Do what I do...

[Chamber005]

Then perhaps you should listen to someone who actually makes his living producing and selling DVDs of pictures that move. Do you think I'm saying these things simply to be contrary?

Well, kinda yeah. lol

I mean, you haven't actually done what I said, right? You're basing it off of some other figure?

We can use this thread to work on your situation specifically if you'd like. Maybe by us discussing your personal experience we can garner some additional views to whatever it is your selling and maybe I can gear my strategies to assist you in your specific enterprise.

The reason that free advice on free ways to advertise are nice and friendly and (should be) graciously accepted is because there's no real risk. Even though it gives me a thrill to make money where there is none, it's not enough for me to risk my own money. So I (all of us) can help figure out why you're not selling more DVDs (and maybe some of us will be willing to give a shout out to your feature on our social networking sites), but if you needed more aggressive assistance -- I don't work for free, but I always work on commission.

But how about we use your particular situation as a platform?

How many people have been active on this thread so far? Like 10? 15? How about everyone on this thread give their social networking count (let's do Facebook just to keep it simple), all of us tomorrow can do the 1, 2, 3 intervals of promoting your film -- see if you get any sales!

Zip BANG! Lookit that! And, I mean, you're a mod here, it's not like you're joe blow cactus. We love DVXuser, you kind of work for them, I don't think anyone here would object to promoting whatever it is you're selling.

And hey! I'll totally check out some other threads here and tell them what we're doing and see if I can get other people on board. Like, strictly as an experiment.

Whaddya think?

 

[Erik Olson]

My grandfather coined the phrase "tell them to go shi* in their hat" when he was at Warner Bros. He and Jack and Lawrence had a lot of good ones like that. They were the Greatest Generation for more than one (or was it II?) reason.

I wasn't pointing fingers at your idea - to the contrary, I've twice said it could be fantastic.

...like, no joke, I had people here PMing me that I should just not talk about it anymore because people are just short-sighted and naive and oh by the way would I please invest in their film?

It might still come up before this thread is done, but I literally offered my marketing services FOR FREE (no commission backend, nothing) to three separate filmmakers here and every single one of them turned me down...

That's interesting, because I remember some past threads where we discussed a DVXUser feature and there is a big desire to do something. But everyone, being individuals and strangers and artists, has their own ideas. If you deal in absolutes, this might be a bad place to float ideas that others are going to interpret.

I don't think you want a discussion though and you're coming across as adversarial. Are you not hearing that throughout the thread?

Anyway, my job isn't to lash you over your manners in a public forum. You're doing a good job of that yourself.

 

[ChipG]

Chamber, I have to run out for dinner now but I'm going to PM you, I'd like you to look at marketing something for me (for a percentage), if your good at what you do and make it a big success I'll put you in direct contact with some major movie distributors that will give you a real budget providing your business model works and you can do what you say.

 

[David Jimerson]

Well, kinda yeah. lol

I mean, you haven't actually done what I said, right? You're basing it off of some other figure?

We can use this thread to work on your situation specifically if you'd like. Maybe by us discussing your personal experience we can garner some additional views to whatever it is your selling and maybe I can gear my strategies to assist you in your specific enterprise.

The reason that free advice on free ways to advertise are nice and friendly and (should be) graciously accepted is because there's no real risk. Even though it gives me a thrill to make money where there is none, it's not enough for me to risk my own money. So I (all of us) can help figure out why you're not selling more DVDs (and maybe some of us will be willing to give a shout out to your feature on our social networking sites), but if you needed more aggressive assistance -- I don't work for free, but I always work on commission.

But how about we use your particular situation as a platform?

How many people have been active on this thread so far? Like 10? 15? How about everyone on this thread give their social networking count (let's do Facebook just to keep it simple), all of us tomorrow can do the 1, 2, 3 intervals of promoting your film -- see if you get any sales!

