Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Deleting and destroying finished movies

rogerebert.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

311–320 of 369 posts

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#311

Post by fzeroracer »

dxdm wrote: post #300
leni536 wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they spent $100M and get an asset out that is worth $30M then they have a loss of $70M. Lighting the $30M shouldn't count as additional loss that they can write off, IMO.

By that reasoning, you want to force businesses to do something with their own property that they decide is against their interests?

No, the specific reasoning people are mentioning here over and over again is that we, as a people, should not subsidize businesses lighting their property on fire.

If they want to completely toss out the movie then they can. But it's insane to think the government should pay them for doing so because they say it has no value.

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#312

Post by fl7305 »

Terr_ wrote: post #72
fl7305 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> is the artist to be prohibited from destroying the painting Perhaps not prohibited. But we could make it so they lose all IP rights. Copyright is intended to promote the creation and distribution of new works. It is not a natural human right, like ownership of your physical things.

> Perhaps not prohibited. But we could make it so they lose all IP rights. I'm not sure how that would work. Suppose I make two draft comics of my original character ExampleMan. One features a dark brooding morally ambiguous anti-hero, and the other is a wholesome family character. Are you saying if I destroy one draft and publish the other, the character comes partially or wholly into the public domain? Or that I am…

You can't have your cake and eat it. If you want to use copyright protection, you should only be able to do so after making your work public.

If you then destroy your original work or refuse to let other people use it on reasonable terms, you can't sue people for copyright infringement when they use it.

> Would same logic also apply to a patents of a company that creates 10 different prototype engine designs, and decides to only bring one of them to market?

I think you shouldn't be able to use patent protection unless you also make your design available on the market for a reasonable fee.

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#313

Post by earthling8118 »

prepend wrote: post #152
theshrike79 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How so? They aren’t selling it. So its value is $0. If its value is $0, I should be able to buy it for that price.

That’s not how private property works. The owner doesn’t have to sell to you. Have you ever had a car totaled? Just because the insurance company salvages your vehicle doesn’t mean you get to buy it for that value.

Someone is saying "the way this works is wrong, it should work differently" and you're responding "that's not how this works" to that. How does that help?

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#314

Post by fl7305 »

gruez wrote: post #86
fl7305 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> is the artist to be prohibited from destroying the painting Perhaps not prohibited. But we could make it so they lose all IP rights. Copyright is intended to promote the creation and distribution of new works. It is not a natural human right, like ownership of your physical things.

>But we could make it so they lose all IP rights. If they're actually destroying all copies as claimed, then IP rights is irrelevant.

> then IP rights is irrelevant.

Not if someone managed to make a copy of the movie.

And I don't think you should be able to use copyright protection unless you register a copy with a central authority. Just like how patents work.

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#315

Post by tpmoney »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #239
tpmoney wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Distribution isn't free but it's pretty cheap for getting to sell tickets in major theaters. Last time I saw numbers on something like this, film advertising costs were generally assumed to be another 50-100% of the production costs. After all, those talk show appearances of all your stars don't come cheap. And your "major theaters" are going to insist on advertising. They're not going to block out precious screens…

I'm not talking about advertising. Just distribution. If the theaters won't take it, then streaming services. > that's almost certainly less than the value of the tax write-off Please explain. If the value drops to 1 million dollars, can't you write off the rest? If you can't, then that is exactly the problem here, there's a flaw in tax law causing destruction . > You'll need licensing contracts, lawyer time, account…

Look you’re arguing that they should throw good money after bad. And both of us are just speculating on what the actual numbers are. We all agree that at some point before this, if they cancel the project and write it off, no one cares. So all this boils down to is whether or not you believe their accountants suddenly become wrong or liars about their expected expenses and returns the moment the “final” edit is committed to film.

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#316

Post by Thorrez »

interroboink wrote: post #175
LoganDark wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those things being disliked doesn't mean a law shouldn't be made about them. They are much worse than merely being disliked, which is why there are laws.

I feel like that just moves the goalposts. Instead of deciding what should be law or not, now we are deciding what constitutes "mere dislike" vs "something worse." It's ultimately the same issue, no?

It seems to related or possibly even identical to: what things should the government regulate vs what things should be left unregulated (or left to be regulated by a more local government).

