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Comment by cheez | Hacker News Reader

I clicked "12 years a slave", a movie I have not yet had an opportunity to watch and it started streaming in less than a minute in high quality.

I immediately quit the application as it should not be so easy to benefit from someone else's hard work without compensating them.

Please, movie people, let me pay for this.

You might kill the cinemas, but you'll still get paid.

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> it should not be so easy to benefit from someone else's hard work without compensating them.

Nonsense. I benefit from the work of Mozart and feel no need to compensate anyone. There are real issues with funding mechanisms and creative work in a shareable digital world, but we can reject the idea that you should always pay for anything that is beneficial. If you want to give gifts to creative folks you like, you can go ahead.

The musicians/recording engineers/conductor/support staff don't deserve to be paid?

Well, this is a big debate. I think musicians must be paid by playing live, amd not when every human listen a song, do a cover, or listen it in a bar. I think artists should be credited and pay when others use their creation for commercial use. Staff, as always, they will have jobs. You think the staff is all day working with the records, no, they do sound work on live shows too, as welll producers, designers, print guys, etc. People evolve.

Okay, so what about artists who are unable to play live for one reason or another (e.g. handicap, musical complexity). Recording engineering is different enough from live sound that it's almost two different jobs. And you're suggesting that the staff who do things like set up microphones and haul speakers should get paid to set that up for a live show but not paid to set that up for a recording?

Then it's easier. You cannot live from something you cannot fully profit. It's a dead model, in this case, for you, but not for the rest. Let's say you're just not a musician but you are a genious at the computer. well, you can still sell your music, but in these days, people may be more open to see you on stage and buying a 20$ CD.

Most of the movies, right now, are sold in the metro station in Barcelona tagged 1-2 dollars. And legal stores, not those slave-labor dudes with the house-made copycated movies. The industry already kills its own artists.

If that is the case, why would any entertainer allow themselves to be recorded? And who would bother to waste the time and money to make the recording? I don't have the time nor desire to go to a concert, yet I enjoy listening to good music. Therefore I pay for it.

If people aren't willing to, nope. This is a slippery slope and we can't afford to pay every employee of dying professions forever.

I think utilities and reasonable physical safety and healthcare should be paid for by the people. But for the rest, the free market will work better than an infinity of laws and incentives to put people in a corner to pay up. Money, uh, finds a way...

> If people aren't willing to, nope.

The idea behind this comment is that if people don't care enough about the work to bother viewing it, the maker shouldn't be paid. Which I agree with; I hate the idea of government sponsorship of art no one wants. The difference here is, PEOPLE WANT THE ART, THEY JUST DON'T WANT TO PAY FOR IT. That's a huge distinction. It has value to people, but because they have the opportunity to steal it with no consequence, they do so.

The performers need to be paid if you want to hear more in the future.

You'll work for free?

Pour cast. They can't buy new Ferarris because some kids watch that movie for free.

I'm a left of center guy, but this kind of thinking is a very ugly slippery slope. Its not that anyone should always expect to pay for things that are beneficial, its the fact that people who very recently WORKED to create the very thing you are benefiting from should be PAID for their work. If everyone followed your logic, we wouldn't have 12 Years A Slave. The props cost money. The costumes cost money. The cameras cost money. The cameramen's families eat fucking food, which costs money. Please, go out and find for me a quality movie that was made by unpaid volunteers. I haven't found one yet.

quandrangle didn't say don't pay anyone. They said just because something is good, doesn't mean we have to pay every time we consume it. There are other conceivable ways of funding these things. Like crowd-funding, micropayments, whatever. If everyone followed quadrangle's logic, people who wanted to produce movies would find another way to fund them.

Please explain how crowd-funding a movie even makes sense? There are plenty of movies with actors I love that are terrible. Have you seen RED (or worse, RED 2)? For the same reason your boss doesn't pay you for the month you haven't worked yet, you shouldn't expect people to produce movies without any reliable way of getting paid.

But there are lots of crowdfunding successes for videogames, even though they present the same problem that you don't know in advance how good it will be. So I don't think the situation is hopeless.

Another idea which I think has promise is payment by social conventions. Tipping culture in the US is like this: you are not legally required to pay waitstaff, but everyone does because they would be considered assholes if they didn't. People joke that it's ridiculous that rock bands and web cartoonists make most of their money selling t-shirts, but actually if we are aiming for social pressure t-shirts are the ideal currency---everyone you interact with in your daily life can see that you bought one. So if we got a convention going that "if you regularly read a webcomic you oughta buy the t-shirt", then it would be easy to ostracize the people who violate it.

Ironically, the crowd-funded 'Veronica Mars' opens this week and is getting favorable reviews by fans:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2771372/

Just for context:

Veronica Mars (2014) Ratings: 8.0/10 from 312 users

...

