Open Source Entertainment
by admin on Sep.04, 2010, under Filmmaking
Hey look a bunch of LEDs on a computer chip. Let's call that Open Source!
Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about the concept of Open Source Entertainment and just what that mash-up of different worlds could be. …if anything.
Open Source, of course, comes from the open source software movement where a bunch of people from all over the world to work together in a sort of human cloud computer of developing new software. Linux is the granddaddy of open source software but there are now numerous applications. OpenOffice is an open-source Microsoft Office clone. Blender is an impressive open-source 3D modeling application.
What’s interesting to me is the thought of applying open-source principals to creating filmed entertainment. Part of the reason I’m considering this is my upcoming action/sci-fi series Divergence. The first season of Divergence is being produced in a manner that has a lot of similarities to open source—that is, a lot of people working together with the goal of creating something great, rather than immediately profiting. In that way, low-budget filmmaking and open source software development have always shared a core key idea.
Like Star Wars, Star Trek, or Terminator, Divergence creates a very cool and unique sci-fi universe and mythology that can ultimately be explored and expressed through any number of stories. There’s a wealth of Star Wars and Star Trek fan-fic, and many novels, videos, and series for all of these properties. Of course, these are all controlled by the owners of the original property. It’s interesting to me how many talented people are out there in the world and I see how a lot of fan-fics in these genres can better than some of the original ‘official’ stories. (Needless to say, there’s also a ton of crap.)
We’re already working on a number of different multi-media expressions of Divergence: the initial web series, graphic novels, video games, and more. But I find myself wondering if there’s anything worth exploring about the idea of eventually opening up the story world to other people’s interpretation. And in considering this, I’ve been trying to figure out if anyone has really made open-source movies that work.
There have been a couple of open-source movie projects that consist of people uploading their shot video to servers so that other people can create their own edits. “Route 66″, and Stray Cinema are a couple of examples. But this is pretty much just re-mixing existing footage. Something cool may come out of this, but I doubt it will be a revolution in entertainment.
Other films are made with a little more open-source spirit. Someone at Blender.org sponsored a couple of animated short films to be made “Elephant’s Dream” and “Big Buck Bunny”. They look pretty amazing for movies made for free, whether you like the stories or not. And the Lord of the Rings prequel Born of Hope is racking up millions of online hits for a film made on an open-source-ish model. But like open-source software with lead architects, these movies have one writer and director apiece. The open-source part of their existence comes from the fact that a lot of people contributed their work in creating textures, models, animation assistance to support the core team. I think a movie or series needs someone at the center deciding what’s happening, making a cohesive artistic decision or statement. More minds aren’t always necessarily better. …or maybe they are and the sample size is still too small to tell yet.
With Divergence, there is a lot about the story world that will be revealed in the first season, but many more secrets that we don’t plan to reveal for seasons to come. So I wonder how I can open up this world and keep it true to its many exciting secrets without spilling the beans and spoiling the fun. Imagine if Lost told everyone what that smoke monster was on the first episode, how fun would that be?
What do you think, is there a future for open-source movies, or is fiction so inherently tied to a creator that it can’t be easily spread across a wide group as, say, software development can?
9 Comments for this entry
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September 4th, 2010 on 7:32 pm
Two questions…
1: If you’re doing this as a truly open source project, which open source license are you going to use when you distribute it?
2: If you’re doing this as truly open source, then your worry is not about spilling the plot beans. Your worry is about forking the project.
This has happened with major projects like X-Free (the group that created the basic underpinnings of the Linux GUI). There was a big debate about the direction of the project, enough people didn’t like the way it was going, and the group fractured, creating competing versions.
Love to actually learn more about your plans for this when you’ve got time.
September 5th, 2010 on 8:04 am
Right. Forking the project is another big potential problems with doing something like this. The more I look at the topic, the more problems come up. However, I’m keeping an open mind about this and trying to look for the potential advantages as well.
Divergence is a great opportunity for me to experiment with different methods of distribution and audience building, so I’m trying to spread my ideas as wide as possible. From the standpoint of traditional distribution, the idea of making a series and just giving it away for free—or worse, allowing the world to take over your property and make it their own—is so radical that it’s ridiculous. But then, traditional distribution is in its death throes and that may be because it didn’t try out enough ridiculously radical ideas.
So far, I don’t see the upside that is going to convince me. I haven’t yet seen a great open-source movie project that gains much of anything but a little press for being ‘open source.’ But I’m keeping an open mind. If it makes sense, then I’ll tackle the decision of which license to use. (In which cans, I’ll probably be picking your brain…)
As for Divergence, stay tuned… The project is heating up and we’ll be announcing cast, shoot dates, and putting up some teasers and trailers over the coming weeks.
