Producer Thanks Pirates For Stealing His Film
Written by Ernesto on November 13, 2007Eric Wilkinson, the producer of the independent film “The Man from Earth”, wrote an email to RLSlog in which he thanks them for the free promotion they gave him. “In the future, I will not complain about file sharing” he wrote, “when I make my next picture, I just may upload the movie on the net myself!”
All the attention for his film was boosted by a positive review on RLSlog, a weblog that reviews some of the new releases on BitTorrent. It turns out that a lot of people who downloaded the movie off BitTorrent liked the movie, as they started to write positive reviews on Amazon, IMDB and other websites.
Wilkinson was pleasantly surprised by all the attention. He explained in his email to RLSlog that the people who illegally downloaded his film actually helped to promote it.
He writes: “Our independent movie had next to no advertising budget and very little going for it until somebody ripped one of the DVD screeners and put the movie online for all to download. Most of the feedback from everyone who has downloaded “The Man From Earth” has been overwhelmingly positive. People like our movie and are talking about it, all thanks to piracy on the net!”
To illustrate this, on IMDB the film received close to 700 votes with an average rating of 8.2 which makes it one of the most popular movies of the last 2 weeks.
Wilkinson continues to praise the pirates and adds: “What you guys have done here is nothing short of amazing. In the future, I will not complain about file sharing. YOU HAVE HELPED PUT THIS LITTLE MOVIE ON THE MAP!!!! When I make my next picture, I just may upload the movie on the net myself!”
This example once again illustrates what a powerful promotion tool filesharing networks are, especially for independent productions with a small budget.
Previously: Mininova Enters List of 50 Most Popular Sites on the Internet
Next: Leading BitTorrent Admins Discuss The Future of BitTorrent
84 Responses (Add yours or TrackBack)
Soon our website is going to be more popular then tomshardware.com ! check the alexa !
More people need to pirate Skulltag. They don’t have an advertising budget either!
http://www.skulltag.com
Join the club :-)
Finally someone realizes :_)
This is what filesharing is for. Sharing amongst your peers something they might not have been exposed to otherwise. No way would I buy this movie or see it in the theater, but chances are I might download it, and find out how good it is.
We need more sane people like that who actually want their work to be seen or heard instead of fat hypocrite fucks like Peter Jackson who only care about their bank balance and cry about *perceived* lost revenue while getting payed obscene amounts of money.
Yey! Great story.
Luckily I received my cc today, so I guess I will have to spend some $$ in support for this film.
Ah, finnaly someone is greatfull for our bandwich use!
This just proves the point that the Indie industry enjoys the extra exposure. File sharing is the best thing that happened to culture in the last decades. It’s the big companies who are losing money, and it’s no because of the act of sharing, it’s because people discover more high quality culture and don’t find a reason to put up with the crap Hollywood creates.
——-
edit: no spam sigs
Yay, all Americans aren’t hungry for Gee Pee(Yes, gp. lol)
This is great news, congratulations Mr. Eric Wilkinson, especially for one major reason:
I downloaded this movie a few days ago and enjoyed it very much. Great work on the movie :)
check his page out!
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=146843614&blogID=328230543
hahaha awesome! :D he has posted a paypal aswell as many thanks, Richard Schenkman the Director also commented on Rlslog.
Given his Myspace page, its fairly safe to say the paypal is legit and they are who they say they are ;)
It is always happy to hear news like this. It helps more and more “normal” (people without a publisher etc.) people to understand what a great tool piracy is. Let’s hope to hear some more great news like this in the future.
IF YOU “DOWNLOADED” “THE MAN FROM EARTH”, PLEASE READ THIS!
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=146843614&blogID=328096444
Makes me laugh, how someone can be so greatful, yet you have these fucking producers+music artists who cry like we’re hurting them oh so much.
Morons
thats the spirit mr wilkinson!!!
Come on! A site like TF can’t make the simple distinction between physical objects and “immaterial property”.
The word “theft” only applies to the former. You’re starting to use the oppositions language! That’s the first step of brainwashing, ffs!
Even copyright law acknowledges this distinction. If you’re going to fight this fight, at least use the correct wording.
@#14 I like this idea, I’ll look into this filem, if i like it, i might also just pay what is approx. a rental fee.
