Stopping pirates? [Archive]

Imran Farouk

11-15-2009, 09:44 PM

Well...you could lawyer up...but what are the legal fees going to cost you and are you sure you can 100% prove it?

If so...then yeah you could do that...

I thought Blu-Ray was going to help stop pirates because it had some sort of protection thing on it?

There was a discussion about this on some forum not too long ago, mostly about the UK gov trying to stop it and then realizing it would take too long etc. and some issues came up. Simply put, a lot of the forum members said that, they could go after the small time people but sometimes it isn't them but people leaching off their internet or even then, its just small time people. There are the bigger fish that supply those small people. Though tbh, its like the idea of the hydra, cut one head, two come back and so forth.

I don't think it will ever be stopped. I have to download videos because I can't get stuff from the states, when they use to sell iTunes US cards I would buy tv shows and movies but because of this BS wait time etc. around the globe, its just easier to download it when its released. That said, I don't believe in skimming off of small people. Usually they have a way of getting their product internationally available, self distribution in some cases, at which point I'd buy directly.

Basically.
Theres ethical points, unethical points about Pirating. Theres ways to catch and ways to stop. Though in the end, it never will be stopped.

Charles Angus

11-15-2009, 09:58 PM

I think the way to deal with piracy is to take a deep breath, and move on with your life.

I don't personally believe that they are significantly eroding sales...

Vince Doran

11-15-2009, 10:06 PM

I don't personally believe that they are significantly eroding sales...

Huh?
What if my documentary is airing 24/7 in a shop window as it is now and I havn't made a cent, why buy it when you can watch it for free anytime you like?

Daniel Browning

11-15-2009, 10:28 PM

What if my documentary is airing 24/7 in a shop window as it is now and I havn't made a cent, why buy it when you can watch it for free anytime you like?

Yeah, I think you're missing out on a huge untapped market.

Myself and millions of people like me decide to watch shop windows instead of buying their own DVDs. Nobody watches a DVD in their own home anymore; it's not worth the $25 or whatever.

Shop-window-viewing has all sorts of benefits. The fresh air. The hard ground. The lack of audio. The weird stares from everyone walking by. What's not to like? By not paying for the DVD, there is plenty of money left over for things like popcorn, soda, and medical expenses after being forcibly removed by the shop owner.

I don't buy music, either; I just go to a shop door and setup a folding chair, listening to whatever music they have on inside. The convenience of carrying your music around with you on a portable device is overrated. I no longer need to buy music!

Also, whenever I need a car, I just go to the shop window and wait for the delivery truck to leave, then hop on the back and hope he's going somewhere close to where I want to go. I no longer have to buy a vehicle! I'm sure the car dealership will go out of business soon, if they haven't already.

:wink:

Vince Doran

11-15-2009, 10:47 PM

Real funny Daniel, I take it you don't produce your own stuff and if you do would you like this happening to you? Maybe you would change your attitude if it was your only source of income, but then again you sound like a wanker so maybe not.

Gavin Greenwalt

11-15-2009, 10:50 PM

Are they using it to demo TVs or something? Seems like a business opportunity. Cut them a legit trailer and tell them they either need to license your content or only play the trailer. Then encourage them to try and sell the DVD along with the TVs when it's released. Sounds like good exposure.

Vince Doran

11-15-2009, 10:55 PM

They are a plane charter mob involved in tourism to a remote island chain. They air my footage to get more asses on seats. 70% is filmed underwater with quite a few very rare shots.
Besides all that, I have never given them a copy nor planned to, so I feel a bit pissed off and it can be viewed on the street in comfort whilst drinking a beer from the pub next door whilst sitting at the pubs chairs and tables.

Gavin Greenwalt

11-15-2009, 10:57 PM

Perfect! Make sure each arse gets peddled a DVD to send to all their friends!

Those things are everywhere and they go for like $30 each. Make the back of the DVD case look like a postcard and each tourist will buy a stack to send to grandma and grandpa who couldn't come to see it for themselves.

Gavin Greenwalt

11-15-2009, 11:00 PM

Or you could just document proof they're using your work illegally, hire a lawyer and sue them into oblivion. Seems like an easy case to make.

In the US if it's a registered copyrighted work you can sue for damages, punitive and legal fees. Probably similar in Australia.

Jannard

11-15-2009, 11:11 PM

Vince... I share your frustration. Almost everything I have done has been copied, counterfeited or emulated since the very 1st handgrip back in 1976. There is even a guy who started selling RED Digital Cinema stickers on ebay (we just got him shut down).

The aggravation is enormous. The solutions are many, but never 100%... and mostly expensive. I grew up across the street from my best friend who became an attorney. That helped a lot. It took many years of lawsuits to be known as a badass in the sunglass industry before people even thought twice. While we collected millions of dollars in damages and shut down many copiers (even put people in jail in Taiwan, Mexico and China)... piracy is still a thriving business. Ugh.

RED Ray will address this in a fairly comprehensive way. Mostly because we hate piracy. You are not alone... the studios pull their hair out over this stuff if it makes you feel any better.

Jim

Vince Doran

11-15-2009, 11:17 PM

Harry Lipnick

11-15-2009, 11:18 PM

RED Ray will address this in a fairly comprehensive way. Mostly because we hate piracy. You are not alone... the studios pull their hair out over this stuff if it makes you feel any better.

Jim

Hey Jim-
One of you RED people mentioned this a while back also, and it got me to thinking. I'm kinda hoping that while RED Ray's main content will be locked up tight, that there will also be a suitable and easy to use method for distributing a digital copy on the medium. I know for a lot of my stuff, so long as people are buying a copy, I'm happy to provide another format that they can copy to their computer. I don't know about the technical, legal or otherwise hurdles involved here, but I'd like to know if you all had been thinking about this at all?
Peace,

-Harry

Vince Doran

11-15-2009, 11:19 PM

Thanks Jim, I'm just a small operator battling away wishing it was easier.

Gavin Greenwalt

11-15-2009, 11:40 PM

Thanks Gavin, I'm in the process of gathering enough proof which is easy enough, i have not registered it as copyright but I'm sure in Australia if you write.... copyright, your name, and year of release you are covered, (as I have done). They are definately doing this illegally and I'm wondering how many copies they may have sold on the side.
Thanks again

Maybe. IF you do that in the US you'll only be able to sue for damages. You have to officially register with the US Copyright office if you want to sue for punative damages. But that can be up to 18 months in the US after 'publication' seeing as you haven't released the DVD in the US your clock hasn't even started to register yet.

I would imagine seeing as the US and Australia have such similar copyright laws and identical lobbyists :sifone: your rules are probably similar. Hahaha. Again, I'm sure an attorney could explain in depth what your options are.

