Time is more valuable than money. You can get more money, but you cannot get more time.
-Jim Rohn
I came across the following quote from Amy Pascal (a bigwig over at Sony). She says:
We do everything we believe will make money. We are constantly looking for good artists who are different, who have a special voice. They are the people who make a lot of money.
-from deadlinehollywooddaily
This is why Hollywood is so fucked. It isn't about making money, it's about doing something well. If the end goal is doing "everything we believe will make money" then why not sell tumbleweeds over the internet? Because Hollywood isn't in the tumbleweed selling business, it's in the entertainment business, but they've lost sight of that.
And that's the real problem. Once an organization loses sight of what it does best, game over. Basing every decision on the metric of "does this make money?" can only lead to industries making stupid short term decisions that help the balance sheet at the expense of their long term sustainability. Like trying to screw writers out of Internet residuals. Sure it helps the balance now, but what about a year from now, when the writers have left because they can make more money elsewhere?
What she should be saying is "we do everything we believe will make great entertainment." Hollywood has a great product, people are just dying to pay for that content. They're buying DVDs, they're lining up outside of theaters, they're watching TV. They're downloading off iTunes and from NBC direct and from Netflix and from Comedy Central. Stop worrying about making money. As long as you're holding people's attention the money will come. But the studios have lost site of that. And if you think about it, we've always had creative people telling stories. From the earliest oral histories, to Shakespeare, to whatever summer blockbuster will inevitably suck this year. But we haven't always had the studio system and if I had to bet on which one is going to be around in the future, my money is on the story tellers.
Posted by Ben Corman at 1:26 PM