If it wasn’t for P2P and the community, I wouldn’t have heard of this film, so all those anti-p2p people take note.
That’s great. My son is an excellent song writer, and I was thinking of uploading one of his originals to torrent sites just for exposure.
Great stuff. I never would have heard of this movie were it not for this. I’m grabbing it now, and if I like it I will tell everyone I know about it… and most of those people don’t know the difference between BitTorrent and a 14.4 modem, so they will be going to Blockbuster or renting it on Netflix. :)
Well done Eric D. Wilkinson! Someone who is embracing the internet and p2p and not trying to fight it. I may watch his film now. After all, I’ve allready downloaded it!
I just added it to my netflix after reading this.
it’s share, not steal, although i see your point.. or whatever, ppl can call it wtf they want; it doesn’t make it any less right
maybe i’ll download it after reading this hehe.. and buy the dvd if it’s any good, the way it should be
What Zaerc said.
P.S. Love your tracker, dude… ;D
I’ve read several positive reviews of the film now. Think I will download it and check it out.
woah man thats a shock now i want to thank him he has class i may buy the movie just to thank him for his wonderfull response
He really ought to complain anyway… to get the free press from the controversy.
@26
He wouldn’t get any press at all if he actually complained like the rest of the producers. That is, if he didn’t complain after he praised the piracy. That would just make him look crazy.
I notice that the producer himself did not you the word steal. Perhaps he has enough of a clue to realize that stealing is something else. More so than the person who wrote the headline on this story.
after his response and me enjoying the movie will buy the dvd as low budget as it was it was awesome
we want to support this guy
cant wait for his next movie
And how much money is the poor schmuk made so far?
Awesome bit of news!
Although great news, it’s still not stealing.
If i downloaded it, and he didn’t know about it. Is he missing anything?
It’s not stealing. If i break into someones house and copy thier entire music collection and i don’t tell them. They don’t know anything better, that’s not stealing unless i take something.
It would be great, if more pirates can help the author monetize.
i have to see his movie then :>
I will BUY this film today.
saw the movie. didnt know what it was about downloaded it anyway. it was a great movie!
I just finished watching ‘The Man from Earth’ and I must say, it is a very refreshing movie.
It has earned a place in my DVD collection. As soon as I see it for sale, I will buy this movie. I am also making a paypal donation.
Best movie I’ve seen in a long time! Thank you for such an excellent film!
Nice to see the indie’s breaking though the monopolies! Glad to be of assistance! I’ll be sure to write up a review on my journal and donate what I can if it turns out as good as the trailers. :)
My question to all who have seen it: is it worth going to the cinema for?
this guy has the right attitude! POWER TO THIS MAN! MAN!
example of a real thing I did, I downloaded the movie “300″ saw it was ubber cool, and went to the theatre to watch it again=money for the makers and positive reviews on any site
ANOTHER SATISFIED CLIENT! I realyl think the only chance for an ind. movie to make any kind of buzz is to use the p2p as an ace card…
Awesome! Nice to hear story’s like this. h33t = RIAA.
I watched it via BT and I’ve gotta say, that movie was amazing. I actually went online and bought 3 copies, because I know of some friends who this movie is perfect for. Had it not been for BT, I’d never have found this movie.
Looks like a good movie. Should be a good watch.
YES! That’s what file sharing is for, sharing with the community and friends. Not Stealing!
If I see a movie I download that I like, I’ll recommend my friends to go watch it in the cinema or I’ll go watch it again in the cinema, and when the DVD is out, I’ll go buy the DVD to keep in my collection. I’ll also give it a good review on the internet.
For those who download and don’t go buy the DVD, we’ll have to forgive them because not everyone can afford everything they want!
For those who download and convert to DVDs to sell, to make a profit! Those real pirates out there… then that is STEALING! And sometimes the profit from pirating DVDs goes to organised crime such as terrorism, human trafficking, and planning larger scams!
Do not buy pirated DVDs, you indirectly sponsor organised crime!
The law should put a blind eye on downloads as it really indirectly push the market. But should hit hard on those who make a profit out of it.
Pirated DVDs = Guilty! Stealing!
BT Downloads = Not Guilty! Forgive!
I would have most likely never heard of this flick if not for the torrent, and most likely wouldn’t be going to see it (like I will now) if it comes to my local cinema. Over the next few years you will see more and more artists realize they don’t need Hollywood middle-men to move their product, all they need are fans and the limitless distribution potential of the internet.
