Harry Potter and the Entertainment Industry

VoidEngineer writes "In a surprisingly insightful article entitled Harry Crushes the Hulk, Frank Rich discusses how "Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix" beat out "The Hulk" and goes on to offer some insightfull and interesting comments on demographics, digital media piracy, file sharing and p2p networks, the iTunes store, and more... His conclusion? "[Consumers] may well be willing to pay for their entertainment -- if the quality is guaranteed and the price is fair."

Comments

that strategy won't work

[DarkSkiesAhead]

[Consumers] may well be willing to pay for their entertainment -- if the quality is guaranteed and the price is fair.

Sheesh, what dunce claimed that? Clearly consumers are more willing to pay if you threaten and sue them. Duh.

Without even reading the article....

[TallEmu]

... I would certainly pay for accessible, reasonably priced, good quality music and video.

I don't have an Australian Drivers licence, and my local video store requires *australian* photo ID. So, that counts me out as a video consumer. The last time I bought a CD was for *one* song I liked. I'd use ITunes if it were available out here.

Sadly, I doubt that the companies will wake up and smell the coffee...

Re:Without even reading the article....

[inflex]

There's the 18+ card for Australians - no need for a licence.

Re:Without even reading the article....

[SoSueMe]

"Sadly, I doubt that the companies will wake up and smell the coffee..."
Just wait 'till Starbucks figures out their "On-line" strategy

Re:Without even reading the article....

[Anonymous Coward]

They have dickhead schoolkids down under? I thought they were only allowed on Slashdot.

I'm boycotting all RIAA products

[Anonymous Coward]

until they stop suing everyone and bribing my congressman

(the fact that their stuff is overpriced crap makes this easier)

Re:I'm boycotting all RIAA products

[BrokenHalo]

I agree with your point, but IIRC Bloomsbury Ltd. is not a member of RIAA. And I wouldn't exactly describe the latest Harry Potter as crap, and am happy in the knowledge that my dollars were well spent on a hardbound copy.

Re:I'm boycotting all RIAA products

[Lysol]

Unfortunately, I think then, you'll be boycotting them forever.

That said, there's plenty, plenty, of good non-RIAA stuff out there. The indie/underground/non-corporate/etc scene has always flourished and always will.

Re:I'm boycotting all RIAA products

[TygerFish]

"I'm being a bit pedantic here, but surely those are Bernie Taupin's lyrics? (Elton John wrote the music)."

Hmmm... I'd better be careful here...

I, the respondent to your post, which was in response to my own, earlier, post do hereby stipulate the following points enumerated by bullets which will be indicted in this text by hyphens (-). My stipulation shall be limited to and only to the following three (3) enumerated points.

- You, the respondent to my post, are almost certainly right in the latter point of your sentence (q.v., above).

- Considering that the songs that Elton John (b. Reginald Dwight) sang, either while recording albums or in public, during performances for which he was paid, onstage, on one or more occassions while playing the piano, are the result of the Reginald Dwight/Bernie Taupin collaboration, and therefore there is a high probability that the lyric in question is B. Taupin's (i.e., that they were written by the aforementioned B. Taupin.)

- I also freely stipulate that you are correct in the former point of your sentence (q.v., above). You are being pedantic. :-D

Jokes aside, it was a very nice catch.

Hmm sounds familiar

[prockcore]

"[Consumers] may well be willing to pay for their entertainment -- if the quality is guaranteed and the price is fair."

That sounds familiar.. where have I heard that.. oh yeah, now I remember, that's how all the other industries work.

You know what I realized

[rsilvergun]

prices on entertainment goods aren't nearly as bad as I thought. I'd been complaining about how expensive it was being an anime fan boy, and saying I'd happily pay $5 bucks an episode for my anime. Then along comes the Nadesico Box set for $60. That's $2.30 an episode. At prices like that it's not worth the trouble of pirating it.

And yeah, I paid $30 for Morrowind, but it'll be months, if not years, untill I'm finished with it.

On the other hand, music goers into the lastest American stuff are still getting gorged. Then again I got John Arch's A Twist in Fate for $10 bucks, and lots of the stuff I liked when I was a kid (Judus Priest, King Diamond, Early Fates Warning, The Ramones, the list goes on) is getting released on the cheap.

It's funny, but we fan boys aren't getting screwed nearly as bad as we used to. Anyone who paid $35 for 2 dubbed eps of Ranma 1/2 knows what I'm talking about. If the trend carries on like this, I'm gonna have to shut my mouth and start buying more stuff :).

Re:You know what I realized

[darien]

So that's $1000 to watch the whole series.

It's $1,000 to own the whole series. If you just want to watch them once, go to the video shop. Or wait until they're repeated.

Re:You know what I realized

[rsilvergun]

You kinda missed the point. Stuff from a decade ago appeals to a hardcore market that'll generally pay whatever it takes. If I like a band enough to remember them after 10 years, I'm not gonna quibble over price. It's the new bands, without that hardcore fanbase, that you'd expect to be cheap. After all, they need to encourage people to try their music, right? It's just funny that the exact opposite of what you'd expect is happening. Often it's the mainstream stuff that's expensive.

I figure the reason is production costs have gotten so cheap that companies would rather reach a broader audience using lower prices than screw the fans. That, and when your dealing with record labels as small (relative to the big guys) as Metal Blade, you get nicer people in charge. People who enjoy what they're doing for more than the thrill of money and power and genuinely want people to enjoy their music

Re:You know what I realized

[SlamMan]

Nothing wrong with acting as an oligopoly. Its actually encouraged by law. Your issue with with the intraindustry collusion.

Meh...

[syberanarchy]

Clearly consumers are more willing to pay if you threaten and sue them. Duh.

Good news: The **AA's of the world now realize their respective business models are obsolete.

Bad news: Their new business model consists of the following:

1. Scan Customers' ports.
2. Lawsuit
3. Profit!

In all seriousness, I really do think that these guys are deluded enough to believe that this could work - we can't make up our lost revenue because our product is not as culturally relevant as, say, video games; so let's make up said revenue with repeated lawsuits! Even if only a fraction stick, we'll still make our money back!

Old plan: throw shit at consumers, hoping they would buy it.

New Plan: throw shit (lawsuits) against a wall, hoping they will stick.

It's official - The RIAA/MPAA seem to have a scat fetish :(

Bottom line

[Jarlsberg]

The entertainment industry loves 15+ kids for their spending power, but loathe them for the grand scale theft of music and videos. However, they will pay for quality, ie. the fifth Harry Potter book, but won't spend the same kind of dough on an album with one hit and a lot of fillers. It's nice to finally see journalists getting the point so many in the Slashdot crowd have been trying to make for some time.

Re:Bottom line

[sebi]

No, it's not. I've seen rips of the text already. It's actually pretty easy to do, I could do it on my computer if I wanted to.

I tried reading a e-book copy of a book once. Stephenson's 'The Diamond Age' wasn't available at any local bookstores so I downloaded it. It was horrible. Plain-text is really bad for large amounts of text. So I layouted parts of it myself and that was a bit better but I still had to read it on a computer screen. Sure--you can print it out, but a stack of loose pages is a lot less comfortable to handle than a bound book. That is the big difference between books and other forms of entertainment. With books the package is important and not easily recreate-able at home. Films, games and music can be burned on any old blank. With 'The Diamond Age' I read the first couple of pages and then ordered it.

From the article:
By the next year, The Times would have to bend to Harry's will and initiate its first separate weekly children's best-seller list, lest adult fiction get crowded out by the Rowling juggernaut.

That is kind of unfair, isn't it? After all people of all ages read the books.

Re:Bottom line

[Anonymous Coward]

Wouldn't it be fair to say (in the case of the book), that they are willing to pay for something where the pirated version is qualitatively different (in a significant way) from the 'original'?

