[apatters]

Is it really? There are only five major studios which command 80-85% of the US box office [1], and by extension a major share of all global box office returns.

Five corporate boards exercise creative control over nearly all of Hollywood.

That's not much competition, and they seem to have arrived at a consensus about what kind of content we should experience at the theater.

Who says the content is valuable? Can you prove that the cash generation value is in the content and not the strictly regulated, consolidation-friendly oligopoly structure which Clinton put in place for these guys in the 90s?

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_film_studio

[scarface74]

Tyler Perry Studios and Blumhouse both show that you can make a movie cheaply (less than $10 Million), with great ROI, and get widespread distribution. On an ROI basis, they both usually do better than the major studios.

Neither of these studios are based in Hollywood. In fact right now, both Coming To America 2 and Bad Boys 3 are filming at Tyler Perry Studios in Atlanta.

On top of that, if you want to make a movie today and get distribution, there are dozens of cable channels and streaming services who want exclusive content. You don’t need to be in theaters.

In fact, you can sell your movie to consumers via any of the on demand platforms like iTunes, Vudu, Google Play Movies or Amazon.

[bluedino]

Tyler Perry Studios also proves you can produce terrible content.

[sangnoir]

Was there ever a year that Hollywood failed to prove this too?

[scarface74]

Like I said, if it were “terrible” people wouldn’t be spending their money on it. The studios are producing what consumers are willing so pay for and consumers pay for it. Amazing how well the free market works without government getting involved.

[scarface74]

Well, again in the grand scheme of things in a capitalist society, his content makes a profit, has no negative externalities [1] and has a great ROI so it is a good product.

[1] I’m personally no fan of it, it’s low brow shucking and jiving, Stepin Fetchit content. And before I get downvoted to oblivion and flagged for being racist, I am Black.

[Grazester]

Tyler Perry acknowledges he does not make movies for everyone but for and audience the movie industry typically ignored in the past.

I am not a fan either...

[austhrow743]

Clinton didn't introduce a mandate that people go to the cinema.

[marcinzm]

Going to the theater is neither a necessity nor is it the only form of entertainment available. As such, nothing forces people to go there so even if there was only a single film studio the quality of films would still matter.

[mark_l_watson]

My wife and I just returned home from two years working in a large university town (Urbana/Champaign) and one of the things we really enjoyed was having an IMAX theater nearby. We went very frequently. When we returned to our home in the mountains of Central Arizona, we stopped going out to the movies - our local theater is OK, but not the IMAX experience.

The amount of at home entertainment with HBO, Amazon Prime, CBS Streaming (for Star Trek), and Netflix is phenonimal. I am fine with paying for services and just experiencing a wide sampling. It does take some self control to be willing to stop watching series after sampling some episodes.

[notfromhere]

As a fellow former U-C resident, I do miss the art theater in town. A bit rundown but definitely has its charm

[scarface74]

My dad has been a once or twice a week movie goer since I can remember, sometimes with my mom sometimes without. But since I bought him a 49" Roku TV, he goes to the movie a lot less often. He has Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, access to my Plex Server, Crackle and the Roku Channel. He would have access to a lot more if the other network provided apps didn't keep forgetting his cable login and force him to validate by going to a website.

[apatters]

The substitutability of going to the theater is not super high if for instance you are busy parents in a small town and you want to have a date night, or get your kids out of the house for a few hours on the weekend.

People might still go because the theater experience is convenient, even when the content produced by the studios is crap. Happens all the time.

[taurath]

People willing to pay for it says content is valuable, or at least valuable enough for a few hours of time.

[goldenkey]

But with monopolies, you usually just take what you can get...

[s1artibartfast]

if you chose to pay fr it, it is at least worth that much.

Sure, there may be a more valuable film that was never made, but that doesn't negate the net positive.

[scarface74]

How is it a “monopoly” with five major studios and two or three minor studios?

[thebooktocome]

Oligopoly is also bad.

[scarface74]

So how many major studios do you feel are appropriate? Once again, despite the opinions of HN, the definition of a monopoly is not “a company does something I don’t like”.

As I said previously, there is nothing stopping anyone from distributing content via a multitude of channels.

[fauigerzigerk]

The definition of "monopoly" doesn't matter that much though. What matters is whether new players can realistically enter a market and compete on merit. That's what creates incentives for innovation and low prices.

I agree with you that the film industry itself doesn't currently have a monopoly or oligopoly problem, especially not internationally. But the fact that there are huge problems in related areas of digital content distribution and discovery (app stores, search, social networks, network operators specifically in the US) is cause for alarm in my view.

The problem is spreading rapidly and it wouldn't be a surprise if the film industry was one of the next victims.

[thebooktocome]

My gut feeling is that the largest player in any market should control less than five percent of it. So, more than twenty?

[goatinaboat]

That's not much competition, and they seem to have arrived at a consensus about what kind of content we should experience

The flurry of movies loved by critics coincidentally working for media outlets owned by big players, and hated by actual fans shows the power of this.

Terminator: Dark Fate should have been amazing but it pretty much sucked, for example. Being out of sync with the fans doesn’t seem to matter to studio bosses, even if the movie tanks.

[scarface74]

So isn’t that an argument against worrying about the big bad studio monopolies? They put out a product, people don’t want it, they lose money. It sounds like capitalism for the win to me instead of wanting the government to intervene.

[rayiner]

What is the “strictly regulated” part?