As studios begin to embrace the potential of vertical micro-dramas, should their rise be dismissed as merely a fad or a profound shift in the production, consumption and gender-bias of global storytelling?
Bite-sized video series designed for mobile viewing are taking the world by storm and even the $26bn in annual revenue predicted by 2030 seems conservative.
“That number is very realistic – if not bigger,” says Vivian Wang, Head of Content at Crisp, an app dedicated to vertical content, based in LA. “Vertical storytelling has limitless potential, and we haven’t even fully seen it yet.”
When people talk about vertical content, they often call it “micro-drama,” but industry professionals usually refer to it as vertical drama, vertical series, or simply “verticals.”
When the format first emerged in China, most of the content was...
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