Lawrence Lessig says that there might not be a viable business plan for us DIY filmmakers anymore -- and too bad.
The lawyer/geek-rockstar/FOO (Friend of Obama) spoke at a company function today (yes, I have a day job) and indicated that culture and the arts change over time.
And our time may have passed.
During the Q&A segment, I asked him about his public policy thoughts on the effects of filesharing on filmmakers' ability to earn a living.
We're different than the music industry. Musicians make their money through live performances (so free and wide distribution of their recordings is a good thing), while for us filmmakers, recordings are our stock in trade. If recordings of our work are freely available, then no one will pay for them and we all have to get (or continue) day jobs.
His answer (in my view) boiled down to: take it.
To be fair, he also said that we need to decriminalize and encourage remix culture. Decriminalizing and ending the RIAA-style lawsuits will encourage kids to trust in the gov't again and have a healthy respect for the law. [Insert snark.] Then, as kids do their own remixing they will find out how hard it is to create high quality media and start respecting (and paying for) it.
Uh huh. And start eating their vegetables too.
But his main point was that the time for a viable business plan for a certain type of small-time filmmaker may have passed (indeed, for Hollywood itself, it may be passing), as it has for so many other forms of art.
Well, regardless of my own bitterness, he's right (and he's a nice guy promoting an important cause besides his copyright-related work: citizen financing of elections).
This gets us back the basic question: what shall become of us DIY filmmakers? With no viable business plan, we become like the handmade arts of embroidery, ceramics, and letterpress printing, whose fundamental business plans have been usurped by technology.
Now we are artisans and hobbyists.
We need donations and benefactors, not investors. (Memo to the major foundations: don't just fund documentaries! Us narrative filmmakers need your help too.)
And we stay with our day jobs or live at home with our indulgent parents.
Most of all, we don't expect to make a sustainable living wage -- much less ever hit the big time.
In such a toxic business environment, is there another way for DIY filmmakers to turn this into a profession?
One idea:
One path would be creating free webisodes that lead to discovery by Hollywood -- where a filmmaker builds up an audience up on the web, before leveraging that into a traditional TV or film deal. A few people have started to do that. But the initial webisodes would have be 100% free and -- most likely -- totally lost money.
What do you think?
Very interesting article.
Regarding the final question---
I've done two season of a web series, we currently have about 5.5 million hits. Mostly because of one webisode. At the time of its conception, profit was not the goal, it was exposure, and so I see it as a success, but if the exposure doesnt create profit, then was it helpful? I mean, we don't have agents, no tv deal. hollywood has not come knocking. We still have day jobs. BUT we have 5.5 million hits worth of online exposure. I don't know if that particular show will ever have the opportunity to make money (whichis ok, because it cost almost nothing to make). I do know that 5.5 million hits and growing, should make my next web production seem a little more legit and will hopefully give me some leverage when I pitch a new series to an online sponsor. I guess only time will tell. But I do think web-based content (short form initially...then long form eventually) is going to be where a lot DIY Filmmakers can thrive. I'm interested in finding a DIY friendly model in this market. And the only way to do it, is to experiment.
Posted by: Ryan Balas | January 23, 2009 at 02:55 PM