Localized Creating by Matt Firman

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How Mom-and-Pop Companies Could Come to Dominate the Film and Entertainment Industry

This is an excerpt from Matt Firman’s Article: “The Globalization of Localized Creating | How Mom and Pop Companies Could Come to Dominate the Film and Music Industry.” Written at Storyprism.Substack.com

We find this article interesting as it is relevant with the current movement in the DMV.

By Matt Firman

2023 is coming to a close and soon we will be entering the perilous unknowns of 2024. Things…have gotten heavy in the film and entertainment industry. So much so that there’s been a massive resurgence surrounding our fixation on the future and what it entails for us. 

That makes sense because what we decide, today, could determine how we make movies and live as creators, tomorrow. So I thought, as an end-of-the-year blog, it would be cool to give my wild prediction on the future of the film industry based on everything that’s unfolding, today…If only to look back and laugh at how utterly wrong I was!

But I don’t want to just write a list of things because, frankly, we see too many of those. Instead, I wanna focus on one fundamental prediction that I strongly believe in and use this piece to justify why I think it will likely happen. Yes, I know. We can’t know what the future will hold. But who cares?! 

It’s a fun topic to ponder, so don’t take what I’m about to say as being the capital “T” truth. Take it as food for thought from someone who has been doing indie filmmaking/screenwriting for 11 years and who recently partnered with his brother to develop AI screenwriting tools for people to land their ideas, faster. 

Now…On to the prediction…

(drumroll)

I believe that localized efforts will be capable of scaling globally, and the independent film industry will likely surge because of this. For the longest time, the best way to maximize output and value was to centralize everything into major corporations so that operations could scale nationally and globally.

And, indeed, this is true…But eventually, it won’t be.  Of course, there will always be certain businesses and organizations that require centralization, but most of the future companies will realize that they can keep their operations smaller while dramatically scaling distribution. So, in short, localized groups will be able to globalize without having to grow into large organizations.  

Consider how cheap and easy it is to do things today with the technology we have. Eventually, it’ll become so cheap and easy that it could stratify the whole industry to the extent that most of our content will either be made by an advanced AI from the few remaining legacy powerhouses or by localized indie creators of all shapes and sizes. However, these smaller creators will be able to produce like mom-and-pop production companies, but market, sell, and distribute like major studios.

It sounds ridiculous, so let me justify this prediction with the following considerations:

Flaws of The Modern Production Process 

Not too long ago, when Capitalism and Industrialization were just in their infancy, creating and distributing goods and services were operated by mom-and-pop professionals, often working out of their cottages.  This was the era of the Cottage Industry, and like all things, there were pros and cons to this system.  

The pro, of course, was that the quality of goods and services based on the technology and knowledge at the time was very high, on average.  However, the goods and services lacked consistency in quality and interoperability. Also, none of these businesses could scale and provide adequate output to millions of people since making everything by hand was just too slow to achieve such a feat.

But, then what happened?  Well, we invented all these new machines that allowed an individual or a group of people to grow their operations.  However, these machines were incredibly expensive and big, which meant that you had to have a large area (like a factory) to house them, you had to have a huge labor force to operate them, and you had to have a ton of money to pay for the space, the machines, and the people running them.  So the Cottage Industry died when rich people were given the means to outcompete regular people via new technology.  

The benefit was that it allowed us to finally scale creation and distribution so that quality became much more consistent, the prices started dropping, and the availability of products and services became more ubiquitous.  It was the foundation, which led to the modern economy that we see today.  And, although, it’s been a net benefit over countless decades, it didn’t come without its flaws.

Flaw #1: Quantity over Quality

For one, the quality of goods and services might have been consistent and even very good when this new system first began.  But over time, as the technology became more efficient and cost-saving, the quality of goods and services began to diminish so that businesses could focus on producing the highest quantity of products and services.  

Quality was nice and maybe essential to some businesses, but for many, quantity became the key to making boatloads of money.  This is because with quantity you can serve many more customers over and over again as opposed to serving a few well-to-do customers now and then.  

The Film Industry was immune to these trends for a very long time since making and distributing them was so expensive.  Only a few could do it, successfully, plus it took a lot longer to produce them.  But now it’s much cheaper and faster, and with online digital technology, we have streaming services, both legal and illegal, pouring mountains of content directly into our heads.  

So the business model changed from making a limited slate of qualitative movies to making tons of movies where some of them are high in story quality, but most are decent stories that will entertain us for a few hours to keep us on the streaming sites.  With major centralized businesses like studios, the cheaper and easier it becomes to make things, the less craftsmanship and quality are put into these things. That is, if the business seeks to scale and serve millions of people, instead of a specific niche of people (think Walmart watches versus Rolex watches).

Flaw #2: Reduction of Talent and Skilled Labor   

Second, if quantity grew to become king, then talent and skilled labor were reduced to peasants since it no longer mattered how well you could do something.  It was all about how fast you could do it.  This led to worse conditions at work and lower pay.  And with skills out the window, we the consumers, began to suffer the consequences with lower quality stuff that we use, every day.

Going back to the film industry, even though there are a lot of insanely talented people working in narrative filmmaking, the major studios who’ve essentially cornered the market decided that it’s okay to treat most of them like factory workers instead of artists.  Before, it was about producing stuff that would instill awe in an audience.  To elicit that required a high amount of artistic discretion and a lot more freedom to express themselves.  

But these days, it’s more about producing a lot of content quickly, so everyone from the director to the below-the-line crew is replaceable on most sets since they don’t need the best artists.  They just need skilled labor.  This is why we’re seeing so much discontent with creators in Hollywood, today, because they’re getting paid less and treated more poorly.

Flaw # 3: Concentration of Power

Third, with huge centralized business operations came unprecedented power in the hands of tycoons who ran these massive companies and began to partner with governments to create more favorable conditions for themselves, often at the expense of citizens and smaller business owners.  Now it seems that corporatocracies are replacing democracies across the Western World and cornering entire industries.

For instance, Disney, a company that’s seen exponential growth through its acquisitions of Pixar, Marvel, Lucasfilm, and 21st Century Fox is highly criticized, not only for dominating a majority of the entertainment industry but also for lobbying the U.S. Government to extend their copyright laws. Now their IP is pretty much never released into the public domain. 

Another glaring example comes from Comcast and AT&T/WarnerMedia. They heavily lobbied against net neutrality, which would have allowed them to prioritize their content over others on the internet, limiting diversity for consumers and giving less-advantaged creators a harder time getting noticed.

But these are just two out of endless cases involving unfair practices through the partnerships between Hollywood and the government. Everything, from unfair tax advantages to relaxing merger laws, is strengthening their monopolies and turning them into “gatekeepers”.   

We’ve certainly done a lot to correct these externalities, but the problems still plague us. So it seems obvious that if we want to solve a lot of these issues, we may want to consider downsizing a lot of our companies.  However, the numerous challenges that come with smaller businesses would still affect us, from decreasing the quantity of goods and making quality inconsistent to increased prices and reducing the amount of money entrepreneurs can make.  

So how can you expect business leaders and consumers to settle for less?  Well…This is where new technology can give us a kind of “third option” to optimize our production and distribution efforts so that we don’t have to settle for less. 

Read the rest of the article at Storyprism.substack.com

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