When you buy a CD or DVD, you experience the data it contains in exactly the same way as you would with the pirated version; the same speakers, the same screen.

A book is quite different - while the data may be identical, most people would far prefer the experience of reading from a bound dead-tree version than from a CRT/LCD etc (not to mention the portability factor - not everyone has a laptop).

As for the 'quality' of the fifth Harry Potter book; well, thats another argument altogether, and theres enough flamebait in the world as it is.

Re:Bottom line

[drinkypoo]

I really enjoy reading books on my computer because I can do so while I do other things. While I'm waiting for a compile, for example, I can knock off a few pages of a book. In addition, you can search the text, which will let me find things later much easier than earmarking the corner. Finally, you can always download the text onto a PDA or ebook reader. The only bitch about that is that if you have a palm PDA, you almost certainly will run into times when you don't have enough screen to fit a whole sentence on it at once, and that can be a real pisser :)

Re:Bottom line

[The Raven]

sebi commented about the article:

By the next year, The Times would have to bend to Harry's will and initiate its first separate weekly children's best-seller list, lest adult fiction get crowded out by the Rowling juggernaut.

That is kind of unfair, isn't it? After all people of all ages read the books.

They did it because other books were being held back. Rowling's astounding success was preventing other books from being released, because the publishers were holding them back until they had a chance to get on the bestseller list. With HP1/2/3/4 out there, they were relegated to #2 at best, even if the book was of a quality that would normally garner a #1 spot for several weeks.

If you were going to enter a Chile cooking competition, in which it cost you a lot of money to enter, but winning (or placing well) would gain you a nice profit, would you even bother entering if you saw that Betty Sue, who was 90 if she was a day, had won the past 45 years and showed no sign of stopping? So people stop competing, and the competition dries up in the Chile contest.

To bring competition back, they make a Senior Chile contest separate from the normal one. People happily compete in both, everyone still KNOWS that Betty Sue could kick all the asses of the young whippersnappers, but now they have a chance again.

I don't see a problem with what they did.

I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[westyvw]

I read CS Lewis stories when I was a kid. They were fascinating. But why is this new thing sooo cool? I dont get it. My wife says its aimed at a lower grade audience, so why does she read it? I have read a few chapters of the HP and find it near tripe. I am not a fan of fiction anymore, I am an adult, and find the story to be a waste of time.

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[AdamHaun]

Harry Potter is a children's story set in an adult world. As you go farther along, you begin to see that the HP universe is actually a very frightening place, where very bad things can happen to very nice people.

Also, the characters tend to be far more realistic than you would expect in children's literature. Not all the good guys are nice, and not all the bad guys are mean.

Summary: It's just a good story. Read more.

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[gotacap]

Matter of fact; most people who read Harry Potter don't read much else...

I must disagree with this false statement, it has been my experience that the children who are being enraptured by Harry's world are truly starting to hunger for literature, and as there is a limited supply of Potter to read, they expand their collection. I know 7 year olds who, having read all of the potters, have gone on while waiting for book 5 to read J.R.R. Tolkein and C.S. Lewis and other great classic literature. I doubt if you would find many 7 year olds reading Tolkein 10 years ago...

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[stwrtpj]

I am not a fan of fiction anymore, I am an adult, and find the story to be a waste of time.

If you don't care for Harry Potter, that's fine, not everyone does. But by this statement you're implying that you don't read fiction because you're an adult, and I fail to see what one has to do with the other.

My father is in his seventies now and still devours about three novels a week. He is a rather intelligent and well-educated man. He cared for my ailing and home-bound mother for ten years all by himself until she passed away a few months ago. All through that time he read tons of fiction. It helped him remain sane while he saw my mother deteriorate despite his best efforts. A social worker that visited him once said she was astonished at the quality of care he was giving my mother.

Here is a man that is very much an adult. He shoulders his adult responsibilities seriously and with skill. Yet he continued to read fiction during that time. We need fiction as an escape, if nothing else, a way of immersing ourselves in another world as a way of recovering from the harsh realities of real life.

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[SlamMan]

Thats part of why its so good. J.K Rowlings does a very good job of making the charcater extremely lifelike, instead of one demensional like most children's books are.

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[FunWithHeadlines]

" I read CS Lewis stories when I was a kid. They were fascinating. But why is this new thing sooo cool? I dont get it."

That's because you are no longer a kid, and your tastes have changed. The Harry Potter books, which I have not read I will admit, are aimed at children, not at your level. From all I've heard, they are written well, but so is, say, the Judy Blume books that kids loved. Doesn't mean adults will find them of interest.

" My wife says its aimed at a lower grade audience, so why does she read it?

This is similar to something I have wondered about for several years: why do adults like the HP books? Cleary they weren't meant for them, and adults were clueless about the books until their kids discovered them and made a fuss. My theory is three-fold:

1. The hype factor: When anything gets hyped a lot, people join in just to see what the fuss is about.
2. The quality factor: The HP books are apparently well-written, not just hyped junk. The hype machine came after Rowling wrote the first few books. They are good books, simple as that. Again, I cannot speak from personal experience, but I have friends who have read the books and tell me what they think.
3. The literacy factor: Adults are not reading as often as they used to, and the literacy level of adult fiction has lowered over the decades to keep up with the times. Compare a newspaper from a hundred years ago to one today. Compare a popular novel to one today. People like easier material. They get lazy. So when they pick up a HP book they find it's easy to read, contains a good story, and they feel as if they are accomplishing something.

"I have read a few chapters of the HP and find it near tripe. I am not a fan of fiction anymore, I am an adult, and find the story to be a waste of time."

Well, I find your concept of adulthood to be odd. Fiction is universally known as a window into the human condition. The best fiction tells us more about the world than the most thoroughly researched non-fiction. It says more in a glance than reams of charts and facts. So to hear you dismiss all fiction tells us why you don't like the HP books, but it also tells us something about you.

Namely that you are probably just trolling. :)

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[Robotech_Master]

Funny thing is, as the article itself points out, the hype came after the books, and from the other readers instead of the publishers. It's the literary equivalent of the Slashdot effect.

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[Kirijini]

The literacy factor: Adults are not reading as often as they used to, and the literacy level of adult fiction has lowered over the decades to keep up with the times. Compare a newspaper from a hundred years ago to one today. Compare a popular novel to one today. People like easier material. They get lazy. So when they pick up a HP book they find it's easy to read, contains a good story, and they feel as if they are accomplishing something.

Whoa, buddy. Couple of things here.

As for adults not reading as often as they used to - unless you can bring some kind of statistics to the table, I'd have to disagree. Adults this day and age are far more educated than adults at any other peroid in time. To say that they read less is to fall into a stereotype about this generation vs. "the great generation" of yesteryear.

As for the literary merit of adult fiction: again, not the case. More educated people = more educated things to read. As science and philosophy and even society advance and become more complicated, it is nessesarily reflected in the literature.

As for the comparison between old literature to modern literature: Of course old literature is harder to read! It was written in a vernacular that is no longer used. People write and speak differently now, and so modern literature looks easier simply because thats how you speak. Old prose being harder to read does not increase its literary merit.

So when they pick up a HP book they find it's easy to read, contains a good story, and they feel as if they are accomplishing something.

What an elitest thing to say. You're assuming that outside of your circle of friends and family, and "present company excluded," America is filled with trailer park trash. And it's absolutely not true. People arn't happy about reading Harry Potter because "Oh! I read a 900 page book! Whoa, I didn't know I had it in me!" No, people are happy they read Harry Potter because it sparks the imagination.

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[Kjyn]

"I am not a fan of fiction anymore, I am an adult, and find the story to be a waste of time."

