As the crisis in Japan continues to unfold, getting electricity to essential services is understandably more important than keeping some of its digital out-of-home screens lit up.

I don’t want to suggest that any business challenges are more or less important than humanitarian ones, but just what would it take to make a DOOH network in Japan (or anywhere for that matter) so essential, it must be kept running?

Google succeeds via the utility of search, before it monetizes via advertising. Facebook succeeds via the utility of connecting friends and family, before it monetizes via advertising. Like Google and Facebook, DOOH networks need to provide useful services and applications to the environments in which they operate before they can be monetized for secondary purposes such as advertising.

One way DOOH screens in Japan could be more valuable is to display hyper-local real-time updates at locations where people are struggling to remain informed.

We don’t need a crisis to learn that DOOH screens must provide utility and value.

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