But personally I would be sure it's a good business decision and you aren't letting justice get in the way of a business opportunity. I've been on enough tourist planes/boats/automobiles to know that there's nothing those guys love more than to peddle wares at the end. If they're putting through several thousand passengers a year you might be throwing away a lot of lost business.

Danish P.V.

11-16-2009, 12:07 AM

Yeah, I think you're missing out on a huge untapped market.

Myself and millions of people like me decide to watch shop windows instead of buying their own DVDs...

:wink:

*ROFL*

Vince Doran

11-16-2009, 12:16 AM

Yeah I hear what your saying Gavin, who knows how many though they will actually sell that are the ridgy didge real thing, at present it is from a VHS tape pirated over and over to DVD, I don't want people seeing such poor quality with my name attached. We did discuss a business option when I made a TV commercial for them, they said "NO not interested", it seems stealing it from someone else, burning it from VHS to DVD is a better financial decision........I want to take them down, there is no future business agreements to consider with said pirates.

Gavin Greenwalt

11-16-2009, 01:29 AM

Ace

11-16-2009, 01:30 AM

As Jim said, the Law is your friend... Especially in Australia where you can hit really hard if you know who it is... (and if you have some money for a letter or 2). I can introduce you to some good IP/Media lawyers in Sydney that have acted for me and represented a lot of small producers in Aus. Sometimes all it will take is a letter on a firm letterhead to scare someone to death from even considering infringing your IP. Especially since you seem to know who it could be.

Dont feel too bad though. The Last Ride with Hugo Weaving got downloaded 30,000 times since its DVD release last friday. The producers contacted one of my colleagues and were in utter disbelief. Youre not alone... But yeh, if i was you id be sending some letters/warnings then invoices out...

Stephen Gentle

11-16-2009, 01:55 AM

Getting sick of this crap, is there any medium available for distribution that will stop them or make it hard for pirates to copy?

The problem with video and photography is that if you can see it, you can copy it one way or another. I mean, look at AACS - it's a well designed system designed by cryptography experts, but let down because there's no way to decode it without having the encryption key somewhere in the player software's memory. As soon as you find the key, you can decode Blu-Ray and HD-DVD disks.

The fundamental problem is that cryptography is designed to get something from party A to party B, without a third party being able to read it. DRM and copy protection tries to get something from the studio to the consumer, and letting them see it whilst trying to hide the data from them. This is effectively impossible unless the user doesn't have access to the key (but then they wouldn't be able to watch the content!)

Another thing to consider is that apart from being fundamentally flawed, DRM and copy protection is getting less and less transparent, and annoying to consumers who actually buy the content. For example, there's no way to watch a Blu-Ray disk that I have bought over a VGA connection, because of HDCP copy protection (which tries to stop people copying the movie by recording the image coming out of a display connection like HDMI, VGA or DVI, by only letting it be shown on authorised displays*). But if I hadn't bought the thing, and had just downloaded a HD rip, I'd be able to! The only way to cut down on piracy is to offer a better product, and the movie industry is currently failing at this. The recording industry is getting better though - now I am able to buy DRM free music from iTunes, I'm far more likely to buy music from them.

* Incidentally, HDCP has been rendered useless now there are devices to strip the protection from the stream.

geoffboyle

11-16-2009, 02:50 AM

You know Mutant Chronicles had in excess of 4 million downloads before it was ever released. I still don't have a DVD copy from the producers

Street Fighter The Legend of Chun Li was available as a cam the day it went into theatres and as a DVD the day it was released on DVD, or was it the day before?

Dark Country was available for download the day it was in the shops on DVD.

Wallander series one is all available on the net but for the first time I have got a film/films from the producers before it is available on the net! series 2 is not available to steal, yet.

I think that the only way things like this are going to work in future is HD PPV on satellite with serious encryption, then a DVD release and then a TV showing. If you are going to have a theatrical release then have it after the PPV

geoffboyle

11-16-2009, 02:56 AM

I was wrong, I've just found full DVD copies of the second series of Wallander, shot on RED, available for download.

Full DVD iso images with all the extras.

Pawel Achtel

11-16-2009, 03:00 AM

Well...you could lawyer up...but what are the legal fees going to cost you and are you sure you can 100% prove it?

If so...then yeah you could do that....

Lawyers will cost you more than the loss of income from the piracy. Remember, "Criminal Lawyer" is a redundancy! There are more effective ways...:emote_whack::violent5::boxing_smiley::gun: :nads::emote_hanged:

Eirik Tyrihjel

11-16-2009, 03:10 AM

DRM sucks!

I buy everything legit, and have to struggle with "forced subtitles", endless intro menu movies, and forced commercials/trailers that never end.
I even had to get a second blu-ray player to get around those annoying region-codes.

A while back I needed to see a movie (as part of preparation for a meeting) I had little time, no options of buying the film were available to me (you can´t buy movies on itunes in Norway), but the film was available through piratebay for immediate download.

I don´t approve of piracy one bit, I have litteraly tons of DVDs and blu rays (original and ligit). But I hate DRM and I hate that I have to sit and watch the warnings and anti-piracy "commercials", hey! - I bought the thing, dont show it to me!

The film studios are not helping themselves by putting on DRM, restrictions, region codes and all sorts of enforced limitations and annoying warnings etc. And by not making the films available through internet purchase (for all), they help the pirates even more.

Seems like Vince has an easy case, and I support him 100%.

Vince Doran

11-16-2009, 03:16 AM

There are more effective ways...:emote_whack::violent5::boxing_smiley::gun: :nads::emote_hanged:

Yes, I have not ruled out an eye for an eye, so to speak, I can and possibly will take them out of the sky....thanks everyone.

Pawel Achtel

11-16-2009, 03:25 AM

Yes, I have not ruled out an eye for an eye, so to speak, I can and possibly/will take them out of the sky....thanks everyone.

Just be careful that you act within the law. For example, you can use REASONABLE force and steps to stop a crime. It all depends how far you can stretch it and be still within the law. :patriot:

Pietro Impagliazzo

11-16-2009, 07:02 AM

Movie piracy is so great because distributors refuse to listen to the demand.

People LIKE to download movies at home, well and if they do it for free they won't pay 20 bucks now.

Offer a HD .MKV file, with subtitles with it, commentary track, sell it for dead cheap and perhaps they won't lose that much money.

If distributors were more customer-oriented like RED piracy would never be so big.

