Besieged Movie Industry Suffers Record Takings

nagora writes "The BBC is reporting that the movie industry, in yet another illustration of just how much damage the Internet is doing to the long-suffering members of the MPAA, has just endured a record breaking $1Billion dollar takings for the single month of June. Clearly there is a desperate need to tighten up copyright laws in the face of this huge mountain of cash that is literally being metaphorically syphoned into the studios' pockets. How will they survive? "

Comments

Funny

[TejWC]

Its funny to know that the Video Game industry is STILL bigger than the movie industry even after record breaking growth.

Re:I'm really curious...

[malefic]

I downloaded The Return of the King before it came out on DVD. But I also saw the movie in the theater opening day and three other times after that

See, if you hadn't downloaded it you would have gone to see the movie 5 times instead of only 4!! You owe them $8.50!!

Movies are worth it...

[Psymunn]

But there's that commercial with the guy whose the stuntman and... and... he goes through all that work and you can watch his movie with just a single click... and... P2P rapes 3rd world children...
I hate all these people trying to guilt trip me into thinking I'm a criminal because I download movies, even though I pay to see them in theatre, buy them if I think they are excellent, and then they turn around and make more money then i will ever see off of something like chronicles of riddik. I think for every Van Helsing (arguably the worst movie EVER) a person watches, they should be entitled to download 2 movies.
Not many people have watched teh Clerks cartoon, but it's worth it jsut for the scene where Randall brings every shitty movie director into court and demands, under oath, that they admit that 'star wars 1 sucked' or something to that effect.

Re:Movies are worth it...

[dasdrewid]

I downloaded that episode.

Then I bought the whole run of the series on DVD (It only took 2...)

You should see the episode of South Park where the George Lucas and Steven Spielberg release a special edition update of Indiana Jones, and it sucks so hard it rips their faces off like the scene from Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark. Very closely related. And really, really funny.

Re:If they don't stop making shit movies they won'

[garcia]

Sometimes they swing and miss.

SOMETIMES? You're fucking kidding me right? MONTHS at a time go by that I don't see a single movie that appeals to me. It's obvious that it isn't just me either as we see fantastic movies like The Butterfly Effect and Along Came Polly.

Those are obviously just "mistakes" right? Casts that include Ashton Kutcher as the star? Come on.

Re:But what's the possible amount?

[mopslik]

Say, what if they should've earned $10 billion, but only took in $1 billion.

A potential sale is not an actual sale, and cannot be accounted for as such.

It's often argued that those who DL movies would never have purchased tickets in the first place. Whether that's the case or not is up to you to decide.

Re:If they don't stop making shit movies they won'

[Anonymous Coward]

Who was the intended market? When you make a movie that costs millions of dollars you should expect to make at least you investment back. It's obvious that they didn't do that or they wouldn't be whining about piracy.

Re:What happened?

[eofpi]

The past 10 years have seen ticket prices near me double. I'm just glad prices on everything else haven't had the same rate of increase, as that would be dangerous levels of inflation.

Re:If they don't stop making shit movies they won'

[MenTaLguY]

90% of everything is crap.

Also, crap is relative.

Meanwhile, back in the music industry

[Thagg]

The LA Times has an interesting story today (registration required, sorry) about the Mexican music industry. It is in the process of being destroyed by piracy. I think that the movie industry is about five years behind the music industry in terms of the impact of downloading, mostly because the file size is so much higher. It will happen, though. Note well that that Harry Potter film that they are talking about cost about $120 million to make, as opposed to a record which might cost about $1 million. That money has to be recovered or the movie will not be made. Movies will, of course, continue to be made when piracy becomes rampant, but they will be dramatically different. They will be far cheaper, and will be filled with product placement. Hopefully, I'll be retired by that point. thad

Slashdot logic

[rd_syringe]

"Piracy has nothing to do with sales losses! There is absolutely no correlation. Remember, 'correlation does not equal causation.' You're just making crap content, and that's why people aren't buying it. Let's ignore the question of why someone would download something if it sucked."

"Well, well! Sales are up! Just like I've been arguing all along, piracy affects sales. There is a direct connection between piracy and sales, and the more piracy, the better."

The funny part is that all this argument still ignores the fact that it doesn't fucking matter if you college dorm room pirates think piracy helps or hurts anything--it's not legal and it's not ethical for you to take it upon yourselves to violate somebody's rights. Yes, believe it or not, content creators have rights to the property they make. I know, it's such a crazy idea and all.