User Reviews: Review this title »

ie, no reviews. How is this "favorable"? Sounds like insiders gaming the score for the moment.

My boss pays me three months in advance.

And you're talking about a very new funding model. I'm not saying there are necessarily lots of examples of great movies already produced with this model. I'm saying they could easily be. A good number of projects have raised millions on kickstarter [1], including two movies [2, 3].

There's no reason the movie industry couldn't move to a pre-funding model. Or some other model nobody has thought of yet.

[1] https://www.kickstarter.com/discover/most-funded

[2] https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1869987317/wish-i-was-h...

[3] https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spikelee/the-newest-hot...

Their model already exists and they have moved to it - movie theaters and netflix. The movie industry is nice an healthy, they make more money each year then the previous. The reason they fight against piracy is simple - they want more money. If there's a chance to get more money, why not try? In reality, piracy is negligible and is not worth the policing effort. More importantly, eliminating piracy altogether will not convert all pirates to movie goers. That's absurd! A pirate is a person who will either steal a movie or not watch it. Either way they are not paying for it. Only a small percentage of pirates will switch to paying customers in a perfect scenario. So in reality, the industry will enjoy a negligible profit increase - that's all. Considering their current ever increasing profits from year to year, the industry is booming. They only reason they are chasing after pirates is because they are driven by they greed and incorrect perception of 'opportunity cost'. They see a huge chunk of potential pie because they imagine that once they are able to police movie watching completely, then every pirate will be paying them royalties. This is of course far from the truth. Greedy and dimwitted they persist to believe that illusion. I wonder what positive effects move piracy has on the industry that the industry is benefiting from but are not aware of? Perhaps free word of mouth advertising on an enormous scale? I think more people pirate movies than pay which means that a immense audience is functioning as free word of mouth advertisers. What impact would eliminating this group have on the industry? Worth to think about.

I suggest that the answer to the conundrum is to tear up the concepts "money" "paying" "salary".

Did you know walking is the leading cause of taxi cab unemployment? You should really consider the ugly nature of walking next time you decide not to cab it up. Taxis cost money, and their kids eat food.

If you hopped in the taxi cab, rode to your destination, and jumped out without paying the posted fare, you'd have a point.

While infinite other people are able to also use the same taxi.

Sure, and infinite other people screw the driver. Oh, I suppose some people will pay the posted fare for their ride. As long as it doesn't have to be us, right?

The point is that digital copies cost (almost) nothing, so by standard market principles you would not expect to pay something.

I understand the reasoning, but I believe it is flawed for two reasons:

First, you're confusing the cost of distribution with the total cost of creating media. While digitization has driven down distribution costs, it doesn't affect the tens or hundreds of millions of dollars that a typical movie costs to produce. Just because you can download a movie from a server to your laptop for free, does the cost suddenly cost nothing to produce? Of course not.

Second, the scenario we're discussing does not reflect traditional free markets. Conventionally, a seller offers a product or service, and if the seller and a buyer agree on a price, there's an exchange. Basic supply and demand.

Technology now allows buyers to set the price of certain services to zero against the wishes of the seller, and the seller is powerless to stop the transaction. Clearly, this is not a conventional free market scenario, and we may need new principles.

The difference between taking a taxi and walking are significant. For your analogy to work you must alter it in one of two ways:

1. You hijack the taxi and demand the driver take you to your destination for free. This creates an equivalent or better experience for the consumer at zero or near-zero cost.

2. Instead of clicking a button and watching 12 Years a Slave, you get a crudely animated version pieced together by drawings crowdsourced from 1st grade students around the nation, and voiced entirely by Gilbert Gottfried.

#2 actually sounds kinda interesting...

I'd certainly watch it, but I don't see it winning any Oscars...

#2 (or something pretty close to it...) worked pretty well for http://ourrobocopremake.com/

The reason I think my analogy applies is because "pirating" costs cameramen nothing. You can measure their net worth before and after I pirate a movie and it will be the same. The same is not true of bumming a taxi ride.

For this comparison to be effective you have to measure their net worth, inclusive of their time available to earn an income (which has value), prior to making the movie. If they "spend" that time on being a cameraman in order to earn income and the movie studio has to pay less because free loaders keep watching the movies without paying, you have cost them money.

A cameraman's salary is paid by the movie's budget, which is effectively a loan against the projected future earnings of a film.

Sure the cameraman already got paid for the film you just pirated, but if said film doesn't earn enough then the studio will decide to make fewer films or go bankrupt, either of which could cost the cameraman their job and significantly reduce future earning potential.

But if the movie wasn't worth any money to said person in the first place, then maybe it isn't such a big loss. Maybe some just do not value cinema entertainment very much even though they may watch a movie.

