How Do You Discover Movies?

Just a quick question for you...and perhaps you'll answer in the comments.

How do you discover new movies today, predominantly? If you think about the last few movies you've seen (whether in theaters, on DVD, via iTunes or BitTorrent), how did you hear about them? Was it via a Netflix suggestion, a Variety review, an e-mail or Tweet from a friend? (Or maybe even an old-school billboard or TV commercial?)

That is all - I'm eager to hear what you have to say.

(As for me, I think I mainly discover movies via reviews or stories in print media... from the NY Times to the New Yorker to Variety...though I hope to see a movie tonight that I discovered via Flixster, a nifty little app on my iPhone.)

Three Monday Links: Flash Wants to Be Omnipresent ... Lumina's Business Model ... Inside the Pirate's Mind

- The NY Times reports this morning on Adobe's efforts to get TVs and mobile phones to support its Flash format for online video. From the piece:

For consumers, what sounds like a bit of inconsequential Internet plumbing actually means that a long overhyped notion is a step closer to reality: viewing a video clip or Internet application on a TV or mobile phone.

For Hollywood studios and other content creators, a single format for Web video is even more enticing. It means they can create their entertainment once in Flash — as the animated documentary “Waltz With Bashir,” from Sony Pictures Classics, was made — and distribute it cheaply throughout the expanding ecosystem of digital devices.

“Coming generations of consumers clearly expect to get their content wherever they want on it, on any device, when they want it,” said Bud Albers, the chief technology officer of the Disney Interactive Media Group, who will join Adobe executives at the convention to voice Disney’s support for the Flash format. “This gets us where we want to go.”

- Dan Carew of the blog Indie 2.0 offers a great example of someone taking the "Fans, Friends & Followers" approach to building an audience for her work: Jen Thym, director of the online series "Lumina." Thym explains her business model in a Q&A with Carew:

On LUMINA, we’re going with the fan supported business model, which basically goes like this: Viewing is free. If you like us and want to support us, please spread the word about us and, if you’re feeling really generous, buy our mechandise. Webcomics have succeeded on this model with varying degrees of success - Penny Arcade probably being the most famous of these - and they even have a themed convention called PAX now, next year I’m sure they’re going to host a panel on the moon or something! On the music side, Nine Inch Nails did something similar by giving away Ghosts for free, and then selling limited editions of the CD, concert tickets, and so forth.

- Slate's Farhad Manjoo explains why there isn't yet an expansive, totally comprehensive movie service. And he offers some insights into the thinking of people who get their movies illegally:

... I've been getting my programming from the friendly BitTorrent peer-to-peer network. Pirates aren't popular these days, but let's give them this—they know how to put together a killer on-demand entertainment system.

I sometimes feel bad about my plundering ways. Like many scofflaws, though, I blame the system. I wouldn't have to steal if Hollywood would only give me a decent online movie-streaming service. In my dreams, here's what it would look like: a site that offers a huge selection—50,000 or more titles to choose from, with lots of Hollywood new releases, indies, and a smorgasbord of old films and TV shows. (By comparison, Netflix says it offers more than 100,000 titles.) Don't gum it up with restrictions, like a requirement that I watch a certain movie within a specified time after choosing it. The only reasonable limit might be to force me to stream the movies so that I won't be able to save the flicks to my computer. Beyond that, charge me a monthly fee and let me watch whatever I want, whenever I want, as often as I want.

Post-Thanksgiving Linkage: Blockbuster Kiosks, Streaming Video Piracy, Speed Racer, Vudu

- Blockbuster is gonna try putting automated movie rental kiosks into Papa John's pizza joints and Family Dollar stores. DVDs will rent for just a buck, cheaper than at Blockbuster's traditional outlets, and they can be returned to any kiosk -- not just the one they came from.

- Slate has a great piece on a new kind of online movie piracy. Dan Morrell writes:

As the MPAA has focused on BitTorrent downloading, however, a newer, more popular kind of piracy method has come along. BitTorrent is out. Streaming video is in.

Before it was shuttered by European authorities in October, the British-based TVLinks—which offered links to hundreds of pirated movies and television shows—had become perhaps the Web's leading destination for illicit streaming video. If you've never heard of it, you're not alone: A LexisNexis search found only four mentions of TVLinks in major news sources over the past year. The Pirate Bay, one of the most popular torrent Web sites, was cited more than 300 times. The lack of hype didn't stop the site's spread. According to Web traffic analyzer Alexa, TVLinks passed both the Pirate Bay and TorrentSpy in global traffic rank this August. At the height of its popularity, TVLinks ranked 160th in global traffic, near the level of the New York Times.

- Looks like the Wachowski Brothers are taking the green screen approach with 'Speed Racer.'

