People who invest in movies invest for the same reasons all of us invest in anything-- to make money.
Hollywood is a business, albeit one rooted in entertainment, but let's face it-- many artists are also just in it for the money.
I don't think our world view of "entertainment" is going to shift the way that YC suggested in it's call for action. I think most of us (unfortunately) are still going to want to watch movies like Transformers 3 at a $200 million budget than a $1million dollar indie flick.
So, once we've recognized that uprooting involves figuring out how to finance movie production instead of shifting the realm of entertainment (at least, for our generation, perhaps future generations will just want to watch WOW and starcraft online), then we're getting somewhere.
Unfortunately, figuring out a way to finance a film that costs tens or hundreds of millions to produce is a pretty tricky endeavor.
Still, it will be pretty awesome when Brad Pitt signs onto his first crowd-sourced flick =)
Movies do not have a typical accounting structure and that impacts their budgeted "costs".
In a typical collaborative venture with some degree of risk one might expect for most of the principals (director, actors, etc.) to take most of their compensation in the form of profit sharing. However, this is untenable in Hollywood because the standard is to use a fucked up accounting structure which results in most movies showing no profit on paper. Instead, a small number of people end up taking home a percentage of the gross revenues of the movie and most of the earnings for everyone else are upfront in cash.
This has several negative effects. For one it makes any movie staring a big star very much more expensive because you have to pay them $x million out of pocket. Also, because it raises the budget floor for making a top tier feature film it forces the industry to take fewer perceived risks, because a financial loss would be more devastating.
But this is only Hollywood's poisonous culture, not a fundamental aspect for making films. A production company that was founded on firmer and more ethical financial ground could implement proper profit sharing for actors, directors, other creatives, and even effects houses. It would allow movies to operate on lower budgets and embrace higher risk projects.
But I think it is pretty much possible to build a platform where we can finance a TV series like The Big Bang Theory, by charging only $1 per episode to the subscriber. Just cutting the middle man and setting a deal with a dumb pipe channel like Google (YouTube), where they can make money from ads, and paying the creators some more money... That would be only $4 a month for a series you REALLY love. [1]
And of course, the public wins A LOT, by avoiding unexpected cancellations, time slot changes, etc!
I'd definitely pay for series like Battlestar Galactica, TBBT, MacGyver (lol! how would it be today)...
And of course, if you make it GLOBAL, erasing regional restrictions, you can increase your audience at an enormous level!
I see this model as something ABSOLUTELY plausible today. Why are we still paying to the middle men?!?! Let's make this happen.
Make the movies the way you would build a lean start-up. And bank on innovation in the movies and scripts, rather than recycling popular content and make it very flashy.
But as I mentioned in another comment, I think to kill Hollywood you need incubators like YCombinator to seed the initial team and script, and attract young talent, and then help them find investors who would put a few millions into the movie, and also build a platform for distribution, like a Youtube for these movies, and a good business model to monetize them.
Some kind of news/community sites would help too, not only to share information about the projects, but also get feedback and build a group of "early adopters" who will evangelize your movie later.
Independent production companies, which represent the origin of most non-blockbuster films, work just like incubators now.
They have a development budget which they use to find and develop scripts in what might as well be an early seed round. They then shop this developed project around to financing sources, of which there are a great number that are not tied to studios. These financing sources may require additional development or even "pivoting" of the project.
Once financing is secured and the people providing the funding are happy, production can proceed. At this point, you're still wholly outside the studio system. You can completely finish your film outside the studios. This happens now, all the time, and it happens not just with Sundance style films, but with mainstream films with pretty substantial budgets.
Sundance, as an aside, is not just a festival, but also a market for these independent productions. Festivals such as Cannes and Toronto are much the same. You'll see a number of stories over the next week about films acquired at Sundance. What this means is that distribution deals were signed for films that were produced using means independent of the studios. The distributors are often, but not always, arms of the studios.
Someone mentioned Brad Pitt. He stars in independently financed projects all the time. In fact, he himself is often the indie producer, via his company Plan B which arranges for the financing through other entities.
The thing you have to understand is that smart, talented people are making films right now with innovative scripts and low budgets. And most of them will lose money, because nobody wants to see them. People genuinely prefer watching 'flashy' films with lots of VFX and actors who they've heard of.
Just because you want it to work differently doesn't mean it will.
That's why I see hard to visualize crowd-financing to movies. The risk may be just too high.
Make the movies the way you would build a lean start-up. And bank on innovation in the movies and scripts, rather than recycling popular content and make it very flashy.
Problem is that this is very high risk and the public are fickle, if your innovative idea does not take off then you have lost money. If it does take off then you will be very tempted to milk that one idea for as long as you can.
[1] The average cost as of 2008 is 106.6 million http://articles.latimes.com/2008/mar/06/business/fi-boxoffic... in 2009 MPAA, the organization compiling and reporting the figures stopped. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2009/0...