Absolutely. Certainly the hypothetical cameraman has no inherent right to be paid to do whatever they want to do, I only assert that the so-called utopian pirate market is incapable of sustaining cinema without drastic changes to the business.

Not to say those changes aren't currently necessary, only that if everyone chose to pirate rather than pay then all of Hollywood would likely just shut down rather than keep throwing $100+m AAA blockbusters into a financial abyss.

Hollywood shutting down would not be a huge loss to the world. Movies of cultural value could still be funded and then be made available to the public.

That's a highly debatable point. People's definitions of cultural value differ wildly, and the sort of violence and humor that many people find entertaining would be difficult to justify seeking public funding for.

It might not be worth any "money" BUT it was worth something to the person who pirated. As they watched the movie. It had SOME value to them.

"pirating" costs cameramen nothing.

If only one person thinks that way, and pirates a movie, your statement holds true.

If 1,000 people think that way, it probably still holds true.

Extending this, however, you reach an obvious tipping point, where a critical mass of people pirate the movie and the production costs are not recouped (and the cameraman is out of work and his children starve in the street).

It's the logical conclusion of your line of thinking. What if everybody believed pirating the movies they want to watch will not affect the cameramen. What if nobody paid for the movies they're watching? Obviously, high-budget movies would no longer be possible, and we'd all be reduced to watching shoe-string-budget art house shlock (I know, I know... Primer).

Obviously, that is not sustainable. So what makes you special? Why should you not pay for the movie you're watching, while other people should foot the bill?

> 1. You hijack the taxi and demand the driver take you to your destination for free. This creates an equivalent or better experience for the consumer at zero or near-zero cost.

For completeness, this is true only if the consumer prefers the taxi ride over walking and considers it to be a better experience.

> 2. Instead of clicking a button and watching 12 Years a Slave, you get a crudely animated version pieced together by drawings crowdsourced from 1st grade students around the nation, and voiced entirely by Gilbert Gottfried.

A counterpoint to this is Primer ($7,000 budget, 70% RT, 7.0 IMDb): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primer_(film)

If taxis go out of business, you can still walk. If people stop making new movies, you can't watch new movies.

(You can still watch old movies of course, so if you restrict your downloading to old movies, and not fairly recent releases, your argument works.)

I often wonder what would happen if the de facto standard in an industry were to disappear overnight. If taxis disappeared, would more people find ways to participate in carpool/rideshare systems?

If we stopped making new movies, would people learn to appreciate older classical films they'd never considered before? Surely there have already been more movies produced than a person could consume in a single lifetime, though it's debatable whether or not most of them are worth viewing at all.

Movies are still a new enough medium that there quality is still improving, so current movies tend to be better then those from a decade ago, and (likely) worse then those a decade from now.

Once the medium platues (or long enough after to build up a supply), then this would work.

By better than, I hope you were referring to the image quality and special effects. In terms of filming techniques and the actual content of the movies, I do not think films made decades ago are categorically worse than films made today.

I doubt it.

It's not like people are making professional-grade movies now in the free time, as they are now driving around cities with their own cars. Likewise, not everyone is trained to make movies as most adults are already trained to drive cars.

The big thing that slips is relevance. Culture moves.

A great book about this is Concerning the Spiritual in Art by Wassily Kandinsky http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5321

The argument being that art is intensely connected to the time in which it is created, and the function of art in the context of the progression of humanity requires that artists constantly make new art for the current generation.

If a movie looks good, ill go to see it. That's how Hollywood makes money. Unfortunately the majority of blockbusters are trash. That's what projects like this are for.

If they're worth spending the effort of creating an application like this, then they're worth something. And yet this offers nothing for that something.

Except you're being scammed by Hollywood. I had numerous friends who went to school for film and went elsewhere due to finding out that the purpose behind it is to turn a profit, not to create something of worth. Every blockbuster movie contains the same boilerplate concept, the masses are too hypnotized to realize their money is being drained.

Because all entertainment must also be high art?

If it's trash then wouldn't it make sense to just not watch it at all? Why is it that we somehow 'deserve' to watch a film at whatever price we think is reasonable, when the whole thing is optional anyway?

Exactly.

I don't have HBO so I don't watch Game of Thrones. It's not like my life suffers immensely because I can't consume it. There are plenty of other forms of culture and entertainment in the world that I use to occupy my time.

> we wouldn't have 12 Years A Slave.

We may still have 12 years a slave but maybe not at the same level of quality.

I guess you're unaware of independent films. 12 Years a Slave would absolutely be made, regardless of a non-blockbuster budget. There are always going to be people trying to make art or assist in doing so, without the intention of making an absurd amount of money. Why do these actors even need millions for a movie? Its an absurd amount that is more than necessary.

