Indie Movie Explodes on BitTorrent, Makers Bless Piracy
Written by Ernesto on November 10, 2009Hollywood often complains about the billions of dollars allegedly lost due to piracy. Indie film makers, on the other hand, tend to welcome the free buzz generated when their film is pirated. The makers of Ink belong to this latter group, and are thanking the hundreds and thousands of people who downloaded their movie on BitTorrent.
Written and directed by Jamin Winans, Ink is the story of a brutal mercenary who appears in the dreamscape of a comatose 8 year old called Emma. Like virtually every movie nowadays, the film ended up being ripped and put on BitTorrent just a few days ago.
In this short time span it was downloaded by more than 400,000 people on BitTorrent alone, earning it a spot in TorrentFreak’s chart of top 10 most pirated movies this week.
For most Hollywood bosses this is usually a trigger to start complaining about lost revenue, but the makers of Ink are welcoming their new pirate audience.
In an email to the followers of their newsletter, Jamin and Kiowa Winans say that they have “embraced the piracy” and are “just happy Ink is getting unprecedented exposure.” Thanks to the pirated copy their movie jumped to 16th place on IMDb’s movie meter, and according to the makers this increased popularity also boosted DVD and Blu-ray sales.
Who needs a hefty marketing budget to promote a movie (and merchandise) when they have BitTorrent? Sent out a few hours ago, here’s the mailing in full plus a follow up response from Kiowa.
Dear Fans and Friends,
Over the weekend something pretty extraordinary happened. Ink got ripped off. Someone bit torrented the movie (we knew this would happen) and they posted it on every pirate site out there. What we didn’t expect was that within 24 hours Ink would blow up. Ink became the number 1 most downloaded movie on several sites having been downloaded somewhere between 150,000 to 200,000 times as far as we can tell. Knowing there’s absolutely nothing we can do about it, we’ve embraced the piracy and are just happy Ink is getting unprecedented exposure.
As a result, Ink is now ranked #16 on IMDb’s movie meter and is currently one of the top 20 most popular movies in the world.
This all started as a result of the completely underground buzz that you’ve each helped us create. We’ve had no distributor, no real advertising and yet the word of mouth that you’ve generated has made the film blow up as soon as it became available worldwide. So many of you came to see the movie multiple times, bringing friends and family and many of you have bought the DVD and Blu-ray from us. All of this built up and built up and suddenly it exploded.
We don’t know exactly where this will all lead, but the exposure is unquestionably a positive thing.
Ink hits Netflix, Blockbuster, iTunes and many more tomorrow! Remember to get your signed copies, t-shirts and posters at the Ink Store.
Thank you so much for the constant love and support.
Jamin and Kiowa
Double Edge Films
And the follow up response we got from Kiowa, in reply to this article.
Dear Ernesto,
To say we are shocked by all this news and are digesting it rapidly is an understatement. We made this film in Denver, CO on a budget of $250,000 and have fought to bring it to 15 cities ourselves over the past ten months. Hollywood has claimed that they don’t know how to market the film or that it doesn’t have an audience, and what BitTorrent has done in the last four days is prove, unequivocally, that Hollywood is wrong.
So is this the best thing that could happen to our little film? Absolutely! There is no way this many people would know about the film otherwise, or that our IMDb MovieMeter would have shot up an astounding 81,000% from a few days of activity over the torrent sites. What Hollywood would calculate as lost dollars, we calculate as fans earned. Due to many suggestions from downloaders over the past few days we have established a Donate button on our Store page for people to contribute what they can. Thank you for posting that info.
We’re not looking to get rich, but would like to pay back our investors and the enormous amount of personal debt we’ve gone into making the film. We’re also not looking to make Hollywood films (Jamin has had several opportunities) and plan on continuing the march of making fiercely independent films. In order to do that we have to count on the power of the people, eyeballs all over the world and torrenters to throw our film a few bucks apiece. It’s the indie film model of the future and we appreciate each and every person who takes the time to watch our film. It appears we’re all rebels here… so let’s wave that flag proud.
Again, we are really floored that all of this is happening and that you’ve opened up the conversation!
All the best,
Kiowa K. Winans
Previously: AFACT v iiNet: Barrister Tears Into iiNet Key Witnesses
Next: AFACT v iiNet: Judge Asked To Disregard iiNet Evidence
97 Responses (Add yours or TrackBack)
Bit torrent has many, almost unlimited cool and legal uses.
Let’s hope its misuse doesn’t tarnish it’s potentially fine reputation.
Bit torrent rocks. Pirates who use it to infringe, suck.
good things are coming!
@1 Another co. bastard!