- To help market its $399 set-top box, Vudu is throwing in high-def copies of two of Universal's 'Bourne' movies. (Here's more on Vudu.)

- My mother-in-law asked me on Thanksgiving for my advice on whether she should buy "a Blu-ray." When I mentioned the format war, she didn't seem aware of it, and she didn't seem to have much recognition that HD DVD existed. She and my father-in-law are big Netflix users, and Netflix offers movies in both Blu-ray and HD DVD, so I told her the only possible problem could be if HD DVD wins, they'd need to buy a new DVD player in a couple years. Just a data point...

From the World of Online Video: News on Advertising, Picture Quality

- Google seems determined to play a big role in the business of inserting ads into online video. I covered an announcement they're making today in Variety. From the story:

"Video units" -- essentially Internet video players that can be integrated into a website -- will display two different kinds of advertising, both pegged to the content of the site and the subject matter of the video itself. Content in the players will come from YouTube, the video-hosting service Google bought last year for $1.65 billion. The resulting revenue will be split three ways, with the site owner, content owner and Google all taking a slice.

The video units are part of Google's AdSense advertising network, which generates a big chunk of the company's revenues, $1.35 billion in the second quarter alone.

Google had earlier begun placing video ads on the thousands of sites that are part of the AdSense network, and YouTube recently began to test ads that played during its videos.

- And Brightcove has announced that it is working with BitTorrent, the peer-to-peer distribution system, to improve the image quality of its videos. From the Forbes piece:

"It's going to be a very significant shift," contends [Brightcove VP Adam] Berrey. " We've seen an explosive growth in short-form video clips, and this will allow longer format files as well. It's definitely a significant step in the evolution of Internet TV."

The Journal's story about the Brightcove deal also mentions a new company called Move Networks, which is also working to improve video quality. Peter Grant writes:

Move Networks, based in American Fork, Utah, has developed a technology that streams video at the fastest rate possible based on the user's computer, broadband connection and traffic on the network. Move Networks and its customers also are able to deliver high picture quality because content is stored on numerous servers throughout the country rather than at one central location.

From Last Week's Web Video Summit: Audio of Panel on Internet Video Distribution

One of the serendipitously swell things about attending the Web Video Summit in San Jose last week was bumping into Joel Heller, who runs the site Docs That Inspire. When I told him I wasn't going to be able to attend the panel on distribution, he offered to record it for me. After getting each of the speakers' permission, we're posting it here. (Thanks, Joel!)

Here's the description of the panel:

You and Your Audience: Distribution

A service, a network or do it yourself? Everyone wants to host your video, as money has poured in for video sites ever since Google bought YouTube. Many promises, many choices, far too many disappointments as you try to stand out from the hundreds of thousands of other producers. Tom Hammer at Akimbo manages possibly the world's largest library of professional video, from Rocketboom to the BBC. Comcast's thePlatform and Vitalstream/Internap deliver video from ABC to the Wall Street Journal. Bittorent is proving peer to peer works for producers as well as pirates. Bring your question and get answers from the key players in this intense session.

PANELIST: Ian Blaine, CEO, thePlatform
PANELIST: Tom Hammer, CTO and VP of Engineering and Operations, Akimbo
PANELIST: Philip N. Kaplan, Chief Strategy Officer, Internap
PANELIST: Tim Napoleon, Media and Entertainment Product Line Director, Akamai
PANELIST: Ashwin Navin, President and Co-founder, BitTorrent Inc.
MODERATOR: Eric Savitz, West Coast Editor, Barron's

Not surprisingly, there were some interesting sparks between the execs from Akamai and BitTorrent. The file is here, in MP3 form.

Tuesday: 'Sicko' removed from YouTube ... Michael Moore OK with Piracy ... and More

- Cinematical has the definitive posting about Michael Moore's new doc 'Sicko' being posted on YouTube in 14 segments. (It was posted to BitTorrent, too.) The first few segments of the movie were seen by about 3000 people.

From the Hollywood Reporter coverage:

"Every filmmaker intends for his film to be seen on the big screen," Moore said. "This wasn't a guy taking a video camera into a theater. This was an inside job, a copy made from a high-quality master and could potentially impact the opening weekend boxoffice. Who do you think benefits from that?"

When asked about accusations that he may have leaked the film himself for publicity purposes, Moore scoffed at the notion:

"Oh no. The (Weinstein) brothers are devastated."

But here's some video of Moore saying he's OK with piracy, as long as the person isn't doing it to make a profit. In the video, Moore says, "I make these books and movies and TV shows because want things to change, and so the more people who get to see them the better."

