In the past i´ve already complained a lot about location based restrictions for viewing videos outside the US, unfortunately nothing has changed.

In my opinion the current situation more and more evolves into a loose-loose-loose situation between the audience, the filmmakers and the studios & film distributors, let me explain why.

The Problem for the Audience

The situation of the audience is pretty apparent: they want to watch a movie / tv show / web series and are not allowed to or have to wait for a translation.

The Problem for the Filmmakers

Filmmakers make movies / tv shows or web series with the intent that their creations will be watched. Of course filmmakers have to earn money, but apart from that they create to share.

Here is a very interesting quote from John August about his movie “The Nines”:

And that’s okay. Not “okay” in the sense of “legal” or “right.” But okay in the sense of c’est la vie. People are going to watch the pirated version, and there’s nothing I can do about it. Sony, Interpol and the MPAA will do their best, but as the guy who made the movie, I honestly want people to see the movie. If the only way you’re going to watch The Nines is illegally, so be it.

Since this quote might be interpreted out of context here is the full post: The Nines on Bittorrent.

The Problem for the Studios / Distributors

While studios and film distributors might think it´s a good thing to restrict access to certain markets (be it advertising wise or for other reasons) – it´s not.

When someone restricts access they have to be aware that there is no way to restrict to 100%, and those who want to watch will do so. Even those who would be willing to pay will find other ways to watch.

So what happens is that they loose money, money from people who would like to pay for their content but are not allowed to.

Oh, and while i´m at it: those super creative anti-piracy ads, you know who has to watch them? People who buy the DVD or Blu-Ray. Not the ones who pirate the movie.

That´s like if you buy a new car and every time before you start the engine you have to listen to an ad that tells you not to steal cars.

All right, so much for the loose-loose-loose situation.

Movies

While waiting for a translation pretty much makes sense (i can image that it costs quite some money to translate a movie to different languages and wait for an international start), it´s hard to explain why someone who wants to watch the movie in it´s original language has to wait.

It´s pretty obvious that a film distributor has to buy a movie to show it in cinemas in different countries, but what would be the problem to buy the original version when it starts in the US and when the translation is done buy the localized version for the particular country?

Would it be so unfair letting only those wait for the movie who want to watch the translated version?

I know that i´m not an expert in movie distribution, i´m just suggesting that the big players start to re-think the current business model. One simply can´t close his eyes to innovation and change, and at some point it will be too late and a re-thinking will be very expensive or almost impossible.

Just take a look how long it took (and still takes) for the music industry to handle legal downloadable music (which in my opinion still is too expensive). They just ignored the changing environment as long as they could and then freaked out because the consumer found other ways (don´t get me wrong – pirating is not the way to go, but probably the business could learn from it).

TV Shows

Believe me, it can be really frustrating to wait 1-3 years until a tv show gets picked up by a local tv station. With Hulu it is possible to watch the shows on demand, of course only within the US.

What about those who want to watch shows in their original language? Besides buying them on DVD there is not really a legal way to do so. And even if you wait for the translation – it very often sucks in comparison the the original.

Of course there are VPN services that give you US IPs so you can use Hulu, but why make it so complicated for the audience? Should you rather pay for IP masking than the content itself?

Web Series

And now ladies and gentleman – the most stupid geo-restriction ever: web series.

Just have a look at Sony´s video platform Crackle. They feature really nice web series like Angel of Death, Star-Ving and many others. Great service, BUT, as you might guess, only within the US.

So how difficult could it be to show location based advertising on such video platforms?
How easy would it be to spread content throughout the world?
It´s the internet, not a local tv station, the INTERnet. They still could translate the stuff and sell it, but please don´t restrict your content that way – it doesn´t make any sense.

If anybody could explain why geo-locking is a good thing or what the benefits are – please feel free to comment, it would be really interesting!

Tags: distribution, geo-lock, Movies, translation, tvshows, webseries