Re:If they don't stop making shit movies they won'

[TopShelf]

As I remember, we used to outlaw leg shots ("traps"), as they were too easy. If you were hit either too high or too low, you'd call "heads" or "traps", and unless there was a huge disagreement, play carried on...

Re:It makes me want to ask...

[mst76]

> Very comfortably, on a big pile of money.

I've tried this once. It was not quite as comfortable as you imagine.

FWIW: wrong index

[mblase]

Counting the number of dollars made is pointless, because (1) inflation isn't taken into account and (2) blockbusters cost more and more to make every year, mainly as a consequence of (1).

Even adjusting for inflation is a tricky business, though. The more important thing to consider, if you're the MPAA, is the number of tickets sold The number of people paying for movie tickets, regardless of how much they paid, gives you a clear idea of whether the movie industry is losing customers to the Internet or not.

Fortunately, the numbers still support the "not" conclusion. A review of yearly movie ticket sales shows that while ticket sales haven't increased every year for the past two decades, overall they've continued to climb -- even through the 80s when cable television was becoming massively widespread.

Re:For those that didn't read the article

[e40]

I just saw Spider Man 2 the other day. $10. Wow. That's the first time I paid that much (SF Bay Area). That's about $2 more than I paid last time (I don't see a lot of movies). Perhaps this is why revenue is up, they're charging more?

Re:But what's the possible amount?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have an infant, and a broadband connection, and no family in the area to babysit.. I know I wouldn't have purchased tickets for a theatrical showing, but I might have been willing to pay for the ability to watch them at home...

The lost war of RIAA/MPAA

[N3wsByt3]

The IFPI/RIAA/MPAA is fighting a lost cause. And I think they know it.

First off all, I have difficulties with their acclaimed 'stealing' of music/movies/etc.. As far as I know, stealing implies that the one that has been stolen has been derived of something. When you take a copy, you do not take the original away, thus they have not 'lost' anything. They might claim that they loose money when ppl d/l music, but even that is far from certain. Not only is it not shown statistically to have had that effect (they didn't even show a correlation thusfar - see aussie music-news - let alone a causality). Furthermore, in an individual case, they would have to show they actually lost revenue. Which is far from said, because I sure know some guys who d/l music or movies, but would NEVER have bought that music if they were unable to d/l it. So, how did the RIAA/IFPI/MPAA loose revenue, exactly? And if they didn't lose anything, how can the term 'stealing' apply?

It would still be copyright-infringement, ofcourse, but that's another matter. I think maybe it's time we went beyond our current system of copyrights and walk into the era of cyberspace. With the industrial revolution, patents and copyrights knew a high flight, maybe it's time to let it leave and try something new? Maybe something in the lines of this: fairshare (http://freenetproject.org/index.php?page=fairshar e).

And don't worry, contrary to what the RIAA claims, musicians will not starve to death, and music-making will not stop. We had music long before we had copyrights, and we will have music long after copyrights have vanished from the scene.

And lastly, it's something that *can not* be stopped. P2P progs and their development act as organisms that follow the darwinian rules of survival. When Napster was 'killed' by the RIAA, immediately others (like kazaa) took over, being more resistent to attacks from the RIAA&co. Whenever kazaa will be shut down, others again will take over. When endusers are targeted, systems that protect the user will become dominant (like FreeNet).

It really is a lost cause. But then again, they are not truelly battling for the survival of musicians (as I said; they will survive, just as they used to do), it's for their OWN survival they are fighting. There is no way in hell they are going to keep the giant profits that they have been gathering for the last decades.

But ultimately, they will have to do what P2P systems are already doing: adapt to the new circumstances (and forget about the former levels of profit), or whither and die.

Re:The lost war of RIAA/MPAA

[James Turpin]

Copyrights, like patents, imply an exclusive right. What is lost is the exclusiveness of their right to copy. In theory they have no profit margin without this exclusivity, and without a profit margin they can not justify taking risks by producing new music.

In practice, as long as nobody else is allowed to market the music for profit, the copyright holder is still the only person selling a legitimate collector's item. As a result, he will still have a profit margin even with P2P downloads, for much the same reason that Star Wars still sells merchandise after airing their show on television for anybody to record with a VCR.

It can be argued that allowing non-commercial reproduction increases the profits for the industry because their music get wider exposure and people will buy more of their collector's items. However, if that was really the case then any one of the music recording companies could in theory increase their market share by setting-up a server to allow free downloads of their own music. Since they are not doing this despite a profit motive, it can be reasonably assumed that their market research does not support this reasoning. For somebody to use this argument to rationalize their own actions is presumptuous.