The fundamental problem is that cryptography is designed to get something from party A to party B, without a third party being able to read it. DRM and copy protection tries to get something from the studio to the consumer, and letting them see it whilst trying to hide the data from them. This is effectively impossible unless the user doesn't have access to the key (but then they wouldn't be able to watch the content!)

Remember what happened when Amazon ditched DRM for MP3s?

:)

Radoslav Karapetkov

11-16-2009, 07:21 AM

Internet piracy is technologically invincible.

The only way out is to accept free (ad-supported) media as the norm for home distribution.

All other efforts will inevitably lead to failure and eventually - collapse.

Denis Haineault

11-16-2009, 07:35 AM

I've said this many times: preventing piracy is an impossibility. Sadly, it really doesn't matter what new anti-piracy technology comes out tomorrow, at some point, the video/audio stream needs to "come out" for the audience to see/hear, and anyone can just tap into that. Simple example: you could plant yourself in front of a movie screen or flat panel display with a camera and record the material. Sure the quality won't be great, but many don't care.

It sucks (a lot) for the guy trying to make a living off of his material. But it is a reality that needs to be coped with.

geoffboyle

11-16-2009, 07:53 AM

Movie piracy is so great because distributors refuse to listen to the demand.

People LIKE to download movies at home, well and if they do it for free they won't pay 20 bucks now.

Offer a HD .MKV file, with subtitles with it, commentary track, sell it for dead cheap and perhaps they won't lose that much money.

:)

I agree totally with you.

If I was SPE/Fox/etc I'd much rather have $2 directly from 50 million people than $5 from 10 million people.

Of course those aren't the numbers but the principle is there, make it cheap enough and easily available enough and people will pay for it.

Strangely enough a huge amount of people will still go and see it in the cinemas and wait for it on TV.

I'm absolutely certain that DVD/DR and rental can be converted in to downloads and will generate MORE money for the studios and kill the pirates.

Of course the studios awareness of "new media" varies enormously.

Peter Strietmann

11-16-2009, 08:02 AM

Piracy can be a double edged sword. A couple of months ago I purchased 5 dvds from what I thought was a reputable store. They were pirated copies of 5 films I shot. It looked to me like they were shot off a crt monitor from a VHS playback. Needless to say it looked worse than horrible which concerns me far more than being ripped off. I would love to get into one of those ultimate fighting rings with a couple of those pirates.

Imran Farouk

11-16-2009, 08:06 AM

It's not a bad thought though, especially if you have something that is cheap enough to download and offers more value for money then $20. My one thing though that annoys me more is when people rip videos off and don't give props to its rightful owners, mostly happens on YouTube. Its filled with too much junk. Pirating could stop though with various methods, encoding a video so it isn't possible to rip off the server and detections of any screen recording device will shut down the browser? Argo. You build your documentary's and sell them off your page just as Pietro suggested.

On a side note: Just wondering what do people use to do .mkv and .divx files, is there an encoder for mac that does it? Cause I've been looking for one for ages. Not to become a pirate but it helps send trailers back and forth between my editor and myself when overseas. small file sizes :smile:

L. Langer

11-16-2009, 08:20 AM

On a side note: Just wondering what do people use to do .mkv and .divx files, is there an encoder for mac that does it? Cause I've been looking for one for ages. Not to become a pirate but it helps send trailers back and forth between my editor and myself when overseas. small file sizes :smile:

www.divx.com Same software for both platforms more or less.

Dexter Gregoire

11-16-2009, 09:44 AM

It would be a great pleasure to find my movies in all households around the world, and if Pirates are the ones making it happen, then so be it!

Danish P.V.

11-16-2009, 11:06 AM

Remember what happened when Amazon ditched DRM for MP3s?

For years I avoided mp3 purchases as most companies had some kind of drm, I bought my first mp3s on amazon which, btw, was a breeze ;-)

Martin Weiss

11-16-2009, 11:08 AM

iTunes has shown that it is possible to charge for music that is also available pirated. So it should be possible to transfer this business plan to moving images, but a number of factors are important:

a) Easy to download (and should start playing before the whole donwload is finished, i.e. semi-on-demand)
b) Faster to download than a pirated version
c) Consistent quality - HD should be minimum
d) Very affordable (.99 for a song, so maybe 9.99 for new releases, going down to 4.99 or 3.99 for a movie?)
e) Buy once, own forever
f) Should be possible to have it accross all media players within a household
g) Some form of added value, i.e. the "Genius" in iTunes

I think this could lead to very interesting times for small production companies, who would no longer be dependent on the distributor to get their films out.

Imran, try VLC @ http://www.videolan.org

Gavin Greenwalt

11-16-2009, 11:11 AM

I would strongly disagree with E) Buy Once, Own Forever.

I am a Zune customer and I absolutely love it. I pay a monthly fee ($15) and can download or stream any and all music that I want. Plus I get to keep 10 songs forever ($10 value).

Zune converted me from a $25 a year music customer into a $130 a year music customer overnight. I would like to see that extended to a Netflix style system. Unlimited OnDemand TV and Movies streaming plus 1 movie per month to keep.

I don't really care to own most content I consume. I usually only want to watch it once.

---

The big problem with Netflix on Demand is that it can be slow. Last night I wanted to watch something on Netflix but it had to keep buffering. A downloaded Divx would have been much higher quality and more consistent. I wish Netflix would offer time limited DIVXs (I'm pretty sure DIVX includes the capabilities for expirations). I mean it's not like there isn't an HD off-air edited copy on a torrent site within an hour. If people want to copy it they'll copy it.

Eren Ozkural

11-16-2009, 11:50 AM

I'm of the "buy once, use forever" camp. There are so many variables that can play into the subscription based model. What if I move to a country where this system isn't in place? Or can no longer afford the service?

Still, I recognise that a large group of people may prefer the subscription model. But are the two mutually exclusive?

I wonder when these digital growing pains will stop...

Joe G.

11-16-2009, 03:00 PM

It sounds like two issues (although this is probably addressed later in the thread).

If there is a pirated copy, made by other people that's one thing.

Playing your material for the public is another thing. Public performances are another part of US copyright law, but I'm not sure where you are. You could sent them a cease and desist and insist they license the material for their travel agency.

The piracy is a different matter. And not all that important in the big scheme. Think of it as free exposure, getting your name out to more people who wouldn't have bought it anyway.

jimhare

11-16-2009, 04:51 PM

Someone just had the gall to post a pirate link to one of my complete projects on the YouTube trailer I posted!

They're getting brazen, that's for sure.
:emote_head_explode:

Imran Farouk

11-16-2009, 05:56 PM

I'm very curious...all of you that are getting pirated...how many people have the projects? Or is this after you have done a DVD wide distribution? If its before you even release surely someone you know must've made the rip and passed it around till it hit the pirate...