[2] http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2011/11/03/the-future-of-... In his presentation Mark Suster made some correct but to obvious observation, what I disagree is his take on talent, namely he thinks the cost of talent is going up. He's not completely wrong, in that the cost of mediocre talent has gone done, but talent that people want to see, the talent that can sell tickets and drive views, their pay is going up.
I'm reminded of Firefly. Such a great show, with lots of loyal fans. I guess it just wasn't a big enough fan base for Fox. I thought at the time that the producers should go independent and distribute straight to the consumer. Maybe that was too risky in 2002. I don't think it would be today.
Also, Joss Whedon (and the rest of Hollywood) I think learned a lot about distributing directly to the consumer with Dr. Horrible's Sing-along Blog. I think that this grand experiment was a good template for future direct-to-consumer productions.
Unfortunately, you still have to deal with the problems of initially funding large movies. I can imagine a system where instead of having dedicated studios, you have smaller one-off production companies. These companies would then be funded VC style by funds that seek to mitigate their risk by diversifying their pool of movies. You could fund a few flops, so long as every now and again an Avatar comes along.
At some point special effects are going to peak and the 1 million dollar indie flick will look exactly like the 200 million dollar one.
There will still be other differences, but technology is going to go a long way towards leveling the playing field.
With cost reduction of special effects, I agree that the playing field will gradually level...
...but to contradict myself a bit, perhaps it won't ever level because new technologies will continue to be introduced to improve the entertainment experience that are proprietary and therefore expensive.
Filesharing sites compete against Hollywood in a different way (even though it's illegal) and they manage to grab their attention. What we need is something to give us the same amount of leverage.
Eventually movies will be democratized, but killing the RIAA/iTunes cabal seems like the obvious first step.
A lot of things that people think are "done in someone's garage" are either done by someone with very rich parents or produced by a relatively well funded company.
Luckily with the labels fading as a distribution mechanism for independent music this is not happening as much anymore.
let people have the opportunity to access the distribution channel, and they will figure the other problems out.
people in this community seem to think that they're the ones that are going to solve all the problems in an industry to move it forward.
colleges have access to expensive equipment - if students have access to quality distribution channels, they'll take time to produce high quality content.
my first company made software and hardware; we started in my dorm, used electronic equipment (scopes and power supplies and stuff), and build a product and company that made money. if I can do it with technology, someone else can do it with cameras, recording equipment.
music has itunes, software has app stores, artists/painters have the web, online retail has warehouses without floorspace (and in some cases, not even warehouses). there is absolutely no reason movies don't fit into the equation.
Let's not go overboard here. Just because there is a growing market for indie games like Minecraft does not mean big budget productions like CoD, WoW or Skyrim is at all feasible for a single person to design, code, test, and support from a garage.
Good games are still very hard to make. They dont have to cost a lot of money but if you want to make the next WoW, you better have a big budget.
As you said, I think that there are platforms already here to distribute music. What we should start to put our focus on is in how to finance TV series, and eventually Movies (that are much more expensive).
[1] http://mobilewebgo.com/how-did-angry-birds-become-blockbuste...
Commercial quality polish (generally) takes expensive engineers and expensive equipment, and a lot of time, and this is true of most multimedia fields, with exception of Indy sub genres.
the argument is not "lets all share files until they go bankrupt"; it's "there is change afoot; whoever can make the awesomest, most loved art / entertainment of the next wave will win big".
you're not a special flower. the stuff you like is mass market. you will like even more whatever comes next - if you didn't, then it wouldn't be the next big thing. the argument is self-fulfilling; yc simply wants to be the one that makes money on it. don't be mislead by the macho "killing" rhetoric.
Don’t forget, when it comes along, it will probably appear to be worse than hollywood, just as text messaging is worse than email and email is worse than an express envelope.
That’s the nature of a disruption. It’s obviously worse. Until, after the fact, everyone suddenly claims it’s so much better.
I think the reason this ycomb call to action is going to fizzle out is because all you excited engineers keep using this language - "art" or "entertainment."
Hollywood doesn't produce entertainment. It tells stories. It's an industry of stories. Stories are deep and primal. Entertainment is distraction.
Despite having terrible profit margins (4-9%), six companies have had a lock-down on narrative film production for nearly 100 years. It's one of the most stable industries in the country. The initial ycomb call to action is probably the most misguided thing I've seen them release. Trying to beat back the most efficient and long lasting storytelling machine of all time with "entertainment" is like trying to dam the colorado river with a cheese cloth.
http://incompetech.com/gallimaufry/care_less.html
But I'm in total agreement with you. I too like the productions of Hollywood. I just don't like their political power.
Nevertheless, defeating SOPA is hugely significant, because it shows that we CAN be politically effective. Politics can operate as a kind of nonviolent intimidation: if our opponents have the reputation of being politically effective, and our group has the reputation of being politically ineffective, individuals think it's not worth their time trying to influence politics.