Okay, so you don't like fiction and you find it to be a waste of time. Nothing wrong with that. I find it ironic, however, that you use the argument "I am an adult" in your reasoning since you said you read CS Lewis stories when you were a kid.

Lewis himself wrote in the essay "On Three Ways of Writing for Children":
"Critics who treat "adult" as a term of approval instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adults themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence...When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up."

He also wrote in either "On Stories" or the "Three Ways" essay, I can't remember, and I'm paraphrasing:
Growing up implies adding on, to make more of oneself. If I liked fantasies as a child and then I throw it away when I become an adult to start reading non-fiction, you could not say that I had added non-fiction. I merely changed my reading.

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[Simon Brooke]

Must say I feel quite sorry for you if you think calling bullshit on Harry Potter is elitist.

Matter of fact; most people who read Harry Potter don't read much else. If they did, they might've discovered that there is more to this thing called literature than the tripe that is hyped on low brow tv.

Most things that are very popular are utter crap. Peoples taste are very different, so when a pheomenon like Harry Potter springs up, you can be sure that there are external factors that count, not the actual quality of the work.

Within 72 hours of The Order of the Phoenix being published my partner and I had both read it cover to cover; I'm currently reading it for the second time. She's 39 and I'm 47; we have no children. We've both read all of the Harry Potter books, the first long before it was filmed. There are somewhere between five and ten thousand novels in this house - we both read a lot.

J K Rowling's work is not 'bullshit'. It's not, in my opinion, great literature either, but it is superb and highly imaginative story telling, tightly plotted and compellingly told and stands repeated reading.

There are two particular things I can point to which indicate that the Harry Potter phenomenon is something genuine in terms of literature. The first is, of course, that the first Harry Potter book came out from a small independent publisher with no fanfare at all. The whole snowball effect was entirely by word of mouth, at least until The Philosopher's Stone was filmed. Up to that point there were no external factors - no marketing, no colateral - so that only the intrinsic quality of the work could have made it one of the biggest best sellers of all time.

The other thing is that, in the UK, the publishers brought out an 'adult binding' of the Harry Potter books because they found that adult readers were embarrassed to be seen reading a "children's book" on public transport. This had never been done before for any other "children's book"

Both the original binding and the 'adult binding' of several Harry Potter books have separately been on the best sellers lists in Britain for years, and an individual Harry Potter book has been the best selling book in Britain for three of the last four years (in 2001, Harry Potter books took the top four places on the best sellers list). At this moment, Harry Potter books are first, second, eighth, ninth, seventeenth, and twenty-second on The Guardian's best sellers list. That's right, six places for five books. The second place, after the "children's binding" of Order of the Phoenix is the "adult binding" of the same title. Given that many adults will have the "children's binding" (we have) this indicates that roughly as many adults as children are reading the book.

Furthermore, apart from The Order of the Phoenix, all the Harry Potter books have Booktrack Platinum Awards for selling over a million copies within five years in Britain. Only six other books have ever won this award.

Harry Potter isn't a 'flash in the pan' success. It's a solid, consistent success over a period of years. It's a series of children's books, but it has sold well to adults. Its success long predates its marketing and is still out of all proportion to the amount of marketing effort it receives.

Of course, popularity is, as you say, no indicator of aesthetic merit. However, this degree of popularity sustained over this long indicates something, and it doesn't indicate hype because the popularity (at least in Britain) predates the hype, not the other way around. Yes, it's easy to appear superficially cool by rubbishing Rowling's work. But unless you have some alternative explanation for this degree of popularity, your shallowness and lack of

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[mpe]

But I doubt if the children get even a quarter of the stuff she talked about (the phoenix is a symbol of rebirth and Jesus Christ

The phoenix predates Christianity anyway only a Christian would see an analogy. One interesting thing about the entire series is that virtually no character is assigned any kind of religious faith.

it's named Fawkes after Guy Fawkes etc.).

British kids would get this quite easily.
A better example of some of the more obscure references would be that Hagrid bought Fluffy from a Greek man...

Re:I have been arguing this with the wife all day

[knobmaker]

You can extend the argument of the Harry Potter apologists to imply that the latest works of American Idol winner is high art.

Popularity doesn't equal quality. It never has done and it never will. Harry Potter is easy reading, a kind of a literary equivalent to Celine Dion.

I find that people who dismiss popular books simply because they are popular often turn out to be the kind of folks who are going to write the Great American Novel someday, but so far haven't "made time" to do it. They're the sort of folks who come up to me at parties and propose that I write a novel using their ideas, after which they'll graciously split the royalties with me. I rarely have the heart to tell them how pathetic they are.

Rowling, of course, is not Proust. She has accomplished something far more profound than any other writer of the late 20th century-- she has persuaded millions of children to take up reading for pleasure. Any real writer-- as opposed to the many envious dilettantes who infest the field-- will be grateful to her for that service, since she has single-handedly reversed a grim trend in the number of new readers. And any person who cares about literature will care about Harry Potter, even if the books do not suit that individual's personal taste. Why? Because if you do not understand why so many people love to read about Harry Potter, you do not understand something very important about millions of your fellow human beings. This is your problem, your failure, not a problem or failure in Rowling's work.

Harry Potter is indeed "some sort of classic."

"Harry Potter apologists?" What does Rowling have to apologize for?

Re:that strategy will work

[seamus_waldron]

Quality at a fair price will work. I have two eBooks of the latest Harry Potter and I read the first paragraph only.

Frankly, I'd prefere to read the book than the ebook and I am even willing to by the hardcover as opposed to waiting for the softcover to come out in several months time.

As for iTunes, I've spent about $15 so far. 15 songs I would not own otherwise from 15 albums I would never buy.

How about labeling crippled protected CDs...

[navig]

I would love to be able to pay for my favourite songs but last week I found one of my latest CD purchases was copy protected.

It was the Amélié Soundtrack CD I bought in Australia. Sadly the CD did not even mount in the Linux or Mac boxes I tried it on. :-(

Both the original and replace CDs I tried worked on standard players but could not be mounted on a CD drive. Typical nasty BMG copy protection.

I got my money back but even the store techie was surprised they had not mentioned the protection scheme on the packaging. He mentioned it was required in Oz. Is this true?

Annoying because I want to show my support for a funky French film and was willing to put my money where my mouth was.

If iTunes was available in Australia or the UK, then I would be buying that album online just to avoid the CD protection.

From a consumer who actually pays for music...

Re:How about labeling crippled protected CDs...

[inflex]

Well, I found that my new Sarah Brightman CD "Harem" is 'protected' - supposedly it works fine in Computers and such until you attempt to rip it - Yes well, I can still hear the glitches! In the end, I ripped the CD, eliminated the glitches and now experience a better quality playback (perceived) than off the CD.

Re:How about labeling crippled protected CDs...

[timmyf2371]

If I purchase a copy protected CD which doesn't play in my computer I do a few things.

First thing is I take it back to the store as it quite clearly doesn't fit the purpose it was intended for.
Secondly, I download the album tracks using Limewire.
Third thing is I go to the band's online shop (if they have one) and purchase $20 of merchandise.

IMO, this is win-win - I get the music I originally wanted to purchase, I have some merchandise, and it's showing my support for the band.

Granted, it's probably less than legal, but it does ease my conscience knowing the the band is still making some money from me.

Tim

Pay...

[somethinghollow]

"...insightfull...insightfull..." Do you think he thought it was "insightfull"?

Pay for just "good quality" and "fair price"? I wouldn't. I want good quality and fair price, yes, but fair use is just as important (if not more). If I pay anything for it, I want to be able to use it to it's fullest, whether that means ripping it to listen to on my MP3 player, burning a copy for my car, or putting it in the microwave. Then I'll buy it if I decide I want/"need" it.