Zip BANG! Lookit that! And, I mean, you're a mod here, it's not like you're joe blow cactus. We love DVXuser, you kind of work for them, I don't think anyone here would object to promoting whatever it is you're selling.

And hey! I'll totally check out some other threads here and tell them what we're doing and see if I can get other people on board. Like, strictly as an experiment.

Whaddya think?

I wasn't objecting to the idea entirely. You'll certainly sell some DVDs. I was objecting to your predictions of how it would perform. You're overestimating it by orders of magnitude.

I even offered suggestions of what you could do to help make it work, the approach you'd have to take to maximize the possibility of success. Heck, I even suggested a test product, too.

But you won't hear anything critical, so it doesn't suprise me that you assume if someone's not with you 100%, they must be 100% against you -- and that they're "flaming" you, "loathing" you, etc.

 

[Chamber005]

Chamber, I have to run out for dinner now but I'm going to PM you, I'd like you to look at marketing something for me (for a percentage), if your good at what you do and make it a big success I'll put you in direct contact with some major movie distributors that will give you a real budget providing your business model works and you can do what you say.

Ha!

Look at that, a job! And who says the economy is in bad shape?

But yeah, I look forward to it. As always, can't promise anything, but I think I'm pretty good at what I do.

And I still think at the very least the entire DVX community should all come together and once per month spotlight a single artist or something.

So like, "It's Zak Foresman day everyone! Make sure you get out there and tell everyone to check out Zak's latest feature!" Man, that would be a WAY better prize than half the stuff they give away at these contests.



If nothing else resonates on this thread, take with you the most important premise that applies to anything anywhere in sales -- YOU cannot sell YOU. *I* can sell YOU and YOU can sell ME, but selling OURSELVES is a losing battle.

That's my position anyway. That's the reason why in banking I hire people to go prospect for me and then bring those clients in -- not because I can't prospect, but because prospecting my own clients has a much lower ROI (and, dude, that's if I pay myself 15 bucks per hour and I'm paying 30 bucks per hour to the person prospecting!!). Because I can CONTINUE to sell me, but selling myself is just bizarre and uncomfortable and who the heck wants to help YOU, whoever you might be? But if someone is marketing FOR you -- well now all of a sudden people want what you're selling. "It must be worth buying 'cause look, someone besides the guy who makes it is selling the darned thing! Yeah, I'll take two."

 

[Doc Bernard]

Chamber,

Send me projections/5YP of what you are planning. I am interested, but as some people have said, there are some areas of concern. And for safety, attach an NDA. I am interested.

Co-op's can be wildly successful, or abject failures. And everything in between.

But I do like the idea.

And to lighten the mood a bit, in my own way:

YOU cannot sell YOU

As a male gigilo, I sell myself all the time. And make good money doing it. The ladies love a bit of "Doc" every few weeks, as that is all they can handle.

 

[Chamber005]

Chamber,

Send me projections/5YP of what you are planning. I am interested, but as some people have said, there are some areas of concern. And for safety, attach an NDA. I am interested.

Co-op's can be wildly successful, or abject failures. And everything in between.

But I do like the idea.

And to lighten the mood a bit, in my own way:
As a male gigilo, I sell myself all the time. And make good money doing it. The ladies love a bit of "Doc" every few weeks, as that is all they can handle.

lol

*I* am not projecting anything. This was all theoretical stuff. I tired to be clear on that in an earlier post. I have never in my LIFE sold a movie. I am saying that I feel these are good ideas that could be implemented based on my own personal business experiences, but I'm not making a busines proposal here, I'm offering advice. Chip said specifically that he's going to message me about something so I'll take a look at that and see if there's anything I can do, but I'm just trying to offer up ideas and get things shaking a little bit for people who might not know how to shake it.



Also I found on a different marketing-esque thread here some cool links that move a little beyond the typical banner-ad stuff. There's a guy over in the business section who is dead set on making money doing video ads (or, ads on his videos?). We did the math and there's something to it, but for my money it seems really, really, really aweful.