Indie artists always liked (is this the word?) and benefited from internet as a platform. It’s only the Big Guns™ that go chasing the pirates. Yes another proof.
“Bit torrent has many, almost unlimited cool and legal uses.
Let’s hope its misuse doesn’t tarnish it’s potentially fine reputation.”
It cuts into the mainstream studios money streams, thus it will be dragged through the mud by them and all the media outlets they control.
If it does not work for them or it works better for others – its got to be a bad thing, and anything bad in their world has to be associated with the bogeyman,dragons and seafaring folk who rape,pillage and kill.
Just to point out the obvious, Retarded Mind, this whole article is about pirates using bittorrent to infringe. It must be a real kick in the teeth for you and the other MAFIAA shills, that the people who made this film are actually happy with that.
Ok, I pulled the movie yesterday. Damn, it’s really strange but somehow intersting. you really need to pay attention though. It’s not your typical good guy, badguys and if it’s complicated they both have names.
bittorrent ftw!
Bad costumes, mediocre acting and pointless fight scenes can be funny, like “Black Dynamite”. But in this movie they are just boring. Too much noise, too little content.
On the other hand it is always worth trying. Maybe the next movie will be better. Like “Pi”.
Cool ! Another fan for Bittorrent. Man ! this is going somewhere the rough guys like MPAA & BREIN don’t like.
http://Pirlog.com
I suck…and am proud of it! xD
@ 1 Nov 10, 2009 at 17:14 by Reasoned Mind
Kudos, yet again you’ve proven you’re a useless retard and your claims are beyond worthless, due to having no substance to them in any way, lol
Tell me how much longer are you going to keep spamming on this blog before you get the message that you’re not welcome?
The whole bittorrent fight is about democratising content: putting the power into the hands of the people. Rather than the most popular movie being whatever the MPAA members pump the most marketing cash into, it is whatever creates the most buzz!
It’s a mirror image of the renewable energy industry: wind generators are like bittorrent clients. Wind isn’t centralised, and doesn’t have to be dug out of the ground by one of only a dozen big corporations, who you then have to buy the product from at extortionate prices. You can put a windmill up anywhere and not have to pay anyone for the privilege.
Thats why both the Energy Cartel, and the Media Cartel are fighting tooth and nail to keep their industries centralised and all under direct corporate control.
Fuck that.
Glad to see someone embrace the whole bittorrent thing, Ink isn’t bad either. Very different.
You all bash Reasoned Mind but he’s right. We aren’t winning any wars sitting in an underground blog ranting about “the man”.
BitTorrent is a wonderful tool masked with a bad rep. Grow up and fight the good fight legally, not underground flame wars. You don’t win any respect being a bully.
BitTorrent & Bram Cohen will revolutionize the online content distribution. Peer to peer > server-client model any day.
Bittorrent is the strongest distribution platform anybody can think of. The MPAA wants to keep the distribution channels to itself so they attack bittorrent. They are nothing better than monopolists.
Bittorrent FTW !!!
http://leakz.net
Ok, this is a total freetard article. Don’t get me wrong, I certainly believe the old movie distribution model is dead, but exposure on its own is nice, but not enough.
The problem is freetards expect nice professionally produced content, but for free? As a producer, what then is to motivate me to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars or more to make a movie, when I’m never going to see it back? I’m not some Hollywood producer who’s got millions in the bank to tide me over. Should I sweat blood and tears over many years to get a movie made, in return for the warm fuzzy feeling that 150,000 – 200,000 people may have watched it?
Someone needs to inject some realisim into this article. File sharing is certainly a positive thing overall, but if indie filmmakers can’t make a living from the huge amount of time they put into making these films, they ain’t going to be filmmakers for long. No matter how much the Internet “likes” their work.
@14 I think you are right.
For good arguments to win the “Copyfight” read (among others) Cory Doctorow and Lawrence Lessig. This presentation is a good starting point:
‘It is About Time: Getting Our Values Around Copyright’
http://blip.tv/file/2827842
Ink was a great movie, yes it is low budget, and there isnt really any big name actors, but the storyline was very creative and worth telling..
I really dont expect everyone to appreciate this movie, it is strange, but definitely well done with the resources they had, the acting was better than it is in some of the big $$$ films …
I will definitely purchase the DVD because people who put out such at effort as this *deserve to be supported!
“Indie Movie Explodes on BitTorrent, Makers Bless Piracy”
This is why we shall demand the movie and music recording corporations of to put some tag on their stuff so that we can ban their content from Btorrent.
Soon they would become history.
