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DVD Release Delays Boost Piracy and Hurt Sales, Study Shows (torrentfreak.com)
One of the reasons that drive people to piracy is the delay in the release of a title's DVD or Blu-Ray in their local market. According to a new academic paper from Carnegie Mellon University, movie fans are finding it increasingly difficult to wait for the official DVD or Blu-Ray to come out. From a TorrentFreak report: Due to artificial delays which vary across different parts of the world, pirates can often get their hands on a high-quality rip of a movie before the DVD is officially released in their country. Researchers have looked into this piracy "window of opportunity," and found that release delays are actually hurting DVD and Blu-Ray sales. "Our results suggest that an additional 10-day delay between the availability of digital piracy and the legitimate DVD release date in a particular country is correlated with a 2-3% reduction in DVD sales in that country," the researchers write.
No shit, Sherlock.
Next, are they going to tell us water is wet?
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
It may seem common sense, but that's not a reason to not get empirical data illustrating the assumption.
It's sometimes bewildering to watch companies with a responsibility to shareholders behave in ways that appear counterproductive to their own bottom line. If the study from Carnegie Mellon passes peer review *and* the movie industry does not respond in a way that actually curbs piracy, then one has to wonder what exactly drives their behavior. This is not a rhetorical question. If anybody here on /. has insight into this, please share.
Because all but a select few movie theaters would immediately die off.
The "artificial delays" are simply a specific form of artificial scarcity, and we humans always do our damnedest to route around them.
We also *really* don't want to be lectured to about piracy when we're watching a legally purchased DVD, nor do we want to watch ads, (except for movie trailers), in a DVD we've already fscking paid for. But media producers and distributors seem positively addicted to the practice of strapping on a pair of cleats and stepping on their own dicks.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
What the heck is a "DVD"? Is that Russian or something?
N/T
2) That's not quite what the science says anyway. The science says: If a studio releases a DVD in region A, but then waits ten days to releases it in Region B they lose 2-3% of the sales. The science simply used the Region A release data and called it the "piracy date" as an anchor point in their study. They have not in anyway proven (or even attempted to prove) that piracy is the actual cause of the drop.
I wonder how they get a rip before the DVD comes out? I'm going to guess that the theaters now get digital copies and those get rippped. I wonder why they can't control that effectively. E.g. watermark every theater's version differently.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I'm pretty sure the curve between maximizing movie-in-theatre revenue and then DVD-before-everyone-forgets-about-it revenue is already well-understood by the entertainment industry.
But, I still don't understand NEW MOVIE piracy in developed countries. Sure, I pirate every new GoT episode within hours of the official air date, but it's TV that I watch on a 23-inch monitor where quality doesn't really matter. Same thing with a 10+ year-old movie or cartoons that I watch with my kids. However, when I want to watch something with cutting-edge special effects and sound on my home theater (or any 32"+ TV with separate sound system), dropping the $3 to rent a high-quality edition that is guaranteed not to crap out halfway through (which tends to drive off my wife if she's watching) suddenly becomes worth it.
Right, I'm sure the africans are so worse off now than in 1900 where they had been living in huts hunting EACH OTHER with spears and after over a 100.000 years still had not invented things like "the wheel". Europe singlehandedly brought modern civilization as we know it to the entire world. Of course, along the way it brought a lot of war and death, but so has every single other region of the globe. Furthermore, through civilization and maturity, Europe now brings peace while every other continent (except perhaps Oceania?) has war and oppression. We still have a long way to go, but can you cite a single better place to live in the world today when it comes to standard of living, education, health, freedom, tolerance or anything else that matters?
In Capitalist US, the commerce controls the Government.
I don't understand the delays. Just sell it HIGH right out of the gate.
Make movies something crazy like $60-$80 on opening weekend. Grab all that extra profit while the hype is high and plenty of families with great home theater and 2.5 kids that they don't want to pay concessions for consider it a win-win.
Drop it by $10 or so every month or so, until they're $20 at the same time they're available now.
Why do they hate money so much?
Grammer Nazis - I mod you "troll" unless you actually add something on-topic. Yes, I know I have mispellings in my sig.
Or, we can conclude that you can prove absolutely anything you want in a study.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
are you suggesting that Europe is responsible for delayed DVD releases?
