4 reasons why digital media is not going disrupt the consumption of movies
There is no denying
the fact that digital industry in India, as a whole, is growing. Ad
spends by brands are increasing albeit slowly, more and more users are
accessing it thanks to the internet penetration, there is a new
generation of consumers aka millennials, and more and more businesses
are taking shape in the online space. The signs are positive.
If we focus on the media and entertainment
industry, digital consumption of content is also on the rise, be it in
the form of video capsules, some of which go ‘viral’, or repeat
telecasts of TV shows or other native content created by YouTube
channels.
But what about the movies? Is the digital landscape going to disrupt how movies are consumed?
The answer, in my opinion, is No.
Disruption and digital are the new
buzzwords but they are often thrown around without understanding the
relevance vis-à-vis the industry dynamics.
Apart from the apparent reasons of limited
broadband penetration and slow speed of the internet, there are a few
critical reasons why the internet may not be a severe competition to
cinema halls explained below in order of importance –
The 70mm experience
Watching movies in a cinema hall is more
about the experience than just about the availability. It’s the
combination of sitting in a dark hall and watching the movie on a big
screen with superior picture/sound quality.
It’s also about the factor of social viewing. How many times does one go to a cinema hall alone? Not very often.
We either go with our friends, partner,
spouse or family. It’s an integral part of our idea of ‘taking a break
from work’ and ‘outing’.
Theaters, in fact, compete more with
entertainment parks than with the internet (paid form of downloads) as
both of them are fighting for the entertainment share of a family’s
monthly expense.
Competition
The biggest competitor for digital releases
will not be cinema halls. It will be the illegal downloading sites,
especially from the Indian context. Would the majority prefer to pay for
content released digitally when the same would be available for free
downloading in a couple of days? What is the value addition?
The question then becomes one of changing
habits. We are so used to free content online that it will be nearly
impossible to expect the same set of consumers to pay for the movie to
watch it online. This is one of the reasons why the Home Video / DVD
market share for movies in India was never a significant revenue source
compared to how it was in the West.
Piracy affects theaters as well but it will be more detrimental if films start releasing digitally only.
This is more of a cultural-cum-habitual issue than it is to do with technological laggardness.
The numbers don’t add up
A movie can take anywhere between INR 15
million to 1000 million to make. Add to that the cost of marketing. In
the current eco-system, there is negligible chance of recovering that
amount of investment. Why?
The number of online transacting consumers
in India is 25 million. Although not directly correlated, it gives a
fair idea that we have time to go to and even reach the stage where
there is a substantial sample size that has the ability (let alone the
desire) to pay for a movie online such that it can make its money back.
Misleading comparison of TV with films
The whole discussion started when YouTube
channels started getting popular to the extent that now they have become
a threat to TV. But the only similarity between TV and films is that
both deliver content. The dynamics of both are vastly different.
a. While TV depends on brands and
advertisements (not subscriptions) for its revenues, films depend on the
end consumer for purchasing the tickets.
b. TV shows are based on appointment
viewing and with YouTube, one gets the option of convenience of viewing
the shows as and when they wish to. But when it comes to films, the
option of choosing to watch a particular movie at a particular time slot
already exists.
c. TV shows have 8-10 minute ads for every
20 minutes show which gives an opportunity for a viewer to switch to
online where the ads are only for a couple of minutes. Films have no
such ads and the interval at a cinema hall is not a complaining factor.
Besides, the attention span of the online consumer suits content of a
shorter duration for impulse viewing and not for feature length films of
100+ minutes.
How serious (or not) a threat is YouTube to TV?
We don’t know. Would a ‘Comedy Nights with
Kapil’ or an ‘Emotional Atyachaar’ be as successful if it were released
only on YouTube? We don’t know and that’s a matter of a different
discussion.
But would a ‘Vicky Donor’ or ‘Dhoom 3’ make as much money online as they did at the box office? The answer is a resounding No.
When TV became popular, it was thought to
disrupt the movie going experience in the 1940s-50s in the West.
Gradually, it has become a healthy source of supplementing revenue.
Digital is likely to play a similar role.
There is promise of the platform in providing significant supplementing
revenue but it most likely will not disrupt the multiplex industry.
Think about it. Just because you can order food at home, does that mean restaurants will cease to exist in the future?
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