Old media is dead.
Hello everyone. GLAD YOU LOVED THE MOVIE! (or at least liked it). Thanks so much for your support. It will not be forgotten.
Please post more comments on IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0756683/board/threads/
Thanks.
Eric D. Wilkinson
I really liked this movie, and inspired me to buy the book :)
This movie played with my brain. :)
I just sent the guy a little money and I haven’t even downloaded or seen the film. Just the idea of someone being supportive was worth a few bucks. Bravo!
This movie was amazing! There is not a better word for it then amazing! I would buy this movie over and over. Great storyline and great acting! Great Job!!
awesome Film. A must watch . Goobimama recommends.
http://goobimama.blogspot.com
Indeed, as an indie writer (the big publishers want nothing to do with me because I’m a relative unknown and refuse to pay a literary agent) I’ve found letting people get the ebook version of my novels for free is good advertising before the print version is ready for sale. A fellow I managed to convince to do the same has made more sales than he thought possible of both print and ebook releases by putting out a free copy of his book for distribution. Indeed more sales than a similar book made going through the convention channels which had an advertising budget.
I can’t lie I watch it free too
check out my site http://allysource.com/
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c4t
We, the filmmakers behind “Jerome Bixby’s The Man From Earth” understand that this is a film many sci-fi fans just couldn’t wait until 11/13/07 to see. And we especially understand that if you live outside the United States, you’ve had absolutely no way of knowing when this film might be coming to your local cinema, video store, or TV… if ever! Indeed, all international rights to the movie are still available.
And as a result you may have downloaded the film from one of the many torrent (or other) sites available. Chances are, you paid nothing to do so. But please understand that we are just some independent filmmakers who put everything we had into our little movie, and you really hurt us directly when you downloaded the movie illegally.
Judging from the postings at IMDB.com, we see that the vast majority of you quite like the film; many of you even love the film and have watched it repeatedly.
We made this movie with a great deal of love, sacrifice and effort on a low budget. But as low as the budget was, it was still a LOT of money to us, as well as to the people who trusted us with their investment to go ahead and make such an unusual, even controversial film.
So we are making an unusual request… asking you to return the love, if you will:
Please visit http://www.manfromearth.com, and make some sort of donation in exchange for the enjoyment our movie brought you. It could be fifty cents, it could be fifty dollars. Perhaps you feel the average weekly video store rental is a fair amount. Whatever it is, it might be small to you, but if every single person who downloaded the movie — heck, if only the people who LIKED the movie — donated a few dollars, would certainly help get us to breakeven. Just go to http://www.manfromearth.com and click on “donate” (you don’t even need to have an account). The address to use is ewilkinson100@comcast.net.
The money you donate will go DIRECTLY towards everone who worked on and invested in our dream. And who knows… if we ever do break even on “Jerome Bixby’s The Man From Earth”, maybe we can go make another intelligent, thought-provoking film.
Thank you very, very much for your consideration.
Sincerely,
Eric D. Wilkinson - Producer
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The movies that loses $ from filesharing are often expencive ones that does bad in the box office because they’re not good.
This movie takes place in a house, and manages to capture your interest throughout it’s span, something I cannot say about many expencive movies.
Now, as the producers showes me some love for watching it, I will surely try and pay for it if I can find it on DVD here in sweden.
chewed racket,tinkles nearing.pitched screamer substantiations?… Thanks!!!
A hardcore torrenter, this film is wicked. And as they have the facility to accept a donation of any size, i was more than happy to donate $5. Now if only every film was like this..
Downloaded this movie while looking for something else.
Liked it so much that I went out and bought it, so the free advertising of piracy can make them money—-if I like the movie enough I will buy it! I want a sequel—where did he go? Did he ever get in touch with any of his colleages?——-Need to Know!
Yeah its not stealing by no means. Stealing means it will be unavailable for others, making a copy still keeps it available for the original purpose.
I saw some advertisings comparing someone robbing a movie tape from a store to illegally downloading the movie… its really stupid…
Try making a commercial where you can go into the video store without surveillance, take your own blank DVD, use a computer there to make a copy for yourself while leaving the original available for others.
Thats more like it. Stealing a tape is by no means comparable to sharing a movie.
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