Allen Weiner, Research Director for Gartner Group Inc., finished off the conference with a view of the content industry from the perspective of a research and advisory service that caters to the technology and media sides of the content equation primarily. Not surprisingly Allen's "digital media titans" included key enablers of hardware, software and services such as Microsoft, Apple, Dell and Verizon, as well as low-tech content producers and aggregators that provide high content value to mass markets with little overhead or investment. Not one traditional publisher was mentioned amongst the ranks of these titans and disruptors. The presentation had all sorts of flashy graphs and graphics but somehow seemed a little behind the times in spite of much of its content and outlook being on target with what we're seeing in the industry. Perhaps its coming at the end of an intensive and insightful conference may have left me in a jaded mood, but I think that it also gets to the heart of how many analysts perceive content as an industry through eyes that insist that I.T. is driving the industry as a whole. Certainly from our own perspective at Shore technology is a key ingredient in creating vContent, but the kinds of high-tech "shovels" that are likely to fuel the continuing content revolution from this point out are not likely to be the ones that powered it back in the Gartner-fed bubble days. The emergence of more ubquitous content distribution standards and the prevalance of peer-to-peer content generation and validation capabilities is creating content value increasingly out of the hands of major media publishers and distributors and further away from the control of technology that's increasingly commoditized as much as the commercial content that it supports. It's way too early to call the era of "digital media titans" dead before it's barely begun, but there is a pall to the message that should remind us that while fear may motivate people to use consultants, it's rarely a motivation that results in sound business strategy.