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- Goals for 2009January 2
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Personal
- Be a better friend, son, brother, and community member.
- Enjoy the moment.
- Exercise three times a week.
- Work at my desk more.
- Make my bed.
- Eat less red meat, and more vegetables.
- Simplify, simplify, simplify.
- Move into a new place.
Professional
- Make Ask A Ninja into an actual business.
- Write and Shoot a mumblecore feature.
- Shoot a spec commercial.
- Sell another project to Hollywood.
- Seminal Moment: Old People Pirating DVDsDecember 22 2008
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So an anonymous couple in their early 60s have recently dabbled into media piracy. It used to be that people who shared ripped DVDs were anonymous freshmen living in the dorms.
Not anymore.
On two separate occasions these members of the elder set have now copied a DVD they purchased, and now received a full DVD wallet of Christmas classics.
This officially means that DVD copying has become mainstream.
And I think that’s great. In the wallet of the Christmas DVDs received from a friend that gave them out as Holiday gifts, there were several movies they already owned on DVDs, and then several very old and obscure chestnuts I’d never heard of, along with some well known classics.
Chances are that Couple X would never have bought or rent these ever, but now that they know that they are available, I could see them buying one or two of them to get the packaging.
But, regardless, they pirated, they are delighted by these films and I can see them getting hooked.
They also recently asked for help in copying a DVD they purchased to give to their friend. And I think once they get an easy system down they will do more of this in the future. They buy a lot of media and love to pass along the ones the buy (previously they just watch once and then give it away to friends and family, but now I could see them passing along a copy).
I think the solution to this for the media companies is not to clamp down more, t
- Indie Advocate Gets Bitter About The State of FilmmakingDecember 21 2008
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Mike Curtis, an HD evangelist over at ProVideoCoalition.com and HDforIndies.com, is majorly depressed and angry over the current state of the indie filmmaking world.
Story - a guy trying to make little cheapo guns ‘n boobies sci-fi movies on the ultra cheap - make 3 a year. He got no bites on international distribution at some film market, and sold all domestic rights for $16K. That’s half of what he needed just to break even.
Another story - similar tale of someone who, after all the other fees and cuts and whatnot were done, got $2 per DVD as producer. OK - sold about 5000 units. That’s $10K compensation for making a feature film.
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Anecdote - it used to be that the hot new movie directing talent came up through commercials and music videos - think David Fincher. McG is, I think, the last name I can think of that came up that route that has achieved commercial success. Anybody else? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? There was a list of top 50 hot talent something or other. Nobody under 30. Where’s the new talent coming from? Not from music videos anymore - there’s barely a market, and certainly no real money, in that anymore
…
As long as I’m rantin
- The Power of Myth in AdvertisingDecember 16 2008
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Matthew Yglesias wrote:
The problem newspapers are having with online isn’t that the readers won’t pay, it’s that the advertisers won’t pay. The reduced costs per reader make up for the reduced revenue involved in giving the product away, but a physical newspaper generates far more in terms of ad revenue per reader than does a newspaper website. Probably once physical newspapers all disappear, ad rates for news websites will go up somewhat merely because ad buyers won’t have as many options.
That’s the real crux of the problem. Advertisers don’t know how to value online eyeballs. The myths of old media have accrued until now they are just pure common sense or conventional wisdom.
My favorite example is what’s known as the pass along rate in magazines. The pass along rate is some imaginary number that publishers say that original subscribers pass along the magazine to friends and other non-subscribers. And that certainly happens in the real world, but it’s also very hard to quantify. It’s squishy and human and imprecise.
Right now most of online advertising is anything but squishy and human. Google adwords are the king (44% of revenue), with display brand dollars getting a distant second (21% of revenue), accord
- My Blogiversary: One Year Writing About Producing New MediaDecember 14 2008
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I started this blog one year ago to give attention to the plight of Perez Hilton and his banned YouTube channel.
Since then I’ve written close to 100 posts about new media and how to make a living in this new universe.
Writing about this stuff has been a fun and humbling journey. It’s a scary new world, with a lot of unwritten rules. The exciting thing is that we as a community are all collectively blazing the trails that others will follow. That is why it’s good to reflect and analyze what’s happening and what’s working. And it’s important to keep offering a hand back to those just starting out.
This is a space that completely reinvents itself every few months. It’s hard to have long term vision when there is this much churn. Like being caught in a riptide, this is a time for calm and steady action, not wild and flailing panic. We can see the shore from where we are now, but we can’t swim directly there. We need to swim laterally and get out of the confusion and then to the safety of shore.
In New Media, that means do good work, expect no money, expect no fame, but prepare for them. Continue to get better with each piece of work. And above all survive. Survive either by raising friends and family capital, or by keeping your day job, or by having the TV or movie version of your show ready to sell. Most likely you’ll need to do