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
So which media company do you work for? Just wondering.
On the other hand, in the dark ages before the internet, you were not flooded with spoilers every minute of the day, and a quick comment was often enough to stop people who were inadvertently about to spoil a movie for you. There weren't global fandoms with a head start for those living in the regions where movies/DVDs/games are released sooner.
The Movie Industry biggest competition are pirates and if they want to beat their competition they will not do it on price, so they need to work on convenience. Adding DRM, Disabling Fast Forward/Next Chapter on previews are all things that are annoying paying customers
Why? It's all artificial anyways. I have no problem having patience when it's needed but in this case, it's not needed.
It's nice to have the option. It's a social thing. Also, my 50" UHD television still doesn't compare to a theatre experience. Granted, I go to the movies rarely, and I do appreciate being able to sit in the comfort of my home most of the time, but for certain modern action films - Avengers, Star Wars, Hobbit, etc. ya can't beat the theatre experience. At least, not without dropping fairly serious money for your gear.
Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
1) The world is different now than it was in 1986. This should be self evident, but I bring it up just in case you were posting on /. and yet still managed to miss the internet and multiple orders of magnitude increase in computer storage, processing power, bandwidth, and ubiquity. Those advances have vastly increased the availability and speed of delivery of content, and brought changes in people's views and expectations.
It used to take a good couple of minutes to get your ass out to the outhouse to take a dump. Is it a lack of self-control and patience to expect indoor plumbing? Times change and peoples' attitudes change with the times.
2) Suppose you took over a company that regularly (artificially**) delayed releases in a region, or price gouged (Australia much?), or other silly shenanigans. And the studies came back and told you: "These tactics actually lose you money, don't do it that way, it's been demonstrated to increase infringement and lower sales. Just release everything as close as possible to the same day and don't try to dick with foreign markets."
Would your business decision, in service to your company's financial interests and those of its shareholders, be to stomp on the ground indignantly and say "Damn entitled ingrates, lucky they're getting my DVDs at all! People need to learn to be patient and control themselves." Or would you stop pissing into the wind trying to battle human nature, and do what you can to make money with that knowledge?
**I.e. not related to production/translation/shipping challenges, but just because, man, fuck Asia they can wait.
What does one have to do with the other?
We are not talking about making cinema release and DVD release the same date. What this is about is making the cinema releases worldwide for the same day, and making the DVD releases (later) also at the same day. I honestly can't think of a good technical reason why you should not be able to release the DVD in Europe and the US at the same day. Or, better yet, allow people to buy it wherever they want.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Usually the next step is to eliminate the part that is of no use to you: Buying the DVD.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Neither is an absolute. Piracy CAN hurt and it CAN help sales.
Burry, shaky screeners are actually more likely to help sales because people want "the real thing" instead. If, and only if, the movie is actually worth seeing. Because that's what the blurry screener does: Give people an idea whether the movie is any good. And given today's movie trailers are usually the whole 2 minutes of what's actually decent in the 180+ minutes of movie, people don't rely on trailers anymore. But if that blurry mess looks like it could be worth seeing "for real", they will grab the money and go watch it.
Of course if what you get as a copy is as good as what you could hope for if you bought the DVD (and usually, considering the bullshit like unskipable ads, trailers and other crap, the value of the bought copy is usually lower than that of a rip to the user), this will absolutely HURT your sales. Because the user already has everything he could hope to get from buying your DVD. Actually, chances are he got more than he would get from your DVD.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Yes. Back then they could get away with it because there was no pressure from competing suppliers.
Welcome to evolution, baby! Publish or perish!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Is that necessarily a bad thing?
I have a nice enough 42" Sony LED TV - But it in no way compares to the experience of seeing a move like SPECTRE in the theatre. For me, the theatre is a much better experience.
No, but you need one to prove it to someone who stomps his foot and refuses to listen because he doesn't want it to be that way, mostly because he likes it better that way you just shown to be foolish.
I.e. studios.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
i can watch and re-watch Deadpool AND learn Korean from the subtitles... win/win
Africans had civilisation well before most Europeans unless you subscribe to the idea that aliens built the pyramids, Timbuktu and Greater Zimbabwe.
Even though the movie itself sucked
I feel like impatience is the new normal these days.
I personally have no problem waiting for movies or tv shows to come to Netflix or Amazon Prime.
