Category: Business & Marketing

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Business & Marketing Item of Interest

Copyright Infringement and Theft – The Difference

Copyright Infringement and Theft – The Difference http://t.co/Q4U7Tat

The US Supreme Court has ruled that:

In 1985, the Court ruled in Dowling v United States that copyright infringement is not theft, even when dealing with physical objects, such as vinyl records.

And yet, despite that 1985 ruling so-called “intelligent people” – including VP Biden – have blatantly referred to Copyright Infringement as “theft, plain and simple”, in complete contradiction to law and precedent.

In reality the last thing the RIAA and MPAA want is for copyright infringement (a civil issue) to be prosecuted as theft (criminal).

Firstly, the standard of proof is “beyond reasonable doubt” and it’s very, very unlikely that the discovery process in copyright cases would pass muster. It’s never been proven to be reliable in any court anywhere in the world. An IP address does not identify an individual, no matter what the fantasies of the legacy industries in music and film distribution.

Secondly, the penalties are much more reasonable.

Regardless of your opinions on copyright infringement, in the USA, it’s not theft. Personally, I’d prefer “beyond reasonable doubt”. The article compares the Jammie Thomas case as it has proceeded under copyright infringement and how it would have proceeded had it been tried as theft: bottom line – a much smaller fine (with the potential for a short prison term, although unlikely for the very small amount of value “stolen”, as the criminal case works on actual real value: 99c a song!

Good push back against the ever-growing threat to civil liberties by the RIAA/MPAA and the disastrous PROTECT IP proposed legislation, which has the potential to “break” the Internet as we know it. And that’s exactly what they want, and we don’t.

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Business & Marketing Item of Interest Media Consumption

Hollywood is about to repeat the mistakes of the music industry?

Hollywood is about to repeat the catastrophic mistakes of the music industry. http://tinyurl.com/3spfm4o

Slate magazine’s Bill Wyman argues that the movie studios are repeating the mistakes of the record labels of the last decade, by refusing to adapt business models, suing customers and trying to make their business model problem a legal one.

Right now, in fact, the movie and TV business looks a lot like the music one did in the early 2000s. And as we’ve seen, that decade didn’t work out too well for the labels. So it’s worth looking at the situation and wondering how things are going to fare in the TV and movie world in the decade ahead. It can all be summed up in one single sentence. I’ll get to that in a minute.

He goes on to demonstrate how the legal offerings are inconvenient (at best) for the legal customers making unauthorized distribution not only cheaper but a significantly better product:

The trouble facing the movie industry right now is the same one the music industry had to confront 10 years ago. This is the summing-up sentence I referred to above:

The easiest and most convenient way to see the movies or TV shows you want is to get them illegally.

and

Again, to belabor the obvious: The illegal version isn’t just free. It’s better.

He goes on to suggest the solutions, but read the whole article (please), before commenting

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Apple Pro Apps Business & Marketing

“Full-time Editor” or “Pro” is asking the wrong question

Over the last couple of weeks, some of the discussion around Final Cut Pro X is focused on who Apple wrote it for – a discussion I’ve contributed to in more than one place. And I see today in Oliver Peter’s excellent review of Final Cut Pro X he tackles the same question and punts on “full-time” editor as the distinguishing factor. (And yes, yet another Final Cut Pro X post, but one where the main point isn’t really about that piece of software specifically, but relevant to the discussion.)

It strikes me that we might really be asking the wrong question, or questions. It’s not so much what type of work you do, or what proportion of your time is spent doing it, or even the attitude one takes to one’s work – “professionalism”. In the context of talking about the relative suitability of tools, surely the question is on workflows and toolset?

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Business & Marketing Item of Interest Monetizing The Business of Production

All My Children a killer app?

All My Children a killer app? http://tinyurl.com/3ue2fmr

You may have heard the announcement that All My Children and One Life to Live (cancelled ABC Soap Operas) are heading to Internet distribution. (In this context “app” means use not literally a software application). He runs the numbers on whether or not this could work financially – something I’m always interested in.

Fifty million dollars is $192,000 per episode or $4,370 per finished minute based on 44 minute shows. That’s a lot of money but a lot less than primetime TV budgets. It’s also the absolute most any soap has ever cost with most costing less. Certainly there are some savings to be found in there. Let’s claim a 20 percent labor savings from moving to the Internet, bringing per minute costs down to $3,496.

Actually, there are plenty of additional savings. Some savings will come from lower labor costs as actors accept smaller paychecks as an alternative to retirement or unemployment. But an even greater savings will come from any Internet soap’s ability to offer online every episode ever broadcast — the long tail — at an effective production cost of $0 per hour.

If a third of Internet viewers are watching old episodes that drops the effective cost of new episodes by a third, so we are down to $2,342 per finished minute.

With sponsorship he brings it down to around $2,000 a finished minute and then compares it with the (rumored/reported) budgets for YouTube’s future professional channels.

According toVariety, YouTube will shortly bring some professional channels to its service with budgets of $1000-$3000 per finished minute.

My biggest concern about this particular example – not about the trend to Internet delivery and alternate funding in general – is that the target market for the Soaps may not be technically savvy enough to pick up and continue on the Internet.

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Apple Pro Apps Business & Marketing Random Thought

When Logic doesn’t help

I was have a beer last night with my friend Joe B – @zbutcher on Twitter, follow him and check out his Final Cut Pro X curation site linking to all the stories he can find – and naturally the conversation covered the current Final Cut Pro X release and the consequent debate. In my mind, a good discussion is one I come away from with enlightened or changed thinking. And this was a good conversation.