Re:The lost war of RIAA/MPAA

[N3wsByt3]

Well, besides being correct in my statements, it's always fun to rant against RIAA & consorts! ;-)

Find legislative solutions instead...ermm...right. I'm not kidding myself in thinking I can just force new legislation, certainly not when there are big corporations set on going the way of making the laws more restrictive. In an ideal state maybe this would be possible, but in reality we all know that corporate lobbying, greed, corruption and the might of money often have a long arm in politics.

The only thing I can do is suggest things, and this is what I did (see fairshare). I could also imagine lifting a broader internet-related tax, much as is done (in my country, anyway) for empty carriers, to compensate artists for the loss of private copies. As a counterweight, digital media not bound on a phisical carrier should remain free for personal and non-commercial use.

Ofcourse, there is no way in hell that the RIAA & co could make the same profits of that, but it DOES show you (and some - alas small - political parties have already suggested the same) that it is possible to have other ways of dealing with the issue, instead of criminalising people for it.

So...are you joining the lobbying efort now? ;-)

"If you want to find technological means to make outdated laws more unenforceable, go ahead." :-)

*cough*

Well, as a side-effect of the main goal of free speech, you may mean something like www.freenetproject.org, perhaps?

"After all, if the law was really as obsolete as you say, nobody should be getting caught breaking it, so there's no reason to rant."

I'm not getting that. If it was really obsolete, there is no reason to rant? Ermm...me thinks that IS just a reason to rant.

If it was obsolete, nobody should get caught? Ermm...how do you figger that? Women got caught a lot, before it wasn't illegal anymore to choose for an abortion. In fact, I know of few laws, even when totally obsolete, that didn't catch the 'perpetrators' before those laws finally were adapted or declared void - especially when vested interests of corporations were at stake.

And while they were being caught, most of those people ranted against those that obstructed the laws of being adapted.

So, I'm really puzzled by your last sentence.

Movies and theatres are the suck

[demo9orgon]

Maybe I'm getting old and pissed off, but since I went to see "Return of the King" with the family I haven't bothered stepping foot into a movie theatre.

There's nothing which will draw me back there of my own free will. To be considered a criminal, to sit in a theatre seat and be watched in order to protect someone's interest over watching a movie.
A movie.
A movie isn't so precious that I have to be a criminal to watch it.

I'll wait for the DVD and enjoy it in private.
Since I play computer games and program all the damn time, it's not as if I'm starved for something to do.

I'd pay good money to sit in a theatre and see a thousand miles of film knotted up and ran through the guts and butts of a hundred lawyers and MPAA executives for all the excretions of their efforts. It's the least they could do to atone for the suffering and comminseration they're putting people through.
It would be a bonus if the lovely ladies of "Women of Sodom" would officiate the show.
(Cue the "priceless" commercial spot)

Downloaders Creedo

[StarWreck]

Becuase of the actions of the RIAA, a sort of "Downloaders Creedo" has been developed. Since the actions by the MPAA are slightly less offensive, they will prosper under the Downloaders Creedo.

Music:
1. Don't buy ANY RIAA music, EVER! (riaaradar.com)
2. Download all RIAA Music for FREEEEEEEEE!
3. Pay for any non-RIAA music

Movies:
1. Download all movies for FREEEEEEE!
2. If you like the download, buy the movie.
(You'll find yourself buying even more movies than you would had downloading never been invented).

The real question is -

[t_allardyce]

How much longer before hollywood totally runs out of ideas? At the moment they're getting an average of about 0.2 original ideas per year from the mainstream industry but experts are predicting that the worlds supply of film ideas could run out as soon as 2006. Remakes have helped stretch the supply but already an IP crisis is looming. Movie studios however are confident that they have the reserves to meet consumer demand for the time being: they're using sequals, prequals, adaptations, book-to-films, comic-to-films, even old saturday morning cartoon-to-films to keep supply levels up. Recent writing-pool technology has even allowed combinations of comic-to-films and sequels as seen by Spiderman 2 and ofcourse the less environmentally friendly 'trillogy' which generally closes the door to additional sequals later on. Some say we already reached the point of no-ideas between 2000 and 2003 with the releases of Scooby-Do and Scary Movie 3 but others are more optimistic, suggesting that we can recylce remakes in another 20 years - remaking The Italian Job or Titanic for example could go on indefinately.

I hate going to the movies

[geek]

I prefer cold toilet seats and dentist chairs. I do however make the trek out for special events, like Matrix movies, Star Wars and Harry Potter flicks.

I don't see the appeal anymore. You're locked into a cold room with uncomfortable chairs that don't recline, kids behind you kicking your chair, yelling etc. Some fat lady with 2 huge tubs of popcorn talking at full volume on her cell phone. I went to see LotR: The Two Towers last year and a full on fight broke out in the seats behind me.