But then, I don't really care about much of the content being created these days either. At least, not enough to pay a premium.
Before Netflix came along, I was the guy buying $2 matinee tickets for out-of-cycle movies.
My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
Actually it was the Africans such as the Egyptians, with things like their wheeled chariots, irrigation and other things that came from civilization, but don't let that ruin your petty little racist rant.
Look, I don't necessarily agree with the GP, but your point is just as stupid. Don't pretend that just because Europe has had its shit together for a few decades gives it the right to lord it over the rest of the world. History didn't begin yesterday.
The only reason Europe is at peace now is because it fought a war so unbelievably terrible that it all but destroyed itself. And it had to happen twice in less than a few decades, because they couldn't learn their lesson the first time. WWII might have been avoided if the European Allies had followed Wilson's 14 Points during the peace negotiations following WWI, and during the founding of the League of Nations. Instead, they did exactly the opposite and sowed the seeds of the next conflict with the Treaty of Versailles. Not to mention all the other terrible things that came as a result of the League, such as the Mandate system, which is at least partially responsible for the state the Middle East is in today.
The kind of nonsense you're spouting is basically the "white man's burden", the bullshit justification used by Europe for colonizing and subjugating people around the world. It's fine to uphold the virtues of modern Europe, but don't do so by repeating the rhetoric of the 19th Century.
Only crack the nuts that crack. You don't put the ones that don't crack in the sack.
...or just make the disc/online version generally available at the same time as the movie release, and save having to pay for 2 rounds of publicity. Cinemas had a point when the alternative was a 20" TV & VHS player with lousy sound and picture. Now, we have 50" high def screens, surround sound and TV shows are being made with cinema production values. Cinemas need to sell the social experience rather than the film.
I'd kinda assume by now that most of the old cinemas that anybody would give a shit about saving have already found better business models than just showing the latest blockbusters.
Maybe, instead of having a film showing in every cinema for a couple of weeks simultaneously, they should let the disc sell the film and then "tour" it over the course of a year with extras (obviously it would need something that "scaled" - you couldn't tour it with the cast - but maybe an exhibition of props, live music, post-film debate, marathon showing of the whole series etc. depending on the type of film...)
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
While it is absolutely true that African people were (and still are today) slaves of other African people, it does not excuse the purchase of those people by Whites. That said, going back through my family history I've found no evidence that anyone in my family ever owned slaves, yet I still get shit from time to time for what "my ancestors" did to "their ancestors". How about a big fuck you to anyone who subscribes to that logic? Regardless of race.
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
The fact they're not even going to pay for the product doesn't matter.
Wow you didn't even read TFS.
They pay for it if it's available, otherwise they pirate it. That actually shows that they are prepared to pay, what they're not prepared to do is wait.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Soderbergh/Cuban did it.
http://www.cnet.com/news/soder...
There's no word on what the outcome was.
I do agree that there are so many logistical difficulties to seeing movies in the theaters that a large swath of the potential market is excluded by the Hollywood practices.
For two adults you're basically talking about $70+ to see movie if they have to get a sitter for the kids.
On the other hand, family movies are cleaning up on this. Make a movie the adults can see with the kids and the family saves money by just sending 2 kids to the theater for $20 instead of getting a sitter. And it goes into the theater and studios' pockets.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Or why do they even sell DVDs at all? Why aren't these media companies providing timely streaming or download options?
They are. Availability for purchase on iTunes Store on the same day as DVD release has been around for years. See Apple's eight-year-old press release. DVDs are still made available in the first place because parts of the United States still have satellite or cellular at $5 to $10 per GB as the cheapest home Internet option.
why bother buying a movie where the plot matters (i.e. not directed by Michael Bay) when I know beforehand how it's going to end?
I thought spoilers increased enjoyment as well as aerodynamics.
What this is about is making the cinema releases worldwide for the same day
A lot of films lack budget to get cinema releases across one country for the same calendar year. Think of all the art films that play for a week in Los Angeles County, California, in December in order to qualify for that year's Academy Awards, with intent to open to a wide release the following January.
Even though the movie itself sucked
Incorrect.
Spectre is a brilliant film, the best Craig by far, and easily in the top five of all OO7 movies.