That is a different argument. Why do actors "need" millions? Because the movie makes millions. Perhaps the problem is the cost of the individual ticket is too high? While there are some good independent films, many aren't very good. Generally (at least to me) a high quality hollywood blockbuster is more entertaining (and more polished) than a low budget film. I'd be fairly disappointed if we lost the blockbusters and only had low budget amateur films left.

"Its not that anyone should always expect to pay for things that are beneficial, its the fact that people who very recently WORKED to create the very thing you are benefiting from should be PAID for their work."

Why did the camera, props, lighting and other workers contribute to the movie, if they weren't getting paid? How could they afford to?

In reality, of course, only the movie companies, some writers and a few big stars rely on percentages - the rest work for wages or get up-front money.

So your argument comes down to the special case where A puts out a recorded work, counting on royalties to pay for it, then B makes unauthorized copies - then A suffers, in some sense, a loss of the hypothetical revenue.

But wait, did B agree to pay? If there was no contract between A and B, then the supposed moral/ethical case for making B pay is reduced to "because the legislators said so". And if tomorrow the legislators grant a private monopoly on air to Monsanto, then by your reasoning we all suddenly become thieves.

There is a natural-rights case for copyright, but it extends only to the actual creators, and covers basically only correct attribution (as per some European laws [1]).

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_rights

Those wages and up-front monies likely come from capital investments. It's usually financed through producers or production houses with the expectation that the investment will be made back with profit from the box office and all of the residual royalties of video, TV, online streaming, etc. Making a movie or music record, at least at the small scale, is probably not that different than a software startup.

While B didn't agree to pay, B wanted to watch the works, (and C and D and and and) If B and C and D don't pay, then next time A won't make anything, and everyone loses.

Except A haven't stopped making things in spite of B's and C's and D's refusal to pay, because Z pays. Plus, from the get go, if there was a price tag attached to it, C and D wouldn't consume, only B and Z. So the loss is only of B's copy. C and D convinced X that A's product is good and X pays, offsetting B and more value is generated because more people watched the movie. I used to believe this was only theoretical and the both sides didn't offset; but piracy has not killed industries so...

By this rationale, if you had a way to sneak into concerts without buying a ticket, would you do so? If so, what percentage of the time? 100%? 50%? How would you decide?

It clearly depends on a lot of things.

Can I get into any show I want?

Is there social backlash?

Are there security concerns?

Is the experience the same whether I pay or not? How better or worse?

What's the price of the show, not in dollars, but in work I do for the rest of society?

Do the artists aggregate to my life?

How much does it cost them to be there performing?

If the wouldn't do it, would someone else?

Basically I think your example gets a bit overcomplicated because the current market is heavily distorted by giant recording companies. It is an area that is almost fringe economics because it involves feelings and quasi-irrational judgment of value. Should you ask me if I would steal a computer (not for necessity) or if I would sneak into the bus instead of walking I'd ask mostly the same questions, but the thinking process of the decision maker would be a lot more rational and, therefore, adherent to the models that shape our economy.

You're just a common thief. Nothing more. Stop trying to justify you stealing from another person.

I did not say nor did I imply at any moment that I pirate anything; not only pirates think about piracy. Comparing pirates to common thieves is a fallacy since it attributes the feelings we have toward common thieves to people who can't see the ones they might be hurting, and so can't empathize with them.

Someone who downloads a pirated copy of a work is not similar to someone who mugs someone or lifts a wallet on the street because it requires a lot more to visualize the one's from who you are stealing.

That being said I would like you to retract your statement about me, not because I'm not a pirate or a thief, but because you offended me.

P.S.: This is a place for the discussion of ideas, not for personal attacks. Come up with an argument and I'd be happy to debate the issue with you. Insult me and you will be breaking (again) the two first guidelines for comments on HN

The problem is digital isn't "real". For example, imagine I create a product called a "pet rock". Let's say this product is simply... a rock. Anyone who has access to outside can basically make their own copy. Is it their fault for "copying" without paying? Or is it my fault for making a product that is extremely easy to copy?

U.S. IP law is so outdated and in need of major reforms.

The alternative is to ask people to fund the movie in advance. Either in forms of a mandatory fee (like in Germany where each household has to pay ~20 Euro for public television) or in some other way. Since digital copies are free, their price should be close to zero.

I never said that people who make movies shouldn't be paid. The point is simple: however we figure out funding movie creation, doing so by making sure nobody ever benefits without paying is definitely the wrong approach.

Ah, spoken like someone who has never created anything of value.

This kind of discourse just isn't productive.

What do you think the actual odds are that the parent has never created anything of value?

>I benefit from the work of Mozart and feel no need to compensate anyone.

