distribution Amazon Prime royalty rate now down to just 1 cent per hour!

I remember when Amazon was paying 16 cents per hour. For the last year or so they were paying 4 cents. Well now it's down to 1 cent as of Jan 1st!
Amazon is just about as much of a drop in the bucket as YouTube. Your content is about worthless.
 
Yes, it's very disheartening to put so much into a project and get next to nothing in return. We were pushed out of the you tube world because we didn't fit their requirements, so we moved over to Amazon. We saw the handwriting on the wall with Amazon, so in March 2019 we moved five of our titles over to Filmhub. Well, since then we have only made $18.51 total with Filmhub. But on a brighter thought, at least our stuff is "out there" for people to watch, and the films are not simply forgotten on a shelf somewhere... We tell ourselved that we make films simply for the love of making films...I guess that now it's really true.
 
I remember when Amazon was paying 16 cents per hour. For the last year or so they were paying 4 cents. Well now it's down to 1 cent as of Jan 1st!
Amazon is just about as much of a drop in the bucket as YouTube. Your content is about worthless.

Is that rate variable with how popular the movie is (sorry I didn't read the entire article)? Or is The Matrix paid out at a same rate as mymovie3?
 
I'm SURE the Matrix is paid more than you and I are.
But there is some variabiity - you can find some details in here, and you have to look at you Customer Engagement Rate (CER) each month.
Amazon Prime rates

I've done better with TubiTV, but they don't tell you the rates - it depends on their ad sales during your movie.
 
Your content is about worthless.
Basic supply and demand really. There is just too much shit to watch. Nobody is chomping at the bit for the names of movies they haven’t seen.
You can post a question on Facebook and get 30 different movie recommendations that were all made for millions of dollars and never even watch 1/3 of what your friends are telling you is good.
 
Yeah, sucks to be the other side of capitalism. Now, (not defending Amazon), the streams DO calculate earnings Per streamer. If you took payout from old-school Broadcast TV channels and spread them out over the few millions that watched their rerun of a film, I suspect the numbers would look not too distant from what Amazon pays out per stream.
 
Wooopie! I earned 47 cents in September on Amazon Prime for my short film "Life After Republicans, a Mockumentary". At this rate, I will pay off my $800 production budget in 141 years. Good thing I didn't have to hire a voiceover artist (I did it myself), otherwise it would be about 2 1/2 centuries to break even. That encapsulates the state of the indie film business.
 
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Wooopie! I earned 47 cents in September on Amazon Prime for my short film "Life After Republicans, a Mockumentary". At this rate, I will pay off my $800 production budget in 141 years. Good thing I didn't have to hire a voiceover artist (I did it myself), otherwise it would be about 2 1/2 centuries to break even. That encapsulates the state of the indie film business.

Yes I have some actors scoff at me when I say that I'm not paying them but... nobody is paying me either.
If I pay more money I can get a better actor perhaps but who cares because the film isn't making any money and hardly anyone will watch it either way.
 
Yes I have some actors scoff at me when I say that I'm not paying them but... nobody is paying me either.
If I pay more money I can get a better actor perhaps but who cares because the film isn't making any money and hardly anyone will watch it either way.
And they are just ignorant. Same thing with some owners of locations. I remember once when I needed a liquor store to rent. One guy firmly wanted $5,000 for use of his store one night. Some people hear the word "movie" and just automatically believe that you've got a multi-million dollar budget. I wound up finding a great location for $800.
 
And they are just ignorant. Same thing with some owners of locations. I remember once when I needed a liquor store to rent. One guy firmly wanted $5,000 for use of his store one night. Some people hear the word "movie" and just automatically believe that you've got a multi-million dollar budget. I wound up finding a great location for $800.

it's not like that with locations outside of ca
 
Something will happen. People will get tired of the low pay and figure something out. If all the content creators really banded together and stopped making content for the platform.... Would it make a dent? Maybe, maybe not.

I wonder if you could combine the hype of a crowdfunding campaign with a VOD service? Somehow show the audience that they are helping create and support the next filmmakers project, while watching their content?

Seed & Spark kinda does this already. But I don't really like their choices for film content. Some of them are way too trendy.

I wish there was another platform that could combine Twitch aspects with Vimeo services.

I was honestly thinking about building a Twitch or Youtube following, and then asking for donations to build a "fund this film" pot for other crowdfunding campaigns.

How cool would it be to be a youtube or twitch streamer, actively looking for cool crowdfunding projects to fund with your fans. You would also give the filmmakers your following as a potential audience. It would be a win win.
 
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Something will happen. People will get tired of the low pay and figure something out. If all the content creators really banded together and stopped making content for the platform.... Would it make a dent? Maybe, maybe not.

I wonder if you could combine the hype of a crowdfunding campaign with a VOD service? Somehow show the audience that they are helping create and support the next filmmakers project, while watching their content?

Seed & Spark kinda does this already. But I don't really like their choices for film content. Some of them are way too trendy.

I wish there was another platform that could combine Twitch aspects with Vimeo services.

I was honestly thinking about building a Twitch or Youtube following, and then asking for donations to build a "fund this film" pot for other crowdfunding campaigns.

How cool would it be to be a youtube or twitch streamer, actively looking for cool crowdfunding projects to fund with your fans. You would also give the filmmakers your following as a potential audience. It would be a win win.
I think people do this right now with youtube and patreon
 
So what's the answer to the pay drop with these services then?

A strike? Or stop putting your content on there. People complain, but people will still put content in there in hopes it runs in their favor.
 
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So what's the answer to the pay drop with these services then?

A strike? Or stop putting your content on there. People complain, but people will still put content in there in hopes it runs in their favor.
1 cent per hour is just a sign of the Internet times. Indie movie makers are no more going to go on strike than musicians witholding their music in response to file sharing. Musicians actually have it a lot easier than filmmakers, even thought filmmakers generally pay more to create content. When you release songs via Tunecore or Catapult distribution, they collect royalties from YouTube as their software detects the content uploaded from anyone's YT account. I am not aware of any digital distributors who do that with video content (correct me if I'm wrong). The nice thing is that YouTube cannot demonetize content that is distributed by Tunecore and Catapult, as YouTube censors soooo love to do. There is no arguing with copyright law.
Also SoundExchange collects royalties for satellite and Internet radio airplay. Unfortunately movies are not played on the radio.
 
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1 cent per hour is just a sign of the Internet times. Indie movie makers are no more going to go on strike than musicians witholding their music in response to file sharing. Musicians actually have it a lot easier than filmmakers, even thought filmmakers generally pay more to create content. When you release songs via Tunecore or Catapult distribution, they collect royalties from YouTube as their software detects the content uploaded from anyone's YT account. I am not aware of any digital distributors who do that with video content (correct me if I'm wrong). The nice thing is that YouTube cannot demonetize content that is distributed by Tunecore and Catapult, as YouTube censors soooo love to do. There is no arguing with copyright law.
Also SoundExchange collects royalties for satellite and Internet radio airplay. Unfortunately movies are not played on the radio.

I'm not arguing anything you are saying at all. (I'd say being a musician is harder in the sense there is more competition, though that doesn't really apply to making a profit).

I have barely made money on my short films either.... But I'd like to know the way forward, since the old ways seem to be failing most filmmakers. Otherwise, what can we do??? Just keep submitting and hope it gets better?
 
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