To everyone who regularly downloads dvd rips instead of purchasing the dvd, I need your help answering this question: What would it take to get you to purchase the dvd, vs downloading a dvd rip? What incentives could the studio offer? What would make you want to buy the whole dvd, instead of just downloading the movie, itself? This is a MARKETING question, not an ethical scolding. I don't really care about right and wrong, here. Concerned directors have been bringing this up a lot, as a serious problem, so I thought I would ask YOU GUYS. Your thoughts? Edited by - oneking on Aug 5 2010 Edited by - oneking on Aug 5 2010
Fat bottomed girls make the rockin' world go round! 1551 Posts 5/09
Posted - Aug 5 2010 : 5:34AM
What causes me to purchase a DVD is when the used DVDs go on sale at my local Family Video store. If I notice a title that has received great reviews here, I'll buy it. Usually, the used titles there are sold for $10.00 each. The other two adult video stores in my community also sell old titles, which is frustrating for me. Since I've found ADT, I've been able to avoid titles that receive poor reviews here. I've noticed some web sites where some titles are available as "download to own" for $10.00 each. I've yet to make a purchase using that method. I'd prefer to remain anonymous, and pay cash for porn. I may try to purchase a title on-line someday (when viewing porn becomes more acceptable in the U.S.) using my credit card, but right now I don't trust "Big Brother", F.B.I. tactics, Postal Inspectors,and b/s prosecutions. It would be great if someone opened a few brick and mortar stores where new titles are sold.
In my area, the local strip club has a small separate DVD sales area in it. You may want to call a few if there are some at least semi-local to you and see if they sell DVDs as well. Just in case you are from Michigan, in Muskegon, Michigan the local strip club is called The Odyseey and is on Broadway Blvd. in the Heights district. Last I knew (admittedly a couple of years ago) they still sold DVDs.
Fat bottomed girls make the rockin' world go round! 1551 Posts 5/09
Posted - Aug 16 2010 : 7:46PM
^ I was just in Muskegon Heights last week to help some friends work on their house. I went to "The Chicken Coop" for dinner..deep-fried walleye! Good food! Next time I'm in Muskegon, I'll check out the strip club you mentioned. Thanks!
OneKing, This is a serious problem, and as Internet speeds get faster and technology to rip is even easier to get, I am not sure what the answer is. I am a bit one sided as a cameraman (not that I have much porn to shoot in Australia, thank God for news and corporate jobs) but I like original discs for quality and it 'the extras' are always good to have. But I am afraid no matter what Producers do, the internet will always be the main source. Sure you may not get the extras on downloads but that is not what the punters are after. The only way is to make encoding even harder to break but I don't know how you can do that to ensure the movie plays on the average DVD machine. Maybe Porn that can only play on PS3 or XBox would work, but then you limit your market to gamers and I am sure an encoder invented, someone will have a decoder the next day. It is a shame that people don't understand that quality porn costs money and money comes from sales.
Oneking, I'm not sure I can answer your question as it is aimed at people who regularly download rips which is something I have never done. But here I go. I don't want to buy the entire DVD. I just want a scene out of it. I would much rather pay 5 dollars for a single scene when it comes to gonzo. Paying 20-30 dollars for a full DVD isn't a prob. 15 is real nice price for a porn dvd that I will enjoy in it's entirity.
I hear that they have good food, but after dark that is a very dangerous place to be. I have heard of (literally) lots of murders in their parking lot over the past twenty years. The strip club is much safer, thankfully (I have only heard of one murder in that parking lot in twenty years). There is also Murphy's strip club on the other side of the Heights (also on Broadway) if they are still open. Since the Heights is mainly populated by African-Americans, that may affect what talent the strip clubs hire (although I know that the Odyessy was mostly white talent a few years ago). I actually worked at a (now closed) credit union a block from Murphy's on Sherman Blvd. I met some very interesting people while working there. I used to tease the assistant manager there (her last name is Murphy) about that strip club, but she actually had nothing to do with the place.
The pricing of porn is a big obstacle to a lot of people. If you shop at your local adult bookstore, a new title might run you upwards of 50 dollars (and sometimes more). That's a lot of jack to jack. I know the average porn isn't like a hollywood release where they are cranking out 300,000 dvd's at a pop, but fifty dollars for a movie is a little much. Online sales have helped, lowering dvd prices by ten bucks or so per disc, but porn is often an impulse buy, who wants to wait four days for another chance to be alone with Jenna Haze?
I don't download DVD rips but I'll answer anyway, because I think I have a useful POV. A few people have massive amounts of $ and will buy anything because money doesn't matter. Some people want huge porn libraries and can't afford to buy it. So you either figure out a way to get it inexpensively (buy used, trade, review movies here for free screeners, etc) or you pirate it. Some people are going to pirate it no matter what you do. You could sell your DVDs for a $1/each and free shipping and no sales tax, and they'd still download it all for free. But some people, and I know a lot of people like this, want to buy legal DVDs, either because they lack the skills to find and download the movies, or they don't want the hassle, or they just want to own a legit copy, not a ripoff. Whatever. (Plus a DVD lives outside your computer, whereas a file download sits on the hard drive and can be found by nosy spouses, kids, etc. So can a DVD, but I think you know what I'm trying to say...) These people usually don't have big porn budgets. They don't have the money or the ability (wives, familes etc) to accumulate a big library. So they buy DVDs in dribs and drabs. I'm not a market researcher and I could be wrong, but I think these people tend to be a) married family men (or women), or maybe divorced, but they're usually not single b) they tend to be older c) they tend to be more picky about porn, but more vanilla in tastes and less x-treme d) they want to feel like they got bang for their buck e) they don't have a lot of disposable income for porn and make few purchases; if they find something they enjoy, it'll make them more likely to buy another; if they get burned, they won't. If I were marketing porn, I'd try to aim at older, educated, more affluent men, women, or couples. I'd make porn which is more vanilla. I'd do my best to make the experience as positive as possible (lot of good content, smart chapter menuing, etc). I think that segment of the public is more likely to buy than to pirate. But you have to give them something they *want* to buy. I fit this demo (except I'm single) and I feel very under-served. I've complained at various times that it's difficult for me to find stuff I *want* to buy, because most of it seems aimed at the hip-hop/tattoo'ed/x-treme/cum-guzzlin-road-whore crowd. My two-cents, for what it's worth.