If its distribution already...then really...someone has to start finding ways to keep the content either on the DVDs or watermarking it and then using copyright laws to sue major pirate distributors.

Vince Doran

11-16-2009, 06:06 PM

I have given 1 VHS (not wanting to be pirated) tape to a bloke, he is the captain of the pirate ship and must be sunk.
He runs a charter boat operation to the islands that I documented

Milan Spasic

11-16-2009, 06:19 PM

Like somebody else said, adopt new technologies and be flexible, don't let it bother you.
Piracy is undefeatable but you can definitely take advantage of the demand (look at the bright side: somebody WANTS to see your work ;). Unlike moto grips and sunglass piracy where you flat out lose money, there is an actual VALUE in having more eyeballs see your film.
It's up to you to explore this.... just saying. Don't beat yourself over it but look on the positive side and take advantage of it.

Cheers,

Milan

jimhare

11-16-2009, 07:39 PM

All of mine are pirated after wide DVD release.

We control it pretty closely before that stage.

About two minutes after the release however, all bets are off.

Jacob_Ross

11-16-2009, 08:01 PM

simple answer...

you just have to transcend money

:patriot::patriot:

Radoslav Karapetkov

11-17-2009, 01:57 AM

"I think that the Internet is going to effect the most profound change on the entertainment industries combined. And we're all gonna be tuning into the most popular Internet show in the world, which will be coming from some place in Des Moines. We're all gonna lose our jobs. We're all gonna be on the Internet trying to find an audience." Steven Spielberg

geoffboyle

11-17-2009, 02:32 AM

It would be a great pleasure to find my movies in all households around the world, and if Pirates are the ones making it happen, then so be it!

Hmm,

How do you pay your mortgage, food, insurance etc?

I work for a living, I expect to be paid for my work.

J. P. Sendall

11-17-2009, 04:28 AM

We have to forget technologically protecting content and instead concentrate on the psychological aspects of distribution.

I'm working on a business plan that actively seeks to release material through the bittorrent sites for free. There will be a release of material and goodies for our core audience that they can hold in their hand that nobody else will have. You increase the value of your core customer base, treat them well, treat them nice and they will pay for what you have (if your content is any good of course). This also significantly increases the value of your product to major TV and film distribs. This is the new way to distribute and it's slowly taking a foothold. The majors are waking up to it but like all giants are slow and fearful of the mouse underfoot. Indies HAVE to go down this route. There is no other way as far as I see it. Just take a look at DIY DAYS and others. Here's a list to get you started if you want to go down this route.

http://diydays.com/
http://workbookproject.com/
http://showcase.fromheretoawesome.com/
http://lanceweiler.com/

Just a little bit of history that illustrates the idea. Rumour was rife that Battlestar (the new one) was going to be good. The distribution of the show meant that the US showing occurred I think after the first UK showing. So after broadcast in the UK of course it appeared on the bittorrent sites very quickly much to the anger of the Sci-Fi Channel. But what in fact happened was that the buzz generated from viewers in the US looking at the pirated first episode increased the US audience significantly and as a result...Sci-Fi had an instant hit. It could be argued that the take off of that series may not have been so great if it hadn't found it's way into the hands of viewers who are net savvy and like to talk up a thing because of the coolness of seeing it first. The momentum carries on from there.

Think outside the box. Turn a negative into a positive if you can.

Jochen Schmidt-Hambrock

11-17-2009, 04:33 AM

It would be a great pleasure to find my movies in all households around the world, and if Pirates are the ones making it happen, then so be it!

Amateur post of the week.

This month the elected delegate of the Pirate Party took his seat in the European Parliament.
Movies and music became information - information wants to be free. Thus it is an act of freedom to pirate music and movies.

That people actually believe this crap....

Jochen

Vince Doran

11-17-2009, 04:39 AM

Amateur post of the week.

Jochen

Agree........must have some other source of income?

Denis Haineault

11-17-2009, 04:46 AM

Many (most?) in today's generation don't even grasp the illegality of their action.

I'll always remember the story of a local artist (a few years back) in an interview, where she went to an autograph signing, and this young teenager came over with a huge smile and sparkles in her eyes. The young girl gave her a pirated CD to autograph -- and we're talking just a regular CD with no attempt at making it look legit. The artist of course refused, and the teenager was devastated that she couldn't get an autograph. The artist said she could see that the teenager didn't understand at all that what she was doing was wrong.

I'm quite certain that many (not just younger people though) have absolutely no concept of wrongdoing when pirating material. They think it's just something you do: you need music or a movie? Just get it on the internet. It's kind of like telling a teenager who's already been smoking/drinking for years that it's not legal for them to do so. He'd just look at you, puzzled.

Vince Doran

11-17-2009, 05:23 AM

The persons burning me are quite aware of what they are doing, they own 3 planes and 2 lobster boats, wondering if theft got them where they are today?
.....3 unusable planes and 2 sunken boats would be nice.....
come on karma, its my turn now

ericyoung

11-17-2009, 07:31 AM

If you don't want to lawyer up, have already tried to reason with them and they're ignoring polite requests, you could try embarrassing them in the local newspaper via a story, go on local radio to talk about piracy, or setup a picket line. Basically harass them in legal low cost ways until they relent. Actually threaten them with all the above first, so they can consider doing the right thing, but follow through with the threat if they don't.

In future, if someone requests a "viewing" copy make sure there's a prominent watermark banner across the picture (semitransparent lettering across the middle is hard to get rid of).

Good luck!

Jeff Kilgroe

11-17-2009, 08:03 AM

Vince,

I'm a bit late into this thread. But in this situation you need to hire a good lawyer and tell the lawyer to go after them. On the surface it really is that simple. Take pictures / video to document how they show your footage that they have not licensed. Which begs the question, why did you give this guy a VHS tape of your footage? OK, I can probably understand that, but you should've watermarked the crap out of it, put your logo over a significant portion of the image or make it move about. Anytime I give video to a client, it's always representative of the final product, but never suitable for actual use -- as in I put an animated watermark and sometimes even moving lines over the image (stuff that's pretty much impossible to remove) and they don't get the real deal until it's paid for and/or licensed.

For me, I have had plenty of my work stolen over the years. It sucks. I always do whatever I can about it. In fact, I'm dealing with such a situation myself right now. The worst thing you can do is turn your back and not do anything. Especially now that you have made a public reference to this. If you ignore this incident and then decide to pursue a similar situation in the future, you may open yourself up to inconsistency and doubt within a court of law. It's much like protecting trademarks and copyrights; you have to protect them. And I'm sure it works this way in Australia too, but in the US and UK you can not only demand they stop using your video, but you can also seek restitution and have the court demand they compensate you for all your expenses and legal fees, lawyer costs, etc.. needed to accomplish shutting them down.