I have a 65" HDTV in my living room with 5.1 surround sound. I'd rather spend 20$ or less on a nice DVD with good reviews 5-6 months after it's theatre debut than spend 40-50$ at the theatre. Until they can tempt me into coming back I won't go. This would be the same if all I had was a little 20" TV in my bedroom and played DVD's on my xbox. It's still better than sticky floors, seats with missing arm rests, rude people and over priced sweet tarts. I can make popcorn for 30 cents at home, I don't need to pay 3.50$ at the threatre.

Re:Kill MPAA, RIAA the right way

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

I don't think the MPAA's profits make it right or wrong

Maybe it does. Copyright isn't just a right given to people for their pleasure. Let me quote a well known document

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;

So we have to ask - does a 'loss' of earnings from 'piracy' hinder this Progress. If it does not, then one has to start questioning if it is wrong. This is quite different from other kinds of property rights which are exist as an end in themselves.

Literally being metaphorically siphoned?

[Martin Blank]

How the hell can something be literally done if it's being metaphorically done?

Must Be Nice...

[severed]

Wow, that's a whole lot of money those guys are making. I guess it really does pay to sue everyone, and buy off lawmakers to pass a whole bunch of insane laws, and basically be a dick.

Meanwhile, I'm a small independent movie producer, I don't back the MPAA, region encoding, or CSS. I am even a big supporter of fair use... and I can't even get a booth at a hacker convention. But don't worry, the guys who advocate downloading my film over buying a copy got a space...

Don't get me wrong, on my website we pretty much encourage people to download our film, because the way things are going, we don't have any other means of distributing it. But I love how everything is about the P2P networks versus the Hollywood Big Boys. You know, there are still independent movie producers out there... we just don't get any attention from anyone. I guess the only way you get noticed anymore is if you make a big scandal about how Disney won't distribute your flick...

I think I'll go see if the MPAA is hiring...

Re:If they don't stop making shit movies they won'

[|/|/|||]

Outlawing leg shots seems like a pretty dumb rule. Too easy? What, is jumping also against the rules?

I always thought outlawing head shots was just cruel. You get tagged in the head, your glasses cut your nose, and you have to stay in? ;D

Dodgeball was always one of my favorite games for some reason. I guess because I always sucked at any kind of team coordination. It's one of those games that really gives you incentive to try, too - do you remember the feeling of panic when an opponent was aiming for you at close range? Or when you were the only person left on your side? I had a PE teacher in high school that thought it was funny to throw in a couple extra volleyballs once there were only a few "dodgers" left. Fun game.

Re:If they don't stop making shit movies they won'

[NanoGator]

"There is absolutely No justification for stealing, regardless of the quality of the product."

I'd agree with that except for a couple of things.

1.) If somebody's spending >24 hours downloading a questionable quality movie for the sake of saving a few bucks, it is a true indication that ticket prices are too high.

2.) There is no guarantee of quality or satisfaction. Trailers can lie to get you to see the movie, but you can't get a refund if it really sucks. (Boy, imagine if they had a refund policy back when Godzilla came out.)

It may be immoral to download and watch movies without paying anything blah blah blah, but it's a powerful expression of supply and demand that we (the consumers) have. The mere fact that Hollywood is thriving illustrates the point that there is SOMETHING wrong with what they're doing, but people are still willing to spend money.

I really wish Hollywood would just listen to why people would jump through so many hoops to download a movie and figure out what to do to compete with that instead of trying to buy senators to change the laws. Only then would they know that Rob Schnider is a money repellent.

Re:shameless plagarism

[PsiPsiStar]

Actually, he was pointing out a flaw in your analogy. Intellecutal property is not real property and copying it is not 'theft.' It is intellectual property infringement, which is treated differently under the law for very valid reasons.

Your meaning, of course, was that just because a store can 'afford' to be stolen from, stealing from it is still not justified. His point was that, unlike real theft, intellectual property infringement can sometimes be of monetary benefit to the 'injured' party, a crucial point since damages for intellectual property infringement are based largely on harm done due to the infringement.

You never really addressed his point that some forms of IP infringement can be helpful to the injured party. Calling an argument 'outdated' doesn't really carry any force unless you can give some point to explain why the argument is 'outdated.' In the cases of small bands and niche markets, free publicity is crucial and these folks aren't too strict about enforcing their IP rights, out of self interest. Of course, with major bands and large movies it's less important since these folks can buy their publicity wholesale and don't want alternate means of distribution that could compete with their theaters and video stores, whom they have a snuggly relationship with.

