Owen Gleiberman penned an “upper decker” of a review/slam of Scorsese’s The Irishman and Netflix’s release strategy this week in Variety when he wrote “Netflix, You Have a Problem: ‘The Irishman’ Is Too Good,” arguing that the film demanded a longer theatrical release before it hits streaming.
His entire argument can be summed up by his last paragraph:
Read MoreI’m back from my social media and all-things-electronic-vacation, and back to writing this newsletter. Can’t say I missed the social media, but I did miss the feedback from readers, so I’m glad to be back.
Fall Festival Thoughts:
Read MoreWell folks, “below the fold” is the news for this week – and for awhile. As my longer-term readers know, I take every August off for a writing and social media vacation. Every year since 2010, which means for ten years now (!!!), I’ve unplugged from the web – except for work – for the entire month. I don’t check blogs, read any online news, f-around with Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, or any other social media. I am not lucky enough to be able to completely unplug – I do take emails from clients and other general work for the first two weeks of August, but then I actually stop checking emails for the latter half of the month and am completely off-line through Labor Day.
Read MoreErick Opeka got a few laughs on LinkedIn when he posted this comment recently:
I’ve long argued that Netflix is going about brands and content in the wrong way- product placement like this, or these gigantic ads for Lavazza Coffee on Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee are actually more intrusive and gross than regular advertising. Heck, on the new season of Comedians… Seinfeld takes us on a five minute gushing tribute to Porsche that is longer than any commercial.
Aside from the few times when it makes legitimate sense to show a product for nostalgic reasons (and some of the Stranger Things tie-ins fall into this category), Netflix should move away from product placement and embrace smarter branded content. With nearly every brand you can think of making films these days, and all of them needing distribution, it’s a great opportunity for Netflix to get good content, lower its bills and bring in a new revenue stream without ruining the consumer experience.
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Elizabeth Méndez Berry (a director at the Nathan Cummings Foundation) and Chi-hui Yang (a program officer at the Ford Foundation) wrote a great Op-Ed for the NYT on July 5th about the need for more diversity among critics, cultural writers, editors (and assigning editors) in the arts and cultural sphere. The entire piece is required reading, but these two paragraphs sum it up for me:
This matters because culture is a battleground where some narratives win and others lose. Whether we believe someone should be locked in a cage or not is shaped by the stories we absorb about one another, and whether they’re disrupted or not. At a time when inequality and white supremacy are soaring, collective opinion is born at monuments, museums, screens and stages — well before it’s confirmed at the ballot box.
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Big news in the educational streaming market this week – I may be the first person to ever type those words!- as the New York City Public Libraries Drop Kanopy’s “Free” Movie-Streaming Service. The NYPL, Queens and Brooklyn Public libraries all dropped the service (they are actually distinct library systems) citing costs. Now while many readers may not even know what the heck the educational streaming market is, I think this is bigger news – and worse news – than it seems.
Up until now, if you had a library card from these or many other public libraries, you could watch movies for “free” by just using your library card to access Kanopy, which has become one of the biggest streaming libraries for film in the educational marketplace. I scare quote the “free” part because Kanopy reportedly charges libraries about $2 per view (with a view being at least 30 seconds of watching), which adds up. In fact, these three libraries said the cost got too high for them to renew their contracts and would invest more into ebooks and audio books. Mind you, that’s what public libraries pay. Educational libraries, like a University or College, pay even more, with some quoting $150-300 once more than 3 people watch the film. For a good run-down of the educational market, Kanopy and how this all works, read this Film Quarterly article.
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Every brand is now a studio. Every day, a new brand enters the fray of content creation. They all want to be filmmakers. And I obviously think that’s a good idea in general, or I wouldn’t advise brands on how to do it, smarter. But at a time of superabundance, when the last thing the world needs is another movie, smart brands should be thinking more about curation than creation.
Mind you, I didn’t say every brand. People trust certain brands and not others, and curation only works when there’s trust involved. But for those brands that have built such trust and have the following to prove it – there’s a unique opportunity, and a glaring gap in the market for smart curation.
As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, Joe Marchese wrote about curation and the attention economy for Redef recently, and pointed out: “…The brands, retailers, and media companies that understand how to operate in the current Attention Economy will become trusted curators and shape the future of culture and commerce.” (emphasis mine).
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