PatrickW

11-17-2009, 08:24 AM

Piracy is not inherently a bad thing, with digital downloads.

It is however a bad thing if digital downloads result in no/low sales and thus content producers receive no money.

While it is easy to unleash the lawyers, that makes the lawyers the real winners. Perhaps you need to re-evaluate how you produce and distribute content in order to profit from it... to coninue producing more content.

First ask...
Why am I making this work?
Then ask...
Why would people pirate this?

To the first question, you could want people to see the work no matter what, or you could merely want to make money. Or you want a combination of both.

Secondly, realize why people pirate works, to provide them what they want. Unfortunately you now HAVE TO COMPETE WITH PIRATE DISTRIBUTION. Its up to you to leverage PIRACY TO YOUR BENEFIT.

If people want on demand streaming of content, they dont want necessarily want to watch a poor rip or cam version of your film... so provide them with the type of distribution they want.
If people want a low or no cost version of the film (instead of 20$ DVDs, $30 Blu-Ray or 5 dollar rentals), provide a free version with product placement as the revenue stream or direct adverts. With advertising as the revenue piracy is great because it with P2P distribution costs go down, and the more people that watch it, the more revenue you bring in. Or simply charge less.

Basically relize what you want, and what the media consumer wants and give them the choice they want that still works for you. Red is revolutionizing digital cinema, and its up to content producers and distributors to realize that the market is changing, and instead of stagnating in yesterdays media system, we need to be realistic visionaries and use modern technology to create a next generation business model that works for everybody, from the man who makes the camera, to the man who uses it, to the man that shares the film to the man who watches it.

Its all about finding the right choices and presenting them.

Milan Spasic

11-17-2009, 09:30 AM

Amateur post of the week.

The point of these posts is not pro-piracy. The point is that the DVD system of distribution and the DVD itself are dead. If you are still trying to make money from DVD sales, you are stuck in the past and that can't be good.

Like I said, if you have a problem with piracy, the good news is: there's a demand for your product. It's up to you to adapt to the changing market and find ways to take advantage of this.
Many people encourage "piracy" or as it's simply known in digital age as SHARING. More eyeballs the better. 20 million P2P downloads or streams is worth a lot of money to someone.... it's up to you to find who.

Go viral young man. :)

Good luck.

Milan

Jochen Schmidt-Hambrock

11-17-2009, 10:12 AM

I can really picture my future: Sending out mass emails:

"One of the 16 million files on your hard drive is a work of mine I have spent 3 month to write and produce. Would you be so very kind and send me 10 cents? I really have to buy some groceries."

Anybody here has illusions I will get 10 dollars?

Radoslav Karapetkov

11-17-2009, 10:58 AM

Anybody here has illusions I will get 10 dollars?

If your movie is good, you will get much more...

Much much more than you would get with the old model.
:thumbup1:

Jochen Schmidt-Hambrock

11-17-2009, 11:34 AM

Oh, I am so relieved.

And may I ask what is the basis for your answer?
I mean other than sheer optimism?

Now that all seems to be so much better, or is it?

Radoslav Karapetkov

11-17-2009, 12:17 PM

A change is on the way... I can feel it.
:conehead:

BTW, something of this sort might be helpful:

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?t=14873

Gavin Greenwalt

11-17-2009, 01:36 PM

Piracy as promotion only works if you have something to promote.

If people don't buy your DVDs, Pay to stream or download your content and won't go to a theater but would have otherwise then piracy isn't doing you any good.

The counter argument is that when I was 12 I pirated 3dsmax. At the time it was about $4500. There is no sensible reason for a 10 year old to buy a copy of 3dsmax. Now I own a personal copy and my employer owns a copy for my workstation and they collect the $1k a year in maintenance fees. There's a strong argument for offering extremely low cost non-commercial products to those who wouldn't otherwise spend anything but would later convert into paying customers. And I think offering extremely low cost content to those who are on the peripheral also keeps them "customers" instead of training them to be pirates. Even if they're paying a small fee they're at least in the mindset that they can't get it for free. Since then through educational packaging and Personal Learning Editions most high end software has embraced this strategy. In the case of music I think there should be free streaming on record company websites. It keeps the user in the mindset that they should pay if they want to upgrade while satisfying the "I won't ever buy this album, I would just start listening to the radio."
crowd.

Movies are so much more consumable though that you really have to make money on the first sale if it's going to be purchased. You can't as easily depend on return customers to spend money after having seen it.

Milan Spasic

11-17-2009, 02:20 PM

I've worked on six figure productions, where client didn't sell a single copy of the finished product. But 40 million people got to see it - for free. Sharing (or piracy) was in fact encouraged. It's up to you as a filmmaker to explore this value (of eyeballs).

And no it wasn't a commercial....

Joe G.

11-17-2009, 02:42 PM

"But what in fact happened was that the buzz generated from viewers in the US looking at the pirated first episode increased the US audience significantly and as a result...Sci-Fi had an instant hit."

What a shame?

Someone should burn in hell?

TV is different than features, of course. Hooking the audience to watch more down the line is a great strategy, even if you lose money up front. Showtime put the first episode or two of United States of Tara right up on their website for free. Seems kind of an obvious way to get viewers.

One can hope that this translates to other types of content (increasing buzz = increasing chance of success, duh).

Anyway, some people are never going to pay, and they will watch your crap for free. There's nothing you can do about it, so best end it all now.

Others will always pay, even too much (providing they hear about it and desire it at all, not a given).

Many in the middle will pay a reasonable price, whatever that is, or tolerate commercial interruptions.

All dependent on them actually hearing about it in the first place in a sea of competition.

Piracy is the least of your worries when it takes $100,000,000 to launch a film these days.

So, if you're still upset, and still in this kill the pirates rage, consider that these people who watch free pirated versions have friends. Some of them may recommend it to a friend who purchases, or watches it in some other version down the road. Is it worth something to you then?

Of course it is.

Joel Kaye

11-17-2009, 05:14 PM

I'm working on a business plan that actively seeks to release material through the bittorrent sites for free. There will be a release of material and goodies for our core audience that they can hold in their hand that nobody else will have.

I'm heading down this road. A friend of mine spent a year making a documentary. About a couple years ago he began selling the DVD online. Within a week the entire movie was on Google video. He had a very hard time getting them to take it off. When they finally did take it off he noticed his sales went down. I'm not saying A caused B but it sure made us stop and think.

