The internet has revolutionized media consumption. Where consumers once pounced only on big hits, they now rejoice far from the mainstream, preferring highly tailored niche content. Or, so goes the thinking detailed in Chris Anderson's 2006 book "The Long Tail." But now, that theory, which has captured the imaginations of many people working in interactive, is being challenged by a marketing professor at Harvard's business school.

According to Anita Elberse, the professor who published her rebuttal to Anderson in the Harvard Business Review, Anderson's theory may have misunderstood the forces that drive consumers. Where Anderson believes that consumers have used the internet to embrace niche content, Elberse insists that the web may have actually increased attention to mainstream content, often referred to as the "head."

For Elberse, the continued dominance of big media and mainstream content has much to do with a human desire to experience culture communally. The internet, she argues, simply amplifies that drive.

Anderson, who called Elberse's analysis "rock solid" on his blog, said much of the disparity between the two revolves largely around their definition of what is the "head" and what content makes up the "tail."