Nothing’s new, everything’s new!

As a part of the Moving Images blog relay, I'm picking up from Björn Jeffery at Bonnier R&D that wrote about Realtime and journalism. I'm also handing over to Andie Nordgren who will write about the gaming industry and the realtime society.

This post is about the movie business and how concepts like ”on demand” and ”realtime” affects it, now and in the future.

But to see where we’re going its good to know where we’ve been, so lets start with a short history lesson:

We’ve been enjoying movies for over 100 years. The first years without sound though. And no color. Rather dull you might think, but in 1910, people were amazed. Fast forward through surround sound, IMAX and computer generated images to 2009 when we got the 3D experience en masse.

New technology has throughout the history paved way for new trends in film making and helped film makers tell richer and more amazing stories than before possible. On the distribution and production side we’ve seen ”formats” like celluloid film, video, TV, DVD and Bluray. And we’ve seen technology come and go (VHS anyone?). The coming years, Internet distribution and online viewing could potentially kill all these formats. This doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing,  since history shows us that new technology opens up for new possibilities. Remembering this, video on demand should be good thing for film makers and distributors but the movie industry as a whole has been slow at adopting this ”new” medium.

Technology push people’s expectations. Nowadays people don’t want to go to the cinema and pay to see a silent film but are willing to pay extra for (new) things like 3D that add to the movie experience. Internet and long term usage of e.g. file sharing push people’s expectations for faster releases and faster, more convenient consumption. The demand from hardcore fans of a TV-series is to be able to watch the latest episode online the minute after it’s been aired on TV. This new era is consumer driven and the media industry is trying hard to keep up.

Realtime is in many ways about distribution and accessibility. Realtime is when content is truly available on demand and in all forms and formats – to your device of choice. The economy around ”Realtime” for content providers is still uncertain but now is the time for trials. People are willing to pay for convenience and new values (e.g. 3D) and accessibility, or ”freedom of choice”, are often key factors why people use e.g. The Pirate Bay instead of other services offering the same content in perhaps another (more limited) form.

Big movie studios are still learning the basics of on demand and gearing up for the big shift when everything will be available online. Smaller producers and companies have been online for years trying new business models, marketing methods and promotions with what you could describe as a ”You learn a lot by doing a lot”-philosophy. Some ideas that seem crazy might actually be valuable and money-making why it’s important to be open minded and dare to try.

Obviously it’s a luxury some don’t have, but big companies should embrace ”on demand” and ”realtime” as much as they can.