Now he has a ton of 3 minute clips on youtube in hopes people will come to his site.

I think there's different types of piracy - they all kinda suck. The worst is where a company knock offs of your product and sells them as legit. Individual users bittorenting still seems like it's probably more a pain than it's worth for many people. A bigger issue for indies is that Titanic is in the $5 bin at Walmart. Best Buy is going to have $7.99 Blu Rays on Black Friday. Why are they paying $20 for your low budget thing? How does a distributor make money?

If I was the original poster here I'd probably sue them at this point. If I could go back in time I'd probably give them a nice Blu Ray version and put copies in the store for people to buy. Why not make a partner out of these travel guys? They like money. Sell the damn disc and make some profits.

Now I'm working on the assumption anything I create will be bitorrented. Given that REALITY how do I make money? I think the physical goods with movie purchase is a one reasonable route. Maybe you make the download free, don't even produce a DVD and you sell stuff.

A lot of people pay $1 for iPhone apps and Music. I'm afraid movies are going to be the same price. You might be better off writing a great song and spending $100k marketing that. No really.

Gavin Greenwalt

11-17-2009, 07:15 PM

If I was the original poster here I'd probably sue them at this point. If I could go back in time I'd probably give them a nice Blu Ray version and put copies in the store for people to buy. Why not make a partner out of these travel guys? They like money. Sell the damn disc and make some profits.

Well in this specific case the travel guys were given this VHS I presume in order to work out just such a deal, but they declined the offer. Which is to say they're dirty rotten thieves.

I like the 3 minute clip system. If someone is willing to watch my material in 3 minute intervals then they clearly don't actually care enough about it to actually ever spend money, but they might get engrossed and so fed up with such small intervals that they spend money to finish it. :D

The trick with the digital age is going to be getting positioned to exploit customers when they're most vulnerable. The best two ways I think are going to be from low cost impulse buys. "Watch this movie for $2" or nagware. I know when my internet connection is on the fritz and I'm in the middle of a movie I'll spend $1,000s of dollars to make it stop buffering and just start playing :D. Stream it for free. But play a commercial every 10 minutes and a button that's nice and easy to press that makes the bad annoying commercials stop. They won't want to stop watching, they won't want to the commercials. The adrenaline from frustration will be boiling to the surface and they'll rage-buy. It's like the new pay-to-drive carpool lanes. You're sitting in traffic, you're losing your temper but for the low low fee of only $1.50 all that can go away... just press this little button .... right... here. :emote_hippie:

The problem with TV downloads right now are they are WAYYYYYY TOOOO EXPENSIVE. $3-$4 an episode? A 20 episode series and you're up to $80 for a season of scrubs. That's ridiculous. But if it was $0.50 for rental to $1 to own I would probably pay it without thinking. Eventually money stops having value and for me $3 is just above "nothing" for a TV show and $0.99 is still above my song threshold. Make it $0.20 or $0.10 and I'd probably spend 20x as much.

Vince Doran

11-18-2009, 05:24 AM

Well in this specific case the travel guys were given this VHS I presume in order to work out just such a deal, but they declined the offer. Which is to say they're dirty rotten thieves.
.
The VHS tape (1 only) was given to a fisherman that was in the doco. He has since become a charter boat operator and he pirated it to DVD and is handing them around or selling against my protest, the plane charter mob have since got a pirate copy and they are doing what has previously been stated.
have learnt a lot from everyone here and I thank you all for your help and education

Gavin Greenwalt

11-18-2009, 08:11 AM

Milan Spasic

11-18-2009, 08:44 AM

One thing I've always wondered and maybe Geoff knows is how Netflix OnDemand compensates its licensees. Does anyone know? Do they track a full viewing and the pay a per-view license fee to the owners? Or do they just pay a large flat rate sum for the privilege like a TV station?

That would be interesting to know. One of my films is still on Netflix even though my contract with the distributor expired a year ago and I haven't seen 'Netflix' anywhere on a royalty report.
Who's collecting this money, if there is any?

Radoslav Karapetkov

11-18-2009, 08:57 AM

Words like "buy", "sell", "pay" etc., are out of the game.

Monthly subscriptions at best,.. as all else will be hacked.

Human psychology...

Fredrik Callinggard

11-18-2009, 09:01 AM

$3 is just above "nothing" for a TV show and $0.99 is still above my song threshold. Make it $0.20 or $0.10 and I'd probably spend 20x as much.

Funny thing is that what the record companies earned the most on was ringtones. People were prepared to pay more for ringtones then for the song itself as a digital download? I don't know about today this was back in 2003-2005.

But I agree, the costs are high for the quality and furthermore the accessibility. A large part of piracy these days is because of the time factor. The whole world has A LOT OF INFO about a film/TV series and doesn't want to wait a year or so to see it. I include myself in that category.

We can see it for download in pay per view sites etc but we're not allowed to download and pay for it :emote_rainshower:. So the wait becomes unbearable.

Steven Caesare

11-18-2009, 11:02 AM

Funny thing is that what the record companies earned the most on was ringtones. People were prepared to pay more for ringtones then for the song itself as a digital download? I don't know about today this was back in 2003-2005.

But I agree, the costs are high for the quality and furthermore the accessibility. A large part of piracy these days is because of the time factor. The whole world has A LOT OF INFO about a film/TV series and doesn't want to wait a year or so to see it. I include myself in that category.

We can see it for download in pay per view sites etc but we're not allowed to download and pay for it :emote_rainshower:. So the wait becomes unbearable.

Judging from what I pay for Rock Band track packs, somebody's making some decent coin there as well. Dunno how much of that goes to the original artist tho.

-sc

Joel Kaye

11-18-2009, 04:08 PM

One thing I've always wondered and maybe Geoff knows is how Netflix OnDemand compensates its licensees. Does anyone know

I'm baffled too. My suspicion is they buy very cheap licenses for indie movies where the filmmaker makes next to nothing on the deal and then absolutely nothing when the show streams or is rented.

I'm guessing the big studios have a totally different deal and get well compensated.

Kevin Olsen

11-18-2009, 04:52 PM

Maybe there is something a bit more sinister going on...

http://torrentfreak.com/illegal-downloads-150x-more-profitable-than-legal-sales-091009/

KO

Aaron Neal Trout

11-18-2009, 05:11 PM

Maybe there is something a bit more sinister going on...

http://torrentfreak.com/illegal-downloads-150x-more-profitable-than-legal-sales-091009/

KO

That's amazing!! That's a solution I never thought of. Go after the consumer directly, and give them an out.

Offer it legally for a $10 download, but if you catch someone pirating, send them a bill for $20 (to cover the cost of collection, ect.) If they refuse to pay, and they get enough infractions against them, then it would be worth it for the collection company to sue. Creates a whole new business.