But these kinds of things might be nice ways of getting your "previews" to mass audiences as the theatres cost what they cost and forget about television.

I wonder if they would allow a "clickable" video...or if they actually have a click-thru aspect. THAT would be awesome!


TubeMogul: Average Video Ad CPM Is $12.39

Online Video Advertising CPM Rates – Currently a Bargain for Advertisers

TV CPM: $25. Online Video CPM: $70 (video)

What Are The Going CPM Rates For Online Video Advertising?

Next New Networks to Turn Profit This Year, CEO

 

[Doc Bernard]

Okay, as a business person myself, I see the power in working together, which is why I am interested in this.

But as a business person, I want to see tangible plans/projections/goals. If I was to involve myself and my contacts in this I would want to speak from a knowledgeable position. Right now it is just discussion, links to other people's stuff, and bantering. If you want me and others to take this under serious consideration, you need to have certain things in place.

Namely, a plan. I do not just jump into a co-op just based on discussion alone. My name is golden to me, and anything I involve myself and my company in must be pointed in the direction of not sullying that. So, I am careful, as any business person should be.

If you want me to seriously look at this as a viable business op, I need to see real work behind this, not just discussion and bouncing it around. If you are serious, provide me the requested info. Yes, if you don't have it, it will be work on your part. But the reward is people will take your idea more seriously.

 

[Chamber005]

Okay, as a business person myself, I see the power in working together, which is why I am interested in this.

But as a business person, I want to see tangible plans/projections/goals. If I was to involve myself and my contacts in this I would want to speak from a knowledgeable position. Right now it is just discussion, links to other people's stuff, and bantering. If you want me and others to take this under serious consideration, you need to have certain things in place.

Namely, a plan. I do not just jump into a co-op just based on discussion alone. My name is golden to me, and anything I involve myself and my company in must be pointed in the direction of not sullying that. So, I am careful, as any business person should be.

If you want me to seriously look at this as a viable business op, I need to see real work behind this, not just discussion and bouncing it around. If you are serious, provide me the requested info. Yes, if you don't have it, it will be work on your part. But the reward is people will take your idea more seriously.

In regards to this and your PM, to be completely and totally honest, I think the most I would want to do in the arena of film marketing would be to provide people with a store on one of my sites to sell their stuff. I would then take it upon myself to promote the DVDs for sale there and would get a percentage of the profits. I mean, cut and dry, clean and easy, that's about all I think I could do. That could be SUBSTANTIAL for the average filmmaker who has zero marketing dollars and no marketing plans, but, yeah, that's probably the extent. And in the end there's no confusion about "Where did the profits ACTUALLY come from?" ya know? That's easy to quantify geographically, but online it gets a little tougher.

If anyone here would like me to put together a storefront and promote their DVDs, say so in this thread. Maybe I'll put something together. I'd probably use the model I was mentioning here (e.g. "today is your marketing day! Make sure to go out and tell everyone to go out and message all their friends!") just to really push that word of mouth, and, honestly, I don't think I would be able to spend more than 50-100 dollars per day on such an odd venture (so like 3K per month MAX).

But yeah, I'm willing to do it. I have a site that's just hanging out right now. If I can find 10 people here who want me to sell their DVDs on my site (and assuming the thing at least looks like some effort went into producing it), promote them online, etc. I'd be willing to do that.

That and, I guess, whatever Chip might PM me about. LOL

This thread has for me, personally, gone to a very strange but, I think, very happy place! Neat.

 

[Doc Bernard]

Okay, now I am seeing some stuff.

And now I will play Devil's Advocate, as this is stuff that normally seen in the Business Plan.

1. Why should I choose you to promote my movie?

2. What benefits, other than just being "another promotion site", will attract me to you as a film-maker?

3. How will you promote my movie?

4. So I give my film to you for promotion, how will you generate buzz?

5. How will you attract real volume to the site, rather than just having a site and an online store?

Like I said, you need to find a way to make this attractive to people if you really want to make this viable. Otherwise, it's just another site hawking your DVD. These are the kinds of questions I would ask you in person as well, if we ever had a meeting about this. You need to understand, many of the people here look at what they do as a business, not just a hobby. That being said, if you want to attract them, you need to look at what you are proposing as a business as well.

