Content Leaks: Call The Lawyers, Or Talk To Fans Honestly?
from the which-do-you-think-works-better? dept
You may remember last year all the press attention that came about when a work print of the movie Wolverine leaked out a month or so before the movie was set to be released. At the time, 20th Century Fox went ballistic and all of the talk was about legal threats and getting the FBI involved (in fact, the FBI eventually did arrest someone accused of the leak). However, in our post about the leak, we wondered if a better response might have been to not freak out and call the lawyers, but address fans who were downloading the leak as fans and treat them with some respect. Totally off the top of my head, I mocked up what Fox could have said:Hey Wolverine fans! We know that you're all looking forward to the release of the movie next month. We're excited too! By now you may have heard that an early totally unfinished version has been leaked online. It's missing a whole bunch of stuff -- including some amazing special effects -- and honestly, this version isn't a finished product at all. We think you'll get a much better overall experience by waiting for the full finished product, but we certainly understand that some of you just can't wait (trust us, we feel the same way!). If that's the case, please, feel free to check it out, but please remember that this isn't even close to the final version. If anything, think of this as a "behind-the-scenes" peek of just what a movie looks like before all the real "movie magic" gets put in there. If you do check it out, we hope you'll join us May 1st to check out the finalized version as well on the big screen the way we intended for you to see this awesome movie. It's just a month away!But, of course, that's not what happened at all. I still do wonder how people would have responded if 20th Century Fox had responded that way. While it's not quite the same scale, we now do have some information from a band who did choose to do something somewhat similar when their album leaked. It's obviously on a much smaller scale, but involves a similarly obsessive group of fans who were eagerly waiting for the content. In this case, it was the release of an album from a band called Man Overboard. The story is explained by the band's manager, where they quickly and actively responded to the album leaking a month ahead of schedule by not freaking out, and moving to treat fans who wanted the album with respect. In this case, it involved putting the album up themselves as well, and proactively communicating with fans. And the response was that fans loved it, with some pointing out they were buying the album just to show support for a band that would act that way:
The response could not have been better. Many fans praised us for being "adults" about the situation and countless fans were thankful they got a record they had been waiting for a month early. Other said they would buy the record just to support a group behaving in this fashion. On messageboards and blog comments we could not have gotten a better response,with at least two dozen compliments on how cool it was for us to release the record to our fans early instead of inflicting the usual torture of waiting upon our fans.Nice to see some people making this work. Somehow, I doubt we'll see many of the "big" guys figure this out any time soon, unfortunately.
We earned loyalty from our fans and made them into evangelists by doing them right, which coincidentally also did us right. A win-win situation that most labels turn into a lose-lose situation. We could not be more thankful to have a smart label and team that made us able to benefit from something that is usually thought of as a catastrophe.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
Pardon, time to buy.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The movie made hundreds of millions of dollars doing it the way they did it. Can TD show any evidence of loss of revenue based on how FOX handled it? How is catering to the piracy of their film (as inevitable as it may be) a good long-term strategy for these media companies that have a racket going (and they well know it?)
Sure they could give the movie to fans! They could give a plush doll away with the movies, and a slush puppy and free attachable claws! They could do lots of things that would please their fans to no end, but would it result in dramatically better returns? I highly doubt it, I see a point of diminishing returns.
I just don't see it. These companies, Apple, they sell just as much an image as they do a movie, and I think they are very protective of that image that they create films and they want that presentation protected. They don't really care about the repercussion of someone getting attacked by the FBI affecting their fanbase. You are talking about a public that donate relief to Haiti for a month or two and then forget where Haiti is on the map, do you honestly think the public gives a shit?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
So are you admitting that the "leak" probably didn't cause too much damage?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
So, I'm not sure if you're thick enough to buy negative proof arguments your self or if you're just trying to win a debate here, but... Typically when someone asks you to prove that something doesn't exist, they have no foundation to their argument whatsoever. So, let me ask you, can you prove that the tooth fairy dos't exist?
So, you're probably going to come back with "he made the assertion, the burden of proof is on him" just guessing...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Probably. People love free stuff. As you mentioned, they're selling an image, so I don't see how handing out free gifts on admission or purchase of the DVD would wind up hurting them. If anything, they'd be helping themselves out by furthering their brand through what in essence is advertising:
http://techdirt.com/articles/20100222/1028568252.shtml
This kind of thinking seemed to help out Old Spice:
http://techdirt.com/articles/20100728/17372910400.shtml
And Mike fairly points out the following as well:
That said, the increase cannot be necessarily attributed entirely to the social media campaign, since a coupon campaign for the body wash was also running at the same time.
I do know the last time I watched a funny YouTube video, however, I cannot recall the last time I clipped and turned in a coupon. To use an antiquated term, I'd say web 2.0 was responsible for this.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
1. WTF does Apple have to do with this?
2. Did *anybody* see this movie just because it was released by Fox and they have a certain image? I doubt it.
3. Actually, if anything, Fox's image hurts them. They're the ones who constantly cancel great TV shows that appeal to exactly the same demographic as comic book movies.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]