The Vampire genre has been a big producer in popular culture.  

The question is, will it remain so?

No, that’s not the question. (For this too shall pass.)

No, the question is, when will Vampires fall from fashion.  

I gave a presentation this summer to a big media holding company

One of my slides read "Are Vampires Done Yet"

I was trying to be provocative.  I was talking about the inscrutability of our culture and the difficulty this causes, um, big media holding companies.

The head of the publishing house came up afterwards, her eye’s wide.

"I heard you on Vampires.  We’re still signing up authors.  And I just know the thing is going to turn, and we will be stuck with projects we cannot publish, let alone sell."

The question, then, is, how?  How do we track the Vampire trend and spot its decline.

This morning I dropped in to HSX.com to see if I could find any evidence.  And I found this. The Hollywood Stock Exchange is tracking a Vampire movie in production and the HSXers now evidence a waning enthusiasm.

To be sure:

a. their enthusiasm is not waning very dramatically.

b. HSXers may be not be a useful measure of popular opinion.

c. even if HSXers were a measure, they might be acting out of other motives.  (They don’t like the choice of director or leading lady, for example.)

Still, it’s a project that expresses our (and Hollywood’s) interest in Vampires.  It’s a measure. It changes over time.  

Not perfect.  But better then, "I just have this feeling."

The talking point: is there a way to use the Hollywood Stock Exchange as a cultural metric and, if so, how.  

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