 

[ChipG]

Who gives a shi* if he's paid on a percentage of the sales (nothing different from affiliate marketing) it's not like your handing him millions of dollars.

Talk is cheap, I mean CHEAP. Results talk though.

I'm curious to know why anyone would want to distribute something that is crap, is it because it's a movie? Well, you can find crap indie movies that will bankrupt you at every turn all over the place, some 10k+ of them. There is a reason why no distributor will pick them up, CRAP! 99.999% of indies think what they made is good and it's the furthest thing from it.

A guy I know who has a personality disorder - narcissist (self inflicted overflated ego) wrote, directed, produced an indie film, it was the worst thing I have ever seen, to him it is the best thing ever made and he thinks it's Oscar worthy, can I put you in touch with him? Just kidding, I wouldn't do that to you but the same goes for marketing.

Do you have a resume? I think SAD MAX asked you twice now?

 

[Doc Bernard]

Who, Me?????

 

[ChipG]

Sorry, the first sentence was directed at you, the rest him.

 

[Doc Bernard]

Sorry, the first sentence was directed at you, the rest him.

I understand the percentage thing. That's not a big deal for me. I was just trying to see where and how he plans on standing above the rest of the people doing what he wants to do.

I mean, right now, it's not really an original idea. So, how can he make it one that would attract people not affiliated with DVX. I am trying to help him see it from a business POV.

That was my point.

 

[Chamber005]

Okay, so up brainstorming last night on the phone with my best promotions guy and I think this is doable.

Let me try to field some questions --

1) The beginning of this thread has nothing to do with what I'm addressing at this point. The purpose of the thread was to give some free marketing advice to people (take it or leave it, it's free), but after people PMing me and others showing some interest in me actually selling their stuff, I'm going to go ahead and turn an idle site I have into a platform for indie films that have yet to be distributed. I'd originally set it up more than a year ago as a place to do online reviews for comics just for fun and then just stuck a couple pictures of the film I'm working on up there for the sake of having something there. But, ironically, I think the name will do this project justice: www.thegreatindependent.com

2) None of this can be launched until I start an LLC for it, which won't take long but will be an aspect.

3) Talking to my best promotions guy, the model would be anywhere from 4-8 films to start. In addition I have some musicians and small local businesses that I can spotlight once per month on the site. I don't do anything in my marketing without simultaneously supporting local Chicago small businesses. It's a part of my business make-up even in banking, so it kind of goes without saying. And it REPRESENTS which is an aspect of my overall branding. I'm Chicago, everything I do is Chicago, this site is built and maintained in Chicago. The Chicago way or the highway.

4) Once the LLC is up and running and the movies have been selected, I'd then work out the appropriate percentages based on the movie's marketing scheme, genre, whether or not the disk has already been printed or if it needs to come to our company via CreateSpace.

5) This will be in a strictly PROMOTIONAL capacity. There's no co-opting. Whatever movies the company chooses, we will get a percentage of the sales generated.

6) There will not be any forecasting as this is the beta stage. But, essentially, in addition to local Chicago marketing, we'd probably run 1 million impressions + 50,000 network recommendations per month (a separate network that my guy has in place for whatever is I am marketing -- he doesn't market those 50K for anyone else). So, if you have a movie on the site, once per month you'd have a massive online ad blast. I'd inform the producer of what day that blast was going to happen so that they could utilize their own network and resources to also get the word out that same day. If I can provide, say 600K unique impressions on FB at a .30% click thru (e.g. they actually watch your preview) and a 50K recommendation at a 20% view ratio, at least that GETS US 1800 + 10,000 = 11,800 views and, even at a 1% pull-thru (which, if the movie is good and the preview shows it, I think, could be on the low end), that's 118 copies sold that day, not to mention any residule effects of branding, site recognition, etc. which would, hopefully lead to more sales and/or more marketing dollars per unit which, again, leads to more sales.