For anyone that has downloaded the movie and liked it, they also have a Donate button on their website, so help them out. We need all the support we can from people who embrace torrents AND make good content.
http://www.doubleedgefilms.com/
@19
Great addition to the thread, although I think you may have gotten the wrong impression (as a few others have) They do not really “from people who embrace torrents”"
Even on their page they claim they arent happy about it.
Im sure they cant deny that BT has helped tremendously but they are probably wondering how much money they will also lose…
If you grabbed this movie and liked it Ppl, support them…
Eh.. people.. I’m pretty sure that’s not Reasoned Mind… two reasons.. first: He/She would never use the word rocks on that way the one who made that comment did… and would have probably said something smarter, tho.
Second: He stopped coming here 10 post ago or so, if I’m not mistaken.
@POST: Well.. I guess indie movie makers just got the message they can’t stop “piracy”, and that in fact… it ends up being cheaper when it comes to adversite, and you end up having money ;)
we need more indie stuff out there, support these guys so the studios and mafiaa keep getting bitch slapped.
i gonna buy both the dvd and bl of this one.
btw hav’nt downloaded it yet , so am off to get it now :P
@1
Crawl back into your corporate hole you spies.
Will you all shut up about Reasoned Mind? I couldn’t care less if he’s being paid to post here, or if he is posting because he is opposed to what we are doing. Whichever it is, he still has an opinion. Learn to accept it, even if it is different from our own.
And Capn, I couldn’t have said it better myself. We can sit on TF and shout and scream till our faces (fingers?) turn blue, it isn’t going to achieve anything. The other side is lobbying, why aren’t we? The various Pirate Parties are doing their bit, but the rest of us are just sitting idle. We number millions. The other side numbers thousands, if that. We could crush them easily.
Wow, I downloaded this off of a site a while back. I havent watched it yet (I have alot of movies I havent watched tho)
The plot seems a bit interesting though poorly explained, but TF cleared it up for me…so this might be good enough I might actually buy it to support these guys.
Also, this led me to find an old rip of Dark City, which I havent seen either but always wanted to ever since I seen the trailer on a VHS… which I cant find anywhere locally. Thanx BT.
@20 – You may well be right.
They seem pleased by the extra publicity and all the peeps who scour this blog have now heard about the film – will they just go and leech it.
Some “may” donate but a quote has been left out and I do think some people (inc TF) have slightly the wrong impression. On their impressive site they do say “While we are not excited that people are seeing the movie without paying, this has given an enourmous amount of exposure. TF has seen fit to leave out this quote, so perhaps they are not “just happy” it’s getting this exposure. Wonder why it was left out of the story or the quotes?
@ 24 (and the rest of you who would like to make a difference)
The “”various Pirate Parties are doing their bit”",
Thats *Exactly* how…
I have been selling that idea for months to people, I have even recruited people that havent the slightest idea what BT is, not to mention ever using it….
Spread the word, stand on the very same ground that “they” do and present your arguments, it really is the only way to have any hope of winning…
i think the title of this piece is wrong. surely it should read:
‘Indie Movie Explodes on BitTorrent, Makers Bless File Sharers’. after all, this is what it’s really all about, sharing (not stealing!)things, for no gain. only certain greedy, uneducated morons cant see that and continue to condemn the process instead of embracing it and using to their own advantage, as well as others.
Awesome, I’m downloading. If I like it, I might buy it from iTunes. The only problem? I’ll have two movies to watch this weekend, versus my tradition of one.
Plus the retail and itunes prices are not exactly “pirate friendly” are they – no “reasonable” e-download charges, eh? as demanded by many users of this site and torrent users. Just a DONATE button to help pirates soothe theit consciences. INK site says 150k dloads, TF say 400k- whatever, much exposure – not many $$$s, tho.
Those who do not dload illicitly, will have to pay a high price, $18.99 to obtain the film.
Interesting to know the average & total DONATE figures?
Ink MOVIEmeter on IMDB: Up 81,093% in popularity this week.
Yeah.
@ Tutame ex inferis..
Ya know, you’re right, TF kinda didnt report “everything” but you never know, the site could have been modified since they grabbed the original quote??..
But even though it wasnt “spelled out” in the article it was the impression I gathered, reading the site just confirmed it….
And that “high price” is for a *signed DVD* a little more than your average DVD
Don’t have time to properly comment right now but I have to tell 1, our pro copyright kid Reasoned Mind, has fallen into a hell of a contradiction.
The movie was illegally ripped and uploaded, not to mention the hundreds of thousands of illegal downloads. Yet you say it’s a good use… cool.
im downloading now, whether or not the ink crew is “happy” or “unhappy”
about my choice of methods for viewing this movie.
good to see reasoned mind and his opinion…which is worthless to just about everybody on here.
