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Torrent-Only Movie Denied IMDb Listing
An anonymous reader writes "A film set to be released for free via BitTorrent has been denied a listing in the Internet Movie Database. The Tunnel is currently in production and despite pleas from the makers, IMDb won't allow it on their site. The creators of this horror movie believe that because they have shunned an official distributor and chosen a BitTorrent model instead, this has put them at a disadvantage with the Amazon-owned site."
IMDB has a very clear rule requiring traditional distribution in order to make their site. Search for your favorite podcast there, even if it comes from CBS-owned CNET or Comcast's G4, and you get comical results of other uses of the words in the title with the exception of only those that had TV runs at some point in the past. TV shows are allowed on the site, but saddled with a "(TV)" mark every time the title is mentioned in the DB.
IMDB's purpose for living currently is a place for Amazon to collect data on video entertainment products that more likely than not will eventually show up as a product Amazon is going to carry. Even if you've got a huge budget, if you're going to go for non-studio Internet downloads, you're not going to end up in Amazon's catalog and offend the big media types that IMDB depends on.
Don't like it? Create your own directory of legal download video projects and lock big content out unless they embrace the download format. Better yet, help people download their picks onto whatever device they want. Oh, wait, that's MediaFly.
On the plus side, they'll now get way more publicity than if the IMDB guys weren't dicks. Perhaps they'll even make the popular news.
Global Frequency, anyone?
I love IMDB for keeping track of movies I've seen but they have some really annoying policies around what gets included. How is this any different than the 60 or Funny Or Die movies in IMDB right now? http://www.imdb.com/company/co0215655/ I don't think any of those have gotten anything other than web streaming distribution.
A while back I thought I'd add a few obscure short Russian films that are included on a DVD set I have. Mostly fascinating propaganda from the 1950s or so. About half of the films are in IMDB. I spent a good hour or so using their ancient and difficult to use system entering all of the data that I could find which was relatively substantial. Go figure, they actually had a lot of production information in the credits for the main one I wanted to submit. So I put all the data in, got the e-mail that said OK we'll take a look! Waited. Waited. Got another automated e-mail saying well you don't have enough information. Please add more. So I tried to clean things up a bit. Waited.. Waited.. finally got an e-mail saying Well, sorry, none of our staff have looked at this yet, and don't expect them to. Resubmit with more information if you want us to maybe consider it. !!!
What do they want?? There's tons of movies in there that don't even have things like director and producer credits much less acting credits. After that I just don't see the point in trying to help.
I feel bad for these guys with this torrent movie. Can't imagine they'll get very far on their own with them.
I guess the real argument is what is considered a Production. Surely if the movie is of the quality as many B titles the means of distribution are irrelevant.
That said, the flip side is a IMDB that is littered with amazing Productions such as "Football to the Groin" and "Cat Gets Tasered, In Bathtub"
I guess for some of us the real IMDB will be reduced to .NFO files and their summary. That'll learn em' :O
Last I checked, Musicbrainz wouldn't allow this sort of thing either. Mind you, specifically I was asking about bittorrent 'compiliations' of pre-existing material where, arguably, the set and ordering chosen results in a new work. I'm not sure if they would allow a torrent-only album under 'other' under the current practices:
http://wiki.musicbrainz.org/ReleaseType [musicbrainz.org]
But at least Musicbrainz is rather 'open' and allows dissent among the community on such topics--this leads to the obvious question, then: why isn't there a centralized 'open' metadata database like this for *all* forms of media: music, scores, movies, television, books, magazines, journal articles, encyclopedias, video games,etc...
Hasn't stopped them from listing The Guild. I'm sure there's others. Screw you, Amazon.
If it doesn't come out in theaters, it's a home movie, not a real motion picture.
In one universe, digital distribution is an unholy force that costs the world eight billion jobs every year and funds terrorism.
In the other universe, digital distribution doesn't exist at all and is no more potent a force than than a barely perceptible breeze.
I look up movies on wikipedia, anyhow.
this has put them at a disadvantage with the Amazon-owned site.
That explains why the site has been getting so "design" heavy it is almost unusable. It can only be viewed with flash and javascript blocking.
Did "The Hunt for Gollum" and "Born of Hope" make it to the big theatres? They are on IMDB.
If people can login via OpenID, they can use their google account or their yahoo account or other accounts.
Are you really purposely introducing flaws in your own database? Is it not a movie? Does it not have actors, grips and sundry?