September 24th, 2010 on 4:08 pm
This is a cool post. The concept reminds me of the recent YouTube musician phenomenon. There’s the live mashup musical concept (best iterated by the Gregory Brothers and AutoTune the News, or their recent song ‘Bed Intruder’).
I still think the best example, and a cautionary tale, of the convergence of open source thinking, piracy, and the age of short clips is Downfall (aka, the Hitler meme videos). I’m hoping you know what I’m talking about.
Downfall was a 2004 Oliver Hirschbiegel film (prd: Constantin Films) about the last days of Hitler. The film is excellent, both critically and commercially, and did something like $92 million in global box office (http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=downfall.htm) on a budget of 13.5 million Euros (so, roughly $20 million budget).
But it’s remembered mostly for a pivotal scene of Hitler being told the War is lost by his staff and then erupting into a frothing rage. The scene became a staple of internet viral videos (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/8617454.stm). Starting in 2006, people would take a clip, add in their own ridiculous subtitles, then substitute some thing for Hitler to be angry about. There were, literally, thousands of these videos, some of which had views in the tens of millions. The meme peaked in 2009.
In April 2010, Constantin Films requested that YouTube issue a take down notice of all the videos. There were varying reasons given, everything from irritation at potential DVD sales losses, copyright infringement, and simple poor taste. When a copyright holder requests YouTube to take a video down, YouTube scans the metadata of the clip from the holder, then runs an algorithm to compare the clip to all of the other clips in its database. When they are found, one of two things can happen.
If the holder wishes the video to be removed, it is deleted. The other option is for the holder of the copyright to convert the video into a payment opportunity, via ad sales.
Setting aside whether taking a video of Hitler and turning into comedy is in poor taste, the reach of these videos was pretty astounding. The views of all the video clips in total were in the hundreds of millions to billions. The videos were also regularly distributed in Internet publications (there’s even a story from The New York Times on how to make one – http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/25/technology/personaltech/25basics.html).
Had Constantin elected to convert the videos to ad channels, they could have (potentially) shared in a revenue pool of $100 million dollars, depending on the CPM and click through rate of the ads, and also whether the ads are preroll, which tend to offer lower CPMs but higher per-view monetization, or click through.
I don’t know if it’s possible to manufacture something like the Downfall meme, or if it should be done. But it is food for thought.
Great article.
September 24th, 2010 on 5:21 pm
Thanks Fred. I think your response is better than my original post. (Exactly the kind of thing I was hoping for.)
Yes, that is truly an amazing phenomenon. If your numbers are correct (which I would not doubt, knowing you) then the PROFIT from this form of distribution would have been greater than the GROSS RECEIPTS from all of theatrical.
I doubt it’s terribly reproducible or predicable, and of course, if the film had been open source, then they wouldn’t have had the option to stop the infringement or collect on it.
October 18th, 2010 on 8:49 am
I think Joseph Gordon-Levitt is doing something similar with his web site
http://hitrecord.org/reel
and needless to say there’s a bunch of legal issues that came up for him, too. His lawyers and team have been trying to figure out how it could all be handled. Might be worth reading through their rules/regulations.
One of their projects made it to Sundance called
“Morgan M. Morgansen’s Date with Destiny”
I think that’s the link to the video:
http://hitrecord.org/records/40939
I LOVE the idea of “open source entertainment”!
July 15th, 2011 on 6:38 pm
check this link out for some seriously delicious food for thought – this truly open source project was in post-production in ventura when i was living there a few years ago…
http://moviepals.org/premium/moviepals-open-cinema-everyone/spark/jathias-wager-%E2%80%93-open-source-sci-fi-movie
August 7th, 2011 on 1:03 pm
I’ve noticed people getting annoyed when Manga gets grouped in the same genre as comic books, or when bookstores sell anime alongside western animation..
May 16th, 2012 on 10:51 am
Open source entertainment also seems to me to encompass the shift to transmedia. There are many ways to tell a story, and some of these are becoming more effective. I loved this article on the creator of the short-lived series Carnivale:
http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2012/04/carnivale-creator-bypasses-hollywood-launches-transmedia-story-haunted117.html
May 16th, 2012 on 12:03 pm
Great article, Wonder! Thanks for posting the link.
I loved Carnivale and felt that it suffered a very ignoble cancellation right when it was really getting good. This is another reason why I am excited about series that can be successfully supported by even a much smaller audience than a cable series.