Posted on 12/04/2007 9:42:36 AM PST by abb
THE writers strike negotiations disintegrated again last week, with an allegedly "groundbreaking" proposal from the studios dismissed by writers as a massive rollback. With much of Hollywood grinding to a halt and widespread pessimism about how long a strike will last, everyone is asking why the two sides can't find common ground.
There's a simple answer, but it has nothing to do with what's going on -- or more accurately, not going on -- at the negotiating table. On the surface, the impasse revolves around how to divvy up future Internet media revenues. But the real problem is that nobody knows the value of anything anymore. Whether we're reading horror stories about the mortgage meltdown, watching the dollar plummet or gagging on the prices at our neighborhood gas station, we're all stumbling around with a nagging feeling that the value of things has become unmoored.
snip
"It's in the zeitgeist now -- we're at a moment in time where people don't how to value things," says Michael Lynton, chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment. "Art and media are a reflection of society. And if you no longer have an internal sense of what the dollar or a tank of gas is worth, it's no surprise that you don't know what content on the Internet is worth either. It goes to the heart of why we're at an impasse with the Writers Guild.
snip
The music business, which has become something of a canary in the coal mine for worried media conglomerates, has been buffeted by value-of-product clashes for years. The entire record company economic model has crumbled after young music consumers decided, almost overnight, that they preferred sharing downloads on the Internet to buying CDs full of songs they didn't want.
snip
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
ping
Be honest abb I been watching lots of TCM movies lately they been showing those Christmas movies and Andy Hardy movies lately
That tell you something writers you guys sucks I rather watch 50 year old films LOL!
I am generation X
Related.
http://mobilecrunch.com/2007/12/03/you-will-control-25-of-entertainment-by-2012/
You Will Control 25% of Entertainment by 2012
Posted by John Kullman
Nokia’s latest study, ‘A Glimpse of the Next Episode’, predicts that within five years a quarter of all entertainment will be created, edited and shared within peer groups rather than coming out of traditional media groups. Trend-setting consumers from 17 countries were asked about their digital behaviors and lifestyles. Nokia also used information gathered from its 900 million customers and views of leading industry figures to reach the conclusion that you will control 25% of the world’s entertainment by 2012.
“From our research we predict that up to a quarter of the entertainment being consumed in five years will be what we call ‘Circular’. The trends we are seeing show us that people will have a genuine desire not only to create and share their own content, but also to remix it, mash it up and pass it on within their peer groups - a form of collaborative social
media,” said Mark Selby, Vice President, Multimedia, Nokia.
Nokia also looked at four emerging trends that will make entertainment more collaborative and creative as we move towards Circular Entertainment. These trends are listed as, Immersive Living; Geek Culture; G Tech and Localism.
Immersive Living is the rise of lifestyles which blur the reality of being on and offline. Entertainment will no longer be segmented; people can access and create it wherever they are.
My favorite is Geek Culture. (I always wanted to be a Geek but I didn’t fit in.) This triumph marks a shift as consumers become hungry for more sophisticated entertainment. As Geek Culture rises, consumers will want to be recognized and rewarded - the boundaries between being commercial and creative will blur.
G Tech is an existing social force in Asia that will change the way entertainment will look. Forget pink and sparkly, it is about the feminization of technology that is currently underway. Entertainment will be more collaborative, democratic, emotional and customized - all of which are ‘female’ traits.
The report uncovered a locally-minded sprit emerging in entertainment consumption and Localism will become a key theme of future entertainment. Consumers will take pride in seeking out the local and home-grown.
The good news about this report is that much of the entertainment will be created and distributed on mobile phones. These are the perfect devices for capturing images and sounds on-the-fly and then editing the content with music and graphics. One person in a peer group may take the pictures, a second edit the sequence of pictures and a third add music before the production is sent to the group as entertainment.
Also related.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/12042007/business/dvd_isaster_sales_806649.htm
DVD-ISASTER SALES
By BRIAN GARRITY
December 4, 2007 — Just in case Hollywood didn’t have enough to worry about with the writer’s strike, here comes the latest horror to scare Tinseltown: Shrinking DVD sales.
The DVD businesses, one of the movie industry’s biggest sources of profits, is expected to post a year-over-year sales decline for the first time since the format’s rise a decade ago.
