what happens if SOPA passes?

one thing that's interesting is that in the 1990s, something like... wait for it... 100% of videos of films available in the PRC were pirated. and now it's much much lower, not i think largely because of anti-piracy efforts but because people have more money.

(actually i think the 100% was true up until like 2002-3, when piracy began to decline.)

Yes, maybe there are cheap cameras and cheap CGI programs that do what expensive ones used to, but where are you going to get top quality cinematographers? Where are you going to get storyboard artists and programmers and trained actors and all that sort of thing? Where are you going to find the time it makes to create something really good, polished, etc.? How do you imagine everyone involved feeding and clothing themselves while working on a film full-time? Or do you think great films will be made in spare time by people with day jobs?

This is true, but my point is that in Hollywood, as opposed to most everywhere else, most of these people are waaaaaaay overpaid. If you can make EXACTLY the same film for 1/10 the price elsewhere, then surely that suggests that a town SET UP for making movies has pretty much become a town set up for padding budgets.

I'm not saying we can all make great movies for $0, but I am saying that talented people can make great movies for a fraction of what it costs the average studio-made US movie to be made.

that is true, but things blowing up: the sequel is always gonna gost an arm and a leg unless people are willing to put up with like nollywood production values.

cost

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/02/highest-paid-actors-actresses-2010_n_916237.html

Top amongst all thespians in the last year was Leonardo DiCaprio; the man who played a dirt poor kid in "Titanic" saw his films "Inception" and "Shutter Island" take in a cool $1.2 billion; with contracts that guaranteed him part of the backends, DiCaprio made a whopping $72 million in the last year.

In second was Johnny Depp, with $50 million; the "Pirates of the Caribbean" star was tops the year before, with $75 million. Next came Adam Sandler, with $40 million; his company, "Happy Madison," produced his wildly popular film, "Grown Ups."

In the actress category, Angelina Jolie and Sarah Jessica Parker topped the cash list with $30 million each; Jennifer Aniston was a close third with $28 million.

saw his films "Inception" and "Shutter Island" take in a cool $1.2 billion

jesus, that's a lot of cash.

By any measure that's a precarious expectation at the top level. Hollywood has made its own bed here imo.

― Autumn Almanac, Thursday, January 26, 2012 12:09 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this strikes me as a bit ridiculous, like when ppl act as if NBA players earn too much.

Well, they really, really do. Nobody should earn huge amounts of money when all they fucking do is PLAY A GAME.

i disagree. i think being that good at whatever you choose to do, in a capitalist society, has higher value. there are less competitive positions in other fields that pay considerably more, where the relative 'skill' is just knowing how to work the system

sure, and I'd pay those people less too. but this is personal opinion, i'm never going to convince anyone of my own personal frothing anti-sports rants

I do find the whole stop piracy stance of Hollywood amusing, given Hollywood only exists in the first place because early movie-makers settled there in order to be out of reach of the copyright/patent enforcement of the inventors of the technology they were using

the above the line people in h'w'd make a lot of money, below-the-line not always.

also -- high salaries for below-the-line people are often compensation for job insecurity and spending 1/3 to 1/2 of the year out of work.

I do find the whole stop piracy stance of Hollywood amusing, given Hollywood only exists in the first place because early movie-makers settled there in order to be out of reach of the copyright/patent enforcement of the inventors of the technology they were using

i bet you couldn't find a single executive at one of the major studios who is aware of that history.

this strikes me as a bit ridiculous, like when ppl act as if NBA players earn too much.

ignoring the 'what % of profits do players deserve' issue - the worse players in the NBA probably make too much money (they benefit from there only being so many teams) and the very best players are prob underpaid

dude stop

stop what!

iatee is totally right here. I had a professor say this about Brett Favre, "he's a manual laborer, his salary should be $75,000 tops" which is one of the most idiotic things I've ever heard

i bet you couldn't find a single executive at one of the major studios who is aware of that history.

I'll take that bet - I'd bet all of them know a great deal about all that actually

talented people can make great movies for a fraction of what it costs the average studio-made US movie to be made.