Well, Mozart is dead, for one thing...

Exactly. Inn a few hundred years, 12 Years a Slave will be free to watch. But people don't want to wait that long, so they pay or steal.

actually, in 100 years, the copyright will be extended for another 200 years. that's how they've done it so far.

So.. yeah.

> I benefit from the work of Mozart and feel no need to compensate anyone.

Even on legal side you are not required to compensate anyone as it's so old that it's in public domain.

Ah. This old argument again. It would make sense if people actually support artists. Every time some one brings this up in real life, I ask them for instances where they have actually supported somebody.

Supporting them doesn't mean paying for million dollar mansions and vehicles.

The gaffer doesn't have a mansion.

90% of the people who work on a movie couldn't hope to own a million dollar mansion.

Exactly my point. Because there are 10% who can own them. Seems fair...

Just 2 days ago, I commissioned a work from a local painter.

People support artists in many ways. One of those ways is paying to enjoy the things they produce.

Commissions are the same as Kickstarter, IE you pay before it's created. In no way does something like this have any bearing on works by commission, in fact it puts things back on the path of human traditions, which have typically relied on commissions, patronage or performance, rather than ownership.

And I bet most people can give you several. Can't remember the last time I bought a DVD or vinyl record, without having enjoyed it somewhere else first, for free.

Ah this old misdirection. There is no shortage of evidence of voluntary payments for creative works so stop spreading bullshit. How far do you move the goalposts when people mention examples like the Humble Bundles, Nine Inch Nails, etc.?

Nine Inch Nails, etc.?

Go on. You might be able to cite Radiohead's In Rainbows. Did these new distribution models flourish, or were they one-off experiments? NIN's new album is available online now for a fixed price.

Nine Inch Nails? Seriously? I'm pretty sure they had already found success through the traditional channels before they had the ability to do something like that.

Crowd funding works in certain contexts, but it's no magic bullet.

Don't get me wrong. I like the crowd funding model, but the real world is not so perfect. We should not say "I won't pay for this, since somebody has already paid for it. " That puts everyone in a bad situation.

My policy: Enjoy something? Contribute back (or pay forward) in some tangible way.

There is also the aspect of risk. Do you pay someone before or after they make a product in an unknown market (E.g. Will this game be successful?). Paying for it rewards them for taking that risk.

Of course, if you commission something beforehand, you take away some of this risk, and the artist should gladly part with some of the rewards.

Copyright law acknowledges that the marginal cost is near zero. That's why copyright holders get a temporary monopoly. The goal is to incentivize the creation of these goods so that everyone can (later) get them at near-zero cost. Copyright law does not enshrine the idea that "you should always pay for anything that is beneficial." The idea is that as a society we collectively want to always pay for something that is a net positive.

There are many ways this system is currently broken (e.g. copyright lasting 70 years after creators death in US), but the fundamental concept of incentivizing creation of works that ultimately provide public benefit is sound.

The interesting thing is that the 'temporary' monopoly isn't really temporary as it keeps being extended before most copyrights expire. In theory it is temporary but in practice it's not (at least so far). To see this in action, look at the copyrights on Mikey mouse and how many times those have been extended right before they were set to expire.

So do you tell your boss he is free to pay or not pay you based on his mood for the week? And you are Ok with that yes?

There's probably a good analogy somewhere, but that isn't it. I don't have a contract with any movie production studio.

Actually you do. You pay the price they ask to consume their content, or you don't consume it. Hence why doing so without paying is illegal.

I don't have any continuous contractual relationships with any studios like I do with my employer. Maybe Netflix or HBO would qualify, but they don't charge their customer per unit, so it doesn't really apply here either.

This really is just a sideshow (excuse) to justify watching movies without paying for them. I don't have any contract with my utility companies whom mail me bills every month for using their services, nor do I have one with Kroger when I go buy groceries. I still am obligated to pay both of them for using their services.

Sorry, but you're not paying the studio for watching a movie. The cinemas are paying the studios for having the right, to charge, whatever they want for you to consume movies. It's the theathers, the netflixs who put the final consuming price on something, you're just paying them, not the guy who worked in the sound system for that movie, or the guy who made the logo of the movie, he was payed, and for sure, not so equally as everyone in here are claiming to be paid.

The less people paying to see a movie equals less movies being made, which means less employment for people involved with making movies.

Quite innacurate and narrow. Many movies don't make the weekend. You will see them at some stores for 1 dollar one month later. It's not the users who kill the industry.

Actually, in this era more and more tv shows are made because they're a better format than movies and because they're attracting people to consume or pay services. Movies will never dissapear, only the worth making movies will make it and that task would be decided, not by people, but by a middleman.

There's more and more music today than ever, and it doesn't cost 20 dollars or require to be in an store to be accessible to anyone.