- On another topic, here's an LA Times report on niche programming at movie theaters during the daytime (mostly for kids). Piece focuses on Bigger Picture, a digital movie distributor in LA.

New survey data on movie downloading behavior

Toronto-based Solutions Research Group surveyed 1,230 Americans earlier this month, and found that:

- Only 8 percent have paid to download a movie (up from 5 percent in October 2006)
- 30 percent of iTunes users have visited the movie section of the store. Among visitors to Amazon.com and WalMart.com, 10 percent and 8 percent, respectively, have visited the movie areas of those sites.
- A third of all Netflix members use Netflix's "instant viewing" feature to watch movies (or parts of movies)
- Among other movie download sites, 9 percent of survey respondents had visited Movielink.com, 8 percent had visited BitTorrent.com, 5 percent had visited Vongo.com, and 5 percent had been to CinemaNow.com.

A PDF summary of the survey results is here.

(Via Movie Marketing Blog)

MovieLabs launches technology challenge

I've got a piece in Variety today about a technology challenge announced this morning by MovieLabs, a joint venture of the six biggest movie studios. From the piece:

The MovieLabs Technology Open Challenge, running through the end of September, will provide grants of up to $100,000 for technologists working on solutions to problems like improved security for Internet content, converting a single piece of digital content so that it can be played on various consumer devices, or developing a movie screen that works equally well for 3-D and 2-D projection.

MovieLabs, based in Palo Alto, is a research-and-development group founded by the studios in 2005 with a $30 million bankroll. Silicon Valley tech veteran Steve Weinstein was hired to run the five-person group last July.

Here's more official detail.

When I spoke with Weinstein last week, I brought up the divide that has long existed between Silicon Valley and Hollywood. Weinstein said, "One of our missions [at MovieLabs] is to show that the studios are interested in figuring out YouTube and BitTorrent, and building that bridge. Silicon Valley and the consumer electronics industry and the movie and media industries have never figured out how to work together in an open way, other than at standards levels. Hopefully, we’ll help with that."

It's a telling detail that MovieLabs' headquarters are in Palo Alto (although they do have a satellite office in LA.)

Internet Movie Marketplaces: Who's Most Likely to Succeed?

Who’ll end up as the Blockbuster of Internet movie distribution?

No one has all the elements in place yet: big audience, vast selection, intuitive design, and a simple way to transfer movies onto portable devices and the living room television.

But here’s my ranking of the five players that are “most likely to succeed” in the business of digital distribution.

1. iTunes Store The big dog. Works for both Mac and PC users, and as of April 2007, had sold 50 million TV shows and two million feature films. New $299 Apple TV device makes it easy to wirelessly transfer iTunes content to a television and view it there. The negatives: no rentals (only download-to-own, at $9.99 and up), no way yet for indie producers to sell their content, no simple way to burn shows or movies from iTunes to a DVD. Also: only a few studios offer features on iTunes, including Disney, MGM, and Lionsgate. Paramount supplies older films -- not new releases. Others have so far been reluctant to cut deals with Apple CEO (and Disney board member) Steve Jobs.

2. Amazon Unbox Unlike iTunes, Amazon Unbox makes movies available for digital rental and purchase. Movies can be sent directly to an Internet-connnected TiVo device for viewing on a TV. While Unbox hasn’t yet built much momentum in the marketplace, Amazon has a built-in advantage over the other players on this list: hundreds of thousands of consumers already trust the company with their payment information, and have Amazon accounts already. Amazon can also make movie recommendations based on past purchases. Indie producers can make their content available on Unbox using Amazon’s CustomFlix service, and keep 50 percent of the revenues. That makes Unbox the most “long tail”-friendly movie service. Among the studios offering features: 20th Century Fox, Lionsgate, Universal, Paramount, Sony, MGM, and Warner Bros. Movies from Lionsgate, Sony, Warner Bros., and Fox. Works well with Windows-compatible portable devices like the Creative Zen Vision. PC only.

3. CinemaNow CinemaNow has been in the movie download business longer than most anybody else: since 1999. It helped pioneer technology to download a movie and then burn it to a DVD (more than 100 titles are now available, mostly older movies), and CinemaNow also hasn’t been prudish about offering “mature content,” working with porn providers like Vivid and Hustler. CinemaNow is the only service working with all six major Hollywood studios. Offers some movies for free, as ad-supported streams. Movies can get to TV with a Windows Media Center Edition PC, and to Windows-compatible portable players. PC only.

4. Vongo Vongo is unique in offering an “all you can eat” movie service for a dirt-cheap $9.99 monthly fee. About 1000 movies are available at any given time, but some titles rotate in and out of inventory. Works with various Windows systems (Media Center Edition, Vista Ultimate, Xbox 360) to display content on a TV. Content can also be synced with Windows-friendly portable media players. Vongo also offers a live, streaming version of the Starz TV channel. Rental only, PC only.

