Chris Anderson’s (2004) theory of the long tail was revolutionary for its time: the internet would destroy the tyranny of the blockbuster. Our culture wouldn’t be dominated by a few select hits that everyone likes. Instead, online retailers like Netflix and Amazon could succeed by selling a large number of niche products, they would all be sold in small quantities but together they would create a massive market. The long tail was supposed to be a theory wherein every niche could find its audience, if you knew where to look. But those times are gone. The value today isn’t in holding all the niche products, but it’s in making those niche products. We have moved from a long tail to a algorithmic tail.
Look at TikTok for example. Imagine that you have a slight interest in the Harry Potter movies because you just watched some of the movies on TV. In the old long tail model you would have found a list of other generic fantasy films, but now, TikTok’s algorithm will give you something different. Their algorithm doesn’t just see the fantasy tag, they see everything. They see the highly specific elements like magical world-building and British boarding schools. Your ‘for you’ page will turn into content about ‘mystery novels with a magical school setting’ or ‘fantasy with an academic rivalry in it’. Authors will respond to this and will create books and content that fit these categories that were created by the algorithm, which will further reinforce the trend.
This sounds amazing because your niche tastes will get catered to, but is it really that great? We might get put into ‘filter bubbles’. Filter bubbles are personalized filters that can limit the amount of diverse viewpoints that get shown to you (Pariser, 2011). Because of this, the algorithmic tail has the possibility of becoming the world’s biggest echo chamber.
What do you think? Is this new algorithmic tail a great way to find new content that you find amazing, or is it simply handing us a menu of preferences that were chosen for us by a computer.
References:
Anderson, C. (2004, 1 October). The long tail. WIRED. https://www.wired.com/2004/10/tail/
Pariser, E. (2011). The Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding from You. Penguin Press.
This was a nice read Ravin,
I would personally say that the proposed “Algorithmic Tail” is more of a natural evolution of the long tail than anything else. Companies have long tried to find all of our interests along with ways to sell it back to us in a repackaged way. As for how creators respond I feel like this always comes in waves, it has always been a thing even before the Algorithmic Tail. I do not know if you remember the whole “Urban Fantasy” hype when Twilight first got big, but that was also extremely similar to what is happening right now.
I also feel like the effectiveness of the algorithm depends deeply on the person, someone with a wide taste might never really get niche content that truly appeals to them. For example if someone likes Dark Slasher Novels along with Romantic Comedies, it would be rather weird to cater to them as their tastes would be a bit contrasting. I can imagine that this person would also rather have these two genres staying split instead of becoming some kind of Dark Romance as they might enjoy the contrast between light and dark in their media. One might balance out the grit of the other you know?
Regardless, I think it was an interesting proposal of yours and you did your research very well!