Piracy From A Film Student’s Perspective
I was recently asked the question of whether or not I would offer any film I made for free via peer-to-peer or Bittorrent. It didn’t take me long to respond with a resounding “hell no,” and I’ll explain why. Back in the day, I was quite the swashbuckler. When confronted on the issue, I would defend my lecherous ways to the teeth by exclaiming such proverbs as “fuck the man” and “the MPAA are jerk-faces!” If I was feeling particularly rowdy, I would just say something along the lines of “lol butts.” However, things changed for me and I did a 180 on how I view the whole “piracy” issue. This happened as I walked onstage and accepted my fake diploma, along with the germs of the President of Columbia College.
Fuck.
My career IS film.
If you think about it, the movies you see on screen are the result of hundreds of people working their asses off to create an end product that you can enjoy at your leisure. When you get it for free and share that free-ness with others, you’re essentially punching all those people in the nuts and stealing their lunch money. Do I need to give you a worse metaphor? Fine! When you decide to download Wolverine: X-Men Harder instead of paying to see it, you’re killing babies.
The argument that films these days are just too expensive has always been strange to me. When you go out to the bar, you usually blow anywhere from $20-$40 depending on your level of alcoholism. When you go out to eat at a place that isn’t Popeyes or McDonalds, you’ll probably put away somewhere in the ballpark of $10. Sporting events of any kind usually drain you more than a movie ticket’s worth. And what about matinee prices? What about second run theaters?
As I enter into the realm of filmmaking, I can’t help but think about all the people out there who feel it’s their right to watch a movie and never compensate anyone for it. Girl’s gotta eat, folks!
Do You Force It?
When I have writer’s block, I try to force myself to write something whether it’s any good or not. This tends to put me at odds with myself since I don’t like writing anything unless I have something to actually write. I’ve been told countless times to just get something “on the page” no matter what and that it’s not always going to be good. Do you hold to that? Do you force it when you know you don’t have it in you? Is forcing it a good idea?
I’m definitely curious what other writers think about this…
Donning the Rant Pants
Lately I’ve been a frustrated individual and it’s not because of the raging writer’s block I’ve been having. No, my frustrations are the result of feeling like I’ve picked the wrong gaming system. You heard me correctly. I may have picked the wrong console. All my life I’ve been a loyal customer to the Nintendo brand and have displayed my love of said brand openly, nay saying the various competitors every chance I got. I even (gasp) defended the Gamecube back in the day as a viable console in the gaming world.
But now I think I might have to rescind my love of Nintendo. Sorry, guys. I’m going to don the rant pants for a bit and just go off on a few reasons why I’m not going to be singing the Wii’s praises any time soon.
- Third Party “Garbage Ware.” When you go to any electronics store and peruse the Wii aisle, you’ll find that at least 90% of the titles on the shelf are junk. These are the games that are based on films or TV shows and all lack anything resembling fun gameplay. Go into a Gamestop or Best Buy and find a compelling game for the Wii that isn’t produced by Nintendo itself. I dare you.
- Stagnant Online Presence. Remember when Wii friend codes were easy to share and didn’t take a bajillion steps to add? Remember when there was a way to integrate your Wii experience with any various social networking site if you so wished? Yeah. I don’t either…because THAT’S NEVER EXISTED! If there’s one thing that could push the Wii ahead, it’s developing a social presence of some kind. I know the whole “being social” isn’t Nintendo’s aim necessarily, but when you can share your gaming experience with other people around the world automatically you find that it’s so much more fulfilling. If I had more online “social” options for my games, I’d probably play them more.
- The biggest games coming out are sequels! Seriously, another Zelda game? Another Mario Galaxy? They look great, but I feel like there’s some degree of re-hash here. How about we make something new that can be franchised and beaten to death…
- Wii-Ware. This is the big mamma of my irritations with the Wii console. When I first heard that there was going to be a store for independently created games for the Wii, I got insanely stoked. So much potential! In essence, indie games could thrive. Boy was I wrong. I think the only games that I’ve played from Wii-Ware worth the money can be counted on one hand. I certainly haven’t bought any more outside of Dr. Mario, Mega-man 9 and World of Goo. I might get Tetris Party, but I’m a little puzzle game’d out.
Sigh.
This isn’t a complete dismissal of the Wii as a console, especially since there’s so much that’s right about it. For example, it has one of the cutest menu interfaces in existence, and you can jump into a majority of the games and just “get it.” All first party games rock 110% and are perhaps some of the better games out there. Nintendo understands nostalgia and they can deliver that feeling in spades. They also changed the way we view controllers and have in essence shifted the paradigm of console gaming. However, the part of me that’s not a completely casual gamer is consistently left wanting more from this system.
I dunno. Does anyone else think about this shit or am I just weird?
Filed Under Moronic
Jonathan Wright writes via The Guardian:
There was time when episodic science fiction television was exactly that, episodic. Though there might be a few recurring plotlines in your favourite shows, you could dip in and out of a series without being seriously inconvenienced.
Not today. In the era of the story arc, it increasingly takes serious commitment to watch sci-fi telly. The new series of Torchwood is a case in point. Torchwood: Children of Earth, to give the latest series of the Doctor Who spin-off its newly expanded moniker, is “one epic story told over five nights”.
