AmericaFree TV presents the IndyReels Revenue Sharing Program : FAQ File
IndyReels and AmericaFree.tv are two great venues for independent film makers to reach our audiences. They represent the direction movie viewing is moving in the 21st century.
Elanor Togliatti, Director, Buffalo Hearts
The Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) file
for the AmericaFree.TV IndyReels Program for Independent Films
What is the IndyReels Program ?
AmericaFree.TV is an advertising supported streaming video site (i.e., we provide free Internet Television). IndyReels is a program to share advertising revenues with Independent Film makers who chose to air their content on AmericaFree.TV. Selected films will air on the
IndyFree.TV channel, and on our main channels as appropriate, or
even as streaming Video on Demand.
What sort of revenue sharing ?
We are now offering a 50-50 revenue split, with several revenue opportunities.
If your film is chosen for an E-premier or other promotion, we will provide a web site and a Video on Demand (VOD) streaming of just your film.
For Video on Demand showings, all of the advertising revenues for the showing can be directly apportioned to the movie shown, and you get 30% of those revenues.
In any case, we will place your film in the appropriate channel stream, and provide revenues pro-rated by the audience hours the film
gets. (In other words, say if in a day there were 12 films shown, and they were all 2 hours long,
then each film would get 30% of 1/12th, or roughly 1/36th, of the ad revenues for that channel for that day.)
We may also place your content on Set Top Boxes (STB) that pay on a per click / view basis.
Either way, there are no upfront charges and no out of pocket fees to the content creator.
You pay nothing but the cost of sending us your content, and (if chosen) you will make money from people watching your movie !
Why are you doing this ?
To make money and acquire content. We think we can make a profit at that level. AmericaFree.TV wants to provide a basis for Independent films and productions, most of which make no money at present, through revenue sharing. We view this as a win-win for both sides; we get new content, you get a chance to air your movie, we both get some income. We reserve the right to alter the terms for new content.
How much money are we talking about ?
That depends on your audience. Note that the Internet is not like network TeleVision. There are many channels on at any time, both ours and others, not to mention many millions of video on demand items, downloadable content, etc. Audiences have to be grown, and we have spent the last 3 years in growing the AmericaFree.TV audience, which we will now share
with you (we now get 15,000 people or more per day viewing content). This means that thousands of people will look at your movie - how it does is, well, up to them.
The sums involved may not be huge, or even large - we can't predict that. What we can say is that we will give you your share. As of March, 2007, we have
paid out several thousand US Dollars to content creators.
What is an e-Premier ?
New Independent films submitted to the Indy Reels program may be suited for "e-Premiers", where we will
premier your film on the Internet. (Films that have premiered in film festivals are still eligible, but not ones
that have seen wide release on the Internet.)
e-Premier films do participate in revenue sharing, and will be promoted
on the home page of AmericaFree.TV.
So far (October, 2006), two films have had e-Premiers :
AmericaFree.TV's "IndyReels" program is aimed at... independent films. We are interested in films that tell a story, are informative, entertaining. If you have submitted your film to a film festival or aired it in a theater, we are especially interested.
All films submitted will be reviewed. We reserve the right to reject content for any reason, and are not interested in pornographic or excessively violent content.
AmericaFree.TV currently broadcasts on the Internet at 640 by 480 pixel resolution at 30 frames per second, so we are primarily
interested in movies that can deliver that resolution. A DVD version is preferred, but we will accept anything that Quicktime
can read. Movies will be re-encoded to match our broadcast encoding standards.
(We have found that DVD's are the best transfer mechanism for Gigabyte size video files, but
we can arrange a download.)
New! AmericaFree.TV is looking for HD Content for our new HD channel ! If you shot your movie
in HD, please let us know.
Will there be a contract of some sort for me to sign?
Yes, you will need to provide a license for us to air your film.
Will AmericaFree.TV have any ownership rights over my content and if so, what would be the extent of that ownership ?
We obviously have to have physical possession of at least one copy of each film.
We encode this material using our broadcast standards, so we would have these (digital) copies as well.
Also, we need a license to air it. That's it.
We will not have the rights under this program to sell DVD's, show your movie in cinemas, make mash-ups, etc.
Note that these Rights can be revoked at any time (just ask us to stop airing the work). By the same token, we reserve the right to pull any work from our schedule at any time for any reason.
What about DRM ?
We do not use DRM.
Can you help with promotion, DVD sales, etc. ?
To a limited extent. We will be glad to work with you in linking to your site or to your fulfillment agency for DVD sales, etc. Once your film is accepted, we will gladly review trailers of it or of your new films for airing on AmericaFree.TV. We could also discuss a promotional contract if you have a film being released through other channels.
Can I ask for Donations ?
Yes, of course. We can add a donate button directly to the player pages and also on the web site page
created for your movie. This can be done either with
Paypal or
Amazon.
What do I do now?
If you have a film for consideration (principals only, please), just send an e-mail to
info@americafree.tv
with as much information as you can (or links to your web site, film festival archive, etc.) and we will
begin the process of consideration.
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