@16, brizzl
That presentation is amazing! I’m about 25 minutes in and it is very informative. Here’s a brief overview of what I’ve covered here for people to ponder.
The copyright clause written to law (to date) did not account for the system of distribution that we experience. Digital copying was not considered when the current draft of copyright law was formed (I’m sure many of you already are aware and argue this as is).
HOWEVER, free distribution (as desired in scientific publication) is no more beneficial to society as the MPAA/RIAA model. People need incentive to be motivated. Some find this incentive through self-gratification or the joy of others but at the end of the day they need to put food on the table too!
A solution we need to arrive at is a model where the parties involved (movies) get paid, and one where the desired viewers (us) are not being charged drastically (hey, that sounds familiar!)
As citizens of a country protected by law it is NOT our position to revoke or reject the law that protects us. We should not pick and choose which laws are right and wrong. We do however have every right to question these laws.
I’m ranting now, I could keep going (and probably will in a more informative essay I will be required to present to my telecommunications company) but the message is simple. Question the laws that are in place, do not break them. The people in congress are people too and will listen to the loudest voice. Torrentfreak isn’t your channel to these people it is up to you to find that channel.
Historic revolutions were not triggered, nor won by internet tough guys. They were vocal and knew how to get the job done.
-Capn
PS, I’m not talking out of my ass here either. I have made my viewpoint vocal to my local parliament representatives and consistently fight for fair distribution of content within the company I work for.
You can scream…..
You can shout….
It is too late now
Because ….
You have not being paying
att en tion
server-client rules, take your crappy low speed p2p garbage and shove it.
eh?
@36, troll
I know I shouldn’t feed you but I want to hear your argument about how a single provider should be required to provide a 1GB upstream to support content distribution when a 5MB one would be sufficient in a P2P model.
There’s a reason why TV companies use multicast and linux distros use P2P protocols for their content distribution.
[quote]HOWEVER, free distribution (as desired in scientific publication) is no more beneficial to society as the MPAA/RIAA model.[/quote]It is. It’s called Utopia. We achieved it with software. If only we could achieve it with tangible things as well… we’ll forever solve all shortages, can you imagine?
People and projects need to be funded and supported, not sold. Big difference. Selling something that has infinite supply is a very backwards concept. However funding its creation is not.
this works great for indie films but not Hollywood films. This proves nothing.
Nice to see the response and the donate button. It downloaded at lightning speed on the torrent, and I’ll watch it this weekend (friday or saturday night). If I like it, donating looks like a great option!
@34 Capn
If you liked the presentation by Lawrence Lessig, have a look at Cory Doctorows talk at the Q2C festival this year:
http://www.q2cfestival.com/play.php?lecture_id=7748
(skip the first 2 minutes if possible, long list of “thanks”)
Or this interview with Clay Shirky:
http://lauraflanders.firedoglake.com/2009/11/06/week-in-review-clay-shirky-the-media-revolution/
“It doesn’t matter what the law is, if enough people are not going to obey it, then the system is going to be changed.”
Hollywood sucks shit but the little guy does not.This makes sense to me.The bigwig greedbags don’t have a clue but this filmmaker and artists like me love P2P.We get a lot bigger audience than we ever would of.
Boycott Hollywood,RIAA,MPAA, and all their asshole stooges.
Kudos!
IM tellin ya dude, Piracy is da Shiz!
Jessy
Privacy-Stuff.be.tc
I haven’t seen the movie, but I’ll donate regardless as I’ll support film makers embracing the technology and sticking it up MPAA.
@Sendaii
“Whichever it is, he still has an opinion.”
Reasoned Mind doesn’t have an opinion. What he has is a small and unchanging repertoire of bullshit he recites from a list.
“The other side is lobbying, why aren’t we?”
Because we don’t have the kind of corporate power it takes to buy our way into the executive and judicial branches. Duh.
@Exposure sure is nice, but what about the $?
“File sharing is certainly a positive thing overall, but if indie filmmakers can’t make a living from the huge amount of time they put into making these films, they ain’t going to be filmmakers for long. No matter how much the Internet “likes” their work.”
Yeah, because filesharing is new. Oh wait…
Both Indie filmmakers and filesharing have existed simultaneously for years, and for all those years – including this one – indie filmmakers have never stopped making a living. Your conjecture fails.
wow i really found this to be an interesting read; thanks for sharing
spread it around
You guys are missing the point.