5. Microsoft Xbox 360 Video Marketplace Microsoft has sold more than 10 million of its Xbox 360 gaming consoles, as of December 2006. The video marketplace offers standard-def and high-def features from Warner Bros., Paramount, Lionsgate, and New Line. (As of April 2007, Xbox and CinemaNow are the only of these services offering movies in high-definition.) Rentals only; no download-to-own. High-def new release movies cost $6, and standard-def new releases cost $4. Since the gaming console is already connected to a TV, viewing on the big screen is a breeze.

Dark horses (in no particular order) MovieLink: Initially launched as a joint venture of several major studios, but never well-promoted. Blockbuster is reportedly interested in acquiring Movielink – which could help introduce the service to a wider audience, especially if Blockbuster ties in digital downloads with rentals from its retail locations. ClickStar: Offers both rentals and downloads. Some movies, like “10 Items or Less,” will appear on Clickstar just a few weeks after their theatrical debut. Biggest things ClickStar has going for it: the involvement of Morgan Freeman and his producing partner, the supremely tech-savvy Lori McCreary. Netflix: Digital downloads are now built into Netflix’s monthly subscription package. About 1000 titles available, which could grow to 5000 by the end of 2007. Streaming only, PCs only. Wal-Mart: Expect Wal-Mart to offer the cheapest prices, if not the most compelling user experience. Launched in February 2007. Joost: Viacom announced a deal in February 2007 to make movies from Paramount and MTV Films available on Joost. BitTorrent: Download or rent movies from Fox, MGM, Paramount, and Warner Bros. Bit Torrent’s advantage is zippy peer-to-peer download speed. GUBA: Partnerships with Warner Bros. and Sony.

Some other comparisons of Internet movie marketplaces:

TechCrunch (good pricing comparison)

ExtremeTech

Three from the Times: BitTorrent, Gaming at the Movies, and YouTube Celebs

Feeling glum this morning because I wound up in the middle of the pack last night in the Oscar pool...(though I did manage to get the visual effects and best animated feature awards right -- two categories near and dear to CinemaTech.)

Most of the coverage this morning involves dissections of last night's Oscar-cast. But the NY Times has three worthy, non-Oscar pieces:

- Software Tool of Pirates Gets Work in Hollywood

Brad Stone writes about BitTorrent, the file-sharing service that's trying to go legit. One possible advantage of buying movies from BitTorrent as opposed to other sites could be speed:

In a test of the new BitTorrent store, downloading the film “X-Men 3” took two hours with a broadband Internet connection. Downloading the same movie from Walmart.com took three hours. And BitTorrent downloads should theoretically become faster as more people sign up, since digital copies will originate from nearby computers whose owners have bought the movie, instead of from a central server.

The company, which has received close to $30 million in venture capital, ultimately wants to use its media store to demonstrate how the underlying technology is effective at moving large files around the Internet. It wants to sell the technology to other media stores and to the studios themselves.

The studios hope the new BitTorrent will put a dent in the illegal trading of their content. Thomas Lesinski, president of Paramount Pictures Digital Entertainment, said he hoped the store would win over young people accustomed to free fare. “We look at this as a first step in the peer-to-peer world, to try to steer people toward legitimate content,” he said.

- The New Video Arcade in Spain Might Be the Movie Theater

Doreen Carvajal writes about cinemas inviting gamers in to play against one another on the big screen:

“Forget the pathetic speakers of a PC or television!” screams an ad for the theater, which opened in December and is offering cut-rate tickets at 3 euros, or about $3.95. “Come feel the sound that puts you at the center of the action.”

“We’re trying this concept because there are many theaters in Spain, and admissions are down,” Mr. Martínez said. “So we have to offer new products.”

- New Hot Properties: YouTube Celebrities

Bob Tedeschi profiles some YouTube celebs who are being recruited by other video sites, with promises of pay - or just more promotion. He claims that YouTube "has been stung by the departure of popular acts" like Lonelygirl15. Would any traffic numbers bear that out? Not sure it made much of a dent. But there is a tiny scrap of speculation in the piece about how YouTube may soon compensate creators. Tedeschi writes:

In January, YouTube’s co-founder, Chad Hurley, said the company would in the coming months begin sharing advertising revenue with contributors. The company last week said it would not elaborate on that plan, or on the efforts of competitors to lure its contributors away.

But [videomaker Paul] Robinett said he was contacted by a talent agency claiming YouTube plans to share about 20 percent of the advertising money gleaned from each video clip with the clip’s producer. Mr. Robinett said he could not confirm that claim with a YouTube executive.