Lee Gomes provides some data into the long tail — or rather, the lack of it.

In a critique to “The Long Tail”, Lee quotes examples such as:
– With expansion of inventory, the no-play list on Ecast has gone up from 2 to 12%. The number on Rhapsody is 22%.
– 2.7% of Amazon’s titles produce 75% revenue; 10% of Ecast songs account for 90% of the streams.
– 10% of Bloglines feeds grab 88% of subscriptions; 35% have no subscriptions at all.

There does seem to be some movement towards the tail, but apparantly the hype has overtaken reality once again.

Our own experience at venturewoods suggests that media is definitely getting more personalized and targeted. May be the more relevant question is “what are the applications for which long tail has an immediate impact”?

[also see followup on 21st Sep, 2006 here]

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