If all content producers operated in this manner, I’d starve to death. It’s as simple as that. Hopefully, the internets will die and you people will continue to purchase plastic discs so my ass can expand exponentially. Least we forget, that is the meat of the matter. I don’t give a damn about the sluggish economy, inferior content, outdated technology or some newfangled innovation. Bollocks, I say. We must protect the old monopoly at all costs.
“If all content producers operated in this manner, I’d starve to death. It’s as simple as that.”
Only if you just stood there.
A reasonable person would then try and get another job in another field. Is it such a radical idea? When your old job gets made obsolete, retrain for a new one. That’s why we didn’t have hoards of saddlers and farriers suddenly starving to death when Benz created the Ic engine, or when Ford made the first automotive production line. Them people got jobs in other industries. I’m failing to see the difficulty in grasping this concept.
@ 54 Ben
“I’m failing to see the difficulty in grasping this concept.”
I’m not surprised. You see, Ben, I have no intention of doing any actual work to earn a living. That’s for you sheep. My intention is to protect established interests in hopes for any table crumbs that may fall my way. A parasitic existence is not that difficult of a concept to grasp. Movie studios have been doing for it years and earned billions in the process. Why should we rock the boat now? You pirates are easy targets because you’ll never have our clout or insider connections. True justice is for sale to the highest bidder, Ben. Besides, it’s so much easier to protect the status quo instead of embracing anything new. I miss the Stone Age…
“I’m failing to see the difficulty in grasping this concept.”
Ben, the buggy whip went out of favor and out of business because we no longer needed it and we set it aside and the industry dried up from lack of need. The music is the buggy whip. But you are not setting the music aside, everyone still wants this particular buggy whip, music is as popular as ever.
Instead you use technology to copy the original buggywhip, an exact copy made illegally and with no right and with no compensation to the whip maker, even though you DID NOT set it aside, you still want it and copy it and still use it and still enjoy it. In fact Ben, you even NEED the musicmaker to keep making new music so you can COPY it illegally again and again.
This is not fair evolution of industry Ben, this is using technology to strip the rights of the workers who make the products you still want and use (and take free copies of) everyday.
This is a clearly different situation. So if a smart guy like you can’t see the difference, it’s because you don’t want to see it.
@ 56 copyright law creates artificially protected industries and the consumer shall not change to accept.
it is the producer that needs to change their business model.
it is the distributor(mpaa, riaa)
that copyright law was created for:
http://questioncopyright.org/promise
Bittorrent ftw!!!!
Beethoven was really pissed when his CDs went viral. He couldnt make ends meet, soon after he committed suicide at The Lanesborough, London
,leaving a note. The note read: I cannot become successful now that Ive been impoverished from internet theft.And it has taken all my inspiration to create any great works of art.I do not feel the need to go out and a make a buck playing for the paupers. And I really cant stand the way I am treated at expensive hotels and restaraunts and all the publicity I get walking down the street. Im tired of being treated like a God and wearing all the bling for the hoes. But I will leave my work for the riaa to make hundreds of thoudands of dollars for themselves.
@1 Reasoned Mind, just to nitpick, in this instance, the BitTorrent-based distribution occurred without license from the copyright owners. It was piracy, by your definition, and infringement, under the law. But the copyright owners don’t agree with you that the pirates suck.
ZOMG I just pooped in the toilet and it looked like a Baby Ruth bar. I didn’t eat it though b/c that’s gross. I flushed it right down. I did sniff it a little first though. Sort of like curry, but I didn’t eat any, like WTF?
Great movie, audio 8, video 9, just unzip and play, would definately recommend.
You guys suck.
Imagine if you could download anal lube instead of paying for it like my boyfriend. Anal lube makers would really take it up the ass because nobody would buy their product. Is that the kind of world you really want? What a pain in the ass…
Indirectly @ 1
A few months back I remember the same thing from the makers of “The Man From Earth”. An astounding movie! I’m glad that these groups are seeing that filesharing isn’t a terrible thing, even when copyrights are infringed.
These big corps with these white fatties in their suits just don’t know how to incorporate events like these into their projections, so they become evil.
Guess what? I miss a TV show by 1/2 hour, I download it in 5 minutes and watch it when convenient for me, broke copyrights there.
I get curious and find a movie online, download it, blows my mind! (Renting is available, but if the movie is complete trash, renting has become so expensive now I might as well buy the darn thing!) I go and buy it to add to my collection, after breaking copyright laws.
I see a new game coming out, but the demo is released only to people who pre-order? What if I don’t know if I’ll like the game or not and I don’t pre-order, I’m supposed to go on a blind assumption or somebody else’s opinion of what’s good? Download an early rip, love it, buy it on launch, again broken copyright laws.
