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Adrian Hickman
Member
Join Date: Jul 2007
Local Time: 07:57 PM
Local Date: 08-29-2008
Posts: 9
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From the IDEA side of EMA...Where were all of you?
Hi, all,
This is my first post. My name is Adrian Hickman, I am secretary of the IDEA Board of Trustees. IDEA is the Independent Dealers of Entertainment Association, which is the independent video retailer wing of EMA. I am also the General Manager of TLA Video in Philly.
I'll point you first to a column by Jennifer Netherby in Video Business in her current blog THE DOWN LOW, titled WHERE'S THE HI-DEF?
ADMIN EDIT: Here is the link.
She gets it, and makes a fine case for the opportunity that you and the HTF attendees missed, along with the studios, at EMA. While you are rejoicing in your partying and your goodie bags, and your studio updates and your free BluRay players [Forgive me for asking, but why do you need another BluRay or HD-DVD player. Is not your reason for being exactly the early adoption of these formats?]. Someone in another thread mentions that they didn't want to bother the EMA folks. Why not? That is the reason we are there, to interact with other attendees, and to go home enthused and energized.
I read HTF and the Bits and TVshowsonDVD. However, while you were enjoying your excursion, and with free admission to the show to boot, hundreds of independent video retailers were right next door to your meetings, side by side in the Titian and Bellini ballrooms, dying for the chance to interact, and discussing both formats, the introduction of revenue sharing BluRay through Rentak, talking new release and catalog stocking in both Hi-Def formats, sales and rentals, the developement of indieNET, which is an internet backbone to allow any retialer to rent by mail and download to burn, etc. AND they paid for admission to the show as well.
We would have welcomed the chance to interact with your group, and bring a true value beyond tchokes to the show. The retailers at the IndieEXPO have vast amounts of experience in this business, and know we can always learn more.
However, for whatever purpose, you were at our show, yet you were as distant as the East Coast for the week. While many indie retailers had all access passes that cost over $450.00, all access was not actually that, with your soiree under the EMA auspices not included, or even listed in the show guides. I talked with a couple of you in the exhibit hall, but would have liked to have had more interaction.
You don't know what a missed opportunity this would have been to advance the formats. The studios fought the video rental market with the BETAMAX case, and were proven wrong when video retailers launched VHS to amazing rental and sales volume, and gave Hollywood a goldmine. It happened again with DVD, even though Warren Lieberfarb and Warners tried their damndest to discourage rental, and DVD became another amazing cash cow. LaserDisc never achieved a meaningful level of rental success, and it is now just a memory.
The indie video retailers are one again a crucial part of the key to these format launches and their success: we see the regular, non-early adopter everyday, and they come to us becuase they trust us to entertain them, and to inform them when it is time to upgrade.
Yet, for whatever reason, most of you chose goodie bags and photo-ops to true advancement and advocacy for the hi-def future. If you read the above mentioned article, you will see that the hi-def camps were practically the only segment to almost completely ignore the attendees in favor of 75 already-adopters. And, as blogging journalists, I've got to have more doubt about your opinions, because a reporter should never accept free goods from a subject they are covering. How do I know for certain that an endorsement or positive review is not based on a little spiff? I know that is reaching, but that will enter some poeples minds.
I still have a lot of respect for all of you, but it would have been so much better for all if you had joined us, instead of remaining separate. An opportunity unfilled is an opportunity lost.
IDEA has a new concept in October aboard the Carnival Fascination called IndieEXPO At Sea 2007. This will be a intense workshop/seminar event that will included some of the video industries best minds, and is strongly focused on the business, and not on the glitz. You would be amazed at what YOU could learn as well as teach us. We will master and thrive in whatever the future holds, but it would be so much easier with all of you participating instead of sequesting by yourselves.
Adrian
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