Slashdot, where armchair scientists get shouted down and armchair theologians get modded up.
They have to draw the line somewhere. The bittorrent angle is a red herring. If they don't establish some meaningful threshold, then they have a pretty big universe of material to apply resources to, considering that we've seen quite a revolutionary amount of video works of independent origin in the past few years.
...idiots or trying to drum up publicity (my bet is the second).
Really - IMDB can't do what they want them to and remain a reliable source of movie information. IMDB clearly told them what was needed: be at a late enough period of production or at release so they can tell it isn't simply a hobby or publicity stunt or have a major publisher sign off. So they resubmitted without *any* of that happening and *gasp* got rejected each time! I mean, there is only one explanation right - they are protecting Amazon.com business of selling movies!!!!!! BitTorrent is a *distribution method*, not a distributor. They are following their rules for self published movies and those are in place for a reason. It's like complaining that a CentOS repository will not take your half baked project like sourceforge would - after all you have other half baked projects that made it! It's not some grand conspiracy, they list professionally made published movies and some publishers are reliable enough that they allow them to "pre-publish" information. Any other database that is looking for a similar reputation (again, take a community accepted CentOS repository) and they have to do the same thing. Nothing wrong with either way and there is place for both, but do not expect one striving for the higher reputation to take anything.
Further this is what you pay publishers to do and is the tradeoff one pays for saving that money. To use another computer analogy no reason you can't self publish your own x.509 certificate, set up a secure server, and rely totally on that. Just do not complain when people do not trust it like they would a certificate signed by Verisign - you are not really paying for the distribution, you are paying for the trust and connections that the publisher (or CA) has. Lots of examples there too - have your home for sale by owner? You aren't going to get the ability to advertise like a real-estate agent would. Service your own equipment? The place you purchased your items from aren't going to refund your money because you hit something with a hammer you were not supposed too. Yea, they have a few other movies with them but I bet they were not added unless: the movie was released, at the end of production, or had a publisher backing it. Even then one has to note the number of movies that are "in production" and never make it, by that observation the standards are already low.
IMDB is *not* looking to be a repository for information on any and all movies out there (they aren't looking to be a sourceforge of movies, they are looking to be a community wide accepted CentOS repository). Yea, some "real" movies may very well end up with much worse production values than this one - but they aren't going to take your word for it. If they release a quality movie and IMDB refuses *then* lets blast them, until then these guys are only marginally better then me submitting my upcoming movie to IMDB.
------- Sorry about the spelling, I suffer from two problems. Dyslexia makes it difficult to spell well, lazy makes it
Defining what is a "real motion picture" by whether or not a handful of companies decide to play it is not the best option. I fully support capitalism, but for it to work, we must be able to move beyond reasoning that the level at which something is marketed is the definition of it's quality.
Media companies practically have an oligarchy, and people have been eating it up. However, as they pump out more trash, the people seek more substance. When comapanies want control, users want usability. In a time when economies are low and tech is high, I feel that people will reach more and more for technology and a community module for entertainment.
Currently, I don't go to theaters, so what comes out in them means little to me. I also don't spend much time in the video rental stores for the same reason: there's nothing there that interests me these days. I find that I have better luck finding good content on the internet. I'm probably a minority now, but I see that sentiment growing.
There are 10 commandments: 01)Thou shalt love the Lord Thy God 10)Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.Matt22:34-40
IMDB requires indie films be released before they are listed.
http://www.imdb.com/help/show_leaf?titleeligibility
This movie isn't out yet. He can submit the movie for inclusion once it comes out.
Is there no website that won't fall for a fake outrage story like this one? Is it really this easy to manipulate "new media"?
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
No public API, only some ambiguous statement saying they *might* be willing to license you you for at least $10,000, maybe, if they are feeling ok about it that is.
There needs to be an open web platform that does what IMDB does, but allows it's information to be used freely. While I can understand there needs to be a standard as to what get's in, not including something solely because it's internet distribution only shows that though they exist on the net, they don't really care for it. We deserve better.
Torrent-distributed movie that vows never to be sold in stores denied listing at online retail giant's movie database. We've got a team working on the story overnight and will have complete details on tomorrow's Wicked Early News, we start now a half hour earlier than before normal people wake up.
IMDB is ripe for being made redundant, or at least there is room for someone else to fill in where they've left off.
Been there, done that, paid for the T-shirt
and didn't get it
Pre-release PR. Mmmm ...
