Ad media shapeshifters

Came across this at Kelvinbridge subway station in the west-end of Glasgow. The subway system is tiny by Ny-lon or Tokyo standards, but it's a smart operator. Everything about it, from the branding, to the station design to the train journeys is smooth. They are for example leading the way in contactless ticketing.

It's no surprise therefore that they should have, via Primesight, digital ad screens. This one's for STV News, so not an ad per se, but it's a smart move from the subway folk. It's also of course a smart move by Primesight to have this, alongside their regular sheet poster and billboard sites. Furthermore, it's a smart move by STV.

Even the half-fulls are not fools are recognise that tv has some kind of shelf-life. The merchants of doom will tell you tv is dying - especially if they want you to click on their blog - but let's face it, they probably proclaimed the end of the pencil with the arrival of the pen, and the pen with the pc. It's not quite worked out that way, and while tv is not the same it was five years ago, we'd be naive to believe it would be. TV, like most advertising media, simply evolves and changes shape to meet the environment and indeed the market. They're shapeshifting. So while I can get my news at 6 on STV, I can get it on +1, web, app and in Kelvinbridge subway station. STV News is a shapeshifter, just as Primesight is, just as the subway operator is, and just as your company is and mine.

The point is that you and I are too. You're a young thing, and you're looking well. But think back to say how you consumed news as a kid. It's not the same now. Some call it digital Darwinism, the survival of the fittest media, the fittest company. But it's more than that, it's more than Darwinism and wondering how come apes still exist. The smart ones, the smooth operators recognise not only that game is changing, but that it can change to their own specifications and they can make up the rules. They're shapeshifting, and we are too.