Hollywood Studios Fuming Over Indie Studio Deal With BitTorrent

silentbrad sends this quote from TheWrap: "'It's a deal with the devil,' one studio executive [said]. 'Cinedigm is being used as their pawn.' Cinedigm announced this weekend that it would offer the first seven minutes of the Emily Blunt-Colin Firth indie Arthur Newman exclusively to BitTorrent users, which number up to 170 million people.... Hollywood studios have spent years and many millions of dollars to protect their intellectual property and worry that by teaming up with BitTorrent, Cinedigm has embraced a company that imperils the financial underpinnings of the film business and should be kept at arm's length. 'It's great for BitTorrent and disingenuous of Cinedigm,' said the executive. 'The fact of the matter is BitTorrent is in it for themselves, they're not in it for the health of the industry.' Other executives including at Warner Brothers and Sony echoed those comments, fretting that Cinedigm had unwittingly opened a Pandora's box in a bid to get attention for its low-budget release. ... 'Blaming BitTorrent for piracy is like blaming a freeway for drunk drivers, ' Jill Calcaterra, Cinedigm's chief marketing officer said. 'How people use it can be positive for the industry or it can hurt the industry. We want it help us make this indie film successful.' ... 'We'll be working with all of [the studios] one day,' [Matt Mason, BitTorrent's vice president of marketing] said. 'It's really up to them how quickly they come to the table and realize we're not the villain, we're the heroes.'"

Comments

and WHO are the movie studios in it for, us?

[d00m.wizard]

really?

Re:and WHO are the movie studios in it for, us?

[interkin3tic]

I'm astonished that the studio executives own intestines didn't spring forth and strangle the man for such blatant hypocrisy. I'm astonished that politicians aren't on television right now saying "Yeah, that's some pot/kettle 'black' shit right there. I'm astonished any reporter he was talking to didn't kick him in the balls. I mean, I probably would have done all those things. Simultaneously in fact.

Re:and WHO are the movie studios in it for, us?

[AlphaWolf_HK]

The Screen Actors Guild is really uptight about making sure that every actor everywhere is in their union, to the point of fining its members if they perform in the same piece as an actor that isn't part of that union. I wouldn't be surprised if they tried to kill this either, namely because indie studios might be more likely to stay away from that union because they can't afford to pay what any of its members demand.

Re:and WHO are the movie studios in it for, us?

[ShieldW0lf]

The Screen Actors Guild is really uptight about making sure that every actor everywhere is in their union, to the point of fining its members if they perform in the same piece as an actor that isn't part of that union. I wouldn't be surprised if they tried to kill this either, namely because indie studios might be more likely to stay away from that union because they can't afford to pay what any of its members demand.

If that leads to a series of entertaining films coming out that don't contain any members of the Screen Actors Guild, they're really going to be up shit creek.

Re:and WHO are the movie studios in it for, us?

[Anonymous Coward]

Unions are in it for money, you can just stop there. They don't give a rat's ass about conditions anymore.

Honestly?

[DiSKiLLeR]

Honestly? A deal with the movie studios (or any of the recording studios) is a deal with the devil.

I applaud Cinedigm for giving an alternative a shot.

Re:Honestly?

[nametaken]

Well and, what exactly is wrong with this even if it's true?

fretting that Cinedigm had unwittingly opened a Pandora's box in a bid to get attention for its low-budget release

Isn't that precisely what you're supposed to do for your project? Get attention and as many eyes on the product as possible?

Besides, we're talking about 7m of content here. It's not like they're relying on BitTorrent to sell and distribute a feature film. Though with external mechanisms, that's entirely possible. It's not like we don't have private trackers and such, and guys like Louis CK have demonstrated that a little good faith effort can make non-DRM'd content a financially viable product.

Re:Honestly?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's an indie flick. The big studios want it to fail no matter what.

Re:Honestly?

[crutchy]

Goliath (Hollywood) is simply worried that David (indie) may create a slingshot.

Cinedigm gets it!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not the technology, it's how you use it!

Re:Cinedigm gets it!

[jamstar7]

It's like owning matches makes you an arsonist in the *AA's eyes. If you have bittorrent on your computer, you're a pirate, plain and simple.

A 7 minute trailer distributed by bittorrent (After all, that's about all it will be equivilent to) gets the *AA up inside themselves? Good deal.

I'd support Cindigm even if its a crappy movie

[detain]

I probably won't like the movie but I respect them for trying to incorperate technologies that are uncommon in that industry.

