Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood. • Hacker News Board

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#201

Post by tmeasday » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:04 AM UTC

waterlesscloud wrote: post #94

cstross wrote: post #7

Hollywood and the MPAA isn't about making movies. Rather, it's about maintaining a distribution chokehold on mass produced popular entertainment. This in turn means controlling what goes into the pipeline, and how the output from the pipeline is delivered to the consumers, and how the MPPE is marketed -- for example, the whole star system, Oscars night hype, and so on. What is needed is a better distribution channel,…

Distribution is a solved problem. It's open. Even theatrical is more open than it was 5 years ago. NATO wants competitors to Hollywood. In fact, NATO members are beginning to openly compete with Hollywood (see Open Road Films, a joint venture between AMC and Regal). Production is a solved problem. The tools have been democratized. Even financing is open these days. There's a huge range of film financing sources, and…

Agreed. Although discovery isn't just an issue in the film industry; I think it's going to happen everywhere as small scale producers attain the ability to produce great content/products/whatever and the market becomes more flooded with choices than ever before.

Here's a article that goes into this: http://bindle.me/blog/index.php/170/chances-of-discovery-one...

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#202

Post by pg » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:05 AM UTC

sjtgraham wrote: post #52

The soccer analogy is interesting because when a player is fouled in the penalty area, the player is strongly incentivised to take a dive. A foul on a player with a clear goalscoring opportunity in the penalty area is a mandatory red card for the fouling player, and a penalty kick for the attacking team. This gives the attacking team a clear advantage by having one more player than the opposition, for the remainder o…

Yes, but in practice a forward won't take a dive unless he's lost control of the ball.

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#203

Post by malandrew » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:05 AM UTC

kreek wrote: post #194

sjtgraham wrote: post #52

The soccer analogy is interesting because when a player is fouled in the penalty area, the player is strongly incentivised to take a dive. A foul on a player with a clear goalscoring opportunity in the penalty area is a mandatory red card for the fouling player, and a penalty kick for the attacking team. This gives the attacking team a clear advantage by having one more player than the opposition, for the remainder o…

Speaking of soccer in terms of entertainment it is almost as bad as Hollywood and in some areas worse. Like Hollywood all online deals are careful not on step on established players toes (DirectTV, TimeWarner, et al). You can pay $15/month to watch games live online, but any game involving marquee teams is delayed. The FA in England takes it a step further and doesn't even allow unauthorized publication of fixtures a…

How is that even legal? The UK is a common law system like the US. Doesn't it have a court case similar to Feist v. Rural in the US that establishes jurisprudence that data cannot be copyrighted? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feist_v._Rural

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#204

Post by statictype » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:08 AM UTC

Movie/TV Show industry != Hollywood.

There could still be a movie industry that doesn't involve Hollywood in the same way that there can be a music industry without record labels

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#205

Post by re_format » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:10 AM UTC

eru wrote: post #191

re_format wrote: post #82

Give me the programmers, UI geeks, the money to pay them to do as they are told, and I will build it. I have the idea, and it's actually a proven winner, among a smaller segment of users. Like most other internet phenomena, it's something that was once only done amongst computer nerds only to be later done by the general public as if it was just another usual day-to-day practice. And it actually involves more friends…

Pitches don't work like that. If you want other people's time or other people's money, you better throw some more skin into the game. The most simple thing to imagine is creating a small prototype. But there are other ways.

With this "RFS" who's pitching who?

I'm working on the prototype to prove the concept. But there is no GUI, I am strictly a command-line user.

What are the "other ways" you allude to?

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#206

Post by marshray » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:11 AM UTC

eru wrote: post #165

pearle wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not argue against the fact that multiplayer games have a longer potential playtime, however not all games have multiplayer so you just can't say that a $50 or $60 game will definitely have 100+ hours of entertainment value.

You are probably looking at the wrong games. Most people who aren't already into games, won't buy the 60 USD games. Casual games will catch them. Think Solitaire or Tetris, which lots of people have sunk more than 100 hours over the years into. Or even evil Farmville.

I think in a sense you've identified the issue too. For every dedicated player who will pay $60 and be disappointed when he beats the game in 50 hours, there are 99 or 999 who want a game that they don't have to invest as much in.

Players like me want to play on our own terms and come and go as they please. I used to play a lot of WoW but shutting down all my VMs and rebooting out of Linux to do so is now a big disincentive. I have tried to get into some PS3 games but the long mandatory updates the system forces you into just makes me hate it. Oh my god and the loading screens that plague the PS3 are just horrid.

(Sorry I'm not trying to complain, just trying to give you guys some ideas. :-)

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#207

Post by rdl » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:11 AM UTC

Sometime over the past year I went from thinking YouTube content was insignificant compared to Hollywood, to the point where I'd happily give up all broadcast/cable/DVD/Netflix content for YouTube type user generated content. I suspect this will be more widespread in a year or two more.

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#208

Post by lukeschlather » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:12 AM UTC

marquis wrote: post #111

akg wrote: post #63

Has anyone tried out Amazon Studios: http://studios.amazon.com/ ? That seems to be a big step in this direction. Amazon.com has already created a big threat in the publishing industry with e-books and self-publishing. I think hollywood is next with the democratization of content and technological tools. It used to be that to create "Hollywood grade" movies would require tons of expensive equipment and capital. I don'…

Many artists steer clean of Amazon because it is trying to democratize art through crowdsourced development. Can you imagine what would have happened to Blade Runner if Ridley Scott had even less control on the final cut?

Can you imagine what the complete works of Shakespeare would look like if he were responsible for releasing any of the folios we use today?

The whole idea of being absolutely loyal to the artist's intent is a cultural idea that has come in and out of vogue, but is largely an artifact of 20th century America. Really, art has always been crowdsourced in some sense or another, and any work of art is in some sense an amalgam.

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#209

Post by jim-greer » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:12 AM UTC

potatolicious wrote: post #128

skb_ wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you guys consider video games? I think that's already a viable alternative form of entertainment. I would argue video games already killed Hollywood, they just never pulled the sword out. $50 for 100+ hours of content vs $10 for roughly 2 hours? No contest.

I don't think video games are a full substitute for TV or movies. They are completely different experiences - one is purely passive, and the other is active and participatory. There are lots of game fans that would claim that this distinction is what makes games superior , but for a lot of people I think that's what turns them off . The passivity is a virtue in many places.

I'm really not optimistic on getting people to stop watching TV or movies. Maybe there's some way of producing and financing them that's smarter but I wouldn't bet on changing behavior that drastically. People have been consuming stories about other people forever, and they're going to keep doing that.

Re: Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.

#210

Post by autumn_ » Sat, Jan 21, 2012, 1:13 AM UTC

pearle wrote: post #80

skb_ wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you guys consider video games? I think that's already a viable alternative form of entertainment. I would argue video games already killed Hollywood, they just never pulled the sword out. $50 for 100+ hours of content vs $10 for roughly 2 hours? No contest.

I understand your point but, multi-player aside, how many $60 games (that's the standard pricing these days for AAA titles) provide 100+ hours? They are very rare. Skyrim is the only recent qualifying game that jumps to mind.

There are very few, at least in the Western eye. Only two that come to mind are the latest Zelda, and Dark Souls.