Interesting Links for 09-09-2017

[andrewducker]

Scotland to introduce low emission zones, ban polluting vehicles from them

(tags: scotland pollution cars viaSwampers )

Advances in AI are used to spot signs of sexuality

(tags: ai lgbt faces )

3D Coke Sign in Times Square

(tags: 3d advertising coke )

How Many Years of Life Does That House Cost? The Relative Dreaminess of the American Dream

(tags: economics housing maps visualisation usa )

Welcome to your "Premium Mediocre" future

(tags: life society viaSwampers )

Anyone care to take a guess at how this company will ever make money?

(tags: business weird movies )

Why don't we try to destroy tropical cyclones by nuking them?

(tags: nuclearweapons weather )

My brother made an app that transforms abstract lines into images.

(tags: apple apps viaMyBrotherMike )

Comments

[movingfinger]

As ever, the customers' information is the product with Moviepass. Exact demographic information about who went to see what movies when and where will usher in a glorious new day of risk-taking, original film-making allow micro-targeting of advertising and of the movies themselves to maximize revenues. And the moviegoers for the data harvesting.

AMC does or did have some kind of club where members got free popcorn and invitations to special events and stuff, but it wasn't really focused on the actual getting people to see the movies---AMC assumed that that was a given.

The problem, as many would-be moviegoers see it, is that the movies offered are not worth going to...

[andrewducker]

The thing is, you can't really microtarget ads in a cinema, because although your audience are all interested in _that_ movie, they're still going to be pretty diverse, and any ads have to appeal to as many of them as possible.

[jack]

My guess was, gamble on being big or nothing. If they can lost-lead enough to grab >40% of the cinema market, then they have the advantage in leverage over most cinemas and cinema chains, if those cinemas are cut out of moviepass, they'd be bust. *Then* they can jack up prices (or more likely, something else worth money). And if it doesn't work, that's why investment funds invest in a gazillion broken ideas at once.

But the other guesses sounded more specific.

[andrewducker]

Yeah. A gamble that they can make a butt-load of money if they can somehow make themselves integral to the movie business.

Can't see it working myself, but you do never know.

[matgb]

The side point is that, as always, "millenials are killing the movies" meaning a smaller proportion of 20somethings are regular cinema goers than in previous decades.

If this works to draw a demographic that currently can't be arsed to start going again in larger numbers, well, there's money to be made.

The small point that it's not just millenials and decent home theatre setups are so cheap these days lots of people are staying home isn't covered, naturally.

Plus, subscription, I join their scheme and go to see a movie a week for a few weeks, then don't go, then am busy, in 6 months it's like a gym membership, I plan to keep going, it's a good deal, but I never actually do.

[darjeeling]

Now it's time for me to hope that Movie Pass comes to Canada...