Category: Digital Culture

The Wicked and Dissembling Glass

Photo by Yaroslav Gerzhedovich

Last week, MPAA CEO Christopher Dodd spoke in San Francisco about fostering better collaboration between the entertainment and Internet industries.  Not surprisingly, two voices from the tech industry, TechDirt and the Electronic Frontier Foundation rang out with rebuttal. Mike Masnick, editor of TechDirt, called Dodd a “predictable dissembler” and proceeded to attack him personally for “lacking the vision” for his role.  The EFF posted this article, which strikes a more conciliatory tone that only makes for an even more insidious version of the proverbial pot calling the kettle black.

Now, I don’t have any strong feelings about the MPAA or Mr. Dodd per se.  I agree with some functions of that body, disagree with others, and am generally neutral on most of its activities.  In January, I wrote that I considered the protest against SOPA to be generally dysfunctional and that well-meaning people were being used as puppets by the Web industry, playing on a historic distrust of the media industry.  So, let’s clear one thing up right now:  as of this moment, the Web industry outspends entertainment on straight-up lobbying and on general PR, including the work of the EFF.  As an aside, I feel a little silly using the term Web industry when one company, Google, owns more than 90% of search and advertising worldwide.  Is there a U.S. company more monopolistic at this point in history?

Still, the Web folks continue to get away with portraying themselves as the underdog and also as the champions of free speech. Thus, the EFF article states, innocent of the slightest hypocrisy, “But let’s not forget that he [Dodd] serves as the chairman and CEO of one of the most influential lobbying groups in Washington, and that the actions of the industry have yet to back up his rhetoric.”  The writers of the article aim to sound open-minded while warning the reader not to trust “Dodd’s influence” despite the fact that the EFF’s Northern California friends enjoy far more influence, if lobbying dollars are the true measure.  Let’s also not forget that the Web industry has left more than its fair share of unfulfilled rhetoric on the table.

While Web-centric pundits continue to raise the specter of SOPA’s return as an emotional tug on our senses, we should remember some of the odd dissembling that came from the bill’s opponents on January 18.  Remember these slogans?  Good intention, bad law.  End Piracy, Not Liberty.  These reasonable-sounding mantras were designed for general consumption by a public that doesn’t follow these issues on a regular basis; and they imply that the Web industry agrees that online piracy is a problem but that SOPA and PIPA were not the solution.  The question remains, though, what solutions has the Web industry offered since declaring victory in the name of liberty over these bills?

So far, this industry has continued to pump out fears regarding any legislative action designed to protect copyright; it has increased its lobbying efforts and expenditures;  it has perpetuated the implication that copyright itself is anathema to free speech; and it has continued to insist that the solution to piracy is to embrace it as a business opportunity rather than to confront it as a threat.  These are not the actions of an industry looking to collaborate to solve a problem. Perhaps because it’s not their problem.

Both the EFF and TechDirt articles in response to Dodd cite a Congressional Research Service Report (see embed) that they claim makes Dodd out as a liar with regard to the importance of filmed entertainment as a component of GDP as well as the industry’s role as an employer.  But, as is often the case with data, truth is in the voice of the interpreter; and it looks to me as though TechDirt and EFF are reading what they want to see in the numbers.

Download (PDF, 274KB)

First, the entire report is based on best available information only from the major studios listed on Page 1.  Hence, the employment number is meaningless, because anyone who knows the motion picture business, knows that the lion’s share of work is done by people who never receive a paycheck from these companies.  The report does not reflect, for instance, the independent production companies who produce most of the filmed entertainment in the U.S.  A quick glance at a web page for just one company, Participant, lists 50 projects completed or in production. If we average a conservative but realistic 150 roles per project (not including actors or directors), that’s 7,500 contract jobs ranging from entry-level to high-paying through one production company since 2004.

The report also would not include a four-person, middle-income shop in NYC doing motion graphics this year for a TV network. These people most certainly are employed by the entertainment industry, and so are several hundred shops just like them around the country. Then of course, there are tens of thousands of industry professionals who support themselves, their families, and their communities by working variously on TV shows, documentaries, low-budget features, commercials, and industrials, all of which are affected by the overall health of the motion picture industry, even at the top rungs of the ladder.