Re:I'd support Cindigm even if its a crappy movie

[amiga3D]

I don't give a shit if it is the worst movie I've ever seen. I'm going to buy the blu-ray edition when it comes out. I hope they sell more copies than any movie ever. With a little luck that will cause some of the movie execs to die from apoplexy.

Bittorrent != piracy

[Shadow of Eternity]

What we need is to stop the delegitimization of torrenting as a file transfer method. Equating torrents with piracy is ridiculous on it's face, it's nothing more than a means of transfering ANY data that's use legally all over the place. i haven't downloaded a linux distro the normal way in years, steam uses torrents, the list goes on.

Re:Bittorrent != piracy

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it was a total non sequitur, on purpose. Aussie humor, you know.

The reason Aussies pirate that particular HBO show is HBO refuses to sell it to them. Seriously. It can not be had in Australia, for any price, while it is being cablecast in the US. For any price except free, that is. Which is a state of affairs that never ceases to amaze me. I really don't understand how Hollywood thinks dividing up the world into independent little market regions is even remotely possible anymore. It hasn't been possible in a decade for the technologically savvy, and now it isn't possible for pretty much everybody. There's no excuse not to have simultaneous release worldwide, or at the very least for the English-speaking markets (the US, the Commonwealth nations, and most of Europe, plus India). But really, there's no excuse not to have simultaneous release worldwide, with subtitles for other languages. French, German, Spanish, Simplified Chinese, Onyomi, and Korean and you've covered 90% of the most affluent markets and probably 70% (wild-ass guess) of the world's population. Sounds like money to me.

I don't get it

[jfengel]

It's the first seven minutes. That is, it's an ad for the movie, not the movie.

They could have just used YouTube, which would probably get them a lot more eyeballs, and has social-networky features to try to encourage others to watch it. You _want_ people to watch your ads, for free; you'd pay them if you could. I can't imagine why they'd use BitTorrent, aside from the fact that BitTorrent gets you a few headlines.

This isn't any skin off Hollywood's nose. Well, maybe a little: by acknowledging that BitTorrent isn't universally evil, it cuts into their deranged "BitTorrent = piracy" campaign. But I can't see anything more to it than that.

If they were using it to distribute the film, the studio might have some kind of point, though that point would be "How the heck can you distribute a movie on which you spent a minimum of $10 million just on the two lead actors (and probably more) via a medium you can't charge for?"

Re:I don't get it

[chilvence]

Why does no one ever consider the possibility that perhaps $10 million for a lead actor is a slightly over the top wage for the challenge of 'looking pretty while pretending to be someone else in front of a video camera for a few months'?

Re:I don't get it

[chilvence]

I mean seriously, it's no wonder no one has any shame about robbing hollywood, they've been robbing everyone else for decades :)

It isn't really that hard to piece together the big picture is it?

Re:I don't get it

[Solandri]

perhaps $10 million for a lead actor is a slightly over the top wage

Because it's not. Or at least it wasn't. Back in the days when distribution required printing thousands of copies, inking deals with thousands of theaters to show them, and contacting hundreds of local TV stations, magazines, and newspapers for advertising. Back then the barrier to entry was so high that only a few companies could make widely-distributed movies. Which meant only a few movies could become national (or worldwide) memes. Which meant only a few movies could rake in hundreds of millions of dollars. Which meant the actors who could consistently help you create a blockbuster movie commanded extraordinarily high salaries.

The Internet completely pulls the rug out of that at the very lowest layer. Distribution is now essentially free, advertising nearly so especially if you can go viral. The obvious (well, obvious to me) outcome of all this is that whereas we used to have a few big studios, a few big movies, and a few big stars, now we're going to have lots of smaller studios, lots of smaller movies, and lots of small stars. Aggregate "filmmaking" revenue will go up, but it'll be distributed across a much larger population so average revenue per studio/movie/actor will go down. Yeah there will still be the blockbuster, but it's going to become increasingly rare (be sure to take into account inflation before you post any data claiming otherwise - the top grossing domestic film of all time in inflation-adjusted dollars is still 1939's Gone with the Wind).

The established studios are scared to death of this, so are fighting tooth and nail to prevent it and preserve their old, outdated business model. Just like happened with the VCR and movie rental stores. They fought those tooth and nail too, claiming they'd be the doom of the movie industry. Instead they turned into the lifeblood of the industry (tape/disc sales and rentals have long since surpassed movie theaters for revenue).

BitTorrent is not what they fear

[BitZtream]

But its cute to try and blame it on one particular ... protocol? I'm not sure what 'deal with bittorrent' means. I mean, I get the 'first 7 minutes to bittorrent users' but who is that exactly? People that use software from bittorrent inc? Anyone with a bittorrent client? Who are they actually talking about? Well thought out statement you have there.

