Consumers Are Drowning in Content

We have come a long way from Bruce Springsteen’s lament back in 1992, “There are 57 channels, and nothin’ on.”

There has never been a better time for content creators. There are a bunch of new streaming TV services rolling out including HBO Max, Apple TV, and Disney +. Each service has enticing new shows popping up on what seems like a daily basis. These new choices are on top of a rich roster of content from incumbents including Netflix, the main networks and hundreds of cable TV channels. Audio is in there too with streaming services including Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple and Sirius/XM. And of course there are podcasts; a dizzying array of 800,000 of them flooding the market with thousands of new titles monthly.

While it may be the best time for content creators, counterintuitively, it may be the worst time for overwhelmed consumers. So much of the content looks fantastic. And that, it turns out, is a major problem.

On iHeart CEO Bob Pittman’s excellent podcast “Math and Magic,” his guest David Zaslav, the CEO of the top performing Discovery Networks (The Food Channel, HGTV, Oprah, etc.) laid out the essential problem of consumers drowning in choice; “unlimited choice creates anxiety and confusion” he says. That’s it, right there. Zaslav says it becomes harder and harder for people to curate when they have unlimited choice.