Cathrin Günzel questioned me a few months ago about the future of free movies and Creative Commons - following are parts of this interview.
Art does not belong in archives but on the table - "if somebody is remixing or spreading our songs or movies, this means a compliment to us and not a criminal act." so Kluge, "mass criminalization of filesharers to us is nothing but the attempt of big companies to safe the existing dispension of power into the new world. I don't think they will get by with that." VEB FILM Leipzig published their 104 min. movie "Route 66 - an American (bad)Dream" end of 2004 as the first German "Open Source"- feature film as free download for computer and iPod online. Meanwhile, 750.000 copies have been downloaded as well as shared over P2P and 600.000 copies have been spread on DVD. VEB FILM Leipzig reached with "Route 66" over 1,5 million viewers without having been present on the market before.
"Did you decide yet on a license under which the [new] movie will be published?"
I decided to go for the Creative Commons BY-License. This is a little sensation itself. I am not aware of a feature film that has been published under such a liberal license. Shortly an article I wrote will come out where I discuss why this license of all open content licenses is the most suitable for the business model of VEB FILM Leipzig. Despite hardly any artists using it - because it allows for anyboy to earn money with their work.
Why netlabel, why Creative Commons, why so much freedom - whereas on the other hand so many projects online are supposed to create a cash flow?
Recently I visited a virtual 3D online world. Those worlds are really paced fast: After half an hour I was sitting together with a filmmaker from Quebec, a real life-video production teacher and a pioneer of virtual films (a Machinima filmmaker) in his beach house. In front of us was a video screen, we streamed our latest productions after just having met.
The next VEB FILM Leipzig movie premiere will take place in such a virtual theater. The guys from Creative Commons are going to support us, they always are up for some crazy stuff, especially if it is related to Free Culture.
The established movie producers tend to build DRM walls around their productions…
Paramount, Disney or Miramax do not have such ideas - this is the world of netlabels. Concerning licenses: we really should no longer put up with the crap that those corporate groups are pulling through. Disney for example got big with filming folk tales which are free of any copyright or license regulations. Some great artwork originated. Now our generation is ready to roll, to create something new on the basis of those creations, and is beaten up by the corporate groups' lawyers.
Sony makes good headphones, but the digital rights management they expect their customers to accept, is evidence of a vision of art neither artists nor art lovers will like. Art does not belong in archives but on the table - if somebody is remixing or spreading our songs or movies, this means a compliment to us and not a criminal act. If you reached this basic understanding as a label, you can start to think about refinancing with respect to this. Not the other way round. The mass criminalization of filesharers to us is nothing but the attempt of big companies to safe the existing dispension of power into the new world. I don't think they will get by with that.
Are you active in the movie business in real life as well or do you have another job?
Many members of our crew have IT- or film background. Our man for digital special effects works fulltime on mainstream productions and sits down with VEB stuff as soon as the sun goes down. Some of us are lucky to be able to work round the clock for the label. That way of course we make progress. The release of our new movie will form a quantum advance because we can set new standards in Free Culture film production. Then we can go down with the cross financing from other projects. The goal certainly is to have a project bear all its costs.
On your website calls for donations and sponsoring are posted - how successfull are those calls to donate money so far? Did you expect more?
The income from "Route 66" made it possible to produce our latest movie. Admittedly under extreme conditions since money was short, but the goal to entertain some millions of people can create some force! We are willing to give a lot, because we are positive that it is the turn of Free Culture on this level in the internet.
People will honor that and we will be able to make another movie. This is our plan.
Pretty imporant for our work flow are the many small donations, to be able to cover our running costs and focus on the creative work.
In your shop you sell DVDs, soundtrack CDs and books for a price choosen by the customer - how much do people usually pay voluntarily?
Just under $11 we get per DVD or CD. This is on average twice what people have to spend minimum. It seems to pay to believe in the good in people.
Does free content have a future in the filmbiz?
I assume. Netlabels, podcasters, video bloggers - many who are active online on a high level, publish their work under a Creative Commons license. If the convergence between new and old media keeps going at this pace, it won't take long before this influence of artists is felt by just about anybody.