The folks in the entertainment business who have seen revenue drop since the 90s when bandwidth and mp3 / video encoding became practical would disagree.

They've seen drop in dead business models. But they're winning in new areas. See the reports, with the so-called 'piracy' they're winning much more money than in the past. The problem: you want to see a number, like "he sold 20 millons cds". Well, the last sucess history (everyone can't be queen or lady gaga) is Daft Punk: they sold millions of songs by making 'good' music, or music that appealed to people.

This is why you're wrong: https://twitter.com/juanmacias/status/443465968480976897

I will translate it for you: "24€ for the 3 of us at the cinema... empty place. And downloading is the guilty"

Related: in the promotional snapshot they use on the front page, all shown movies are in the public domain.

The sense of smug entitlement in some of the posts in this thread is amazing.

"I should just get for free things that other people make because how dare they charge. If they're greedy enough to want to make money for their work, then they should follow a business model I set forth here and only make money by donations or selling other things I'm not going to buy anyway. Because freedom."

The sense of righteously indignant moralizing at others is just as "amazing" to me. And by amazing, I mean worthy of ridicule.

Hahahaha. The responses to my comment are hilariously off-the-wall. All I said was that the reasoning in the OP was wrong. The reason to pay for movies has nothing to do with the idea that benefits should always have a price.

That's all I said. The rest of my comment acknowledged that the economics and funding for movies is complex.

All the copyright apologists are so defensive, it's absurd. It's like you can't accept dropping any of your arguments, even when they are pointed out as plainly wrong. You are so worried that your whole case is ill-founded and won't be able to keep your position if you accept any criticism at all.

There might actually be some valid points on the pro-copyright side, but we don't get to see them if you keep defending the obviously invalid arguments…

Except that Mozart had ALREADY benefited from his work. But today many people feel they are entitled to watching movies and listening to music for free. The problem is that quality movies and music are expensive to produce. And rather have one person pay for them, they split the cost up over a lot of people. But if no one chooses to pay, these movies (that people apparently WANT) will no longer be produced.

> Please, movie people, let me pay for this.

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00ICSVLPA/ref=as_li_ss_tl?...

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/movie/12-years-a-slave/id7403669...

And many others: http://www.foxdigitalhd.com/12-years-a-slave

Sony could not have made it any easier to get this film into your living room.

(Regardless, I don't think media companies have an obligation to make their content available to anyone, anywhere.)

"Amazon Instant Video (formerly Amazon Video On Demand and LoveFilm Instant) is an Internet video on demand service offered by Amazon in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany and Japan."

iTunes: I don't see renting option.

Fox Digital: "United States Brazil Mexico Canada Italia Australia Deutschland Belgium Holland United Kingdom España France"

ARRRR!

I was outsourced to Eastern Europe for a project and moved my iTunes account too, because it was a bother to send money to the old VISA card.

I have seldom felt so stupid (+) as I did the next time I looked at the empty iTunes store... :-)

(+) Cough, without alcohol being involved.

To add to your "ARRRR!", it is available for rent from iTunes in the US.

Thanks, I watched Harry Potter on iTunes too. Great point.

iTunes has won! I guess I will be watching it this weekend :)

Don't use propaganda terms like 'compensation' here. It's not compensation unless you hired someone to do something. The reason the media corporations want you to use terms that don't make rational sense is because it gets you to think, wrongly, that you owe them money all the time and forever. Don't fall for it my friend. No one thinks there's anything wrong with supporting creativity and artistry so let's stop using their bullshit terms together.

Here's the chain of money as I see it when making a movie:

1. Someone comes up with an idea for a movie 2. They approach someone with money to create the movie 3. Monied person gives idea person $X to make the movie with the assumption that they will receive back $X + $Y (ignoring Hollywood accounting). 4. Movie is made. People are paid out of $X 5a. Movie is successful. Monied person receives back $X + $Y 5b. Movie is unsuccessful. Monied person receives back $X - $Z

None of this simplified hypothetical happens without the idea or the monied person. The idea person makes an arrangement that allows them to realize their idea and make some coin. The monied person... Well, he just cares about money. So he wants to make more.

If movies are perpetually unsuccessful, guess what happens? The monied person ends up investing in something else, leaving the idea person out of luck.

I do agree with some of the other people on here that piracy puts pressure on the business people to improve access.

That could be a valid idea for a startup, where movie people can sign up to sell 'virtual tickets' that provide users with the legal right to watch a movie no matter where they got it from. It could even be transferrable, identifiable tickets (... ahem, cryptocurrency, ahem).

Most copyright disclaimers allow that already ("without the expressed written consent of the copyright owner" etc).

Has anyone ever implemented this?

