The
two articles linked below are excellent. They inspired me to finally
publish this blog. I find them particularly insightful at this time
when our unions are about to negotiate important changes to our
contracts regarding "new media."
Here's my take:
The mega-studios spend much time, money and resources battling a
growing tide of pirates who sell, trade and acquire the studio's (and
our) work for free. This battle has proven an ineffective, even
counter-productive uphill battle without end. Now the studios have not
only piracy to deal with, but they also must try to wrestle control of
the media money flow away from Apple, which has brilliantly brokered
the most successful alternative to piracy there is by far.
On top of all this, we professional creative-types in turn chase the
mega-studios as they practice their own brand of mega-piracy as they
distribute, chop up, re-route and repackage our work, willy
nilly, often for profit, usually without negotiating with us for its
use. They don't seem to get around to paying us, either, unless forced
to. If we get our act together to file a claim with whichever of our unions covers the usage, if
we wait around for a year or so while it is batted back and forth
between union and corporate lawyers, we might eventually get paid
whatever spare change the studios decide to cough up. Or not. In any
event, the corporate financial records remain closed to us, making
verification and accountability improbable at best. And any
successfully negotiated contractual gains in our back end pay are only
as good as their enforcement and the honesty of our corporate bosses.
The most prominent example of creative types' uphill battle to get
what they contractually deserve of the "back end" is director Peter
Jackson's lengthy, expensive law suit against New Line for his fair
share of a few billion dollars of hobbit money. Nice for him that he
has the industry clout as well as the financial and legal resources to
pursue the matter.
If chasing this back end money is our only focus in this age of the
Digital Flood, then I am guessing that we professional creative-types
are as doomed as our studio bosses will be when piracy overtakes all
and all content is easily obtained-- without cost-- planet-wide by
computer, cellphone, or whatever.
While finding some transparent means of tracking use of our work
would be a great thing to have up and running, we creative types must
think bigger and beyond this to survive. I believe we must enlist
those with vision and a working knowledge of the digital revolution to
advise and guide us. And we must trust the power of our own
creativity, for we are the source of fresh content that feeds the
endless hunger of the digital masses.
Without our own proactive focus on the realities and outlook of the
business of digitally distributed entertainment, the fate of our
masters could well be our own.
Imagine a not too distant future where the movie and television
studios are tanking--
just like the music studios are right now-- slashing budgets, staffs
and projects-- our projects. Ad money follows consumer clicks to the
web in all its myriad forms-- social sites, search engines, cellphones,
game consoles, etc. Power and money shifts away from the studios we
now draw paychecks from. Only those who actively adapt to new forms of
digital creation, consumption and profiting will survive.
Today, the music studios, facing plummeting cd sales, have finally
given up on
DRM in an eleventh hour attempt to wrest control of the digital music
money flow back from Apple, which is suddenly the 800 pound gorilla of
digital
distribution. While the studios were futilely blasting away at
pirates, Apple was intelligently building their controlling placement
in the new entertainment economy with a proprietary lock on the
hardware and software delivery package plus a piece of the diminishing
download profit for good measure. Which works great for Apple.
But, have you seen any money after a few years your show selling on iTunes yet? Me neither.
Our bosses, the movie and television studios of today, are still
defending and clinging to
DRM- restrictive digital rights management- the way the music studios
did. Whether they have learned from the music industry's mistakes
seems doubtful.
Here's a great article about all this from the current Wired Magazine:
Let my Video Go
The previous article is the perfect companion piece to the next
article, from the same issue of Wired. Read them both and you've got a
great snapshot of what faces both studios and creative-types in the
modern entertainment economy as it is increasingly overtaken by
collapsing prices and piracy. The following is also an excellent
counter to studios' that claim they make "no money on the web," because
it is no longer about merely making money- the real profit flows in
this day and age when you give it away for "free:"
"Free"
Here's an interesting response to the "Free" article by the BeyondVC blog entitled, "The Free Business Model." A quote:
"as we move to this world of free, there will be lots of carnage and the
road will be littered with many dead companies, as only a small
percentage in a growing pie will be able to make this model work and
viably consume your time and attention to deliver the money."
And a fantastic dissection of the market mechanisms that make "free" profitable:
Saying You Can't Compete with Free is Saying You Can't Compete