One disappointing comment in the article...

[SlashChick]

Overall, a good article, and it draws some interesting parallels. However, I found one piece of the article to be very disappointing...

"The question is: How do all those lovely entertainment-seeking kids weaned on 'Harry Potter' grow up to become thieves? Surely, they know that stealing copyrighted songs and movies is akin to shoplifting sweaters at the Gap."

How can an author who is obviously intelligent enough to write an otherwise-interesting article sneak that in? Making a copy of music is NOT the same as stealing the original. Now, if I went to the Gap, bought one sweater, and then used my home cloning machine to make 50 more and ship them off to people on the Internet for free... that would be a fair comparison. However, "pirating" music (ugh, I despise that term) is not equivalent to stealing a physical good. If I steal one Gap sweater, that's one less sweater that the Gap has to sell... but if I make a perfect bit-by-bit copy of a CD and hand it to a friend, the original is still completely intact and able to be sold, used, or traded.

It's disappointing that the author fell into the RIAA's trap on that point. However, the rest of the article is quite good. Good weekend reading...

Re:One disappointing comment in the article...

[Espen]

As you can see from the included quote the author wasn't claiming it to be 'the same as', but 'akin to' (which is not the same).

Is it reasonable to claim that stealing music (by copying it) is similar to stealing goods? I would say it depends on which dimension of the act you are focusing on and why. As you point out above, the physical aspect of the act is very different, and the outcome for the victims is relatively different, but from the perspective of whether it is wrong to do it, that doesn't really make any difference does it?

Btw. a book might make for good weekend reading; an article is something you read while on the toilet.

Hype factor? Three years versus...

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

however long they've hyped the Hulk. And the hype for Book5 was fan generated, not industry generated. The way Goblet of Fire ended, it's no surprise Harry fans bought up Order of the Phoenix. I'm sorry, with voldemort coming back from a near-death like state, cedric diggory dying and harry beginning to go nuts, you'd have your fucking underwear in knots too...

And it's been damn near 3 years since Goblet too. So this basically adds up to a giant cash cow as long as Rowling doesn't screw the proverbial pooch and writes a terrible book.

Is it as good as they say?

[jericho4.0]

"That's merely the short list of hard-wired assumptions that were short-circuited by last weekend's publication of "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.""

This whole article asumes that Harry Potter is high art, and that it is a product that can earn 100 million while not being part of the hype machine.

I've never read any of the Harry Potter series. I think I'd probably enjoy them, though. But I'm _very_ aware of them. The Harry Potter phenom is well covered in the media, and I doubt they would be so popular without the involment of the media.

Re:Is it as good as they say?

[GMontag451]

I've never read any of the Harry Potter series. I think I'd probably enjoy them, though. But I'm _very_ aware of them. The Harry Potter phenom is well covered in the media, and I doubt they would be so popular without the involment of the media.

The media coverage of Harry Potter started *because* of its popularity, it didn't cause it. I will grant that the popularity of the fifth book has probably been helped along by the media coverage, but remember, the popularity of the series was already quite entrenched when the fourth book was being anticipated. The fact that little kids were lining up to be the first to read a 700 plus page book on their own was what made the story newsworthy.

Re:Is it as good as they say?

[WesternActor]

This whole article asumes that Harry Potter is high art

Actually, no, that's not what the whole article assumes. Rich doesn't say that he considers any of the Harry Potter books art, merely that they're something good that the target audience is willing to not only go out of their way to read, but also pay for. His point is merely that something of quality can still actually sell, and that it doesn't necessarily need to market itself to the lowest common denominator in order to succeed.

And, at the risk of being moderated redundant, as others have said, the books receive media attention because they're so popular, not the other way around. The books were huge sellers before all the media attention started, and if it were suddenly to go away, that wouldn't change--the people who read and love the books would search out the new ones without all the news stories.

Re:Is it as good as they say?

[hiryuu]

The media coverage of Harry Potter started *because* of its popularity, it didn't cause it. I will grant that the popularity of the fifth book has probably been helped along by the media coverage, but remember, the popularity of the series was already quite entrenched when the fourth book was being anticipated.

Bear in mind, however, that Scholastic (publisher of "Harry Potter") over $3 million to market the fifth book. The hype may have started with fans, but like anything else, it's been well-capitalized upon.

Re:Is it as good as they say?

[Reality Master 101]

Is it as good as they say?

I'd like to see the marketing campaign that can get 10 year olds to sit and read -- nearly continuously -- an almost 900 page book that was actually crap. :)

Re:Is it as good as they say?

[Sanction]

In my experience, what truely makes them great is that after the 10 year old reads it, their parents immediately snatch it up and read it too. This series has brought more people I know back to reading as an alternative to TV than any other books I can think of.

Re:Brilliant

[Llywelyn]

Its odd, but sometimes the most obvious solutions are the ones that are almost blatantly ignored in marketing (and in many other fields, I would imagine).

For instance, my International Political Economy professor at one point was on a plane heading for Brazil (he was studying something or other while there) and sat next to a guy who worked in the marketing department for the lab that produces and develops Mallox (or was it Alka-Seltzer?).

They got to talking and it turned out the guy was going down there to help figure out this problem they were having in sales. In some areas their product was selling very well, but in other areas it wasn't selling at all. Marketing had spent billions of dollars (litterally) and said "people in those areas like products that are from the US, so we should put a little American Flag on the packages" and he was going down to do something of a feasability check on this.

My professor turned to him and said, evidently without missing a beat "your product isn't selling well in those areas because your product provides relief for over-eating and the people in those areas are starving!"

The guy's face dropped and shortly thereafter was taking down contact information and writing notes.

You would think this would be obvious, but sometimes that is exactly the solution is hiding.

Kids these days

[somethinghollow]

"Here's what's wrong with kids in the digital age. They live in front of their TV and PC screens. They steal music online. Their attention span is zilch. They multitask on everything and concentrate on nothing except video games. They will buy any trashy product that the media goliaths can sell them, then drop it as soon as the next big hype comes along."

Isn't that the problem with adults in the digital age as well?

Quality is guaranteed?

[Black Parrot]

That's the whole problem. The media companies want to invest their money in the sure sell, so we keep getting sequels and boy bands.

For media-based entertainment products, "quality" involves a bit of variety, a bit of risk.

Time Line of the Book being scanned

[Gryftir]

I watched the development of the 5th book being scanned for distribution over an irc book trading channel.

On Friday Night/Saturday Morning: First Chapter scanned and proofed. The whole book has reportedly been scanned, and is being proofed. Scans are available of both versions of the cover.

Saturday Afternoon (I wake up) Told the proofed version will be ready by 8 pm. Rough versions of all the chapters are available. people looking for the book are being send to a seperate channel. A website has been established where one individual has taken the rough chapters and has been proofing them himself, and posting them online.

Sunday Afternoon book has been proofed and is combined into a html file with the cover images. This is turned into a .rar archive and available for download.

This comment doesn't really have a point. I will say I purchased a copy of the book, and I was personally involved with the scanning. I just want people to be aware of the existence of scanned books, in the hope that it will enhance this discussion.

Gryftir

Re:Time Line of the Book being scanned

[gmhowell]

And I thank you, sir. My wife is blind. Frequently, books are not available, or are prohibitively expensive. There are electronic aids to display text via 'refreshable braille', but none of the major book publishers see fit to distribute their works in a format compatible with them. Thanks to 'bookwarez', my wife can read almost anything she wants. Download the html or whatever, convert to text, and load it into a reader. Usually, she reads the same books I read, so we already have a hardcopy. You and your brethern have helped me excercise what I view as my fair use rights to format shift my books.

Doesn't seem to read much, does he?