There's UltraViolet, which is perhaps similar to what you're talking about (provided you own the content, you can in theory download/stream from any UltraViolet-enabled provider as long as they have that content)

It blows my mind that it's 2014 and we can't do this. We are locked behind garbage cable boxes, poorly built custom software, and region locking, all of which is from a different era.

Would you continue watching it if you had an unused ticket for that movie?

Accidentally? Yes.

When I'm at work, I only watch TV as background noise. I rarely get a chance to go to the movies proper nor do I get the time to sit and watch a movie at home. This is the only reason I have Netflix.

This is specific to me and I wouldn't claim to generalize this to a whole population.

> Please, movie people, let me pay for this.

Pay for what, the ability to stream a movie? Don't we already have a dozen options for that?

I don't think this interesting as a feature, it's the backend technology that's interesting. On a related note, Spotify does something similar to get music to listeners by having existing users upload to new listeners.

I missed where anyone gave us the option of streaming new releases online.

Movie theaters offer neither convenience nor comfort. It's 2014, not 1914. Further, they are epicenters of disease transfer and otherwise completely and utterly dominated by inconsiderate jackasses who, to the benefit of everyone else, should actually probably stay at home.

It's hard to imagine that we live in a world where something so absurdly ancient is still the norm. They want us to endure that AND to pay $13 to watch a new movie. The 400% ROI on the first weekend of release isn't enough, they then want us to pay $20 to "own" the movie at home (and by own, I mean have access to watch it, because they learned that it's really bad to ever give anyone an actual copy of anything, because copyright law actually then prevents them from making even more money later on). Then maybe at some arbitrary point in the future, you can pay to watch a movie once, but for $5. Long after that movie is irrelevant. As a last attempt to extract money from a dead thing, and only as an attempt to make more money. It's in no way about your convenience, nor access to the work.

Imagine if music was still the same way. For every new work, radio stations are prevented from broadcasting the music at all. You have to go to an audio theater where you will sit in an uncomfortable chair with food stuffs splattered all over the floor, all the while battered from all directions with ads and menus for overpriced food and drink for "your enjoyment." You will listen using headphones that have clearly not been cleaned in a month, next to a person with a screaming child and another person who just sneezed a fine mist over 40 sq ft, much of which landed all over your face. Now you can listen to the latest and greatest the music industry has to offer. And oh yes, for this fine pleasure you WILL pay $13. No option just to hear the cover, not even at a reduced price. This is, after all, the bastion of decadence, a truly wondrous place where you should feel privileged to have access to the latest and greatest in entertainment! This is how kings live, and you'll like it!

Then 3-100 months later, chosen arbitrarily, you'll be given the "option" of having access to listen to that music whenever you wish for a mere $10 fee, and 18-500 months after that, finally, radios can start playing it, but only if they pay enormous sums of money to the copyright holders, which requires them to ask you for a subscription fee. What the fuck? You want to listen to music for free on the radio? LOL. Shut the fuck up and listen to my ads.

Clearly that model wouldn't work for music. They tried it, and it failed, so they actually adopted a better model, or rather they got out of the way and let innovators make things so convenient that piracy has become a mere historical oddity. I don't remember the last time I've even heard of someone pirating music.

So why do we still have these evil fucks insisting it works for movies? It very, very clearly doesn't. Piracy is a clear symptom of this. What happens when piracy becomes so easy and so simple that the barrier to entry gets lowered to nothing, so that everyone is suddenly able to experience availability as it should be? My sincerest hope is that it kills the profitability of the movie industry as we know it. Maybe then it may be replaced with something that actually places value in the consumer and their interaction with the work, not solely in the work itself.

Copyright is such bullshit. I have a personal policy of never going to the theater to see any film, despite how badly I want to.

Paying these animals only encourages their deviant behavior. If you value a free and open Internet, you will starve Hollywood until it dies.

Hollywood only continues to exist because people like you keep feeding them. Don't feed the animals.

When I visit the cinema, it's usually for the experience, and less to do with catching a new release. For example, I wanted to go see Gravity this week. I could torrent the movie, but I heard good things about Gravity in theaters. Nonetheless, all the theaters within an hour drive stopped playing it, so I'm out of luck.

They should allow people to buy and stream new releases online. Then, I think they should use theaters for a mix of new movies, and old movies. Run themes, have 80s week, or classic horror movie week, or Star Wars week, or Hitchcock week.

That's quite right.

You're paying the service, not the work done. The work is already payed. The investors now want to make more money and that's all. If they don't know what the consumer wants, i.e. you want to experience this movie on a theather, then they can't win money.

In fact, when you go to cinema, in theory, you're paying the theathers, not the filmakers or the camera man who filmed the movie. Maybe some actors have access to shared profits, but that's pretty rare business nowadays.