Sure, but at least 90% of the American public now thinks a big-budget H'wood noise machine is the only iteration of a 'good movie' -- hence the b.o. window warnings that effectively read "You are going to hate The Tree of Life."

but this is personal opinion, i'm never going to convince anyone of my own personal frothing anti-sports rants

tell me more

frankly the biggest eye-opener about that H'wood salaries article is SJP. her movies bomb, why do they pay her so much?

see also katherine heigl, though she probably gets less cash than she did three years ago.

http://www.appleoutsider.com/2012/01/26/hollywood/

Perfect summary of the current state of play imo. Those companies are actually run by idiots.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-16755449

Singers and bands who withhold their albums from music streaming services, such as Spotify, are in danger of alienating their fans, an executive from record label Universal has said.

Acts including Adele and Coldplay kept their latest albums off Spotify, which is seen by some as damaging sales.

But Francis Keeling, vice president of digital at Universal Music, said such acts risk "alienating their fanbases".

Universal is the world's most successful record label.

Adele's track Rolling In The Deep was the most-played single of 2011 on Spotify UK, but the star has withheld the complete album, 21 - released by the XL label - from the service.

Coldplay's manager Dave Holmes recently told Bloomberg Businessweek that the band's Mylo Xyloto, released on EMI, would be on Spotify eventually.

But he said: "I am very concerned. Spotify competes with download stores."

The Black Keys and Tom Waits are among the other high-profile acts who have kept their latest releases off streaming services.

Black Keys frontman Dan Auerbach told Billboard magazine that the royalties from streaming services were "so minuscule it's laughable".

"It's a cool thing to have if you're in a new band and you want to be heard," he said. "But if you are a bigger band that's already known and you rely on record sales for a living, then it's really no place to be."

Universal has said its research proved that Spotify did not cannibalise sales, and Mr Keeling said the label negotiated with artists on a case-by-case basis.

"Over time, we're trying to convince our artists that streaming services are the right thing to do and these services should be supported," he said, according to PaidContent.

Mr Keeling was speaking at the label's Investors' Open Day in London, where Spotify announced that it now had three million paying subscribers, with approximately 12 million more using its free service.

http://www.appleoutsider.com/2012/01/26/hollywood/

Perfect summary of the current state of play imo. Those companies are actually run by idiots.

to be fair, iTunes (or the music industry in general) isn't really a good counterpoint to this. the Amazon MP3 store, on the other hand...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16757142
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/58138000/jpg/_58138503_58138494.jpg

...

Darrell Issa, a US senator and vocal critic of the stalled Stop Online Piracy Act (Sopa), voiced his concerns about Acta at the World Economics Forum in Davos.

"As a member of Congress, it's more dangerous than Sopa," he said.

"It's not coming to me for a vote. It purports that it does not change existing laws. But once implemented, it creates a whole new enforcement system and will virtually tie the hands of Congress to undo it."

In addition to internet-based measures, the agreement also seeks to curb trade of counterfeited physical goods.

Past drafts of the treaty suggested that internet service providers would have to give up data about users accused of copyright infringement and might have to cut them off - although this segment of the agreement has since been removed.

Outside of the EU, the treaty has also been signed by the US, Australia, Canada, Japan, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore and South Korea.

and yes, the UK government signed up for it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Counterfeiting_Trade_Agreement

ACTA is pretty scary

the ability to demand that ISPs shutdown websites for distributing software that can be used to play DRM protected media is almost cartoonishly villainous. that's like closing a hardware store because they sell stuff that can be used for burglary.

Except those tools can be used for many other purposes, most of the DRM breaking software I've seen is useless for anything else.

well I was thinking more about software that can play loads of different codecs, like VLC

eeyowch, i guess Holy Warbles was shut down by blogger. that blog basically just shared out of print world records from the 50s-60s, afaik.

wow. didn't occur to me, but as the tail gets longer and EVERYTHING is ascribed market value, companies are going to be aiming at more artistically minded and obscure bloggers who are doing good work. If spotify had any sense, they'd snap these guys up to become in-house content aggregator/editors

huh? when everything is ascribed market value obscure artistically minded bloggers will receive paychecks of 4 cents once a year.

eeyowch, i guess Holy Warbles was shut down by blogger. that blog basically just shared out of print world records from the 50s-60s, afaik.

