Allowing streaming between borders will result in films ‘aiming for lowest common denominator of human experience’
What a shitty excuse lol
Duller & less imaginative than they are currently? I fucking doubt that.
For anyone that hasn’t read, or doesn’t understand the article, the geo block ban the EU is proposing is aimed at broadcasters who are the primary buyers of content. Geo-blocking means that France Télévisions only serves a French audience, while ZDF serves German… BBC would be a more obvious example for English speaks, but, Brexit.
This ban would consolidate Europe into a single media market and would likely result in Germany and France controlling the a large portion of the content the rest of Europe views.
Additionally, a filmmaker can sell rights to something multiple times if there is interest in each market. This allows for larger budgets than you could afford if only sold once.
The European market is a bit archaic, and the filmmakers concerns are self serving, but consolidation around a few central players doesn’t seem likely to improve quality.
I’ve heard enough Canadians talk about their “second amendment right” to handguns to know there are deeper societal issues that are at risk as well.
The world is already somewhat ‘consolidated’ right now via services like Netflix, Hulu/Apple, Amazon content that mostly drops everything they make or commission internationally on day 1.
The point is that this all derives from a fundamentally archaic worldview. It’s utterly absurd that I can’t legally purchase or stream shows like Dummedag (an example) because I don’t live in Norway. My only option in many cases is piracy. Do some of these studios not want people to purchase their content?
Here’s my solution to this, the EU should’ve said: If you refuse to make your TV show legally accessible either to stream or to download for a certain country, piracy of that show within that country should be legal.
The broadcasters only own the rights for their market. If the EU forced your proposal, they would force the broadcasters to pirate the material. Dummedag is a series produced by Seefood TV for NRK. NRK doesn’t serve markets outside of Norway and no one has (apparently) offered Seefood to purchase rights outside that market.
The reason the producers were worried is that the EU change would force European broadcasters to effectively purchase worldwide rights, which cost a lot more. That increase in the cost of business, would limit who can participate in the market to the largest players, and the content produced would skew toward broader mainstream tastes.
I doubt anyone would build the system the way it is if they were starting g from scratch, but as dumb as it is, it does create an environment where a show like Dummedag can exist.