So, what, 118 X 19.99 (shipping costs to the purchaser), minus 3 dollar print costs = approx 2K, depending on the marketing, you get, what $1,000.00 in profit sales that day?

Costs on my end would vary dramatically, I think based on whether or not the movie needs a video ad spot (like, say, a drama or comedy) or if it can be pretty much sold on the cover art alone (like an action flick or horror movie).

Personally there's nothing hugely profitable for me in this at this stage, but I love marketing and I love building things and, honestly, this would be, comparatively, almost no effort for me to accomplish. This would replace an hour of playing Call of Duty a couple times per week, basically.

The most important thing to me is that I wouldn't want to interfere with distribution. Otherwise it defeats the purpose of what a site like this would exist for. So my gut feeling is that the movie should have already tried and tried and failed to obtain distribution, because if you just finished your film and you self distribute (which this would be very similar to putting your DVD on CreateSpace) it could hinder your chances of getting distributed by a larger corporation.

I think this will be a niche site really aimed at truly independent features (and possibly short film collections). Obviously as the site grows we can get more and more into the whole PR side, but I think the model would look something like what I've bulleted here.

As with everything I do in marketing, though, there are absolutely no garauntees. But if I spend 200 bucks promoting your movie and not a single person buys it, I eat those costs. And, more than likely, I'd stay away from any kind of tier based system of percentages to keep everything simple, clean and easy.

One thing my promotions guy brought up is that in addition to having our sold-by films that we collect on the independent circuit, we could also solicit some larger films that have not been distributed and ask if we can post a link to purchase their DVD on our site. So, say Ink and The Guild allowed us to link their purchase pages (as I don't think they would allow any kind of profit sharing, just guessing), that may add some additional credibility to the site. And although it wouldn't make any profits off of those videos, it would add some level of brand recognition to the DVDs that we're selling.

BUT that's all in theory. I've spoken to the producers of The Guild before about advertising and they're pretty cool people. Maybe I could work something out posting links to their comics and series. And also, the people over at Ink seem pretty level headed. If I tell them what the purpose of the site is and who it's servicing, they might not mind getting behind it, especially since it could lead to additional revenue for them.

I don't know that I'll be actually getting all of the films from DVXuser folks. Obviously the films I deem to be the highest quality will make the cut. But in the end, any amount of marketing time and money is PRECIOUS to me. So whatever the film is, it has to also be PRECIOUS to me. I'm going to try and really diversify genre, though, so no one will be out of the running. In the end, at the very least the 50K recommendations will be to the same audience every month, 4-8 times per month. So if all we have to offer are Zombie flicks, a large portion of that market is going to go to waste. So I'll try and treat the films not unlike stocks so that the site as a whole can appeal to a wider audience.

So this is super fun, right? New business! The profit margins all seem to make sense, though, and my promotion guy loved the idea of something that didn't require him to get off his ass. lol

The big question mark is going to be delivery of product. I'd prefer the product to come directly to me to be sent out because, in the end, I'm going to be responsible for distribution, but if we do that we're doubling the shipping costs (either the producer shipping from Amazon to me or the producer shipping from their home to me). SO a three dollar shipping charge goes to a six dollar shipping charge.

Maybe I'd just split the difference. If someone has printed copies of their film, I'll let them send it out and just provide me with tracking data which I can then forward onto the client. If they are only available on CreateSpace, maybe I can front the cost of purchasing a 50 count so that at least the shipping is handled in bulk. I think CreateSpace charges the filmmaker around three dollars, right? Maybe four. At 4 X 50 X, say, 3 of the films listed for sale that's only 600 bucks for (on my end) $1500.00 worth of product, so 600 from 1500 minus marketing costs to sell 150 DVDs...See? Not so profitable! lol

But I still think it's worth it. Because even if I'm only making 2K per month in profits, that's still a huge profit for little to no actionable effort, and it's creating a brand within a niche community, which is always awesome.