― tylerw, Friday, January 27, 2012 11:31 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah, it's personal now IMO.

and seriously the amount of cash i've spent on records and artists i learned about through holy warbles and similar blogs blows my mind.

although ironically very little or none of that cash is going to major labels.

so it doesn't really hurt them or help one war or another. which is why i'm kind of o_O that it was taken down.

one waY or another

freudian slip? up against the wall mofos.

yeah i'd say that the main effect the rise of mp3 blogs had on my listening is opening my ears to a ridiculous amount of "world" music that i had no idea even existed five/six years ago. and i've spent a pretty penny on that stuff since.

Yeah internet music investigation led me directly to dub and roots and subsequent purchases of this music -- probably never would have gotten into to it through friends/recommendations.

But I assume the RIAJ (lol) doesn't have any beef with me so that's not really relevant, unfortunately.

haha I just looked up the RIAJ and its real but its for Japan not Jamaica. booo!

I'm fairly certain that RIAA genuienly believe that downloading any music at all robs them of sales. As if you weren't able to download Iranian pop from the 70s, you'd simply have no other choice but to stroll down to Best Buy and spend all of your money on major label stuff.

pretty good writeup of sopa / indie labels at pfork: http://pitchfork.com/features/articles/8763-shades-of-gray-anti-piracy-legislation-and-independent-labels/

i'd be interested to know what kind of traffic a site like holy warbles gets (got), how many actual albums were downloaded etc. over at my site, it's a surprise if a bootleg i post gets more than a 100 downloads (and that's kind of what I'm comfortable with). are some of these mp3 blogs sharing ultra-rare stuff really seeing tons of visitors? it's a pretty niche audience.

and seriously the amount of cash i've spent on records and artists i learned about through holy warbles and similar blogs blows my mind.

although ironically very little or none of that cash is going to major labels.

― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, January 27, 2012 8:57 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this first point gets made a lot, the second point not as much, but to the major labels they are both exactly the same point and it's why they are fighting

the majors work not by providing variety but by locking down the monoculture. they make more money by selling 1 to 50 million copies of one album than by selling 200 to 10,000 copies of 5000 records. when one record gets really big, that's when the deals for lunch boxes and vitamin water take off. the internet proliferates individual tastes to such a point that it becomes impossible to keep those other profit margins going. a blog posting high quality fringe music like holy warbles is the enemy; it's lost money.

so those billboard charts showing how the top selling albums sell a tenth of what they used to -- they aren't showing overall sales, which I know are also down, but it's not the fearsome case the MPAA / RIAA is making to senators. the fight is for something more important than sales, it is for control over our tastes

the fight is for something more important than sales, it is for control over our tastes

― Milton Parker, Friday, January 27, 2012 4:56 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^this is basically the argument i was trying to make upthread about hollywood blockbusters. yeah sure most ppl want to see Things Exploding II, but some people want to see fringe (and inexpensive to produce) films that, within the current distribution system, would not even make it to theaters.

question for lawyers/ppl that know: how does copyright law apply to used media? if i buy an old record at a garage sale, none of that is going to the artist or the label. is that ok simply because whoever sold it is now bereft of the record? what if they had made a cassette copy (for "personal use")?

i'd be interested to know what kind of traffic a site like holy warbles gets (got), how many actual albums were downloaded etc. over at my site, it's a surprise if a bootleg i post gets more than a 100 downloads (and that's kind of what I'm comfortable with). are some of these mp3 blogs sharing ultra-rare stuff really seeing tons of visitors? it's a pretty niche audience.

― tylerw, Friday, January 27, 2012 2:55 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

my blog also deals in oop/obscure music and my top DL is almost 1000, but that's over years of time.

gbx: you're pretty much buying a licence to the music, and if you sell it you're selling the licence. That's consistent across most developed countries I think.

tbh i think i've proceeded on the fantasy that all the blogs/torrent sites offering FREE! COPIES! OF! NEW! ADELE! ALBUM! were going to get shut down, but the parts of the interwebs that helped me access, say, congolese music from the 1950s or some obscure soviet silent film with custom subtitles would be left alone. but that's probably a fantasy. and i guess it just points up my shortsightedness that this stuff is only now starting to anger me. interwebs RIP 2012?