"Tongue tied and twisted, just an Earth bound misfit
IMDB is full of films that have no distributor at all...
there's a lot of fly-by-night, never-see-the-light-of-day films (some of which i've got a credit on IMDB for working on).
how is this different? if an independent film is in production it quite often will not have a distributor, and i can name a ton of movies that still had IMDB listings while looking for distribution.
i don't get this at all. i think there's more to it than TFA is letting on.
If anyone who decides to torrent a home movie could add to IMDB the site would, in my opinion, become less useful. If I want to wade through cruft I'll search with google.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
If it doesn't come out in theaters, it's a home movie, not a real motion picture.
Some of what has hit the theaters have been little more than home movies.
IMDb's head of public relations and marketing said the company would "review this specific case", but brushed off the producers' claims of bias.
"To the contrary, we already list many titles that were initially or solely distributed online and/or via BitTorrent," Emily Glassman wrote in an email from Seattle, where the company is based.
"As a pioneering internet company - we are celebrating our 20th anniversary on 17 October! - we are fully aware of and totally embrace digital distribution."
I know of 2 fan made ghostbuster files that are not for sell (download only that are listed on IMDB
Freddy VS Ghostbusters (only 35 min so prob should not be counted as a movie :P) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0439576/
and
Return of the Ghostbusters http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1230164/
if they got listed then, I don't see why this movie can't be
A legal snapshot of IMDB was contributed to AmiNet in 2004: http://aminet.net/misc/imdb
Imagine if this exact same article were written, but instead of "torrent-only", it said "Youtube-only". Are there Youtube-only full-length movies of good quality that probably should be listed in major movie DB sites? Yes. For every one of those, however, there's thousands upon thousands that really shouldn't. A database of everything ever filmed with a camera would be utterly useless, because all of your searches would return mountains of crap you don't care about.
The question then is, "what standardized set of rules gets as many real movies as possible, while including as few videos as possible that really aren't production-quality, full-length movies?" IMDBs answer is "must have been shown in a theater, either the normal kind or the film festival kind". This is obviously a flawed model, since as others have pointed out already, there's 5 minute Funny or Die shorts in there, and there's many full-length movies of at least B movie quality that aren't.
Many are saying someone should make a better site than IMDB, and it's not a bad idea. If you're thinking of actually doing it though, you need to answer that question in a way that works. I personally can't think of a standard, but there likely IS a much better one than what IMDB uses. The challenge of course, more so than actually making a better site, is to come up with that standard.
I always wondered why imdb had such a gawd awful design. I guess that explains it.
Take what ye can. Give nothing back!
Open data, open API. What more do you want?
I have a short film that's listed on IMDb and I have a personal listing there because of having written/directed it, so I've dealt with IMDb. I can tell you that it's not easy to get on their. They don't communicate with people very well. And their rating system is frequently "gamed" by people to hurt films. So I'm not crazy about them and can sympathize that they're not easy to deal with. However, it's VERY clear that there are fairly simple criteria by which IMDb determines what is a legit film. You can distribution or you can get your film into legit festivals. If you choose to exist outside of that system, IMDb has no reason to believe you're a real filmmaker. They don't pass artistic judgement. They simply say that you have to meet certain criteria to be listed. If they didn't do that, how in the world would they determine what to list? As someone who's been around the indie film world for awhile now, I can tell you that there are THOUSANDS of wannabes who are trying to get listed in order to get some credibility. So I believe the producers of this film are whiners who need to simply shut up. Of course, they might very well KNOW that they have zero chance of getting listed on IMDb, so getting geeks riled up about something on torrent not getting respect might be their real PR strategy. Either way, they seem like amateurs at best.
We have released two indie feature films under Creative Commons licenses through Mininova using BitTorrent, and both have been listed on the IMDb. In both cases we had a very limited screening - you just rent somewhere large enough and do your own screening, that's perfectly valid. In both cases, that was enough for our flicks to get listed. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1265599/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1334226/
www.zombieapocalypse.tv
We submitted our (The Amateur Monster Movie http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1717690/ ) zero budget film to be added IMDB a few times in the past while still doing principal photography. They denied it until we released our trailer and started getting more press coverage. We don't have any distribution deal (yet) or submitted it to any festivals.
I think if they just released a trailer and got more press (which Slashdot should fix) they will be added. I think it's a matter of them simply trying to avoid adding films that most likely will never be seen by anybody but the people involved in creating them.
