Would You Rather Renegotiate Your Contracts... Or See Your Business Collapse?
from the which-is-more-stupid? dept
You see it all the time with companies in trouble, where they are able to renegotiate certain contracts for the sake of saving the overall business. So, I have a lot of trouble with Hollywood studios claiming that they simply can't figure out a way to offer movies online, because the contracts they signed won't let them. In the link above, Slate's Farhad Manjoo tries to figure out why the movie studios aren't offering up a decent, easy to use online movie service, and unfortunately falls for the studios' claims that they know they need to get online, but they just can't because of "a byzantine set of contractual relationships between many different kinds of companies studios, distributors, cable channels, telecom companies, and others." That sounds good, and it's no surprise to see Hollywood lawyers jump all over this as a defense -- but it's laughable. If the studios, distributors, cable channels, telecom companies and others actually realized how quickly the market is changing, they'd rush to change those contracts. No, it wouldn't be easy, but it is doable. Not doing so is a cop out from a group of folks who don't want to change and are hoping that things "just work out."
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Of course, one would hope that new movies have those things included going forward.
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One of the biggest obstacles...
Music licensing, particularly for TV shows, is largely geographically based. When you take a show to other geos, it can be too costly to license the music. Top Gear is an example of this and I suspect that most of the contractual problems with putting stuff online has to do with music...
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Can't Unilaterally Renegotiate
B makes their money primarily through commericals. Commercials only pay if people watch. C makes their money by selling plastic disks. That doesn't happen if people have no desite to buy them.
A wants to maximize the money they get and see online distribtion as a way to do that directly. B believes that will result in fewer eyeballs which attackes their bottom line. C believes (correcly) that high quality online movies would attack their bottom line. B and C have contracts preventing A from distributing so A cannot sell movies online. B and C have no motivation to renegotiate as they will lose money. If A violates the contract they are out big bucks.
It might not simply be a cop out. They might actually have this problem
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Re: Can't Unilaterally Renegotiate
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once the studios go under there will be no contracts left and negotiations can begin anew.
the studios have two choices: they can go under the hard way, by running out of money and going out of business for real, or they can go under the easy way and just go out of business on paper and re-incorporate in a new country under new legal entities.
right now they have the power to choose, they may not have that power for much longer.
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once the studios go under there will be no contracts left and negotiations can begin anew.
In which case you're right back to square one. This is why copyright has to be shortened drastically, or removed altogether.
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which is the case for things that have already been made, but not necessarily for the things that have yet to be made.
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which is the case for things that have already been made, but not necessarily for the things that have yet to be made.
True, and some organizations, like SAG, have been very accommodating going forward (e.g., Dr. Horrible.) But the question is: how do you untangle the thicket of interested parties for past productions? It's insanely tough to do, in part because of the massive number of parties involved.
Short/No copyright would solve that.
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Re: Can't Unilaterally Renegotiate
Not true of TV networks. They get paid to run the ad, regardless how many people are watching.
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honestly, why should we care?
Let the dinosaurs die. There are plenty of mammals waiting to step up.
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Allow me to clean this up a bit for you:
Who needs then to distribute anything? There are thousands of seeders willing to do it for free-- and I promise that even more people will seed if the threat of financial doom were lifted.
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One Bad apple
You Cant Do that on Telavision (old nick show) is a good example, to get the show on DVD requires geting in contact with each cast member (who were childern at the time of production) in order to change the royalty system (each cast member got paid per show airing).
in any case all it takes is one person to say no to shut down a huge cost of redoing the contracts. At the same time the stuff doesnt go out of copyright till 2100.
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Somebody is going to do it
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Excuses, excuses and more excuses!
A (The studios) receives b% from B (TV networks).
A receives c% from C (DVD).
A, B, and C are run by the same people that are receiving a%+b%+c% from the same movie. (%a is the % of Theaters)
So Hollywood executives are making excuses. They have put the system in the first place and they not going to give on it without fight. They (Hollywood) are trying to manipulate the market and because the market can not be manipulated for very long they have created the condition for piracy to occur. Now they are paying the price. Sorry, but Hollywood with their corrupted politicians and corrupted copyright (monopoly) system are the problem.
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Renegotiate
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Re: Renegotiate
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They don't think they have to change
The entertainment industry has done this for as long as we can remember: when radio was introduced they wanted to get rid of it through legislation, when we got television they wanted it stopped, and it is the same with Internet. They don't think they need to adapt like everybody else - they think they have a right to use state coercion to protect their profits and prohibit sound technological advances because they find it too cumbersome to adapt.
As far as I'm concerned, they might as well fail. The sooner the better, since they are set on pushing us into an Orwellian society rather than renegotiate contracts.
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Still Not As Easy
Even if the studios realize that they need to adapt, there are hundreds of thousands of people who share in the revenue from the current system. Just witness the last year's Writer's Guild strike and the apparently narrowly averted Screen Actors Guild potential strike. It's not just the studios that need to be convinced, but all the other stakeholders.
The current system of revenue sharing on the production side as well as the current distribution system (theaters, DVD, cable, Internet, broadcast TV) is a many tentacled thing. This is not an excuse, but a real obstacle to actually achieving the change in business model that you advocate. Do you have anything more helpful than just "renegotiate"?
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Re: Still Not As Easy
Reading comprehension: "No, it wouldn't be easy"
I said it's difficult, but at this point, anyone who can see where the market is heading has to realize it's the only way to avert a disastrous situation.
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Reading comprehension: "No, it wouldn't be easy"
So, in other words you got nothing else to offer.
Saying that "it wouldn't be easy" is a gross understatement and, frankly, isn't really all that helpful. It's not as if there is one monolithic entity that can just "renegotiate" all existing contracts.
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Saying that "it wouldn't be easy" is a gross understatement and, frankly, isn't really all that helpful. It's not as if there is one monolithic entity that can just "renegotiate" all existing contracts.
Your "monolithic entity" would be Congress, which is the entity responsible for the current rape of the public domain to begin with.
And yeah, if they can 'renegotiate' the public's interest downwards, they can turn around and do the same thing to the industry.
But as mentioned above, it's not going to be easy.
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"Would You Rather Renegotiate Your Contracts... Or See Your Business Collapse?"
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"Would You Rather Renegotiate Your Contracts... Or See Your Business Collapse?"
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"Would You Rather Renegotiate Your Contracts... Or See Your Business Collapse?"
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Re: "Would You Rather Renegotiate Your Contracts... Or See Your Business Collapse?"
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Or are you saying you want the government to take over the film industry?
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