Despite the industry recent celebration over Swedish peer to peer site Pirate Bay being found guilty of infringing copyright laws they still see piracy as a huge threat. Unlike the music industry the movie industry's movement to conquer the threat has been faster than the several years it took them. When Napster was the first big file sharing site and was successfully shut down there was no evidence of how to provide consumers with a similar paid service and by the time they created itunes and all the other services now in existence it was too late. Everybody was too well versed on how not to pay for products at this point.
Netflix has gone a long way in servicing consumers who derive their content from online as opposed to through a physical product. Movies have the one advantage that they take much longer to download and with how we allow our computers to fall into disarray as we cram them full of photos and music there sometimes simply isn't the space to add movie files.
The number of movie files accessed online is around the 500 million mark, and that is just in one month. However, the industry needs to consider the types of people who are accessing these files. While the industry looks at this as 500 million physical sales which could have been made, they need to consider those who never intend to purchase any dvd's anyway and if this service were not available would still not be paying for a product.
In a recent panel Richard Linklater referenced a screening abroad of A Scanner Darkly which occured a few years ago. When he questioned the audience on who had already seen the movie prior to its release there almost all of the audience raised their hands. Even though they had all accessed an illegal version of the film, it seeded the desire to experience it on the big screen in the way it was originally intended.
Additionally the recent case of the leaked copy of Wolverine is an interesting one to consider. The industry is still fuming over the extra millions they could have made were it not for those pesky pirates. Considering the leaked copy lacked several special effects yet to be added in post production those viewing it were not able to gain the full experience. Those simply wishing to see the movie without paying will have surely waited for a complete version to be leaked online, which it inevitable will and probably already has. It becomes explicably clear that those consuming this by product were simply eager fans of the franchise unable to contain their anticipation for the next installment who are probably the people taking up the seats at the midnight release screenings.
The dvd industry will never suffer the same way the music industry has until internet connections and computer memory becomes infinate as those not particularly tech savy are still unsure of the world. While there are people costing the industry through these means it may actually be helping with dvd sales in a roundabout way in some cases. The movie industry looks set to stay strong during the current recession despite all of this as we all seek our escape from everything going on around us. What better way to escape than into an entirely different world?