Whereas Skyfall could have been any generic "Jason Bourne" action thriller, Spectre was a true James Bond movie.
Craig retained Fleming's literary grittiness that we've come to love, but the quips, one-liners and (small) comedic moments that the films of the past delivered returned.
Craig's performance was stellar - He *owned* the role and played it with determination. Great cars and gadgets were back as well.
FANTASTIC pre-titles opening sequence, including a 4+ minute take at the beginning with no cuts and an airborne action sequence that took your breath away.
We finally had a "classic henchman" in Mr. Hinx and all the other performances, including Christoph Waltz as the villain, were perfect.
The final minute of the movie literally made the audience in my opening night showing clap and cheer. It's a film full of subtle nods for the hardcore fans ("Hildebrand Rarities") with lots to keep the casual viewer happy.
So if countries require films to be exhibited in the official language as a condition of being shown in a country, how do you propose to make dozens of dubs before a film sees one dollar of revenue? And if countries place a quota on imported films to encourage the local film industry, how do you propose to re-produce films with local cast, crew, and sets?
My economics question is why back catalog movies which have been released on disc can't be purchased as downloads.
A lot of film producers' hands are tied by contracts with upstream licensors (such as the author and publisher of a novel adapted into a film or the performer, record label, songwriter, and music publisher of music used in the film) or with cast and crew unions whose members work on a residual basis rather than a "work made for hire" basis. Not all such contracts that provide for a home video release also provide for selling downloads. DVD early on had a similar problem with older films whose home video contracts were written for particular formats ("VHS and Beta" or "videotape") rather than generically enough to include DVD.
I'm guessing these titles aren't exactly burning up the sales charts and that a budget licensing deal for streaming on back catalog title to a streaming provider would be revenue they mostly wouldn't expect to get from a DVD.
For one thing, it can be expensive to gather all stakeholders (again, upstream licensors and any cast or crew promised residuals) for a contract negotiation. For another, old movies compete with the same studio's newer products.
The DVD-Video standard requires players to implement UOP, which allows discs to specify that a certain control shall cause the player to display the letter Ø in the corner of the screen for five seconds instead of performing the requested action. It was intended to make copyright notices unskippable, but distributors have abused it to make advertisements unskippable.
Press "Top Menu": Ø. Press "Title Menu": Ø. Press "next chapter": Ø (arrrgh). What's left?
And it still took a year after theatrical release to get the 2011 film Hop on region 1 DVD.
The fact they're not even going to pay for the product doesn't matter.
I have money. Where in the United States can I buy a lawfully made DVD of the film Song of the South?
I have money. Where in the United States can I buy a lawfully made DVD of the film Pinocchio and the Emperor of the Night?
I have money. Where in the United States can I buy a lawfully made DVD of the TV series Spartakus and the Sun Beneath the Sea?
Actually it was the Africans such as the Egyptians, with things like their wheeled chariots, irrigation and other things that came from civilization
Granted. But nowadays northern Africa is more closely associated with the "Middle East" brand than with the "Africa" brand. So that narrows the question going forward: What impressive tech or philosophy came out of sub-Saharan Africa before European contact?
are you suggesting that Europe is responsible for delayed DVD releases?
In some cases yes. Spartakus and the Sun Beneath the Sea is the English dub of a French animated series. The original series has been released on French DVD around 2000, but the English dub has never been released on North American DVD.
most dvd sales now includes digital copy which adds a couple of dollars to the purchase. It is near impossible to find dvds without digital copies. This means the customers are giving them money for nothing since most do not get their digital download. Why is the movie industry griping since they are basically getting paid twice for every dvd sales whether the digital copy is downloaded or not???
If you say so.
Yeah. Sure. Art films are what are hit so incredibly severely by this.
Please.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Spectre is a brilliant film, the best Craig by far, and easily in the top five of all 007 movies.
FTFY. It's written 007 (double-zero), not OO7 (double-O).
And does anyone know of a leaked copy of The Force Awakens in 3d?
Deadpool - one of the most popular movies of the year - was released on DVD here last Wednesday, meaning it came out 3 weeks after the US DVD release. If I hadn't already seen it (twice) in the theatre, I can guarantee I would have pirated it. (I do buy movies I like on DVD, so I would have eventually bought it.) Waiting nearly a month after it becomes available elsewhere is just ridiculous.