Seriously, these corps. have gotten more out of me through this terrible system of underground advertising, than a lame commercial or bright colours ever will.
So keep at it Sony, EA, Paramount, you get the idea, keep trying to prevent me from buying your products.
Having watched this movie I cant see how it can make money in traditional distribution method.
(listen to their radio talkshow http://filmcourage.podbean.com/2009/11/02/filmmakers-jamin-winans-and-kiowa-winans-on-la-talk-radios-film-courage)
The film has many “flaws” – childish acting, visually to messy and the story may be too obscure. Keep in mind that the target audience are children.
But the story also has very strong elements like sincerity and raw emotions. Also it explores the possibilities of new digital medium.
So in the end, all this movie has is a open source distribution method and now it has been proven. Otherwise it would have been in the dark forever.
Ofcourse they will not get rich by donation but they will get their voice heard and gather a loyal fan base. And from there, they can do better with next project.
Ya, This has to be the best movie I have seen in 2009. Whole budget 250k and I rank it 9.5/10. Puts those 200 million hollywood steaming POS to shame MUST SEE!!!
@64 Any-Mouse
You are right, the same thing happened to “The Man From Earth”.
To me it seems that these two films have something in common. Namely strong emotion in unsellable form. Traditional distribution just doesnt like it. But the audience loves it, thats why they explode in BitTorrent world.
The important question: if they have a donate button on the site, are they saying you’re allowed to download it to see if you like it without risk of being attacked?
It’s clarification that is missing from the article.
DOWNLOADED AND WATCHED FIRST 20 MIN HORRIBLE MOVIE
I suspect this film was deliberately released to Bittorrent. It’s a clever move and generates a lot of hype for a movie that would otherwise have disappeared without a trace. The donate button on the producers website is a clever means to recoup the losses they would otherwise have made. They also blatantly “seeded” their IMBD listing with gushing praise/reviews for the film. It is startling to see the difference in the reviews, the first dozen or so rate it as the best indie film ever, and then the rest of the (real) reviews are a lot less enthusiastic. Kudos to the producers for turning a pig’s ear into a silk purse.
what they should DO RIGHT NOW is set up a torrent link on their website and limit access to those who donate – similar to the Radiohead experiment with their album In Rainbows… even if the user does not want to pay anything, he or she still has to type in their credit card info and select $0 before downloading.
Torrents are getting so advanced where the user doesn’t even need to download a torrent client — http://torrentfreak.com/6-ways-to-download-torrents-with-your-web-browser/
having it set up so a person can quickly donate and download from one place would greatly increase their revenue or supposed lost revenue from this leak.. GOOD LUCK
Now imagine every downloader gives a $1 donation, this guys will be making a nice little profit (after paying his debts) for funding is new project,
Now imagine he uploaded it himself, he could have a nice page with a bit of advertising = more$$.
The results are, that finally indies (or what I use to be called film d’auteur), can finally be distributed at low cost, get viewed by millions, and compete with the multi million Hollywood soap crap, in a market that is fixed at the moment.
Fixed as Hollywood and its siblings get all the exposure, all the awards, all the theaters, to such an extend, that small production, like this one, can’t even been seen. Who is going to buy this dvd, if it is an unknown director, unknown title? Nobody. Through the traditional distribution, this dude, will probably have to wait 5 to 10y to recover his money if he ever does.
I hope this inspires others, so that we don’t need to be pirates anymore, to enjoy new work, with scenario that are not template of the film making big boss. And if Hollywood can’t come up with better ideas/plots, let them die of a natural death for making junk movies.
“..what BitTorrent has done in the last four days is prove, unequivocally, that Hollywood is wrong”
Not that this is news :P
It’s funny, the first thought I had was “I wonder what mystical powers of industry spin retarded mind and gayostyles will have in wait this time around.” and lo and behold, post number 1.
Following the usual adage of “Let’s ignore all facts that don’t fit our agenda and simply reiterate what we always spew ad nauseam in hopes that it will maybe impress somebody the gazillionth time around”.
Bleeeeeeeeeeeeerp. Wrong.
Pirating is what MADE this movie. Pretty hard to argue around that when the confirming sources are the people who literally ARE the movie.
Then again I wouldn’t put it past the pay-turds mindset to have the hubris to simply put themselves over these people as well and berate them on how they are furthering the evil pirate agenda by daring to speak something positive of it and how they, too, should be ashamed, jailed and industry-style lawsuit-raped ideally, just like all those other lowlives, yea!
Money makes the world go round, and for some, their sanity.
Also, looking over the replies:
What if RM died and all the anti-troll-trollers ended up actually carrying on his legacy via mimic, even though they initially wanted to fight the idiot-spawn that he is?