[nagora]

He thinks the HP books are "quality" (as opposed to bland, if rather jolly, easy-reading) and the Matrix was a "burst of big-studio originality" (as opposed to a trawl through the last 50 years' of SF writing).

TWW

I confess

[Dogun]

I actually hunted down a copy the new HP book online the day it came out; after failing to find it in bookstores. Then, I found it again online, the no-shipping variety, and finished the book before it even arrived last wednesday.
Though I'm sure the author would love to sue me for saying so, you don't lose too much in reading the electronic format. Unlike music or a movie, however, a book is something we don't always finish. A bad book we put down. When we finish a book, we know that it was at least readable.
I guess what I'm saying is that I've never finished an ebook without suffereing the immediate compulsion to grab myself a copy of the real deal. Movies, music, anime, tv... these things are more impulse buys. I would never buy them in the first place normally, but after being exposed to them in a way I wouldn't have been in the first place, I at least have a reason to purchase them.
A book is something I cannot avoid purchasing if I enjoy it. Don't ask my why, I don't know. But I suspect that I am not alone in this; I also suspect that as much as a mediocre amount of piracy can help music sales, it can probably be a great boon for the sales of a less popular book.
I'm not saying "Go forth and pirate books!"; I'm just saying that maybe having people get exposed to your book, no matter how it happens, results in drastically increased sales?

Thoughts?

Re:I confess

[omnirealm]

I actually hunted down a copy the new HP book online the day it came out; after failing to find it in bookstores... Though I'm sure the author would love to sue me... I'm not saying Go forth and pirate books! I'm just saying that maybe having people get exposed to your book, no matter how it happens, results in drastically increased sales?

I noticed an interesting image in the article. It shows two kid sisters in a public library at 1:00am; one of them is dressed up as Harry Potter and it sitting by a bookshelf rack reading the new book. These kids did not pay a dime to read the book. I am quite sure that dozens upon dozens of people will be checking that copy out to read it, again with no money going to the author or to the publisher (except, of course, the money from the library's original purchase).

I cannot help but wonder what Ms. Rowling or other authors and publishers think of this kind of thing. Obviously, they cannot speak out against public libraries, without inciting the wrath from the public at large. Libraries are something that we grew up with. They are institutions of learning that our founding fathers, like Thomas Jefferson, felt were essential for any progressive society.

Yet the same people who would become incensed about the public library being challenged would not think twice about condemning the sharing of a digital copy over the Internet. I am sorry, but I simply fail to see the fundamental difference between the two. Both mediums allow me to read the book without paying for it.

Perhaps this newfangled Internet thing and its implications are too radical a paradigm shift for the public at large, and they cannot deduce the obvious analogies to how things have been being done in the non-digital world for centuries.

Oh, and I can just as easily walk into my local library and checkout out a CD or a DVD. As the media oligopoly tightens its grip on our society (please, no Star Wars jokes), it seems that they will have to attack libraries themselves in order to follow through with many of the assertions they have been making to their inevitable conclusion.

Re:I confess

[macemoneta]

Popular books do get purchased by (or donated to) the library. Our local library has about 10 copies of each of the Harry Potter books. The people that read them (myself included) usually do so in under a week, so that's:

10 copies * 5 books * 52 weeks = 2600 reads/year

That's just 1 small library. There are 117,418 libraries in the USA. If you figure, on average, they only have 3 copies of each book, that's:

3 * 5 * 52 * 117,418 = 91,586,040 reads/year

File sharing has some serious competition. Libraries are a serious force to be reckoned with in the entertainment industry.

And yet, people want to own media they love. Whether it's movies, music or books, if the content touches them they want to have a copy they can call their own. I downloaded and read the fifth Harry Potter myself, before buying a copy. Not because I wanted to steal it, but because I couldn't wait to read it. I'm 47 years old, and fall way outside of the demographic the article is discussing. But I still love the books, I still go see the movies in the theater, and I still buy CDs. If they're good.

In large part, I see the problem being that media is sold as unreturnable. If I go to the movie, and it sucks, I can't get my money back. Likewise, if I buy a CD, DVD, or book.

I don't want to stand in the store for hours to preview, I want to take it home, and enjoy it in the environment that I will be using the media normally. The ability to download and verify the connection with the content prior to sale is the thing that I see the entertainment industry fighting so hard against. They know that the majority of their content can't stand up to that test.

Other industries seem to be moving in the opposite direction. Some car dealerships will even let you take an extended (overnight) "test drive". That's a $30,000 piece of merchandise! Yet for a $20 piece of media, the FBI patrols the net. Does this make sense to anyone with two (functioning) brain cells???

Harry Potter and the Entertainment Industry

[Dark Lord Seth]

Did anyone else think of that subject as the title of a new Harry Potter book instead?

Re:Harry Potter and the Entertainment Industry

[quantum bit]

Did anyone else think of that subject as the title of a new Harry Potter book instead?

The funny thing is that the fourth book was in a way about the entertainment industry. It showed how the media can make people believe things that aren't necessarily true.

The latest one (#5) continued this thread, and also delved into the world of politics and corrupt (i.e. self-serving) governments.

Being on the NY Times doesn't make it true

[nzyank]

If I had more than a few minutes or really cared I'd pick the article apart point by point, but the main point is that the Harry Potter series was no doubt very popular in book-only form, but would NEVER have sold $100M worth of books in a weekend without the HP movies and the media hype.

Normally I'd agree in the conservative estimate of 2 readers per book, but I think that a large portion of sales are driven by a 'me too' mentality. I'd put readership at more like .5 readers per copy. Really.

Would anyone care to bet against me that sales of Tolkien's LOTR and The Hobbit books skyrocketed because of the movies and not just because everyone suddenly, simultaneously and miraculously figured out that they're just really good books (which they are)?

Face it. These people (a lot of them) buying the new HP book are buying it because everyone says they have to and to get a preview of the next movie.

The Hulk just happens to have had fewer big-budget movie prequels than HP (not counting the low-budget Bill Bixby junk) and LOTS less media hype. The Hulk CG also sucks from what I've seen in the trailers. Hopefully I'll change my mind when I watch the DVD in 6 months.

Gawd I hate faulty (I think the word is 'specious') reasoning almost as much as I hate the knuckleheads who believe the faulty reasoning simply because it was written in the NY Times. Probably mostly the same knuckleheads who stood in line to but the latest HP book so that it could sit on the coffee table to show everyone how smart their knucklehead kids are because they can read.

Re:Being on the NY Times doesn't make it true

[Coretti]

Yeah, I hate faulty reasoning too. Such as:

Face it. These people (a lot of them) buying the new HP book are buying it because everyone says they have to and to get a preview of the next movie.

Why would people be buying the fifth book in the series when there's only been two movies? At the rate they've been going, Order Of The Phoenix won't be made into a movie for another two years.

If people were buying a book just to "get a preview", they'd go out and buy Prisoner of Azkaban.

The Hulk has less media hype? Turn on the TV, watch some commercials. Tell me how many ads you see relating to products or programming tying in with Order of the Phoenix versus how many ads tie in with The Hulk.

Re:Being on the NY Times doesn't make it true

[stwrtpj]

Face it. These people (a lot of them) buying the new HP book are buying it because everyone says they have to and to get a preview of the next movie.

Wrong.

Look back at the sales of the previous books. You will find they were just as popular before anyone ever announced that movies were going to be made of the books. And note that WB has not committed yet to movies past book 3 (someone correct me on this if I'm wrong). So there is no guarantee that books 4 and 5 will ever make it to a screenwriter.

Kids are buying the new HP novel for the same reason my wife bought and read it and for the same reason that I read it the day after she did: because they like the story and want to see how it ends.

Your previous example, that of people suddenly buying the LOTR books because of the movies, is on target, though I don't think this is a bad thing. Sometimes it takes people seeing a movie to know that there is some good literature out there (I personally don't care for LOTR, either books or movies, but that's my personal preference).

