Why is Warner Bros. Discovery putting old movies on YouTube?

Post by echelon » Wed, Feb 05, 2025, 6:33 PM UTC

saint_yossarian wrote: post #168

echelon wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With AI, this entire vast content library is about to be worthless anyway. We'll be making more long-form, quality content per month than entire Hollywood production years. And if you include short form content and slop, it'll be more content per second than entire years. When faced with infinite content, people will reach for content currently popular in the zeitgeist or content that addresses niche interests. Holly…

Thanks, I hate it. Can you point me to any examples of AI-generated content that's actually worth reading/watching/listening to?

Post by TuringNYC » Wed, Feb 05, 2025, 6:37 PM UTC

SteveNuts wrote: post #71

lxgr wrote: post #30

Old movies have been available on various "free ad-supported streaming television" for a while now, so I'm actually more surprised it took copyright holders that long to realize that Youtube also shows ads and doesn't require people to install some wonky app that might or might not be available for their platform. Of course, region-specific copyright deals are incredibly complex etc. etc., so I could imagine it was j…

I assume that bandwidth is by far the biggest cost for running your own streaming service, so letting Google take that hit makes a lot of sense.

Post by nix0n » Wed, Feb 05, 2025, 6:42 PM UTC

xattt wrote: post #125

lxgr wrote: post #30

Old movies have been available on various "free ad-supported streaming television" for a while now, so I'm actually more surprised it took copyright holders that long to realize that Youtube also shows ads and doesn't require people to install some wonky app that might or might not be available for their platform. Of course, region-specific copyright deals are incredibly complex etc. etc., so I could imagine it was j…

I’d like to note that older movies have often been “live streamed” in an ad-supported format for many decades. You were even able to use your own equipment to “download” these movies to local “storage” and keep a collection with enough determination. The resolution was often terrible, somewhere around 240i and 360i. /s

Post by pests » Wed, Feb 05, 2025, 6:43 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #36

browningstreet wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a little surprised there isn't more of this. Building a streaming service is pretty expensive.. a lot of the platforms lost money doing so and really only made it back when they merged into an umbrella of other services. I'm also a little surprised no one has yet (AFAIK) done the "viral indie release to Youtube" path. I feel like it's sitting there waiting to be exploited.

"I'm also a little surprised no one has yet (AFAIK) done the "viral indie release to Youtube" path. I feel like it's sitting there waiting to be exploited." There's a lot of "indies releasing things to YouTube directly". However, they're limited both by the algorithm and by the amount of money they can generate by that, so you get a fairly restricted set of genres that this can work with, like sketch comedy or (perha…

Post by bongodongobob » Wed, Feb 05, 2025, 6:43 PM UTC

t-writescode wrote: post #195

bongodongobob wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"you should just do X" generally means you don't have the full picture. You're completely disregarding all the union stuff that needs to be considered. You're forgetting all the little guys that make movies happen. Yeah the directors and actors probably don't care, but the other 100s of other people involved in making films probably do. Edit: You're right. Just disregard any laws and contracts in place. HN knows best…

Early US copyright was something like 20 years + 20 years if they were still alive. Under that, everything before 1985 would be free of copyright already. I think the majority of Americans would greatly prefer that model; but, The Mouse had other plans and has extended copyright to approx 100 years.