I'm all for going after the people who facilitate file sharing. Target those who provide server space, bandwidth, or anything else needed in the chain to commit a crime and make them accomplices. Hit any business in their weak spot, the pocket book, and they'll shape up or go under. Tell internet service providers that they will be fined $100k for every user that violates copyright law and then let them sort out the problem. There's going to be a lot of angry pirates who can't get on the internet anymore.

Radoslav Karapetkov

11-18-2009, 05:46 PM

Maybe there is something a bit more sinister going on...

http://torrentfreak.com/illegal-downloads-150x-more-profitable-than-legal-sales-091009/

KO

That's laughable, I already know a way around that. And I'm an idiot. :arf:

---

Everything will change in this field... in a couple years at most.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXCEaeqZDnA

Count on it!

:bigear:

Gavin Greenwalt

11-18-2009, 06:35 PM

This raises another interesting point about piracy that I think the MPAA and RIAA have GROSSLY mishandled: fine sizes.

If there's a medium to high chance that you'll be caught and the fine will be reasonable you'll be afraid of carrying out the action.

If there's a little to no chance of being caught and the fine is reasonable you won't be afraid of carrying out the action.

But... and this is where the MPAA and the RIAA made a HUGE mistake in human psychology--or at least my psychology: If there's little to no chance of being caught and the fine is *unreasonable* you still won't be afraid of carrying out the action.

If you pirate one song and you get caught you'll be hit with a $100k fine. But who just pirates one song? You'll at least download an entire album. So that means if you download an album you're liable for a $1.2M fine. Now for some people that might be a reasonable fine. For me that would be bankruptcy x 10. There's a point at which the fine is so huge you don't even care anymore. It's like poker, at some point you're "All In" and the betting is no longer of any concern. So after 10 songs why not download 10,000 the fine is already well outside your means to pay.

If the MPAA and RIAA pursued consumer piracy on the level it should be pursued: petty to non-crime but lowered their standard of prosecution then they could increase the volume of claims while reducing the charges. Make it a parking ticket. I would say the average person is more afraid of a parking ticket than piracy. The average person is more afraid of a speeding ticket than piracy. That's how badly piracy prosecution on the large scale has been handled over the last decade. Make the fine $50-$100 and just spam them. It'll be 1,000,000x more effective and unlike a $10k fine people won't fight it. They'll be annoyed and out $100 and leave a bad taste in their mouth. The average person can understand what $100 fine means. The average person can't picture a $1m fine so they just block it out entirely.

There's been some interesting research on the unintended consequences of the Three Strikes law. That after 2 strikes instead of just becoming more careful, some just become more brazen. After all, if the next strike is going to put you away for life, the reward had better be worth the risk. So violence increases, the damage values increase and they go deeper underground.

Radoslav Karapetkov

11-19-2009, 02:45 AM

Yeah, and you got da Gestapo right there..

.. chasing the millions of small-time sinners and putting "PIRATE" stickers on their computers.
:rolleyes5:

Dean Bull

11-19-2009, 04:48 AM

My understanding of Netflix digital streaming deals are that they are 'Flat fee" for unlimited streaming for a certain period of time. Take this with a grain of salt but I under the licensing fee for streaming is mid-high 4 figures.

Imran Farouk

11-19-2009, 10:52 AM

Well...I was sitting around today trying to solve this issue...obviously myself alone can't solve it but I figured there are a few tactics and ways...

Subscription:
We could all go subscription basis on the internet but this would only work to some extent.
You'd need to have a viewing environment that is pleasurable for the audience. VERY difficult and expensive if you were to do it. As it would need to be high quality and full screen and streaming. (no one wants a film to stop half way and 'buffer'.)

Downloads:
The alternative to this is allow for the viewing online but also allow for downloads.

This is where the problem comes in, the minute you allow for downloads its possible for piracy to happen. One person downloads and puts it up on a torrent and BAM! the world has it. $10 for unlimited viewing for one user and that gains free access for all.

Solution to this? Encode into the meta data a serial number for each quick time file. Track it to the source, take that source to court, gain llegal fees. In turn this references to that article whereby you could gain 150% profit. HOWEVER, this is obviously a bad look on your company for one. Taking down the small fish and so on, who knows, could've passed it to a friend who then passed it to another and so on. The other issue that comes with this is the major problem with meta data encoding. In order for this to work it would need 1000s if not 10s of thousands of different serial number, not an issue with generating them but rather encoding them for every person that has decided to download it. This takes time, computing power and more so it takes a lot of infrastructure to make sure there isn't a flaw in the system. Infrastructure costs time and money. Both of which could easily just go to another production.

Advertising:
There is the idea that has been chucked around here about Advertising. Great word. Bad for the end user. Not many people would watch a YouTube video that's only 2 minutes if it has 5 minutes of advertising. Similarly here, they don't know the product and there is no loyalty to a brand so advertising would alienate a large majority of users. One can argue about the cinema and advertising, a cinema is established, therefore people have faith in it.

So really you could do the idea of streaming like netflix, though this probably would be better off if you had cloud computing on your side so the end user doesn't have to deal with too much buffering or anything of sort.

Or...do zero budget for a year, make tons of shorts and market yourself on that with your service. Launch it again a year later with a loyal fan base and subscription, add advertising and you can lose some users or maybe gain a lot with all the extra money you gain in and increase the value of your content tenfold. :tongue:

The choice is rather simple, the tactics and strategies are hard.
Use piracy or combat piracy.

Rick Presas

11-19-2009, 11:24 AM

On advertising in your work:
Sure. Lots of folks do it. Wesley Scoogins is a user on this forum, and he works for Indy Mogul which offers their weekly show for free on Youtube. In the middle of every <10min episode, there is a brief advertising interruption. Indymogul has been around for a time now, and their production values havent suffered, so i'd wager it's working quite well for them.

On the Digital Era:
I'm amazed that, in this forum of all places, so much of this type of talk is taking place. The digital revoltion has taken away a bit of our creative control with the finished product. This much is true.

But it has given us SO MUCH MORE. Digital technology has not only given us TENFOLD the options we had twenty years ago with AQUISITION (these days you can make a GOOD LOOKING feature film with $30,000 and NOT have 80% of your budget go to film stock expenses. But it has also given us dozens of totally new options for DISTRIBUTION.

Case in point:
I'm making a feature film this summer with a modest budget of about $50,000. If it comes out the way i want it to, then it starts the festival circuit. Going about it the old fashined way.