I'll give you one example (among many). I make Anime Music Videos. I do this by ripping material from DVDs and turning them into music videos. Because of this hobby of mine, I've spent about $150 on obscure DVDs in the past few years. I've gotten hooked on a series or two (try Wolf's Rain) from watching pirated dvds online.

you wouldn't really do that because disagreeing with the fact that breaking intellectual property laws is healthy for commerce would require you to be illogical and therefore irrelavent.

5 negatives in one sentance. All I have to say is Wow! (Or maybe 'huh?')

How much different can it get?

[presarioD]

Hmm let's see. Typical American Movie scenario:

1) Bad guy committs atrocious act of violence/injustice to some innocent/good guys close/related to the main Hero/Good guy.

2) Hero/Good guy suffers immensely throughout this, reaching deeper and deeper levels of self criticism/blame suffocating in a moral/psychological decadence.

3) Hero/Good guy eventually rebounds and starts chasing Bad guy.

4) Hero/Good guy gets a chance to fight Bad guy.

5) Bad guy dies (generally multiple times) a horrible and violent death.

6) Hero/Good guy gets the girl/money/both and lives happily ever after.

7) (Potentially) Curse at yourself for paying money to see this again?


Well how much can you push this to make money out of it? It's happening more than 3 decades now, eventually it will collapse or mutate. No wonder Blockbuster has expanded the foreign film section to a whole isle!

Re:I feel even MORE screwed

[commodoresloat]

Interesting thing about those ads is that every last one of the people portrayed whining about piracy has already gotten paid long before the feature comes out and thus long before piracy can even be an issue. They don't wait to see how many people come to the theater before they pay the key grip or the costume designer. So the entire premise of the advertisement is bogus.

Potential copyright violation on MPAA site

[westendgirl]

It appears that the MPAA runs RespectCopyrights.org, a site designed to explain the evils of downloading videos. I noticed that the site links to an LA Times article called "Hollywood deals with piracy , a wary eye on CDs". However, although the article's copyright (LA Times) is noted, no other citation details are provided. You'd expect to find the full publication date, page, month and date. More importantly, you'd expect a disclaimer such as "Reprinted with permission from the LA Times" or "Official reprint: LA Times". I work in marketing and, in every case where I've reprinted an article, I've had to include such details (and pay a hefty reprint fee). The article on the MPAA site doesn't even provide a link to the LA Times site, so that users could obtain original copies -- this is a major marketing faux pas. And the article's title "THE BIG PICTURE PATRICK GOlDSTEIN" and subhead "Hollywood deals with piracy , a wary eye on CDs" contain punctuation mistakes, which might make you wonder about the care taken by the person making the reprint. Finally, the page ends with a copyright notice from the MPAA -- not one that says "Trademarks and copyrights from other sources belong to their original owners...." Although disclaimers are not necessary for copyright to take effect, you'd expect the MPAA to take particular care.

These apparent errors lead me to wonder about the status of this LA Times article. Did the MPAA gain permission? If the MPAA did obtain permission, why didn't they provide the full citation details? Why didn't they modify their own copyright for the page?

I'm considering asking the MPAA about this article, but I thought I'd let Slashdotters know about the incident first. It's possible that the MPAA has the right permissions, but you would think they'd try to set a good example in how they provide the reprint. MPAA's anti-piracy for US consumers is 1-800-NO-COPYS and hotline@mpaa.org. I live in Canada, so I'll try emailing.

Re:Preaching to the choir

[Programmer_In_Traini]

Geez man, are you going through male menopause or something ?

Share your point of view if you want, it'll be my pleasure to read your comments but don't come here to put some shit on my head. ...especially when we know that in the /. community, most irritating comments are made by 18 years old kiddos.

Despite the tone you used, you have point, the fact that they still get A LOT of money does not justify or make any less worst the act of pirating a movie.

But, in the end, it all comes back to what I said in an earlier post about the RIAA

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=108810&cid=9 24 8421

intead of discouraging me to pirate, encourage me to buy.

gimme a reason to buy your product and I'll do it.

I feel sorry for the music/movie industry for the money they lose but its all about evolution. Internet is here and changes a lot of thing, those who cannot adapt will undoutedbly lose money...if not their skin.

Internet is about sharing, its about knowledge, information. That cannot, will not be stopped, anytime soon anyway so MPAA and RIAA might as well get used to it.

They need to change their business model. Like I said, its sad for them because its not the quality of their product or anything related to them that triggered the situation.

But that's how it is and they need to adapt.