The founders of the US were very interested in deciding what are the responsibilities of the federal government vs what will be left up to the states to decide. They wrote entire essay series on the topic.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Federalist_Papers

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#317

Post by [deleted] »

cryptonym wrote: post #257
smarx007 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At claiming a tax break. A tax write off is intended to help you when you suffer a loss. In this case, a company does not suffer a loss but inflicts it on itself by destroying its asset without even trying to liqudate it properly.

Change the rule so destroying in purpose no longer qualify for tax break and someone will accidentally the only hard drive.

[deleted]

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#318

Post by fauigerzigerk »

leni536 wrote: post #294
tpmoney wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not how this works though, right? They're not saying "we think this movie was worth $100 million because that's what someone offered us, so we're going to write off $100 million.", they're saying "We spent $100 million on making this, and we think there's no way to recoup the expenses by releasing it, so we're writing off the $100 million we already spent on it." The "we already spent that money" is the key pa…

If they spent $100M and get an asset out that is worth $30M then they have a loss of $70M. Lighting the $30M shouldn't count as additional loss that they can write off, IMO.

I think what actually happened is that they paid $100m to make the movie. Later they determined that releasing it would be detrimental to the success or value of the company (e.g. because of reputational damage).

To avoid causing this damage they deleted the movie making sure it doesn't get out and wrote off the asset. The act of deleting the movie is not what made it worthless.

If executives had really deleted the movie in spite of believing that releasing or selling it would have a net positive value of $30m, then it could still be written off.

It's the same as employees stealing inventory or vandalising an office. The company could then fire and sue those employees, but that doesn't change the fact that the asset is now worth zero for accounting purposes.

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#319

Post by fauigerzigerk »

fl7305 wrote: post #312
Terr_ wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Perhaps not prohibited. But we could make it so they lose all IP rights. I'm not sure how that would work. Suppose I make two draft comics of my original character ExampleMan. One features a dark brooding morally ambiguous anti-hero, and the other is a wholesome family character. Are you saying if I destroy one draft and publish the other, the character comes partially or wholly into the public domain? Or that I am…

You can't have your cake and eat it. If you want to use copyright protection, you should only be able to do so after making your work public. If you then destroy your original work or refuse to let other people use it on reasonable terms, you can't sue people for copyright infringement when they use it. > Would same logic also apply to a patents of a company that creates 10 different prototype engine designs, and dec…

Do you seriously think that artists should not be allowed to throw away drafts they don't like?

Re: Deleting and destroying finished movies

#320

Post by dahart »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #199
dahart wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except the post very much is arguing studios shouldn’t be able to scrap projects. Did you catch the end? “governments exist (in part) to regulate corporations, in order to stop them from doing things that are deleterious or destructive to the public good and to individuals who work for them.” This isn’t saying the tax break is bad, it’s saying that deleting a film is what’s bad.

> This isn’t saying the tax break is bad, it’s saying that deleting a film is what’s bad. That's a true statement, though. What's wrong with saying that? And if you change the tax breaks, you can get the desired behavior without imposing additional rules.

I wasn’t suggesting above that anything is wrong with say deleting a film is bad, only pointing out that is what the article is claiming, contrary to the parent’s claim.

That said, TBH, I don’t see a problem with deleting a film, if there are no tax breaks in question. I don’t agree with the author that governments should force anyone to sell or give away something they don’t want to sell or give away. I’m pretty sure the author’s suggestions and a bunch of the commentary here is completely naive and unrealistic about the ramifications of being forced to release a film against the studio’s will; there are many reasons studios don’t want to do that aside from money, including reputation, liability, copyrights, brand recognition, etc.. The author suggested trying to use moral rights to force the release, but the funny thing is that using moral rights to prevent the release is a much stronger argument, if the film is actually crappy, right? I don’t know exactly what the tax breaks in question are, but I don’t see a problem with not paying taxes on profits either. I do see a potential problem with doing both things at the same time - if the tax breaks were more than not having to pay a percent of the profits; that’s does start to sound like burning down your house for the insurance money.

I’ve worked overtime on a project that was canned after being finished, and also worked at a studio that was closed on the heels of $1B in sales, with rumors the execs said the tax break was bigger than the remaining profits. These things suck hard and they’re destructive and it’s obvious that accountant-executives lack all imagination and can’t see potential. But should it be illegal? Probably not, forcing people to do business when they don’t want to would drive businesses into the ground and ruin people.

Post reply on HN