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Business & Marketing Career

Why (and How) we need to reinvent ourselves regularly?

Last Saturday, June 4th, I had the pleasure of sharing a Keynote with Marcelo Lewin at the OC Pro Media Camp.  The topic was re-inventing ourselves.  This blog post is the essence of what I said in that keynote.

How do we embrace change? Wholeheartedly and with gusto.  Change is inevitable. In fact it may be the only true constant.  Most people dislike or even fear change, but want things to “get better”.

Fundamentally there are two types of change: Continued Reinvention & Dramatic Reinvention.  I’m 55 now and, as best I can count, I’m on my sixth distinct career. Many of those were a slow transition: from being a general, do anything video production company to specializing in training and education production, which lead inevitably to becoming a training design specialist. The transition from Charisma Video Productions – my first Australian company – to Charisma Digital as the first digital post house in Australia’s sixth largest market – was a significant transition, but more evolution than revolution. But the jump from the Intelligent Assistant training tools to Digital Production BuZZ was a complete re-invent.

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Business & Marketing Video Technology

Why would we want one type of NLE design?

Here’s a question.  If you enter a new business into a crowded market, would you design it to be as similar to the existing competition, or would you design something different that differentiates itself in the marketplace?

Growing up in Australia in the 1960’s thru to 90’s on Saturday afternoon the average Sydneysider – the biggest city in Australia – could choose from five networks: 3 commercial (7, 9 and 10) and two Government – ABC (think PBS but Govt funded) and SBS (for multicultural entertainment). Typically two of the commercial networks and both ABC and SBS would have some sort of sport. (Soccer on SBS was very “multicultural” at the time!)

The ratings winner was the 10 network because they programmed something that wasn’t sport! Although sports were, and are, very popular, the aggregate non-sport market was bigger!

Although Media Composer wasn’t the first non-linear editing software, it was the first to capture the popular imagination of the industry. It’s interface was very comfortable for editors familiar with both Moviola and tape-based offline editing. That was probably exactly the right thing to do at the time.

At the time.

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Business & Marketing Item of Interest Monetizing

Jonathan Coulton Making Half a Million a Year – with no Record Label

Jonathan Coulton Making Half A Million A Year – No Record Label http://tinyurl.com/3kms62l

Jonathan has been at the forefront of those connecting with fans, and it’s working out pretty well for him. He sells his music with a Creative Commons (Some rights reserved, i.e. licensing and making money from it) so it’s impossible to pirate what’s freely exchangable.

And yet, he’s making really good money selling music, merchandise and concert tickets.

More to the point, he’s doing better than the vast majority of music acts that get picked up by the major record labels. If Coulton had signed with them, he’d be hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt!

Of course, defenders of the old system will insist that he’s an “exception,” but, really, just how many exceptions do we need until people realize that the market is changing rapidly, and those who embrace new models and new methods of distribution are finding that they can make a lot more money than they did in the past.

The comments are as interesting as the article.

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Business & Marketing Distribution Item of Interest Monetizing

Kevin Smith’s Red State Experiment has already Paid for Itself.

Kevin Smith’s Red State Experiment Has Already Paid for Itself http://tinyurl.com/4ybp2ql

Kevin Smith announced that he would auction off the rights to Red State after a Sundance screening and then infamously sold them to himself, leading to a rant about the state of distribution for independent movies.

He planned on doing a series of screenings-with-director events leading up to an October theatrical release.  Well, according to reports he’s already close to, or achieved, payback of the $4 million budget.

Kevin Smith’s latest passion project Red State has already paid for itself, six months before it actually sees full theatrical release. Thanks to an ambitious multi-city road trip in which Smith traveled to screenings of the movie and spoke with audiences afterward, Red Statehas already made back the $4 million budget production company SMODcast Pictures invested in the film.

Now Kevin Smith comes with a built-in fan base that he’s cultivated over the years (and that is indeed part of any success in this new paradigm – first Connect with your Fans) but it’s not only working for Smith:

That said, Smith isn’t the only filmmaker experimenting with new types of distribution. Edward Burns, for instance, distributed his latest feature film, Nice Guy Johnny, direct to iTunes, VOD and DVD last year, skipping theatrical release altogether. Indie filmmaker Sebastian Gutierrez distributed his Girl Walks Into a Bar directly to YouTube. And Pixar CTO and independent film producer Oren Jacob used a mix of social media and food banksto boost the profile of his documentary Ready, Set, Bag!

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Apple Pro Apps Business & Marketing

Why the Pro Apps – particularly Final Cut Pro X – are important to Apple

As part of the Sneak Peek of Final Cut Pro X at the NAB 2011 Supermeet, Apple updated their user stats to 2 million customs (with 94% satisfaction).

Now, my understanding is (with help from Oliver Peters) that this number includes Final Cut Express and the early individual sales of DVD Studio Pro and Motion. Some customers will be included having paid only $199, while others will have paid the $995 purchase price and one or more upgrades. For a customer who purchased FCP 1 for $995 and paid for every upgrade, then that customer has invested, over the 12 years since NAB 1999, around $3750.

But balance that with those who bought educational pricing, and other discounted opportunities plus those low priced buy-ins and I’ll assign an average income per user of $1000.  I think that’s conservative but the data to make a more accurate assessment isn’t available to me. (If you have it philip @ intelligentassistance.com without the spaces.) Besides, it makes the numbers easy to work with.

So, 2 million customers with an average revenue per customer of $1000 (over 12 years) and that gives a gross revenue of $2 billion dollars or roughly $168 million in revenue per year.

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