Piracy gives the opportunity for a critical mass of the viewing public to sample before making a purchase decision. It serves as an adjunct to critical reviews. Hollywood is upset that we have an opportunity to get a personal taste of their shit sandwiches before deciding to sit down for the meal.
Of course, the most hyped number for any major release is the opening weekend ticket sales. Except for the rare occasion when a print is leaked early, the option to pirate a film in a way that would do anything to those sales is limited. As far as the studio decision process goes, piracy isn't doing anything substantial to the opening box office so followups to good flicks with solid numbers get greenlit on that basis.
Movies that don't bomb in theaters, but absolutely need the subsequent dvd revenue in order to make the nut-- they're the ones that can get a boost or get trashed due to piracy. A savvy viewing public certainly isn't going to pay full price to take a flyer on an iffy production anymore. From a studio point of view, piracy actually has the potential to boost revenue for the occasional sleeper hit since the majority of the audience that might sample a pirated copy and then make a purchase would otherwise just wait until there's a streaming option.
Maybe now that there's a real feedback mechanism for studios, we can hope that Hollywood will quit making shitty trilogies and stop once the shitty sequel has made the case that the franchise is dead.
Hope there isn't a lawsuit, considering the qualitatively worse offering
The promise of Aereo was to allow access to OTA broadcasts for people with poor reception or no outside access to place a decent antenna. It was functionally equivalent to the basic idea of bottled water. If your local tap water tastes awful and ours is pretty great, then it makes commercial sense to bottle the good stuff and charge people for it. Tivo is just providing the bottles and letting you fill them from your own tap.
I know it's natural for the Supremes to imagine only sparkly unicorn farts can result from the majesty of the adversarial legal process, but giving people due process rights to individually challenge their inclusion on a secret government enemies list, but not until they've already been subject to denial of travel and possible detainment... kinda minimally warm and fuzzy about this one.
Sorry I did I drive-by. It seems that the story evolved before I was able to check back in.
The further comments do seem to indicate that Youtube isn't trying to entirely fence off content for paying subscribers-- though it certainly would make business sense for them if they could get away with it. The access to ContentID and the ability to monetize (or even track) fan uploads seems fuzzy since ContentID seems to be a service for "partners" but there's no telling whether that partnership will also be rolled into the new service.
The Amazon strong arm tactics- yeah, that's kind of a rhetorical stretch. Though, from a business standpoint, a large distribution player presents suppliers with take it or leave it contracts. They target smaller groups specifically with poorer terms in a divide and conquer fashion. The terms may overall seem favorable at first blush, but it's hard not to make the comparison on the tactics. That may just be the way business is done these days.
Youtube and Google provide an immensely valuable service for free... in exchange for the use of uploaded artists' content. It has been an uneasily balanced relationship with ad revenue as a sweetener for artists, not a charitable endeavor by Google to provide the service.
The purpose of the service from an artist perspective has been to help with discoverability. Even the ad revenue is secondary to the ability to track further uploads from the masses through Content ID (which is apparently a service available to "partners").
It's not clear whether participation in the subscription program precludes also making content available to non-subscribers. Presumably, Google would prefer to protect the exclusivity of their paid program. It's also not clear whether the lack of an ad supported partnership option will remove access to Content ID in order to track uploads.
As a music subscription service, Youtube could potentially provide much higher revenues to participating artists. Since most indie artists use Youtube as a tool to aid in the discovery of their music, the direct revenue isn't as important as the ability to reach as many people as possible and to track total views. The Guardian article cites roughly 1/3 of new music revenue comes from indie sales, though the indies make up a relatively tiny part of the industry. That seems to indicate that the indies disproportionately rely on building their audiences rather than marketing a large catalog.
I would say that it's understandable for the indies to kick up a fuss as a industry-shaping music discovery tool looks like it's being revamped to favor the major incumbents and are being asked to participate in a less useful service on even less favorable terms than the favored majors.
It's Google's service and they can run it as they like, but the switch has echoes of Amazon-style strong arming that isn't very palateable.