BUT WHAT IF I DONT GET A 7 FIGURE DISTRIBUTION DEAL (like 90%+ of all the films that make it into sundance, tribecca, and toronto)

I STILL HAVE VIABLE OPTIONS. I'll try my darndest to get my movie onto netflix (totally doable...I've seen GARBAGE go up there) to recoup my production costs, while simeltaneously self distributing the movie on AMAZON in digital DL form and on DVD (with a BUNCH of bonus features as purchase incentive...i'll give each of the cast members a flipHD camera and have them give us quirky "making of" antics).

THEN, i'll simeltaneously post the whole movie (in 4 parts) for FREE on youtube or some other such website, with a 1 minute commercial about every 10 minutes.

GOOD GOD HE'S MAKING A PROFIT!

There's NOTHING unrealistic about this plan. And its all thanks to digital.

But what about piracy? Well, i (to a degree) make P2P and torrent sites moot by offering it for free in the form i mentioned earlier. As a safeguard, I'LL PUT IT IN THESE P2P SITES MYSEFL WITH THE ADS INTACT. Will it eliminate pircacy? Hell no. But I'd be willing to bet t's take a sizeable chunk out of the problem, and *may* even work to my benefit.

So yes, we have piracy-a-plenty, but there has always been (remember the tape trade of the 80s?). It's on a larger scale now, mind you, but so are our options.

This is no different from the whiny comic artists moaning that their medium is collapsing under them, whyen all the while, webcomics are thriving. They don't want to go digital because they feel "it's beneath them to sell t-shirts."

YOU ARE AN ARTIST FOR A LIVING. You have among the most FUN jobs in the world, and you DARE complain? If you want to KEEP getting paid for doodling, jamming, or shooting a flick, EVOLVE.

Creative aritsits (musicians and filmmakers primarily)are all too willing to embrace the IMMENSE advantages that digital has given us, but with them we must ALSO adapt to the drawbacks.

Inspite of piracy being a household practice, this is still BY FAR the most exciting time to be a creative professional EVER.

So...ADAPT.

*edit*
Sorry for the long winded soap box trip. Back to the ORIGINAL topic, Dude, just get a bunch fo your friends to peacably boycott the business on the sidewalk outside. Print out neon fliers and hand them to every potential patron that walks through their doors. Its CHEAP and you'd be surprised how much it will work.

Joel Kaye

11-19-2009, 11:56 AM

I STILL HAVE VIABLE OPTIONS. I'll try my darndest to get my movie onto netflix (totally doable...I've seen GARBAGE go up there)

And how much money do you think the filmmaker got?

I've got a couple friends with movies in Blockbuster and those deals were crummy. Not sure of the exact numbers but I think it's fair to say you could be in Netflix and in Blockbuster and not see anywhere near $50k back in your pocket.

Rick Presas

11-19-2009, 12:01 PM

you could be in Netflix and in Blockbuster and not see anywhere near $50k back in your pocket.

Like i said, the DVD would have a BEEFY bonus features section, and Netflix would effectively make sure that the EXACT demographic that i want to see my movie (who would possibly actually BUY IT) SEES IT. And that will help spread word around to non-netflix subscribers as well (word of mouth is powerful)

Basically Netflix would be paying me back at least *some* of the cost of my production for some of the most demographic-specific advertising you can come by. I see this as being NOTHING BUT SWEET.

*edit*
dude, ALL filmmaking is a big risk. Just ask the folks who produced Cleopatra.

There are NO sure things in life, least of whcih in the movie business, but at least now we have a plan B, C, D, E and even F

20 years ago, failure to get into (let alone win) a film festival was about the end of the line for you in regards to that film. Even getting strait-to-video distribution was hard.

Imran Farouk

11-19-2009, 12:07 PM

THEN, i'll simeltaneously post the whole movie (in 4 parts) for FREE on youtube or some other such website, with a 1 minute commercial about every 10 minutes.

The thing is though, how long is your feature, 90 mins? 120 mins? YouTube based? Surely this is a bit of a killer on your quality, that sweet time you took to colour correct and make everything worth seeing big.

Would it not be more reasonable to cut an epic trailer and post that on YouTube.

Post a link to your site with advertising and have a downloadable version or better yet to just have the feature in 4 parts as you said at maximum potential quality on your own site with the adveritisng as you suggested. Would this not be a some what better option to present your film in as close quality as it was originally intended to be on DVD?

The digital era is great. It has its upsides and downsides. One can take advantage of it or shove it away and go old school. The issue is however, the digital era needs to push more for the quality of viewing for the end user. Even more so there is the fact that you, as an artist, must come on top of all that crap that is placed on YouTube where you are almost a 'nobody' although some of REDUser have got names for themselves, in the vast world outside of this community, only a few a strongly known (assuming...maybe I'm wrong here.) Fair enough, this can be countered by social networking but this would take a strong social networking push to get yourself on top of the YouTube views of the dancing fat man or other foolish videos that people seem to sit down and watch endlessly. I've seen some great stuff on YouTube no issue there. It's the fact when I've now wanted to go back and try and find that video or others like it I can't. Not to mention some channels are just filled with ripped videos.

YouTube needs to sort itself out but having it on YouTube opens it back up to Piracy. Remove the 1min advert and just play the full movie. What are you then achieving? Views but no revenue.

Joel Kaye

11-19-2009, 12:11 PM

Basically Netflix would be paying me back at least *some* of the cost of my production for some of the most demographic-specific advertising you can come by. I see this as being NOTHING BUT SWEET.

Yeah, I think using Netflix as advertising for something else you're selling makes good sense. You might only make a few grand getting on Netflix. Hopefully a lot of people see it and look for more. That's a pretty big hope though. I've watched a lot of Netflix movies and rarely have gone online to find more info about them.

I like the idea of having some streaming only bonuses. And physical products. If you had some really bitchin' sci fi gun in your movie that collectors could buy from you then having your movie online for free makes sense. I don't know how else to think about it... unless you've already got a distributor onboard before filming begins.

*edit*
dude, I know. Invite me to the yacht party.

Rick Presas

11-19-2009, 12:18 PM

Would it not be more reasonable to cut an epic trailer and post that on YouTube.

Post a link to your site with advertising and have a downloadable version or better yet to just have the feature in 4 parts as you said at maximum potential quality on your own site with the adveritisng as you suggested. Would this not be a some what better option to present your film in as close quality as it was originally intended to be on DVD?

i like this even better. I concede :)

dude, I know. Invite me to the yacht party.

lol if there ever is such a yacht party you'll get an invite. I the meantime you can come to the wrap party...we'll have Milwakee's Best on tap and jello shots made from plastic-bottle-vodka. I'm a simple man.