Take software patents. Whenever this comes up, there are always gloomy posts saying that we will never defeat the patent lobby. This perception deters everyone from trying to.
EFF does a good job. But I think more of us need to be active as individuals, on a day to day basis rather than just when the trumpet sounds like this. Suppose there was a website where you could sign a pledge which said: "I will spend 1/2 hour a week working against internet censorship". and then provided stack-overflow-like facilities whereby activists could suggest useful actions and vote on which are the best; and collect data on which arguments seemed most effective. Not only would this make us more effective, it would declare that we were a force to be reckoned with.
Anyone up for making such a website?
Lose that false dichotomy and the rest of your post stands on its own: we won't win if we give up.
Then, the hardest part, you need to come up with something that is Waaaaaaaaaayyyy waayyyyy better than all those movies and TV shows combined -- and do it every single day.
Then, you'll kill Hollywood.
[editted to add] You are right that division makes the message harder to put across. But it's not as simple as that. Take software patents: some people think software patents should be banned altogether, some people think they should be limited to five years, some people think 'obvious' patents are the problem. But most people think that the system is broken. As engineers, our automatic response is to start figuring out what the solution would look like. But the roadblock is not a lack of a solution, but lack of political influence. We can't agree on a solution to the software patent problem, because we won't find out which one works until we get to try one of them out. And the roadblock to doing that is lack of political influence.
That seems far more productive than trying to destroy an industry because you're tired of their political power.
Start funding shows, movies, and productions.
Or figure out how to get 100MM people (or more) subscribed at $10/month (or more) to check-mark which shows and movies they want created. Then use the revenue from that to make the production.
Maybe even make the process completely democratic, where actors (known, and unknown) can send in their auditions and you get to vote on it. Then use YouTube or NetFlix for distribution, and provide downloads.
There is more to it than the above, but that pretty much cuts the studios off, and Hollywood in general, at the knees, and gives control to the consumers.
When it comes to technology, I'm optimistic that it has almost limitless potential to revolutionize. My instinct tells me though that a startup aimed at competing against Hollywood doesn't have to be about inventing alternate forms of entertainment, but rather to work at optimizing on alternate means of production and distribution of the already successful form of entertainment. Recent efforts with other media have shown that most optimizations are about cutting out as much unnecessary intermediary layers as possible.
I'm convinced that a number of people currently working within the Hollywoodian system are unhappy with the present arrangements and I would not be surprised if a few were to come out the woodwork because of this YC invitation. Their expertise will be essential, because if my guess is correct, I think that a large majority of people on HN are complete ignorami when it comes to making a movie or a tv show. We're more consumers and critics than we are creators or producers of such material.
Another thing would be to look at what currently exist that tries to spearhead such alternate efforts. Is it successful? What are the problems? What has been tried? Where's the data?
First, let's ask the people who currently work on the fringe of Hollywood how they're doing it.
VFX companies are external contractors to the studios and compete to bid on upcoming projects. Competition is tough and the studios are more than willing to go wherever they can to achieve the best price/quality ratio. Yet still VFX can amount to a significant fraction of the production budget for a modern blockbuster. The studios are happy to pay for this though since they know that VFX driven films generally do better than the alternative.
http://boxofficemojo.com/yearly/
So if the VFX companies aren't making massive profits, what are their costs? The costs are employing hundreds of artists and developers to create content. And content is what people are ultimately paying money to see. It's exactly the same in the games industry.
So to create an alternative to Hollywood, you'd need to generate content that's as good as Hollywood. And you're not going to do that without lots of highly paid content creators. Doesn't seem like particularly low hanging fruit to me.
I agree that lobbying power for industries like Hollywood is a problem that needs to be fixed, but that is a much larger context than entertainment. We can both replace Hollywood with a more consumer oriented industry and reform lobbying, but they are two separate goals.
As more and more people switch to online sources of entertainment, their industry is simply being diluted by Youtube's, Hulu's, Reddit, HackerNews and the Apple App Store.
So in their dying breaths, they are spending $100 million a year trying to take control of the very industry that is diluting their power over our information and their control of our minds. It sounds very George Orwellian, but I mean really.. have you seen Fox news? It's a parody of itself.
Rupert Murdoch tried his best to have a go at the online industry with Myspace and we all know how well that turned out for him, so I guess the self-professed billionaire tyrant figures if he can't beat them, why not just try and own them?
But here's the thing - you can probably make a dent but "killing it" ?
Wouldn't that be like making professional sports obsolete?
There is just too much money and organization and you are never going to get all the fans to try something else instead and stay with it.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/risky-business/sundance-201...
The real problem is that money has buying power in Congress. Money shouldn't buy votes. I don't know what the solution is but I'm fairly sure that's the problem.
