Movie Makers Use 'Fake' Piracy Numbers To Score Distribution Deal
from the well,-good-for-them? dept
The NY Times recently had a blog post noting that the makers of an $850,000 romantic comedy called X's and O's were thrilled that their movie was widely shared on file sharing networks, because the attention it got helped land them a big DVD distribution deal, and potentially a television deal, helped along by the attention received from that file sharing. Of course, there's just one little problem. The FreakBits guys noticed that the number of downloads the movies' creators are citing are almost certainly false. Apparently some sites post fake download numbers as a part of their advertising, and the movie makers used those fake numbers. But... it seemed to get them attention to get more deals, so more power to them. No matter what, it suggests that (once again) obscurity is a much bigger problem than piracy.
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Filed Under: bittorrent, downloads, fake, movies, obscurity, publicity
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If they could determine the number of people who pirated the video and then ultimately bought the video, it could really super-charge the industry. But only because they could then ask the non-consumer what really sucked about the movie.
However, in all reality, piracy numbers probably should be accounted for under a "Unpaid Rental" column on the books, as pirated videos lack additional content, and take forever to transfer to a blank DVD. If a "pirate" wanted to watch the same movie over and over again, don't you think its a ton easier to just buy it?
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Now, you may be in the minority. But you understand the technology better than the industry itself. You have a bright future once all the deadwood retires, dies or is forced out due to inability to meet customer needs.
They say it's a complete copy, but in reality it isn't. So therefore, it seems the whole argument fails.
No second languages, no extra content, no directors commentary.
A true enthusiast would want and desire this, and in reality, a pirated video is much, much closer to an unpaid PPV or rental. Thusly, a complete pirated copy is recieved by one of three types of people:
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No second languages, no extra content, no directors commentary. "
the language can sometimes be a draw to the pirated versions of the film or series. I'm a bit of a fan of fansub animes and I find that I enjoy the fansubs (usually) a lot better than the dubbed or industry subbed versions (there are exceptions).
Unfortunately, it's a bit of a debate about whether this is tranformative. I know I've noticed the difference in several animes.
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some movie studios used sharing data for research
For better or worse, the sharing data on which movies were shared the most seemed to track closely with success in theaters. There was internal debate on whether the data indicated the sharing lead to ticket sales or if sharing simply indicated the quality of the movie, however, it didn't matter. Some smaller studios actually were paying for some of that data.
While this doesn't prove anything, it does suggest value in the data about movie sharing.
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Dear Ghost of President Scroob...
You mean they would ask why their advertising did not work on these people. It's not like Hollywood cares about content, except as a legal concept.
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More power?
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Numbers...
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Most "regular" people are lucky if they know how to check their email without needing a reference sheet, forget downloading movies.
They say it's a complete copy, but in reality it isn't. So therefore, it seems the whole argument fails.
No second languages, no extra content, no directors commentary.
How many people actually watch the extras? My friend collects tons of DVDs and hardly ever watches the extras. I don't think he's ever listened to a director's commentary.
However, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that there was a DVDR copy available that included the extras.
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The only specific example I can point to is the Dattebayo fansubbing group, and their (former) flagship anime to sub: Naruto.
They stopped subbing it recently because the American license holders started putting up subbed episodes up online (for free?) in a short amount of time,
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