Hmm, can traditional creatives adapt to the world of interactive/online? Obvious, inherent differences between the world of print, TV or radio make the question difficult enough to answer. But it becomes even less certain when you take into account the accelerating pace of change in the content distribution models we are seeing now (iTunes and NBC deal the latest move), and also the rethinking and recombining of the content itself (multiple storylines, different content spread across various media).
Despite his own superstar status in the interactive world at age 57, Greenberg sees a divide between young creatives who have come of age with digital media and those more senior who were bred on the broadcast model. "If you're a young creative, you're automatically going to know the Web and the nuances of everything that's happened in digital media," he said.
Other interactive executives echo Greenberg, cautioning that while interactive needs storytellers, it also has a steep learning curve. "You need to know the medium in order to communicate through the medium," said Lars Bastholm, ecd at independent AKQA. "Many really don't."
Greenberg predicts the emerging digital media world will force traditional creatives to learn the language of the Web. "They're going to have to do it," he said. "They just don't know it yet."
George Tannenbaum, named ecd at Digitas in March after two decades at general agencies, added that traditional creatives who do not learn interactive risk becoming "the 21st-century equivalent of a hat salesman in a department store."
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