Tough Times for Hollywood
The nation's economic recession is hurting a lot of businesses. Restaurants have fewer customers, car dealers are making fewer sales, and California community colleges are anxiously waiting for a state budget to see just how bad the cutbacks will be. but the Hollywood-based entertainment business has long been considered to be immune to all but the worst economic downturns.
But according to this recent Los Angeles Times article, increased difficulties in financing projects and changing consumer tastes are going to make 2009 a difficult year for the local movie and television industries.
Here are discussion questions I've written for this medianote:
•Which will be hurt more by the recession: DVD sales or movie ticket sales?
•Will the recession be harder on broadcast TV stations or cable/satellite stations? Why?
•What types of video entertainment will be helped by the recession?
•Will online entertainment be helped by this recession?
(NOTE: If we have the service learning presentation by Hoover Zariani at the beginning of class on Thursday, I will probably hold this medianote until next week.)
***SPEAKING OF TELEVISION, we had a spectacular turnout for last night's Osbournes Reloaded taping. Most of us got in, and it turned out to be a long evening (yours truly left around 10:45 after the aerial balloon-popping segment). I generally take pictures of field trips, but not when the field trip is a TV taping and cameras aren't allowed.
posted by Mike Eberts (AKA Your Humble Blogger) @ 9:48 AM
2 Comments:
DVD sales will hurt more than movie tickets because there are more options available to buying DVDs (which are cheaper, more economical, and more culturally accepted). You can rent a title if it is no longer playing in the theatres, or you can download the file to a computer or media player, you can also search your cable's listings of movies and pay a small fee to watch a movie in the house. Respectively, DVDs are more expensive compared to a night out to the theatre. Besides, “movie nights" are a culturally accepted outing in society. Many movies made today are of low quality anyways, no one would be inclined to purchase these new titles (if anything they already have their collection of movie classics already). Even when the economy is hurting there will be many friends and family that have outings to the local theatre, rather than buying a DVD. A movie ticket and a bag of popcorn is a usual night out in LA, the economy might slow things down at the theatres, but it would take a long time to change a culture. In a weak economy, DVD sales will start hurting way sooner and hurt way harder before a single ticket stub is tickled.
DVD sales will hurt more than movie tickets because there are more options available to buying DVDs (which are cheaper, more economical, and more culturally accepted). You can rent a title if it is no longer playing in the theatres, or you can download the file to a computer or media player, you can also search your cable's listings of movies and pay a small fee to watch a movie in the house. Respectively, DVDs are more expensive compared to a night out to the theatre. Besides, “movie nights" are a culturally accepted outing in society. Many movies made today are of low quality anyways, no one would be inclined to purchase these new titles (if anything they already have their collection of movie classics already). Even when the economy is hurting there will be many friends and family that have outings to the local theatre, rather than buying a DVD. A movie ticket and a bag of popcorn is a usual night out in LA, the economy might slow things down at the theatres, but it would take a long time to change a culture. In a weak economy, DVD sales will start hurting way sooner and hurt way harder before a single ticket stub is tickled.
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