And like I said, with people purchasing ad space on the site and PR down the road, everything will not rely soley on my marketing of the company, hopefully we can start to brew a culture that wants to support what we're doing, right?

Also, if we build a stable brand we can easily partner with iTunes which is something that the individual independent filmmaker will struggle and fail to achieve unless their film is enormously popular.

So, yeah, I guess what I'd need from you guys are recommendations. Either your own films or films other folks have made that haven't achieved distribution. Obviously people like Zak are at the tipping point of "making it" and Sabi is a really specific kind of company, etc. But who do we have here on DVX who has put out a quality product but that we feel maybe could use a jump start on their feature DVD sales?

I can PM them and let them know what I'm putting together.

Awesome possum!

 

[Chamber005]

Do you have a resume? I think SAD MAX asked you twice now?

In film sales? Yeah, absolutely not. LOL

Sorry. This is the opitome of BETA. Like, I literally have to start a new LLC just to do this project. Never promoted a movie before, never sold a DVD. I got a couple thousand people to watch two web things I made when I was releasing individual working scenes of my feature to get feedback, but that didn't entail much actual marketing per se -- but it's about the closest thing I've done to anything related to mass media.

Ten years ago I WORKED in a video store, lol.

No, I've spent my career in banking and on the side I do volunteer work and assist small business owners -- but none of that qualifies me to sell DVDs. I just think, if I can have (lender based) award winning numbers selling people rates, options, insurance, etc. I think I can get Dan and Susie to buy Paul's movie and do so on a moderately large scale.

In the end, though, the filmmaker's movie description and branding is going to be consistent on my site with what it would be on their own. I mean, otherwise no branding exists, right? Branding means consistency, that's it.

So my company selling their product could only add to the filmmaker value, credibility and, hopefully, sales with regards their product.

Again, though, the MAJOR thing people have to be aware of is DISTRIBUTION. If you think that your movie still has a chance at being distributed by a large company, you have to be really careful about how many copies of that film are sold. Off the top of my head I BELIEVE it's something like 2,000. So as long as you don't have it on iTunes or streaming on Netflix, you're probably okay to be on the site so long as we have that definitive number and you're paying CLOSE attention to how many units you have sold both on our site and via your own channels.

But again, I'm just the promotion guy. I can't help people with every aspect of the production process, I'll be looking to (potentially) improve sales. That's it.

Long term, though, I could see us developing a sister company that could help produce some micro budget features. I mentioned earlier about purchasing a building here in Chicago for a green screen studio -- all of that is interconnected with aspects of an eventual production company. But I think the seeds are going to be spread far and wide and this, I think, would be a great place to start building that brand while providing an invaluable service to the independent filmmaker.

I'm going to start receding a bit on the information giving regarding this particular business structure and LLC, though, as some of my marketing secrets are just that -- secrets. I've given TONS of free information here for anyone who wants to use it to help bring together their own coalition of filmmakers, whether it be via pooling funds and resources and networking or any combination of the three. In regards to The Great Independent as an online film promotion company I'm going to be forming now, though, I'll probably just condense the information I have already given here to the prospective filmmaker.

So any questions on anything I've talked about here so far, I'll do my best to answer. Moving forward, though, I'll have to be at least marginally tight-lipped or else my promotion guy will literally want my head. lol

But yeah -- RECOMMENDATIONS PLEASE! I'll be doing my own research, but anyone who knows of a talented filmmaker who's put together a feature but just hasn't been able to find a distributor, let me know and I'll see what's the what and if they might fit with what I'm putting together.

Thanks!

 

[Sad Max]

I know this is a digression - and this thread has gotten a lot more interesting in the last couple pages - but...