In the TechDirt article, Mike Masnick uses the CRS report to simultaneously assert that the movie business is doing just fine (i.e. studio executive salaries) and, by the way, it isn’t really all that important to the economy (i.e. small contribution to GDP).  Studio CEO salaries, right or wrong, have very little to do with the overall health of the American film industry, especially in a discussion about the effect of online piracy on filmmakers of every size.

As for the significance of filmed entertainment to the economy, again, the GDP part of the report is narrowly focused on box office sales in the U.S. and Canada for the major studios listed.  This leaves out huge segments of economic value in the for-profit, industry as a whole.   (It should be noted that this not a flaw in the report itself, only in how the limited data is being used in this context.)

Strangely enough, Masnick sees no irony in the fact that he says, on the one hand, that the film business doesn’t amount to much economically and yet somehow, Hollywood manages to wield tremendous lobbying power.  In fact, were we to take this report as the only relevant data, it shows clearly that Disney, News Corp, Viacom, Sony, and Time Warner combined don’t make as much as Google all by itself.  So, ask yourself who’s likely throwing whose weight around in Washington?

SOPA and PIPA may well be dead, even in revised forms; but currently on life support, I believe, is the Web industry’s ability to keep playing David to media’s Goliath, all  the while crying, “freedom” in order to effect policy in its favor.  It won’t take too much longer for the general public to figure out that the members of the newly announced Internet Association are no more deserving of our blind trust than any other wealthy, vested interest. This is just business and politics as usual; and I would ask what wicked and dissembling glass makes the the wizards of Silicon Valley believe they’re always the good guys?

Because Film is Next

I have many friends in the filmed entertainment industry working at all levels of production and in just about every department.  Some of them follow my blogs with interest, others just to be nice, and others I suspect wonder why I bother at all.  There are many reasons why I choose to focus on matters related to the digital age, but even if I didn’t care about politics or social issues, I’d care for this reason alone:  because film is next.

Technically speaking, the digital distribution of filmed entertainment, both legal and illegal, is roughly 15 years behind music. Acceptable quality streaming, for those who care about quality, is less than five years old, so we’re still on the leading edge of digital distribution and the inevitable convergence of TV and Web for the majority of viewers. While small-town theaters like the one I’m working with try to raise funds for the costly conversion to digital projection, many wonder if the next generation of viewers will even bother going to big-screens in the future.  At the same time, we see some exciting but challenging developments in DIY film production that both the Web and consumer electronics industries are only too happy to champion.

I know that my contemporaries have experienced massive shifts in work-for-hire on small productions (e.g. commercials, industrials, cable TV) in the last few years.  In general, the day rates for crew members and post-production professionals have not only not kept up with the cost of living, they have actually gone down in many cases.  Among other factors, the flood of affordable, easy-to-learn, digital products has reduced the value placed on professional skills, and many professionals are expected to perform the job of 2-3 people for the rate of one.  This trend really took seed in the early 1990s with the development of non-linear, digital editing, which gave rise to concepts like the Preditor, a hybrid Producer/Editor.

On the other end of production, as high-quality digital cinema has really broken significant barriers with cameras like the Arri ALEXA and Red, the demand for experienced professionals in every department actually increases in concert with improved resolution and complexity of dynamic workflows. As cinematographer Steven Poster indicated in my interview with him last week, at the level at which he works, digital is more complex and more expensive for a variety of reasons.

I don’t know this for sure, but my sense is that neither my colleagues in the big, studio-model game nor those in the purely indie universe are spending a ton of time considering the future of film in the digital age. But I believe now is the time to pay attention, and we’re fortunate to have the music industry to study for guidance.  I know it’s popular, even among artists in the business, to bash the big boys; but my concern is that the pros and cons of organizations like the MPAA, for instance, are really beside the point with regard to the many issues worth examining for the filmmaking community.