None of it ever goes away, it just exists on a different scale or develops a different purpose. Vinyl records are still selling, just to audiophiles and djs. Steel dashboards get made for classic car buffs. I would love a pricing gun the next yard sale I have-- and I could get a used one cheap.
I haven't a clue what scale or niche print media will eventually settle into. Locally, I see newspapers thriving in situations where the artifact itself is valuable like high school sports, weddings and other scrapbookable ephemera, and where the subject lends itself to a larger format like music publications that can tastefully use a full tabloid page for photos.
It may well be that many government agencies have developed such a bunker mentality in regards to releasing information to the public that they simply don't have the institutional ability to maintain records as they should.
As for covering up a conspiracy, the scandal that's been hyped isn't particularly scandalous. The IRS was denying charitable status to organizations that pretty egregiously did not fall within the guidelines- *shock*. The charge that it was a matter of selective enforcement has mostly fizzled upon finding that groups from across the ideological spectrum were examined. I doubt that there would be much more meat in any emails as far as showing some partisan war on conservatives. What I think might be there is a chain of emails from Lerner or other high ranking officials showing them absolutely adrift in determining what to do about the flood of inappropriate c4 applications.
This is the agency that has been repeatedly taunted by pastors organizing events around defying the ban on religious c3 groups engaging in electioneering. Up until this scandalous crackdown, political operations were routinely organizing as charitable groups with no repercussions. Even in cracking down on political non-profits, the targeting was awfully tentative. The existing behemoths that operated in the recent elections got a pass, and most of the groups that made it on the naughty list were not only explicitly in violation of the tax code, but were relatively amateurish local organizations.
In all, the IRS has absolutely sucked at policing tax-exempt groups and the best motive I can make out for them to stonewall is that they want to hide their incompetence rather than any partisan wrongdoing.
Of course reporters don't get prosecuted, they just go to jail
If you're just some schlub without a corporate legal department backing you up, then you're not a reporter and so posting information about the government will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
If you're a REAL reporter, ie someone lucky enough to have lawyers on tap to resist charges, then you won't be prosecuted for properly exercising your constitutional rights because the First Amendment and such. Nope, you just have to forfeit your livelihood and reputation as a journalist by complying with a subpoena to give up your sources, or else go to jail for contempt. Real journalists doing their jobs always comply with court orders and the other kind are dangerous malcontents.
On the post: If You're A Copyright Maximalist 'Piracy' Must Be The Answer To All Problems
Yup, piracy kills bad franchises
Of course, the most hyped number for any major release is the opening weekend ticket sales. Except for the rare occasion when a print is leaked early, the option to pirate a film in a way that would do anything to those sales is limited. As far as the studio decision process goes, piracy isn't doing anything substantial to the opening box office so followups to good flicks with solid numbers get greenlit on that basis.
Movies that don't bomb in theaters, but absolutely need the subsequent dvd revenue in order to make the nut-- they're the ones that can get a boost or get trashed due to piracy. A savvy viewing public certainly isn't going to pay full price to take a flyer on an iffy production anymore. From a studio point of view, piracy actually has the potential to boost revenue for the occasional sleeper hit since the majority of the audience that might sample a pirated copy and then make a purchase would otherwise just wait until there's a streaming option.
Maybe now that there's a real feedback mechanism for studios, we can hope that Hollywood will quit making shitty trilogies and stop once the shitty sequel has made the case that the franchise is dead.
On the post: TiVo Releases A 'Legal' Version Of Aereo, Called Roamio, Proving That Aereo Really Was About Cable Length
Hope there isn't a lawsuit, considering the qualitatively worse offering
On the post: Court Says The Process For Getting Off The No Fly List Is Unconstitutional
On the post: That Story You've Read About YouTube 'Blocking' Indie Artists... Yeah, That's Not Accurate
Re: Re: The indie downside
The further comments do seem to indicate that Youtube isn't trying to entirely fence off content for paying subscribers-- though it certainly would make business sense for them if they could get away with it. The access to ContentID and the ability to monetize (or even track) fan uploads seems fuzzy since ContentID seems to be a service for "partners" but there's no telling whether that partnership will also be rolled into the new service.