Anyway, my point is that the big studios fear anything they don't completely control. They are afraid of people sharing things without them making a cut. They don't give damn about bittorrent, they care about sharing without them profiting.

You just sound stupid when you propagate the stereotype, anyone with a clue knows they are just as afraid of you downloading something from HTTP as they are with bit torrent. Its not like they let you get buy with it via HTTP but not BitTorrent.

From what I can tell from the actual article is that:

The studios repeated their default statements anytime anyone shares anything online when they aren't getting a cut of the profits.
Some indie movie is going to be put shared via bittorrent ... which isn't anything new, there are thousands of shitty indie movies on bittorrent already, thats like saying some indie movie is going to be uploaded to youtube. Contrary to what you may think: Indie does not imply that its worth watching.
No one has heard of or cares about this indie movie either.

Forget news for nerds, this isn't even news.

Delusional Nitwits

[FuzzNugget]

In what other business could you act so profoundly antagonistic towards your own customers and expect your business to actually be around to see the next day?

Fun object lesson: what happens when a violent animal is backed into a corner?

Re:As an indie filmmaker...

[Anonymous Coward]

I completely agree here, this seems like a deal for kickstarter. Kickstarter will take care of several things right away, namely

Getting the money to do the project (most important part)
Knowing if there is an audience (simply not everybody wants everything, kickstarter will at least give you an idea if you production has an audience before you start)
Advertisement (lots of people browse through kickstarter, its not the best advertisement, but its a start)

Remember, with any project, creating the project is only a part of the job. There is a reason why most big firms have people dedicated to advertisement and other things. Its not because you don't have the funds to hire people for the job that you should not do those jobs, you just gonna have to spend some of your own time for it.

I have the feeling most indie things that fail fail because they didn't manage to reach their audience, time after time I find projects that are great but now abandoned simply because they didn't manage to reach their audience. Making sure people know you is a big part of the job.

Re:I think Louisiana has these, BTW.

[Crypto Gnome]

> " 'Blaming BitTorrent for piracy is like blaming a freeway for drunk drivers, ' Jill Calcaterra, Cinedigm's chief marketing officer said"

I like Bittorrent, but this is a bit disingenuous. It's more like blaming a freeway with with drive-thru bars every 100 feet because zoning doesn't forbid it, for having drunk drivers.

Seriously? You HONESTLY believe what you wrote?

I don't often bite back on such OBVIOUS BULLSHIT but you, sir are a complete ASSHAT.

The PRIMARY reason there is blatant and comprehensive copyright violation is because THE INDUSTRY HEAVYWEIGHTS (RIAA/MPAA,and friends) have a ridiculous stranglehold on distribution. And by RIDICULOUS I mean literally impossible for some customers (eg outside the USofA) to legally purchase some content.

LITERALLY impossible to purchase. In some cases literally FOR EVER, in most cases "what the hell do you mean I have to wait YEARS before I can legally purchase this content". And NO, for the record, I'm NOT only talking about "purchasing online", some content you CANNOT purchase even on "original media" (DVD or whatever) outside the US; for NO REASON other than "I control the distribution and I could not be bothered distributing THAT".

The Music/Movie distribution industry constantly sends a big FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU ALL to literally millions of customers - but STILL insists they have a right to cry UNFAIR.

Seriously folks, SHUT THE FUCK UP AND TAKE MY MONEY ALREADY.

Let me say this again, there is ABSOLUTELY NO VALID MORAL ARGUMENT IN DEFENSE OF THE BEHAVIOUR OF THE MUSIC AND MOVIE INDUSTRY.

They have literally gone out of their way, time and time again, to make it actually impossible to purchase content (either at all, or online, or they simply restrict it to some obscure almost unused format, or they excessively compress it so it's ONY worth watching on the postage-stamp that is a 10 yr old phone).

...

To be fair (and even handed) lets be clear, the MPAA/RIAA "claim" to be "the industry body" but IN PRACTICE they act in the interests of existing distribution channels (and NOT "the movie/music industry" as a whole).

So the "industry" is harmed. So what?

[John Hasler]

> The fact of the matter is BitTorrent is in it for themselves, they're
> not in it for the health of the industry.

The fact of the matter is the studios are in it for themselves, they're not in it for the health of anyone but themselves. And that's fine, but why should the rest of us give a shit about their health? So Cinedigm's innovative move might cause movies to become less expensive and owning a studio less profitable. So what? That's competition.

In fact, if the studios have some sort of agreement not to make any of their "properties" available via BitTorrent they should be sued for engaging in a restraint of trade.