There are those who don't understand what L5 is, and why we have done it the way we have. While most of the negitive response can be chalked up to people who just dislike things for fun...you know...Haters...some of it is just folks not understanding things.
A good example is on one of the many Sci-fi forums L5 has been mentioned on. One poster wrote a long post detailing many of the things they felt where "wrong" with L5. While everyone is entitled to their opinions, some of the items and information are just incorrect.
So....I am going to write an open letter here in my blog. I will not link to the forum post directly...if you want to find it do a little detective work.
The post reads as below...Original poster is in blue, my responses are in red text.
I'll watch it on YouTube too, and here's why: YouTube will
be significant in the development of internet video as a business, and that
interests me (probably more than this particular web series does). Bittorrent
simply isn't significant because nobody is going to be investing significant
money and promotion to develop that "business model."
Incorrect and
uninformed… Four major studios and about
three dozen other publishers of video, games and software have lined up to
endorse Bittorrent. They include 20th Century Fox, Lions Gate, MTV Networks, Paramount
Pictures, Warner Bros. Home Entertainment and BitTorrent’s newest partner,
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc.
It comes at a time when
studios are signing deals with other companies too, including one between
Viacom and rival start-up, Joost. The deals are likely to put pressure on
Google’s YouTube. YouTube has dragged its heels on implementing a filtering
technology to placate concerns studios have about pirated movies show up there.
Reports emerged
that YouTube will soon implement such technology, but the latest word is that there are “technical” difficulties.
http://venturebeat.com/2007/02/26/bittorrents-big-day/
I see that site is asking for donations, but what consumers
really want is one place to go to get everything, not a bunch of sites all with
their own shows. That's YouTube, Netflix, Hulu, and I'm sure Facebook is
getting into the act.
However this is going to happen in the future, it will
happen at aggregator sites like that. Internet series need to think of
aggragator sites like movie theaters - if anyone is going to see your show, you
need to get distribution where the average person is looking for content. The
trailer is up at YouTube, why not put the whole series there, since it's
available free anyway?
VODO is
an aggregator. It is an aggregator of actual produced videos. You don’t have to
wade thru 14000 videos of LOLCats and groin kicks to find a show. Netflix, Hulu
and Facebook are (as of right now) only showing content created for other distribution
models; Broadcast and Cable TV, Theatre releases and the like. None of the
content available there is ‘original’, it’s all re-runs.
Screensavers etc as incentives is the right idea, but they'd
probably get more response if they built the incentives around a community -
which means there has to be a community at the site. There's a comments field,
but for a vital, attractive community, you'll need something with the
complexity and scope of TrekBBS, at minimum. (And I think there's a lot more
that TrekBBS can be doing, but that's another discussion.) Which of course
really means that the aggregator sites should be offering better tools for
building communities, not the lame comments sections that now exist.
People will pay for virtual goods that enhance their
standing in a community. You see that at TrekBBS - customizable title, that
sort of thing. But first, they need to have a community and then value it. The
free content attracts the community, and then you build your business model
around the community. Free content is all over the place on the internet, but
good communities that people value are far rarer. That's your real business.
The content is just what you use to build your business. Trying to compete with
an easily available commodity (content) is very hard; competing with a scarcer
commodity (good, rewarding community) is easier.
The
commodity we are ‘selling’ is the fact that you as the viewer have a direct
vote in whether a show continues or not. Why let rooms full of people who don’t
care about a show decide its fate? Firefly is a great example. Additionally, there
is much more than screensavers. You can actually participate in productions,
and get access to exclusive content/perks many of them actual physical items (scripts,
art books, missson patches, hell ever pieces of camera used sets/costumes)
So maybe the solution is some kind of hybrid approach - have
a presence on YouTube to attract attention (with the full series there, for
free) and then use it to funnel people into a proprietary community which also
starts out for free, and then you can ratchet up the microtransactions for
community based goodies. And of course YouTube will share ad revenue if your
show is popular enough there.
Any add
revenue made by content creators from Youtube is approx. 0.04% of generated revenue.
Youtube has no interest in supporting original programming directly. It is a
way to shove the old broadcast model of adverts being the only revenue stream
onto the internet.
PS, okay I watched the preview and once again, I'm
flabbergasted that the achilles heel of these online projects always seems to
be the actors. Why isn't it easier for productions to get talented wannabee
actors eager to jump into anything, just to have it on their demo reel? LA is
full of out of work actors. Even if they're producing this show in Chicago,
there must be a few theater actors or something around - or maybe they should
consider moving to production to LA.
The voice over actor (and ship's computer?) just isn't any
good. The other actors don't really "pop" - even in a short promo,
there should be something there to grab the audience, but they're just flat.
Envision the BSG cast, people like James Edward Olmos or even previous unknowns
like Katee Sackhoff in those roles - I guarantee they would have popped better.
You can
feel however you like about the actors and acting…after you watch the actual
product. Also...the point of this production, from a filmmaking aspect, is to
show what can be done without having to succumb to the traditional Hollywood
system.
When people are used to getting even highly professional
content for free (via piracy), how are you ever going to get them to pay for
content that is a lot less attractive than what they're used to?
Because
it is made for them, with their participation and input, it is not a recycled show/movie
that is available anywhere else. The
cost/benefit for the viewer is directly participate to their interest in the product. If
they want to see the production continue, they support it. That support need
not always be monetary. Time, Money or Love.