Here is a link to our trailer in case your curious.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aZquMQhAmo
This hasn't.
http://www.imdb.com/help/show_leaf?titleeligibility
Once a movie is released, it's pretty easy it on from the "has been downloaded a large number of times from a site" criteria. This is surely how the funnyordie stuff got up there.
But the movie in question hasn't been released yet. So it can't meet those criteria. So it must wait a little bit longer.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Amazon is selling the IMDb as a marketing tool to Hollywood.
How?
Astro-turfing in the reviews section of the IMDb is not just allowed, (and I suspect, sold as a service to big film releases), but when you write a review pointing this out, that criticism vanishes. Or rather, it doesn't vanish, but only appears present to the IP address it came from while remaining invisible to the rest of the world.
Give it a try!
Next time a big block buster release comes out, head over to the IMDb in the first couple of days of release and after wading through the swamp of 10 star rave reviews, down to the bottom where the balanced reviews by real people are buried, and write your own pointing out that Amazon is selling favorable reviews to Hollywood marketing firms and that the movie in question probably sucks just badly enough to require the kind of manipulative push an astro-turfing tactic offers.
Then watch your review mysteriously vanish.
Go on! It's frustrating good times!
-FL
Why should they?
It's not an "non-traditional" conspiracy. "Sita Sings the Blues" is listed. But then, that movie actually exists (and it's free).
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1172203/
It can't be the reason as I know for a fact there are a few 'homemade'-movies which have imdb listings like cardboardman (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1730680/) and it has only got a youtube publication... But maybe the problem is, they still haven't released it.. And until they release it, it just doesn't exist to them.. Try again when it's actually finished (and ofcourse I don't blame them for that, otherwise imdb would be full of crap that is never finished.. And yes there are exceptions ofcourse when it comes to high profile production companies, but that's because they have a track record of actually producing the movies...
So I guess the makers of this movie should stop bitching and finish the movie first.. so many 'homemade' movies have started but never finished.. finish and release it and then submit it to imdb, then you'll certainly will get an entry...
this whole story seems more like a cry for attention...
write your own pointing out that Amazon is selling favorable reviews to Hollywood marketing firms and that the movie in question probably sucks just badly enough to require the kind of manipulative push an astro-turfing tactic offers.
Then watch your review mysteriously vanish.
You know, given that reviews are supposed to be reviews of the MOVIE in question and not rants about amazon's business tactics (even if they're rants that are factually accurate), I don't think this is actually a bad thing.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0274518/ So if GNFOS can make it in, why can't this movie? It's never been shown in theaters, sold, shown at a film festival and yet it has a spot on imdb.
IMDB started out as a really good idea. I used it not only to get film details but especially for the "user reviews" that were much better than any professional ones. Often insiders were contributers and the assessments were informative. Since they went commercial its usefulness has fallen off sharply and I rarely use it any more. I can find most of what I want to know, including better story-line details, at Wikipedia. The reviews are reasonable at Rotten Tomatoes, but that may be the only thing I really miss. NetFlix reviews can partially fill that space, too.
Sita Sings The Blues has an internet-only publication, and is listed. This sounds like more of a non-story.
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
You know, given that reviews are supposed to be reviews of the MOVIE in question and not rants about amazon's business tactics (even if they're rants that are factually accurate), I don't think this is actually a bad thing.
Well. . , sheesh, you still review the film. Plenty of reviews there make reference to other reviews. In any case, what's worse? A bunch of fake reviews which deliberately try to mislead you, or a criticism of the fact that you're being misled?
-FL
pressure from the big traditional media sources and copyright Nazis , is once again trying to stifle a (not so)new distribution method. i think the actors guild, ASCAP, RIAA, and every other larg money hungry interest group, should shutdown their lawsuit factory and replace them with people that could figure out how to use these new technologies to their advantage to create new distribution methods,
FWIW, the open-source movie "Nasty Old People" is listed at IMDB http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1527679. This is available by torrent or download quite legally, as it is published under a Creative Commons license http://nastyoldpeople.org/. It's a surprisingly good movie, quite engaging and with a story relevant to modern society.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
The producers of this film look at you as a tiny wannabe. They are a large production studio out of Australia. You sir are the ankle biter that would kill for their catering budget to cover your entire next film AND your yearly salary.