I’m sorry, but what’s so bad about five not-so-epic-but-nevertheless-carefully-crafted-individual stories shown over five weeks –or possibly even six if you need to re-jig the schedules because of a major sporting event? How did telly get so complicated?
Excuse me? Complicated? As someone who absolutely loves serialized television, this blog post has me scratching my head. What’s got me scratching my head even more is that this guy goes on to blame Babylon 5 for the downfall of the episodic Sci-Fi. What’s even worse is that he states that these ongoing arcs are “inconvenient,” and that one cannot simply jump into a show from the 3rd season and enjoy it like all the other shows out there.
Uh-huh. Whatever. The guy doesn’t seem to understand story arcs all that well, or that story is perhaps one of the most important aspects to television and film. Would you have really stuck with BSG had there not been a mission to find Earth? Would you have enjoyed Buffy quite the same way if there hadn’t been a “Big Bad” every season? And what’s that crap about story arcs excluding episodic content? Hello? Pushing Daisies? Dead Like Me? Must I list every other television show in existence?
This ranty-pants post is brought to you via J Michael Straczynski, who rocks. 
You’d Think They Would Know Better
Woke up today to the news that the courts in california upheld Prop 8. I must say that I’m surprised and extremely disappointed by this turn of events. I understand that this decision doesn’t reflect the beliefs of everyone there, but it certainly reveals what the majority believes. Didn’t think I could want to live anywhere less than I do California. Seriously.
And then the other bit of newsI heard was that they might be making a new Buffy movie without Joss Whedon, you know, like the first one. You would think that they would try to get the involvement of the guy who turned a bland premise into an engaging show! Anyway, I could complain about this and California all day today, but I should really keep an eye out for my stop.
You’d think they would know better.
I find @CalamityEnsues interesting! #followfriday
I was poking around at Stay N Alive and read a very interesting idea about Follow Friday and the ways it can adapt to the new @reply changes that Twitter has set in place. Instead of flooding the tweet-stream with a bajillion usernames no one is going to care to check out, you highlight a select few people and EXPLAIN why they are interesting to you. This is a much better idea in the long run and puts the focus where it truly belongs: on the people you’re trying to get people to follow! Anypoo, with that, I bring you my good buddy @calamityensues.
Here’s the nitty-gritty, as they say. Calamityensues is an animator based out of Chicago. He graduated from Columbia College, and has kept busy doing freelance work in his field. His real passion is with storyboarding, which is evidenced by the most excellent boards I’ve seen him do for our current project. He’s quite passionate about his work and yet will be the first to tell you that the story is one of the most important ingredients in animation and film.
Here’s a demo reel of some of his more recent work, so you can see what he’s all about!
If you haven’t figured out yet why I follow calamityensues, you might very well be the most blind person I’ve ever met. Seriously, check out his stuff and follow him as soon as you can. Link to his blog: http://tommyrobot.blogspot.com/
I Am Writing On A Bus
So there I was, feeling bad that I wasn’t blogging enough when it hit me: I can blog while I’m on the bus! Hurray!!!!
Now, I suppose coming up with something to write might be a logical next step in this process of discovery…
Textbook Piracy
I was listening to the latest episode of TWiT the other day at work and the subject of piracy came up and how it’s–to put it simply–a game changer. Specifically, they talked about Amazon, the new Kindle, and how this could usher in an era of easier textbook piracy. When I heard “textbook piracy”, a little voice inside me went “squee.” I’m sure I’m not the only student burned by ridiculous textbook prices and what little use they’ve been to us in our college education.
I should clarify: I’m a film student.
Our textbooks (at least in the film department) were less than stellar, and I was even able to go an entire semester without needing any. Whether this is the fault of the teachers or the faculty is not the point of my little blurb here. I’m just interested in the idea that textbooks are next in line for evolution-via-mass-piracy. With college as expensive as it is now, why buy a book you don’t really need if you can get it in a .pdf and pull it up in a reader?
Anyway, just a thought.
Outlines Suck, But Are Awesome
A problem I come across when screenwriting is the logistics of the plot. I have no problems placing two characters in a room and making them say cool things, but when it comes down to where things eventually end up, it becomes a different matter entirely. I’ve tried to help myself out a bit by doing the whole “outline” thing, but it always leaves me feeling like I haven’t made any progress whatsoever in my writing. Case in point, I’ve decided to take a step back and write out a step outline for a script I’m writing. I spent a few hours the other day writing what amounted to about 20 lines of outline.
How is THAT progress??
On the flip side of that, however, I now have a better idea of where I want my story to go.
Hrmm.
Jonathan is a VJ, Part 6
Hey there, folks. I figured it was about that time again to scour the internet for some music videos that I enjoyed. Kind of a random assortment this month around, but I figured it was a pretty decent one at that and that you might get a kick out of the selection. If you haven’t heard of any of these bands, you might want to do yourself a favor and check them out STAT!!!
The New Pornographers – Mutiny, I Promise You
Stuff I Do
Stuff I Read
Jonathan’s Buttons
