I wrote this blog thing in 2012 (was I even born then?) and most of it still holds up. It’s about ways that the comedy industry loses value.
I was pretty agressive in there. I was apocalyptic. I don’t feel that way anymore. I feel like there’s value in anything that’s surviving. There might not be enough pie pieces for everyone involved, but there’s always a way.
A quick definition: to me, fun is great entertainment. Even a great sad movie is fun in that engages and gets you involved in an experience.
What sucks and is expensive?
Everyone shopped for a vacuum cleaner by price. They all do the job and you hide them in your closet. They’re not a status symbol and there’s very little reason to get the best. Along comes Dyson. With the ludicrous idea of making an expensive cleaning product, he takes over! There was little value in a “vacuum” but tremendous value in other aspects he offered : health, love of gadgetry, status, the promise of convenience, etc.
a journey
Since I started performing as a little kid, I cared about fun. I wanted the audience to have fun. Maximum fun. I kept pushing it, I kept marketing it. The first slogan for Scot Nery’s Boobietrap was “a show that’s FUN!”
No really! It’s more fun than everything else! How about now? You wanna pay for it now?!
Parallel to this journey I watched some other forms of entertainment find a lot of financial success. Things that weren’t fun. Things that were tedious, anxiety causing, or boring (e.g. selfie museums).
I came to the conclusion that fun has little-to-no financial value to people. The bummer was, that was my expertise. Fun drove me. Fun was important for me to share.
Why’s fun cheap?
I don’t totally know. Maybe…
1) Because fun can be had in a million ways. We can have fun in a free park or throwing bags of water off a balcony
2) Because adults don’t embrace their need for fun. It’s not supported. It’s something you do guiltily when you’re shirking your responsibility as a real member of society.
2.5) We have this idea of “guilty pleasures.” We don’t have a way to promote our straight up “pleasures”
Let’s design the package for fun stuff
We can trick people into really enjoying themselves and paying for fun. We just need to accept that they’re probably not going to pay for the fun directly. Here are some things to consider for the way we package fun entertainment.
- coolness. people want something that’s cool and coolness can be expensive
- social status. Like a selfie museum, it’s not always about being cool. It could be about looking valueable as an employee, or seeming like you fit in
- memorable experience. A vacation is an example.
- edifying experience. Maybe it’s educational or strengthening?
- something expensive PLUS. The Palazzo circus show promotes themselves as a gourmet dinner plus entertainment.
- connection to fame. See someone famous and be tricked into having fun
- stress relief. If you ask adults why they play video games, they’re more likely to say this reason than simply that it’s fun, because stress relief is important
- kids fun. if we give a kid something fun to do, it can be joyful to watch and also take away our headache for a little bit.
- brand engagement. A good tv commercial is fun and it also is worth money to the brand because audiences deem it attention-worthy.