DVD sales, which were flat a year ago at around $16 billion, were down over 4 percent through the end of November, and analysts expect a full-year drop of around 2 percent.
Total home video revenues which include sales and rentals of both DVD and VHS are forecasted to come in at around $23 billion down from $24 billion in 2006.
Even though the industry still has a number of heavy hitters on the way, including the latest installments of “Pirates of the Caribbean,” “Bourne” and “Harry Potter,” and the film adaptation of “The Simpsons,” they would have to power a big surge in total DVD unit sales just to break even with last year.
Drew Borst, an analyst with Sanford Bernsetin, notes that barring a heroic quarter, year over year growth could be a stretch.
Even big box office hits aren’t an automatic slam-dunk on DVD. Alan Gould, an analyst with Natixis Bleichroeder, notes that DVD sales for latest sequels in the “Spider-Man,” “Fantastic Four” and “Shrek” franchises, all fourth quarter releases, have come up short.
snip
Carson Daly has a web site which asks his audience to submit jokes for his nightly show, as he’s decided to buck the writers and keep on truckin’.
It would appear that kids go to the movies and adults buy DVDs. Any decrease in DVD sales can be attributed to horrible crap Hollywood is putting out. I can count all the good movies I've seen in the last few years on one hand and still have enough fingers left to go bowling.
There’s nothing wrong with making a buck or two but I gotta think that if a union, er, “guild” is involved then there is *probably* some cry-babying going on.
I’m enjoying this strike. It’s like someone pulled the plug on the Script-O-Tron 3000 Crapomatic script machine and the conveyor belt of mediocre scripts coming out of the networks and studios has ground to a halt.
Is it possible to make a show or movie without the Film Actors Guild, Writers Guild et al?
I hope someone starts doing it in a high profile way soon.
I think Hollywood is scared chitless. And they should be.
“Is it possible to make a show or movie without the Film Actors Guild, Writers Guild et al?”
Yes. Check out this thread from yesterday about NBC’s future plans.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1933874/posts
I’m not buying that Nokia counts nearly 1/6 of the population of the planet as customers. Which makes the entire rest of the article pretty questionable.
If they want me to buy DVDs, they need to agree on a freaking format and then put out everything in 1080i (or 1080p if they can do that). If the quality is better, I’m much more inclined to watch something of mediocre entertainment value.
I’m constantly surprised how much stuff I’m willing to watch on any channel in HD because of the ridiculous quality of my Mistubishi 1080p 65” TV. The Weather Channel is almost bearable (very small parts of it....). And the Discovery channel just plain rocks.
And being able to watch all of the NFL games in HD via DirecTV even makes a Chiefs or Browns game attractive.
I’d watch (or at least rent) more DVDs from Hollywood if they looked as good as the reruns of movies in HD on HBO/Showtime/Etc/Etc.
I don’t think I would shed a tear if the strike went on long enough for all the writers to go flat broke and homeless.
I’m not sure about this “coming up short” thing. Spiderman 3 has sold 4.3 million copies, plus 800 thousand copies of the full trilogy. Shrek 3 has 5.2 million sold individually plus 600 thousand full trilogy sales. Fanstic Four 2 has 2.5 million sold, which given that it only grossed 134 million in theatrical isn’t bad.
There’s a lot of insistence on bad news for Hollywood but really the numbers are better than people think.
Sweet!
Capitalism works!
Strike? What strike? ... Actually, I really haven't even noticed a difference. Life goes on ... I could really care less if Hollywood goes on or not ... it's not really part of my life anyway. I have my family, my health, my church, my home and love of my Saviour. I'm happy and content. What else do I need?
“Just what is entertainment worth?”
Not much to me. Life is too short to be distracted by “entertainment”.
Things to do, places to go, women to dine, hold and kiss.
I watch the financial channels, old movies and the Discovery, History and Military channels to watch them build big things and/or blow them all to hell.
Hollywood? Drop dead and take all your commie/socialist America hating lefties and crybabies with you. I hope you all starve.
I think that Allan Bloom covers this in "Closing of the American Mind". IIRC, he says that leisure time was once scarce and was eagerly used by people in order to truly enjoy life and/or to better themselves. Nowadays we have more leisure time, we often don't know what to do, and too many of us flop in front of the TV and say "Entertain me".
Sad.
I realized that I only watch what I buy 2-3x, so I’d rather rent for $1.
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