Oh shh…..
@17
Maybe that’s why the setup the donate feature on their site, AND mentioned that DVD/bluray sales have increased?
It’s quite apparent 99% of the commentators here are industry shills, just read the dribble, actually don’t, go to any other post and read their comments, as it’s the same regurgitated bs each and every time.
“Bit torrent rocks. Pirates who use it to infringe, suck”
First, it’s BITtorrent, no space. Second, how does one become a “pirate” that doesn’t infringe? Doesn’t the very term internet pirate rely on them downloading illegally?
Finally, you are still captain Douche, but you better be careful, Kanye West might sue you for infringement as he has been crowned king douche, but Reasoned Mind, you are still captain douche to me.
I’m still amazed to see you posting on almost every article, must be challenging with your head shoved up your own ass and all.
So the producers are happy with the exposure bittorrent provided them, and the industry douchebags come and say they are wrong?
Think I’ll take the opinion of the people who MADE the movie and are CASHING IN on it’s success over that of an industry douchebag that has such a shitty career they spend all day posting douchebaggish comments on rlslog.
Douche?
Now that audio&video products are being shared in their original(digital) form, those fatass corporate fucktards know their scam is over and they can’t people out of their money, so they’ve started to bark and bite as their last solution.
The fact is: the fraudulent procedure of:putting a digital material on a plastic disc adding a holder, opening up huge stores to sell them and then price-tag it 10 times higher than it’s actual worth is long time over and ppl won’t fall for that anymore.
So what the dumbasses must do is to close their huge offices stores distribution branches cut all the nonsense …etc.
instead open up online download stores and sell the movie, music with their actual worth which is 2-3 bucks for a movie album instead of 15-20 up dollars.
then ppl will stop illegal downloading and will be more than willing to pay for it.
now let’s see, in that case the “ink” makers with more that 400k downloads would’ve ended up with 800000-1000000 $ in just a coupla days.and everyone was happy.
Now that audio&video products are being shared in their original(digital) form, those fat ass corporate fvcktards know their scam is over and they can’t people out of their money, so they’ve started to bark and bite as their last solution.
The fact is: the fraudulent procedure of:putting a digital material on a plastic disc adding a holder, opening up huge stores to sell them and then price-tag it 10 times higher than it’s actual worth is long time over and ppl won’t fall for that anymore.
So what they must do is to close their huge offices stores distribution branches cut all the nonsense …etc.
instead open up online download stores and sell the movie, music with their actual worth which is 2-3 bucks for a movie album instead of 15-20 up dollars.
then ppl will stop illegal downloading and will be more than willing to pay for it.
now let’s see, in that case the “ink” makers with more that 400k downloads would’ve ended up with 800000-1000000 $ in just a coupla days.and everyone was happy.
Now that audio&video products are being shared in their original(digital) form, those fat ass corporate fvcktards know their scam is over and they can’t people out of their money, so they’ve started to bark and bite as their last solution.
The fact is: the fraudulent procedure of:putting a digital material on a plastic disc adding a holder, opening up huge stores to sell them and then price-tag it 10 times higher than it’s actual worth is long time over and ppl won’t fall for that anymore.
So what they must do is to close their huge offices stores distribution branches cut all the nonsense …etc.
instead open up online download stores and sell the movie, music with their actual worth which is 2-3 bucks for a movie album instead of 15-20 up dollars.
then ppl will stop illegal downloading and will be more than willing to pay for it.
now let’s see, in that case the “ink” makers with more that 400k downloads would’ve ended up with 800000-1000000 $ in just a coupla days.and everyone was happy.
@55 Reasoned Mind.
“I have no intention of doing any actual work to earn a living.”
Just like me!
However I am making pretty good money blogging for the recording industry.
Reasoned Mind/Capn if you don’t make enough I can tell you what company I am working for. They are hiring and with your background they might pick you.
Hihihihihihi! I have a lot of fun!
mmmmmm Kiowa also said
http://www.justpressplay.net/movies/movie-news/6156-filmmakers-thank-movie-piracy-for-popularity.html
If people don’t buy it, we can’t make any more Indie films if we can’t clear our debt. They gotta eat pay mortgage etc. Please don’t say use another Business Model cause that Sh!t dont cut it. They say that the donate will not cut it.