Surprising that you claim you have a movie listed, but do not link to it. Plus you did not even read the article but simply echoing what 90 other people have echoed from their lack of education or knowledge. Pretty much betting you have nothing and are simply making it up to try and sound informative when you are in fact -2 troll or -2 uninformative.
There's some wiki thing I look at when I want to get info about a movie. But this movie wasn't listed there, either. So I guess maybe it's not a real movie.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/ is way better then IMDB for movie reviews
ie. Their ratings aren't done by 14 year-olds on a scale from"sucks" to "awesome" (although they have included "user ratings" in the last few weeks, ack)
No sig today...
Americans haven't heard of Henry V, but he's still got a history.
Shit, 'merkins don't know the rest of the world, but there's still "World History".
Having a history in the industry doesn't mean "Has to be known in the US".
IMDb is a community-built site, which Amazon is monetizing on.
And now, it is hindring its users apparently.
So, I guess it is time to fork IMDb, and make something like wikipedia out of it.
If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
Posted earlier today in the Sydney Morning Herald
They probably get hundreds (or more) of requests to list all kinds of screwy things every day, and this probably just flew under the radar of people who didn't take the time to do the due diligence of verifying that it's a real project that's well underway and that actually does have a good chance of being released and relevant. I suspect that with all of the attention, they'll probably change their mind in pretty short order and all will be well again. I find both the filmmaker's frustration and IMDB's reticence understandable. It is a valuable resource, and I don't want it trashed with every schmo who thinks that his kid's birthday party video should be listed.
Besides, as mentioned before, the publicity doesn't hurt, and IMDB did them a huge favor in an indirect way. I had never heard of the project before, but I think it's an awesome idea, one I've actually thought of and wished on many occasions that someone would take up. I hope they do awesome, and their project has motivated me to pitch in and buy some frames.
"Internet" Movie Database. Whatever. I only use databases of movies that come in bound form printed by reputable publishers, thank-you.
Sounds like the same crap that Wikipedia spouts about citations from news sources. I'm an expert in my field, and I know things because I've been doing it for 25 years - so when I make an edit, it gets undone because I don't have a puff piece written by a journalist to cite. It's as if they think the sum of human knowledge comes from the evening news, when it is quite clear most "news" is chum. IT moves to fast to disallow non-traditional sources to be used. It's ok though, the non-techies who don't "get" the modern world we live in are slowly dying off. This pleases me.
I just googled to see if wikipedia listed "The Tunnel", and the first google hit was IMDB! The second was a wikipedia article about a New York night club. The third was a trans-Hudson rail tunnel, #4 was the movie's web site.
Did the slashdot story get it listed? I'm at work, so of course torrentfreak is firewalled off. I doubt seriously if torrentfreak got it listed.
Free Martian Whores!
So whatever, I'm waiting for "IRON SKY," check youtube, you'll love it.
Every one of those examples you listed was sold on DVD. That's the very rule this article is about
Does "sold on DVD" have the ordinary meaning of the work being distributed to the public in copies playable on DVD players, or is it stricter? For example, once the film is finished, will a competently self-mastered DVD + short-run duplication + self-distribution count? Or does it have to be through a mainstream distributor?
Then why are films such as Song of the South listed if they have never been legitimately released on home video in Amazon's home country?
not easy to get on their what? And how do you "distribution" something?
Due to ever changing site format, requiring ever changing scrapers, MythTV, XBMC, and others have switched to recommending TMDB for similar and other reasons. IMDB isn't "open" any more...
-- PGP keyID: 0x4C95994D
themoviedb.org, at least, hasn't yet publicized its license terms, nor how people will be able to download its content in bulk form in order to "keep them honest". The history of trying to make money by closing what was open is quite long, now.
I do see that there is an open ticket concerning posting the licensing terms on the website. So I'm encouraged, at least for now.
They won't accept a MOVIE in a MOVIE database due to its distribution method, but yet they accept VIDEO GAMES from the early 1990's that were cartridge based and featured no video, no speech, no acting at all. Why is that?
(Caps used for emphasis. heh)
There are several films thai I know of that had no distribution but are listed on imdb. This must have been a recent change in policy. These are 8 & 16mm films.
Hi Fellow Slash Dotters, I'm an Executive Producer of the movie the Tunnel (So I'm getting a kick out of these replies). Less than 48 Hours after our story came to light on slashdot, IMDB's decision to reject our movie was REVERSED as of today, and we are now officially listed with a preproduction status! http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1735485/ The power of SLASHDOT!! A