...what is the incessant use of 'lol' all over the place intended to convey...? Does your own concept make you laugh *that* hard...?

 

[Chamber005]

I know this is a digression - and this thread has gotten a lot more interesting in the last couple pages - but...

...what is the incessant use of 'lol' all over the place intended to convey...? Does your own concept make you laugh *that* hard...?

Hmm. I never thought about it. I pretty much write in this forum the exact same way I speak, so I'm probably just more jovial than the next person? I guess? lol

BRIMMING WITH OPTIMISM!

yay!

(And I literally just got off the phone with a budding novelist friend of mine who would like to set up a sister site under the LLC that would sell independently produced novels for sale on the Kindle and iPad! How awesome is that?!? One phone call, probably an additional 500K impressions of overall branding, bam! I told him that so long as the branding stayed consistent he wouldn't have to pay me any overhead at all. Because I'm aaaaaawesome. Yup! Now all I need is someone who is looking to sell music on another sister site and ZANG I've got three sites all working in tandem offering a similar product with identical branding. Ain't business cool? This is my favorite part. Well...getting the Paypal bell ringing is probably the best part, but this is a close second)

 

[Kellar42]

I like the original marketing idea, which sounded like a group of people with similar interests loosely banding together to promote their products on social networking sites. Of course with too many people involved, it could get weird for everybody to be spamming their friends every day and hard to ensure the quality of the products. I actually think this is already being done by the big guys in the internet-camera-guru world, Bloom, Laforet, Hurlburt, they all link to each others stuff and help hype it and it's all good stuff and lots of other sites like Planet5D pick everything up, and it builds them up higher...

Making a feature my committee just seems like a bad idea, to me. Sure filmmaking is collaborative, but it sort of destroys the auteur concept while at the same time putting the whole project on the shaky financial legs of a commune. I mean Chamber, you talk about cooperation, but haven't really listened to most of what was said in this thread, just chalking it down to flaming. The very essence of making a feature by voting would require listening to people and occasionally changing one's ideas, something you don't appear fond of...

Now we're talking about something totally different, with this website to promote people's features for a percentage. Fine, but what's new about it, and sure, it's under construction, but what an awful site!

 

[Chamber005]

I like the original marketing idea, which sounded like a group of people with similar interests loosely banding together to promote their products on social networking sites. Of course with too many people involved, it could get weird for everybody to be spamming their friends every day and hard to ensure the quality of the products. I actually think this is already being done by the big guys in the internet-camera-guru world, Bloom, Laforet, Hurlburt, they all link to each others stuff and help hype it and it's all good stuff and lots of other sites like Planet5D pick everything up, and it builds them up higher...

Making a feature my committee just seems like a bad idea, to me. Sure filmmaking is collaborative, but it sort of destroys the auteur concept while at the same time putting the whole project on the shaky financial legs of a commune. I mean Chamber, you talk about cooperation, but haven't really listened to most of what was said in this thread, just chalking it down to flaming. The very essence of making a feature by voting would require listening to people and occasionally changing one's ideas, something you don't appear fond of...

Now we're talking about something totally different, with this website to promote people's features for a percentage. Fine, but what's new about it, and sure, it's under construction, but what an awful site!

lol

I think "under construction" is giving it too much credit. It's essentially a closet space that I'm not using for anything. Figured I'd hang a couple pictures there.

But yeah, that's great that you're interested in the original idea! I'd completely and totally encourage anyone here to take that style of idea and run with it.

And as far as the company I'm forming -- what's different about it is that we're marketing your film on a percentage basis. I mean...remind me again what company is doing that for no upfront costs to the independent filmmaker? I'd love to see it! Maybe they have some great ideas I can use!

BTW because this thread went all wonky and is addressing four or five different things now, I decided to start the announcement of the business structure up in the News section, primarily for those who might be interested in being part of the beta project.

Thanks!

http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?p=1976785#post1976785

EDIT: I also took down the random pictures on the site. Thanks!