Re:Being on the NY Times doesn't make it true

[Anonymous Coward]

This article was a lot less specious than your attempt to criticize it as such is captious.

If I had more than a few minutes or really cared I'd pick the article apart point by point, but the main point is that the Harry Potter series was no doubt very popular in book-only form, but would NEVER have sold $100M worth of books in a weekend without the HP movies and the media hype.

Based on what? Do you have a background in book publishing? Have you completed writing or reading a recent study on the relationship between media exposure and sales volume of hardcover fiction?

Normally I'd agree in the conservative estimate of 2 readers per book, but I think that a large portion of sales are driven by a 'me too' mentality. I'd put readership at more like .5 readers per copy. Really.

What are you basing the .5 readership per copy figure on? Have you done a research on Harry Potter readership numbers?

Would anyone care to bet against me that sales of Tolkien's LOTR and The Hobbit books skyrocketed because of the movies and not just because everyone suddenly, simultaneously and miraculously figured out that they're just really good books (which they are)?

As with Harry Potter, the LOTR was made as a film because of the great popularity of the books, not the other way around. Also, one should note that there have been a couple of real garbage LOTR animated films that didn't seem to do much for the franchise.

Face it. These people (a lot of them) buying the new HP book are buying it because everyone says they have to and to get a preview of the next movie.

I don't see why I should "face it". Would you give any more credence to me saying "Face it. No ones buying the new Harry Potter book because of peer pressure."?

The Hulk just happens to have had fewer big-budget movie prequels than HP (not counting the low-budget Bill Bixby junk) and LOTS less media hype. The Hulk CG also sucks from what I've seen in the trailers. Hopefully I'll change my mind when I watch the DVD in 6 months.

FYI most people in the US don't read the newspaper hardcopy or soft. Do you not watch television? Have you not seen the constant commercials of the green-cookie dough looking monster bouncing around the screen? How many Harry Potter commercials have you seen? Also, your opining that the "CGI sucks" is exactly that, opining. I have neither seen nor read anything that "CGI realness" has any viewership effects (positive or negative).

Gawd I hate faulty (I think the word is 'specious') reasoning almost as much as I hate the knuckleheads who believe the faulty reasoning simply because it was written in the NY Times. Probably mostly the same knuckleheads who stood in line to but the latest HP book so that it could sit on the coffee table to show everyone how smart their knucklehead kids are because they can read.

God I hate the spelling "Gawd". I also hate captious arguments as much as I hate the knuckle heads who throw out a term like specious, apparently understand it's meaning, and then use it to rant about some argument or exposition they don't care about without making any real refutations of any of said argument/exposition's points.

Most importantly, I think you missed the fundamental point of the article which IMHO was not that Harry Potter kicked the Hulk's ass or Harry Potter sells awesomely 'cause it's awesome and would have sold awesomely no matter what (which seem to be the points you are refuting). Instead, I think the article was trying to comment on the fact that human beings are not a bunch of hype-driven lemmings in spite of all the attempts to make us otherwise. And that even children growing up in a shit-hole marketing wasteland are able to easily discern between "heartfelt, I wrote this as a labor of love" quality and "I make $12.00 an hour to write half-hour GI Joe episodes" quality.

Re:Being on the NY Times doesn't make it true

[tgibbs]

Face it. These people (a lot of them) buying the new HP book are buying it because everyone says they have to and to get a preview of the next movie.

Uh, the Harry Potter book that will be the basis for the next movie came out years ago. The fact is that the Harry Potter series was a children's literature sensation before even the first movie. I'm sure the movies have contributed the popularity of the subsequent books, but the first movie was highly anticpated because of the books.

Yes, the books sell largely on word of mouth. And the word of mouth is so positive because a lot of people, young and old, have found the books enjoyable. And people, young and old, seem to be actually reading it, all 870 pages. In the week after release, I couldn't go anywhere without seeing somebody toting the book.

Re:Adults who read Harry Potter

[EvilCabbage]

.. aren't The Simpsons also for children? How about Burger King, Jack in the box, or Futurama? All relatively enjoyable things (no matter how bad they may be fore us) that are aimed primarily at children.

I'm definately not a fan of the HP series (saw both movies, just wish I could get those few hours of my life back) but my girlfriend has read them all, and seems to enjoy them. It hurts nobody, so how is it so wrong?

sharing books

[BenjyD]

and, assuming a very conservative average of two readers per book, a larger audience as well.

People are sharing books! Quick, send in the licensing police. That's $100 million in lost sales. This new trend in book piracy must be stamped out before our book industry is ruined.

No, it doesn't. None of that stuff happens.

[Anonymous Coward]

Either the grandparent post was joking around, or was quoting from the profuse number of full length HP:OoP fanfics out there. Either way, there is no spoiler, that stuff does not happen in the book.

It's the Economic Downturn Stupid

[SailorBob]

The music business's travails -- the top 10 albums sold 33 million units in 2002, down from 60 million in 2000 -- are attributed to Napster, which arrived just as the first "Harry" novel did, and its current successors, led by KaZaA. The recording industry has tried litigation, legislation, education and invective to end file-sharing piracy, all to little avail.

Anyone else getting tired of this? I mean, can't reporters make the connection? When was the economy at it's peek? In 2000. What has it been doing since 2000? Going into deeper and deeper recession. What does that mean? People are spending less money on goods and services.

What?! The entertainment industry saw a drop in sales during a worldwide economic recession? It must be the pirates fault!

Re:It's the Economic Downturn Stupid

[iabervon]

Napster was particularly big at the high point of the music sales, and gone now, at the low point. I'm certain that Napster's demise has had a major effect in turning people away from purchasing albums; I, at least, have felt it immoral to pay the RIAA anything since then, and have avoided it (buying music from used CD stores instead). Given the recent success of independant labels, I suspect that the cause of death of Napster has been a factor there, as well.

The consumer is willing to give up money for their entertainment, but not convenience. I'd rather pay the artist $10 for some music I liked than get it for free without a sense of entitlement to it; but I certainly don't want to pay $18 for a useless hunk of plastic that may damage my hardware and gives me no sense of entitlement.

Re:It's the Economic Downturn Stupid

[jasonbowen]

Actually my mp3 collection is very transient, it varies based on a whim. Currently I have 100 megs and have had up to 700 Megs, I was collecting music for a party. Do I really want a Rick Springfied CD??? No I don't. I just felt like listening to 2 songs of his after watching a show that reminded me of 5th grade. I have a substantial CD collection of music that I found worth purchasing. I just saw the Foo Fighters in concert after purchasing their latest CD last November. I'm tired of the RIAA claiming harm on a large scale when they act like they should have growth during an economic downturn. Sure, there are thiefs out there but a download doesn't equal lost revenue and I bet the actual loss of Revenue is a fraction of what they claim.

A little story from being a teenager... I absolutely felt that Metallica was the greatest thing ever the first time I heard them in 1987. I copied all the stuff I could from friends and over time slowly bought all their major albums. They were the first band that I saw in concert. I listened to Master of Puppets so much that the label wore off and the tape broke. I purchased a second copy of it and proceeded to leave it in a friends stereo the weekend before we both moved away to different colleges. Instead of waiting to get it back I purchased my first CD, you guessed it, Master of Puppets. I do really believe I'm the average person and that I copy something because I can't afford it or don't find it worth purchasing. Now I have downloaded new Metallica stuff before thinking of buying it and finding a real copy has been pretty hard, their label is working hard at placing fake songs on gnutella. I've litterally had it with them, I think they are harming more than helping their following. I will not buy St. Anger(for one it sounds like they are trying to fit in with the current scene, I remember when bands tried to sound like Metallica), nor will I see them in concert.