Let’s accept that our industry has its political arm, and so does the Web industry (in fact they’ve just announced a new and powerful lobby) and so does the consumer electronics industry.  Let’s assume that each multi-billion-dollar industry is out to serve its own interests and that this is politics and business as usual.  Not that we should ignore these things, but I do believe too much attention in this direction results in generalizing and polarization, which doesn’t serve the community of creators nearly so much as it serves one industrial interest or another.  For instance, it doesn’t make sense to me to be an indie filmmaker who outright rejects all of the efforts of the mainstream movie business, when many of our interests are utterly aligned.

Film production, distribution, and marketing is multiple times more complex than music; and no matter how anyone chooses to spin the data on the effects of the digital age on the music industry, the bottom line is that fewer professionals in that business are making a living than were doing so fifteen years ago.  As such, I am unsatisfied with the premise that threats like online piracy are merely a challenge to be met by changing business models.  I hear this generalization from Web-centric voices all the time but have yet to imagine a practical way in which what they’re selling does not mean the end of a sustainable, thriving industry that produces one of America’s leading exports.  (Either that, or Google wants to be the new movie studio.)

I’m open to hearing ideas from film professionals — people who know how to budget, produce, and actually make motion pictures — how any of these “new model” mantras make sense.  But when I look at journalism, which still struggles; I look at music, which has sustained big losses; it’s hard not to believe that film really is next. I think now is the time for more filmmakers to be discussing these matters and I would love to hear from any of you.

Keeping the Dark On

Anyone who follows the ongoing tug-of-war between Hollywood and Silicon Valley will inevitably encounter variations on two cherished themes of the Web-centric:  1) that Hollywood is corrupt, monopolistic, and greedy; and 2) that Hollywood is incapable of embracing technology.  If we are to believe that either or both of these generalizations are fair, then what are we to make of the now-imminent shift to digital-only distribution for theatrical feature films?  Are the studios throwing their weight around and crushing the little guy, or is this just part of the march of technological progress?

I admit the subject raises conflicting feelings for this particular film lover.  The purist in me wants to keep celluloid around for as long as possible; the pragmatist (and semi-proficient DP) in me understands first-hand what digital cinema in general offers the independent film artist; and the humanist in me is sad to know that an estimated 1,000 small-town theaters will be shutting their doors.  See this article from The Wrap.

The bottom line is this:  by about the end of 2013, any movie theater that cannot project digitally will no longer be a movie theater.  The major distributors will cease shipping 35mm film prints, which will save billions in printing and shipping costs. In general, the big chains are already digital, and some of the mid-market independents can afford to finance the new capital investment; but theaters serving small markets will either need to raise donated funds (between $65,000 and $200,000) or close up shop.

I happen to live in a community with a single-screen theater, one that I actually helped save a few years ago (with the promo below) when the business was up for sale, and our local film club wanted to purchase it.  By “film club,” I’m referring to FilmColumbia, which hosts a wonderfully curated, small festival about to celebrate its 13th season this October. In addition to being home-base for the festival, the Crandell theatre in Chatham, NY shows first-run movies for less than half the cineplex ticket price, and it screens independent, art-house films on the weekends. The Crandell is truly the cultural and economic hub of the village of Chatham, and it is the only theater of its kind in the entire county.  And this weekend, my colleagues and I are shooting a new promo to help raise funds to go digital.

Built in 1926, the Crandell had to foot the bill for another capital improvement within weeks of its opening — sound. The brass RCA plaque displayed above the ticket window is a reminder of a time when those who held patents on technology controlled both production and distribution, which more or less set the precedent for how the motion picture industry evolved for most of its history.

Today, the means of production, and at least certain kinds of distribution, are available to nearly everyone.  At the same time, a whole generation is watching movies (legally and illegally) on computers, tablets, smart phones, and iPods. I suppose some might be tempted to wonder why bother trying to save this antique of actual brick and mortar.  But the answer is a no-brainer for me:  because the experience of going to the movies at your local, little theater has not lost any of its aesthetic value. In the same way that film still captures and reproduces textures that the best digital technologies have yet to match, the local theater experience is one not so easily quantified as it is felt.  So, since I cannot possibly do anything about the future of celluloid projection, I can at least do my part to save a few seats for my friends and neighbors.