group chief executive Andrew Rashbass, who this month talked to me at length about his group’s positioning around the idea of “mass intelligence”.

By way of example he pointed to nearly eight million visitors to the Louvre each year, and, closer to home, queues around the block for Leonardo da Vinci’s exhibition at The National.

The success of cable TV broadcaster HBO, home to The Wire and The Sopranos, was provided as further evidence, along with the time when the The Sun realised the value in buying all the tickets to the opening night of Don Giovanni at the Royal Opera House for readers in 2008.

Rashbass could just as easily identified the queues that grow each year for the Proms, and, now, the ensuing accolades for the largely black and white 1930s throwback, The Artist.

All of which seems a far cry from the real life horror that is MTV’s Geordie Shore, or, but Rashbass cautioned against putting people into silos. He said: “We’re all watching the Kings Speech and we’re all seeing Spider Man, those two things are not in conflict. We mix and match.”

The Economist’s has been developing its new positioning for the past few years, but we shouldn’t down-play the seismic shift it represents.

http://www.mediaweek.co.uk/news/1115948/Apps-help-Rashbass-prepare-Economists-first-fall/

The generous, optimistic assumptions of “mass intelligence” jar with much of the elitist ad campaigns the brand spent much of the previous three decades honing. All those witty straplines that almost implicitly required a sneer: “You can tell so tell the people who like don’t read The Economist’, “Is it a superiority complex if you really are?”… have now been replaced by provocative, topical questions designed to spark debate.

Rashbass himself describes the shift as moving away from defining readers in terms of basic, traditional demographics, towards a more sophisticated psychographic approach – one which attempts to tap into the way people like to think and try and make sense of the world, regardless of job title.

The idea that people’s love of the arts, or knowledge and informed opinion is increasing as access to information and reference points multiply is an attractive one. Of course, in the case of Lord Patten and Rashbass, it also conveniently extends the limits of their ambitions too.

  • chris anson

    ‘By way of example  he pointed to nearly eight million visitors to the Louvre each year..’ Well, the obvious question there – perhaps not to him but certainly to me – is how many of the 8m arrive at the Louvre for one reason alone i.e .to jostle for a view of the enigmatic smile pasted on a billion biscuit tin lids ? As oppose to say, seeking out the treasures of Mesopotamia or the paintings of Watteau?  I’m guessing 90%. 

    • Arif Durrani

      Hi Chris,

      Thanks for your comment – although I do think it’s a tad cynical. I happened to be at the Louvre just a few weeks ago and am happy to report there were good crowds throughout its cavenous space. Admittedly the biggest crowds of all were around the Mona Lisa, but there was still plenty of people milling around the Mesopotamia area, perhaps partly boosted by the positioning of Venus de Milo nearby?

      But I don’t want to get bogged down on whether it is any particular “biscuit tin” painting that is drawing the crowds or not as I think it misses the point. Could there be a mass market out there for ‘intelligent’ content currently not being recognised or utilised by many media owners? 

      In last week’s magazine circulations for the second half of 2011, the perceived ‘high brow’ news and current affairs titles were among the best performers, yet again. On a personal note, I’ve had quite a few comments (well four, which is about four times more than usual) from people offering more examples of ‘mass intelligence’ with successful exhibitions, theatre shows and book sales since my initial post.

      The concept is so obvious to almost appear trite, but I love its optimism after a summer when some quarters (too many) were calling for a return of corporal punishment to deal with what were largely teenage rioters.

      I also recently attended a great evening at CST The Gate, where former Future Publishing chief Stevie Spring talked fondly about the influence her “single parent, hippy dad” had had on her life. He had instilled the value of independent thought through discussion, observation and participation from an early age with free trips to libraries, museums, cinemas, and through mock-business meetings at home. Stevie explained how despite having “no money”, her dad, who worked for the railways, had taught her at no cost, “cultural, social and economic practices” that have stuck with her.

      (Dave Trott has captured some of the essence of her comments in a blog I’ll link to when I find here). The idea of the “intelligent working-class” is often overlooked, let alone targeted.

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