The Amazon strong arm tactics- yeah, that's kind of a rhetorical stretch. Though, from a business standpoint, a large distribution player presents suppliers with take it or leave it contracts. They target smaller groups specifically with poorer terms in a divide and conquer fashion. The terms may overall seem favorable at first blush, but it's hard not to make the comparison on the tactics. That may just be the way business is done these days.
On the post: That Story You've Read About YouTube 'Blocking' Indie Artists... Yeah, That's Not Accurate
The indie downside
The purpose of the service from an artist perspective has been to help with discoverability. Even the ad revenue is secondary to the ability to track further uploads from the masses through Content ID (which is apparently a service available to "partners").
It's not clear whether participation in the subscription program precludes also making content available to non-subscribers. Presumably, Google would prefer to protect the exclusivity of their paid program. It's also not clear whether the lack of an ad supported partnership option will remove access to Content ID in order to track uploads.
As a music subscription service, Youtube could potentially provide much higher revenues to participating artists. Since most indie artists use Youtube as a tool to aid in the discovery of their music, the direct revenue isn't as important as the ability to reach as many people as possible and to track total views. The Guardian article cites roughly 1/3 of new music revenue comes from indie sales, though the indies make up a relatively tiny part of the industry. That seems to indicate that the indies disproportionately rely on building their audiences rather than marketing a large catalog.
I would say that it's understandable for the indies to kick up a fuss as a industry-shaping music discovery tool looks like it's being revamped to favor the major incumbents and are being asked to participate in a less useful service on even less favorable terms than the favored majors.
It's Google's service and they can run it as they like, but the switch has echoes of Amazon-style strong arming that isn't very palateable.
On the post: Don't Weep For The Past; Plan For The Future
Re:
I haven't a clue what scale or niche print media will eventually settle into. Locally, I see newspapers thriving in situations where the artifact itself is valuable like high school sports, weddings and other scrapbookable ephemera, and where the subject lends itself to a larger format like music publications that can tastefully use a full tabloid page for photos.
On the post: IRS Now Says It Has Lost Emails From Six More Accounts Tied To The Investigation Of Its Targeting Of Tax-Exempt Groups
Knee jerk reflex or covering for suckitude?
As for covering up a conspiracy, the scandal that's been hyped isn't particularly scandalous. The IRS was denying charitable status to organizations that pretty egregiously did not fall within the guidelines- *shock*. The charge that it was a matter of selective enforcement has mostly fizzled upon finding that groups from across the ideological spectrum were examined. I doubt that there would be much more meat in any emails as far as showing some partisan war on conservatives. What I think might be there is a chain of emails from Lerner or other high ranking officials showing them absolutely adrift in determining what to do about the flood of inappropriate c4 applications.
This is the agency that has been repeatedly taunted by pastors organizing events around defying the ban on religious c3 groups engaging in electioneering. Up until this scandalous crackdown, political operations were routinely organizing as charitable groups with no repercussions. Even in cracking down on political non-profits, the targeting was awfully tentative. The existing behemoths that operated in the recent elections got a pass, and most of the groups that made it on the naughty list were not only explicitly in violation of the tax code, but were relatively amateurish local organizations.
In all, the IRS has absolutely sucked at policing tax-exempt groups and the best motive I can make out for them to stonewall is that they want to hide their incompetence rather than any partisan wrongdoing.
On the post: Words Mean Something: How Eric Holder Pretends He Won't Put Reporters In Jail Without Actually Saying That
Of course reporters don't get prosecuted, they just go to jail
If you're a REAL reporter, ie someone lucky enough to have lawyers on tap to resist charges, then you won't be prosecuted for properly exercising your constitutional rights because the First Amendment and such. Nope, you just have to forfeit your livelihood and reputation as a journalist by complying with a subpoena to give up your sources, or else go to jail for contempt. Real journalists doing their jobs always comply with court orders and the other kind are dangerous malcontents.
Next >>