Occasional Partial Attention.


Last year, lots of people seemed to be blown away by the whole concept of the second screen. At this year's event, there were inaccurate murmurings that nothing new had been said. Such is the nature of media industry audiences - always looking for the radical when they should be dealing with the every day.

But 2 screen is nothing new. We rarely, if ever, focussed entirely on the TV or anything else. The new thing is that the second screen is, in fact, a screen. In the past, we all experienced multiple input sources, but the second screen back then was radio, music or print.

Media folk are excited that the second screen experience has interactive potential, but if they listened to Starling TV's CEO they'd have noted that the 90-9-1 rule abides. 90% of second screen "viewers" are viewing that second screen passively and, I would contend, casually.

Nothing's really changed. Attention has always been partial and occasional - the question that marketers have to answer is, as ever, how to be interesting and relevant so that you get that attention when the opportunity arises.

Just a thought, a fleeting one.

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