BALANCE people. Presumably if they say they cant make another fil, people will suddenly hate the film like they now hate Zombieland after one small twitter post FFS
This is great! Finally someone understands that piracy != teh ultimate evil! Now if only Rhett Reese from the Zombieland article would read this thing…
This also highlights something very, very disturbing. So these indie filmmakers couldn’t market their film well, because “Hollywood didn’t like it”. Are we supposed to let “them” (whoever you consider “them” to be) tell us what we can and cannot like or what we can and cannot watch? Kudos to these filmmakers for embracing Bittorrent and proving “them” wrong. :)
hope u don’t mind i copied the article to my home site ernesto (props to u btw)
seems the man finally gettin a rocket up his own rs
hope these guys will just release their next film on torrent officially first & see how it goes – it might just surprise people …
[TF - no, we don't mind. The site is published under a CC license (see bottom of the page) and as long as you comply with that, it's fine]
Another reason why torrents will always be around.
http://www.plentyoftorrents.com
Evolve with the rest of us hollywood. :P
@ 72 A nun
You comment is out of this world.
The entire phenomenon of my pitiful existence and its mimicry is but a microcosm of the file-sharing and / or illicit copying universe – imagine, if you will, an entire constellation of barren Reasoned Minds where intelligent life cannot possibly exist. Yes, they are all too painfully tangible and all too easily marketable to the mindless consumer – that alien who still acquires plastic discs in 2009. But alas! A great cosmic fart has torn through the universe like a shitstorm of cloned Reasoned Minds – compressed, lossy MP3s which could never hold a candle to Reasoned Flac? “Well who cares,” cries our plastic disc-hording alien – “Better to download a substandard copy before investing in another original which may not be worth my interstellar Credits! Besides, why should I continue to support Reasoned Cartels at unreasonable prices?” And so, our heroic alien begins to explore the P2P universe – from one Reasoned tracker to another, the galaxy of innumerable copies doesn’t Mind who you are or where you’re from. Just seed – which seems pretty Reasoned if you don’t Mind me saying…
I think Hollywood’s going to go after the indie market if it hasn’t already:
Lower-production budgets and higher quantity of production.
When you click the ‘donate’ buttons on future “indie” films, your could very well be donating to Hollywood and the rest of the industry.
downloading now… .. .
well that does it, they’ve earned a few dollars from me.
Let’s just hope that this isn’t just a clever marketing strategy.
@17 What about the $?
I downloaded this movie last week, enjoyed it immensely, and went to the film’s official site to have a look around. Spotted a donate button and made use of it. I already have the film, I didn’t have to fork out jack squat, but I did and others will too because for many hardcore pirates it’s not about getting all you can for free, it’s about supporting progressive artists and producers who deserve it. Hollywood studio slackers/execs do not fall into that category as they choose to make money by leeching off the hard work of talented, creative people. The MPAA just can’t accept the fact that distribution power is in the hands of the many and is no longer in the hands of the few and greedy.
It is possible to be rewarded monetarily in the brave new digital age, but new, progressive business models need to be employed. Their is an endless ocean of support for artists and producers out there just waiting to be tapped. What is NOT out there is any further patience with industry greedmeisters who have raped and pillaged both the creative community and the customers for so many years.
Turn away from the dark side and you will be rewarded. Support the MPAA and an industry that criminalizes your fans and you will be destroyed along with them by your own senselessness and greed.
Yarr!
Oops. There, not their. :P
I enjoyed the visual experience, lots of creative visions there. The story is not that complicated, however it may be overwhelming sometimes to try to fully understand every scene and dialog. Luckily I’ve learned to let go these moments when I’m watching a movie, so in the end I may have a chance to get the “full picture”. And that’s what happened to me.
Here’s an example of hollyweirds idea of innovation…
55 movie remakes currently in the works
http://www.denofgeek.com/movies/166239/55_movie_remakes_currently_in_the_works.html
Some good movies on the list, but as usual they will just screw them up!
Respect!
I’ll donate something right away!
A/V/M
10/10/10 => Very Nice movie, i downloaded from mininova….
hahahahhaha…….
Now, this idea help my friend to produce his movie.
he’s still studying at univ. in Sydney, Aussie.
Teachers mark the movie from many aspects, but if he can get thousands of fans from all around the globe mark from teachers is just a standard for shitty certificate..
Thanks for telling us about this good news…..
Youtube for short videos, now bittorent for movies……..
another example that i know is DJICEMOON, he shares almost all of his musics on bittorent and now he is so famous though some downloaders downloaded the musics only for collection…
:D
I donated 10 bucks. Not that much, I know, but that’s all I had in my paypal!
this all you can find on this new tracker :)
I found out about the movie by seeing it on PirateBay’s Top 100 list.
It downloaded in like 7 minutes.
My wife, daughter and I watched the film last night and thought it was amazing.
Yay for the film makers and yay for .torrent!
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