The simple fact of the matter is that if somebody can't produce something that I feel is worth buying, I won't purchase it. If I'm not going to purchase it, it's not a sale. I won't buy a Rick Springfield CD, they aren't losing money. Personally I think Apple has a good idea going with iTunes but a gnutella download != lost revenue.

Re:"protected CDs" != CDs

[navig]

The Amélié sound track CD carried the Philip's Digital Audio CD label. Still it was copy protected. :-(

I mentioned this to the store and they just looked confused when I started talking about Red Book format.

I got my money back after testing a second copy of the CD, the reason I gave for requesting the refund at the check out was that the CD was not a valid audio CD. :-)

"Red Book - CD Audio

- Defined by Philips and Sony in 1980 and published in a red binder, hence Red Book.

- Standard needed so a CD made by any manufacturer can be read by any CD player."

Introduction to Compact Disc

my car's transmission system crushs Harry

[khallow]

I noticed a number of stories artificially comparing Harry Potter and the Hulk movie. The goods aren't the same since they aren't directly competing with one another. For example, I spent more money on my car's transmission last week than I did on Harry Potter books. Does that mean that I think Harry Potter would be less entertaining?

Also, the author IMHO compares unfairly the Hulk with the newest Harry Potter book. My suspicion is that the amount of money spent on marketing is probably the same order of magnitude for both. Ie, Harry Potter now is as much an instrument of Big Media as the Hulk movie.

Re:my car's transmission system crushs Harry

[Tsu Dho Nimh]

The series got off the ground by word of mouth from kid to kid ... "When Volume I, "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," was published in America in September 1998, its first printing was 35,000, with a promotional budget of $100,000." "The New York Times, for instance, did not review the first "Harry" until five months after its publication. By that time, "Sorcerer's Stone" had been on the Times's fiction best-seller list for 14 weeks".

They spent about 3.5 million in advertising for HP#5 ... and there was one interview with the author. Compare that with the incessant barrage of publicity, talkshow appearances by stars, and the rest of the hype accompanying The Hulk or nay other movie (including the HP ones, but they at least spare the cast the gruelling talk show circuit ... that's almost a sign of a worried produciton company).

Not A Spoiler because thats not what happened

[dduardo]

Not A Spoiler because thats not what happened in the book. Yes someone dies, but its not hermione. Harry and Cho are far from being at third base. And Harry is not lord voldemort, well sort of (Hint: Occulmency).

Re:Brilliant

[titzandkunt]

Sorry pal, but in order to swallow this tale, I'd need a whole truck load of Mallox (or should that be Alka-Seltzer?).

I really started to choke after you tell us, with a straight face, that the company spent billions ("litterally"), on this marketing problem.
FYI Nike's global advertising budget in 2000 was $978 million.

In addition, are we expected to believe that a company that would invest megabucks would be completely ignorant of the demographics of their target market? With bells on, I expect.

This has all the hallmarks of an urban legend - the inclusion of a US flag as a fix being an especially nice touch. I'll pass this along to Snopes or the AFU archives when I've got a minute.

T&K.

Somewhat right...

[gotacap]

Although not completely. Until January I lived in Dallas TX where Movie Theaters were pleantiful, and the only times I downloaded movies from P2P were when I saw them in theaters already and enjoyed the movie enough that I wanted to have it available to view at my leisure until the DVD release. Indeed, being a Potter fan myself I downloaded the CoS movie only after seeing it in theaters with my young nephew twice. And had a copy of the DVD preordered as soon as the release date was scheduled. I had never downloaded movies that were already out on Video and DVD because it was simple for me to rent them, in fact I worked at Blockbuster mostly so that I could rent for free and get a discount on purchasing the ones I really liked.

Now things are different for me. Now I live in the small town of Robbinsville, NC. There are 2 video rental stores both with poor selections and no movie theaters at all. I love movies, so yes, I admit, I download movies that I used to go to theaters to see, cause otherwise I have to wait for the rental. For movies that have been out a few months however... I now use netflix as my rental source, I still don't prefer to P2P, as the quality isn't good and I personally believe that if I like something, I should pay for it so that the people who make it get the incentive to make more things like that.

Money makes the world work, but the article does make a point, everyone targets the younger crowd who have no money to spend, yet they continue to raise their prices higher and higher till their target audience can't afford it anymore, of course they would turn to P2P. I mean movie ticket prices are somewhat rediculous, there are places that it costs $10 for a matinee ticket! Why would a kid want to shell out $10 for 2 hours of mindless entertainment, when they could pay $17 for a book that will entertain them for days. Even the audiobook version is 24 hours of entertainment. And what Rowling can do for young minds is far more magical then anything Harry learns at Hogwarts. For a long time children have fallen away from reading, the instant gratification world in which we live has bred children to not want to read, and in many cases, not be able to read. Yet J.K. Rowling has the most amazing ability to grab minds child and adult alike and make them crave more and more. Each book she releases longer then the previous, this one nearly 900 pages in length, yet children as young as 6 make it through it not once but multiple times. And when Rowling can't write fast enough for these eager readers, the children actually look to OTHER books. Rowling has done more for literacy then anyone in the late 20th century.

Sadly it won't be enough, we live in far too much of a video world, Children come home from school and immediately turn on the TV to watch increasingly disgusting cartoons or play mindless video games, they do this until they go to bed, then get up and continue the next morning before school, when the weekends come instead of sitting outside under a tree reading a good book, they spend the whole day inside burning images into their eyes, and when they cannot get enough through TV and what movies they can afford to see in theaters, they hop online and download the rest of the available movies. Would the best thing be a reasonable price on entertainment? Or less entertainment with more quality to it?

Re:Brilliant

[Llywelyn]

1) The professors name is Eul-Soo Pang.

2) "Billions" may be an exageration to the point done either by him to make a point or through my faulty memory--it has been three years since I took the class. It may also represent many years worth of expenditures.

"In addition, are we expected to believe that a company that would invest megabucks would be completely ignorant of the demographics of their target market?"

Have you ever studied Brazil?

Brazil is a neomercantalist economy which has an unbelievable disparity between its rich and its poor. There are areas of Brazil which are extremely wealthy and in which this product was doing very well,

It is not particularly unbelievable that a company would research the economy, find that it has a strong (trillion dollar) economy overall, and fail to notice that there are regions which are semi-periphery and others which are truly and completely periphery.

Quality, price, and format.

[Fweeky]

Sure, I'll pay, but not for DRM enabled "CD quality" (i.e. 64kbps) WMA, or even unprotected 128kbps MP3.

Let me download a high quality FLAC (maybe even optionally at higher bitrates; 24bit 96khz would make audiophiles cream) so I can transcode to whatever format I like. Let me download a smaller MP3 or Ogg at a range of qualities. Let me have my full fair use out of it, and maybe charge on a sliding scale based on the different sizes. Hell, let me get it elsewhere and just pay for a cheap license so I can support my favourite artist.

Let me not have to worry about whether some dumbass transcoded all his Ogg's from his MP3's encoded with Xing and ripped from a scratched CD in burst mode. Let me not have to spend 3 weeks downloading an album from a billion different encodes. Let me not have to wait for someone to post something to news and spend hours every day hunting through 100's of MB's of headers.

If the music industry can't compete with slow annoying overloaded networks full of substandard rips of music that doesn't even come properly indexed, it doesn't deserve to make money.

And no, pouring more money into lawsuits does not count as competing.

Re:Quality, price, and format.

[Fweeky]

4 words: Try the iTunes store.

Um...

The iTunes Music Store requires a Mac equipped with iTunes 4 and Mac OS X Version 10.1.5 or later. ... 128 kbps ... AAC

So, not only do I have to use a specific OS and a specific application, I have no choice over format and have to use a low bitrate AAC? I don't think so.