I'm tired of the same "compensation" history. What is the minimum compensation they want to leave a fair use? You will find the number can't be wrote down. Everyone wants free compensation for life.

I don't feel any bad for not paying those movies. These guys aren't exactly in need.

That said, yes, if the same service was proposed at a decent price and with recent releases (even popcorn doesn't get the freshest stuff), i'd totally just pay for it too.

Netflix, prime, etc don't even have stuff that's as recent or of similar quality.. (yes they've some of them)

It is the middleman problem. It is not yours. Movies will never disappear. You think all studios will close, no, they will just evolve or die. There are thousand examples of dead labor, technologies that passed away without much drama, just because consumers wanted a different thing or changed their consuming habits.

You can rent 12 years a slave on HD for $6, or buy it for $15 on Google Play. https://play.google.com/store/movies/details/12_Years_a_Slav...

Google Play only has an "Add to Wishlist" button for me.

You can already pay to watch instantly.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuOaTwuzlrY

Not really: "This video is not available in your country."

"Sorry about that."

The video is not available in certain countries. In countries where it is available outside the United States and Canada, it costs close to 2x the price.

Why does it always need to be about the money?? Imagine giving a candy to a child. You make the child happy, and that is your reward. Or do you expect the child to say something like "let me pay you"?...

Just for fun, apply that logic to your work.

They already have been paid. Or you think mr. sound technician guy or lovely ms. Magda the hairdresser will receive money until his last day just because they have worked on a movie. The only one who will have that right is a company, who had nothing to do with filmaking process, they just invested, and for sure, after the premiere they've got, or not, a lot of money. Even the main actors release "rights".

To me entertainment is very simple. The person who offers the entertainment presents a value. It is up to me whether or not the entertainment is worth the value. If it is, I'll pay the price, if it is not, then I will move on to one of a million other options. It's really that simple. If you don't like the deal that is offered then move on to the next one. I have no automatic right to any of the entertainment created. It is no different from any other transaction.

Then when your friends are at your home, you kick 'em out if you want to see a movie you pay, rented? wouldn't be fair also make them pay, or will you let them consume for free too?

Which rental service requires that each person watching pays a separate fee? If the terms dictated something like that then I simply wouldn't rent from that service.

Let's say you live alone and you want to see a movie. You pay for it. Same if I want to do it at my home. we both pay and we have the legal right to see it. What if suddenly, 20 friends come to my home to see the movie without paying as they were in their homes? Downloading is the same case. That's what I mean. You can't have the best of both worlds. Either you all pay to see it or no one.

But when you buy it you have a license to show it to 20 friends in a setting like that as long as you aren't charging (at least in the U.S.).

You are creating situations for the sake of this argument that simply don't exist.

You read the licence wrong. When you buy, rent, you're explicity forbid to do public playing: that means you cannot show other people the material, they have to pay for it. That way they're sure you dont mount a cinema in your home and invite the whole city.

That's simply not true. Public playing means that you cannot go to a part and project on a screen (as an example). In the confines of your home is not considered public playing.

I imagine that the fact that the regular worker has already been paid is not the big picture here.

If every movie is stolen or given away for free, this reduces the incentive to create more big pictures that would keep giving these people jobs.

Eventually this could possibly lead to fewer people getting paid much needed money due to fewer productions happening.

When I work, and want to be paid, I say upfront "I can do this for you, and it will cost you X". However if I say "here, please, take this, it's for you" it means exactly that. I don't want you to put any monetary value. Because there's a chance you might undervaluate it...

I 100% do not understand this argument. So, because I enjoy something, I shouldn't have to pay for it?

Can you please flush out this argument a bit?

If I give something to you it's entirelly up to me to decide whether I want you to give me money. If I want to give (for free) and enjoy doing that, please stop saying "take my money", because I don't want it. If I wanted your money I would have said so or at least hinted you. In other words, don't spoil the moment.

On the other hand, may be it's just me being too sentimental... Or may be it's because I grew up in an evironment where not everything was measured by the money, and giving and helping others without expecting to be "paid" was relatively normal.

Except the copyright owners aren't giving anyone anything.

If Disney put up, front-and-center on their website, a download link for Frozen, saying, "It's our gift to you! No strings attached!" then your analogy would work.

When I do a favor or give a gift to someone, I do it out of the kindness of my heart, or because I care about the person I'm doing the favor for. But when I show up to work and perform my duties, I expect to be compensated. Furthermore, even if I _do_ do something out of the kindness of my heart (like staying late to cover an absent employee's shift) I still expect to be compensated.

There's a time and place for volunteer/charity work, and there's a time and place for compensated work. If everyone just did favors for others, there'd be a lot more people who get screwed over (and also less incentive to do very technical work)

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