Retail Respect

[grasshoppah]

It seems to me that there are two commercial camps that have very different methods of treating the consumer. One camp, consisting of the RIAA, MPAA, major media etc. has somehow established the mentality that we are OBLIGED to consume their products. They figure we can not live withou what they provide( at unreasonable cost and restriction ) and that we know it. Not only do we KNOW that we must have what they provide, but we WANT it. In short, they are not serving us, they do not respect us as discerning consumers.
The other camp, such as independent bands, movie studios, book publishers etc. treat consumers with the respect they deserve. They recognize that people will use good (or at least some) judgment in their decisions and buy quality and originality. They are not requiered to purchase any one provider's product and thus the providers recognize the need to truly differentiate themselves from the rest.
Sadly, though I'm not sure how, the method which does not serve the customers seems to be winning

Re:lame swipe against the Matrix

[gotacap]

The author was not pointing out the plan, just the result. A Great deal of matrix fans thought the Matrix Reloaded was no where near as good as the first one. I'm one of them, and unlike some, I'm not knocking the ending, I liked the ending, I liked the movie, but it did seem faded compared to The Matrix. Granted The Matrix was something incredibly hard to live up to for a sequal. I liked Reloaded, and am looking forward to Revolutions, but when you compare Reloaded to the original, it is a tad faded, engaging story is sacrificed for enlarged special effects and a completely unnecessary sex scene that added absolutely nothing to the story whatsoever and should not have been there, or at the very least should have been shortened, then perhaps they could have knocked the rating down to PG13 and got a larger audience.

Harry on the other hand gets better and better with each new installment. I read the original and thought "not bad, I've seen better" and left it on a shelf for months going back to my normal reading routine, then one day when I heard that a 4th book had been released I decided to give it another go and try the Chamber of Secrets and noted that it was better, at that point I didn't stop reading until I had read all 4 of the books that were out at the time (a matter of 3 days). Now I read OotP in about 12 hours (decided to read it slowly) and it has toped them all, I can't imagine how Rowling will continue to push the limits of her imagination for us the readers.

That's the difference the author was pointing out.

Re:that strategy will work

[bigman2003]

I have never purchased a hardcover book for full price. I've always waited for soft-cover, or found a hard-cover book on sale. This is because books are not usually the hype machines that movies are- I don't NEED to read them right now, because there are other things to read to fill the time before the book comes out. Hard-cover buyers are just suckers, who subsidize the industry for the rest of us.

This was true until I found myself paying full price $29.99 for the latest Harry Potter.

The last book (#4) was the best in the series so far, and I hope this just comes close. I haven't been able to read it yet though- there are two women in the house, so that makes me last in line....

I do buy music- and I hate it. I would love to see something like iTunes on the Windows platform. The only thing that scares me about it though, is that people will only buy the 'hits'. Everyone I know has the same experience with music- you buy the album 'just for this one song', but USUALLY the depth of the album surprises you, and the song you initially liked ends up being the one you hate the most.

So if we only buy the ones we like, a lot of music will never get noticed...

Kid Rock's album (don't remember the name, but the one with 'Cowboy' on it) was actually a fairly solid album. Songs like 'Got One For Ya' and 'Black Chick White Guy' weren't played on the radio, that I heard, but they ended up being some of my favorites. Also, Uncle Kracker (hey, if you didn't like Kid Rock, you probably didn't buy this either) had a hit with 'Follow Me', but in my mind the rest of the album was much better.

There are a lot of cases though were I know I don't want the whole album- usually older songs from one-hit-wonders that I want to put on some party CD or something like that. I mean, do I really want to purchase the entire Rose Royce collection, just to get 'Car Wash'? Although Rose Royce does have at least 5 different 'best of' albums, but I really don't want to pay for the rest of their music. (Interesting note, I saw Rose Royce at the Asparagus Festival in Stockton, CA. They played at 12:00 Noon...it was pretty sad..maybe I should buy their albums just so they don't have to do that again)

Another example is the band Orgy. These guys are horrible- but they did a real good cover of New Order's 'Blue Monday'. I bought the CD...it was one of those rare occurances when I threw the CD away....even with one good song, it wasn't worth the piece of plastic it came on.

So- when do I know the album has depth, and when do I know that I really do only want one song? I guess I will need to rely more on reviewers, and try to make better decisions. So I don't waste money.

My problem with books is actually more complicated. If I don't like a book, I have usually spent quite a few hours to find out. I hate that waste of time- and of course reviews are only for hard-cover, so I never really catch on to those. I end up buying a lot of books I don't really like.

Some good books though:

Hole in the Head
Slab Rat
Carter Beats the Devil
The Straw Men

Blah blah blah

Re:Theres two ebook-versions out there!

[damiam]

The real Order of the Phoenix has 870 pages, 38 chapters, and starts with the line "The hottest day of the summer so far was drawing to a close...". There are a few people with way too much free time who have written their own complete books based on what they think OoP might be. You probably got one of those. But, if you're going to worry about it so much, why not just go buy the real book?

The Reasons Behind the Blockbuster Mentality

[Go Aptran]

Studios love a film like the Matrix Reloaded because it makes them far more money than something that takes time to build up an audience. Why? It's really simple.

They get 75 - 90% of the theater take during the opening weekend.

This figure drops down to 50% the next weekend and keeps going down week after week... IF the film lasts that long.

They are desperate for you to go see a film immediately so they can get the largest possible cut of your $10, get you out the door and get that new "blockbuster" in the theater two weeks later.

Think about it! Not only do they get less and less the longer a film is in the theaters... but something that builds slowly and sticks around for a long time keeps NEW product from coming out in as many locations.

As a result, quality, complexity, and artistry suffers... and the marketing of the film becomes the most important part of the process. A film has to be flashy enough to get them in but not good enough to make them stick around.

Why do YOU think theater chains are going broke even though they charge $5 for a small soda that contains 10 cents worth of product?

in defense of the Hulk movie

[uncadonna]

I may be in the minority, but I thought The Hulk was a wonderful movie, capturing the feel of the Marvel Silver Age perfectly and exploring interesting new comix inspired visualization techniques. I think this movie will be remembered long after the Spiderman and Batman movies are forgotten. I also think it's a work that understands and uses technology both as theme and as tool brilliantly.

Not to say the NYT article wasn't interesting.

unworkable

[alizard]

What's a good guy going to do about the Hollywood entertainment cartel?

I don't think Rowlings is going to turn Harry Potter into Rambo, or that the audience would go for a happy ending full of burning buildings and either corpses or people screaming in death agony.

Come to think of it, I'd find that entertaining.

Hit's only not that much to worry about

[SuperKendall]

The great thing about Apple's store is that you can preview every song, not just the hits (much better than Amazon where you can only preview half a CD)... and take a hint from the most popular downloads what are likely to be the best (not necessarily the ones with the most radio play) songs. That aspect alone really helps musicians sell quality songs, not just blockbusters... and also helps weed out the utter crap.

I don't know if you saw the leaked results from the independent musicians meeting with Apple, but around 50% of the purchases were whole albums. That's another great indication that the movement to single song sales will not necessarily mean the elimination of the album as art form.

RE: concerns of people only buying "hits"

[King_TJ]

Actually, I think Apple's music store has a built-in (if un-intended) protection against people only buying the "hit" songs and missing out on possible great tunes on the rest of an album.

They usually sell complete albums of songs for much less than it would cost you to buy each song individually for 99 cents.

When you find even 2 songs you like on a given album, you often think "Hmm.... spend about $2.00 for just 2 songs - or get all 12-13 tracks for between $6 and $10?" If you end up only listening to half of the stuff, it was still a fair deal that way.