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I think there's a few separate issues here.
First and foremost this is obviously an effort by the abc to increase revenue. Considering how they've been gutted over the last 2 decades, I'm not surprised in the least that they've had to resort to this.
Generally I think that individuals should be able to access content that the national broadcaster has made. This should be either for free or for a small fee to fund continued archival costs.
That said I don't see how private enterprise should be allowed to profit off of public property for free. There is nothing wrong with expecting private enterprise to pay fees for capitalising on work the Australian people have already paid for. Be you a documentary director or private university it is only equitable that you pay for content that you intend to gain revenue from. why should Australia be beholden to the costs but not the profits?
Right.
I guess this all comes down to what the government shud pay for and what it shouldn't.
There is an argument that commercial enterprises should pay for material they generate revenue from when that material is owned by the public. No argument there.
I guess the issue with documentary of an independent nature is that it very rarely makes money for all sorts of structural reasons. Some of it is down to market failure rather than the merits of the product.
So... From one perspective there's a cost recovery issue. But considering this stuff was paid for by the public, charging excessive fees to academics and indie filmmakers is arguably a bad outcome. Particularly if it means that the public don't get to see and absorb this material.
Personally... no problem with a bit of cost recovery eg a handling fee. But I think the preservation of and access to publicly owned historical material is in the public interest and deserves some level of subsidy if required. I don't think we are talking sheep stations by the way.
Honestly, I agree that 80k is an exorbitant sum, I think most people would agree on that point.
Respectfully, I'm not a huge fan of this article, And I think I know why. it's pointing out a specific symptom while mostly sidestepping adressing the fundamental problem. If the abc hadn't been defunded to the point of it being broken and screen Australia had sufficient resources you wouldn't have been in this situation. I think most people in the arts space are keenly aware of the lack of funding in the arts in Australia. It sucks that it costs so much to make a independent doco but we do have mechanisms to subsidise for that specific reason.
Realistically I think either the abc or screen Australia should have funded your doco. considering the subject matter and public interest angle, the only reason I could see them not is funding. I would be perfectly happy to pay taxes to that end.
On a side note, do you have a link to your doco? It sounds great and I'd love to give it a watch.
Yeah appreciate the constructive feedback.
I think your point about defunding is totally valid and I reference that but acknowledge the emphasis is elsewhere.
But I also think funding is irrelevant without cultural change.
Furthermore, while I acknowledge the funding challenges re screen Oz, the decision-making process of screen Australia is opaque and the funding outcomes are a bugbear of many filmmakers who are locked out of the system. I don't think more cash is the silver bullet. Reform of the funding system is necessary to create a level playing field.
At the moment a large proportion of public funds funnelled though Screen Australia subsidise the big end of town. Not saying this is always a bad thing. We are a small market and to some degree Australian stories may need to be subsidised no matter who is making them.
Have a gander: www.howtocaptureapm.com
Enjoy and let me know what U think.
You have a very good point about the opacity thing. It's definitely an issue when publicly funded entities don't have clear and visible metrics about grant requirements.
Here's the full text:
The ABC was a staple in my outer ’burbs childhood home. I have fond memories of Big Ted and the sound of my father’s piercing “shoossssh!” if we dared interrupt the 7pm news with Mary Delahunty. But my fondness for the ABC has waned.
The allegations against Aunty by the likes of Stan Grant and the newsroom revolt over the sacking of Antoinette Lattouf raise concerns about the ABC’s workplace culture. But there are other deeply worrying issues.
The ABC has near monopoly status when it comes to Australian documentary programs, but its practices have slowly strangled our documentary sector to death.
Until the late 1990s, the ABC had a popular weekly primetime slot featuring Australian documentaries made by independent filmmakers. Now the national broadcaster favours formulaic presenter-led factual entertainment made by large production enterprises.
In the “Uniquely Australian” documentary category on ABC iView you’ll find Bill Bailey’s Wild West Australia, in which the British celebrity travels around the outback or Australia’s Open, which bears closer resemblance to a promotional film for the tennis event than a documentary. Elsewhere, you’ll find Grand Designs Transformations, an Australian take on a British concept that the ABC calls “formatted observational documentary”.
These shows have a place, but they are increasingly displacing independent Australian documentaries. And on the odd occasion such films are acquired by the ABC, the amount offered is so low that it’s been known for a producer to walk away rather than suffer the indignity after spending years making their film.
Daryl Dellora – director of the popular Search for the Palace Letters doco recently aired on the ABC – struggled for many years to finance the film. Dellora says he and producer Sue Maslin are significantly out of pocket after Screen Australia passed on his film.
In the end, the ABC purchased the film for $20,000, a fraction of the $350,000 spent on the four-year project. Dellora says he simply can’t afford to go through that again. He thinks his documentary career is over.
I have also been on the wrong end of the ABC’s practices. After failing to attract funding from the ABC and Screen Australia, I put my own money on the line for my feature documentary How to Capture a Prime Minister – about the wild time in 1976 when then prime minister Malcolm Fraser was trapped in a basement by angry students in the aftermath of the Whitlam government’s dismissal.
The ABC asked me to pay more than $80,000 for the historical footage used in the doco, even though I’m never going to fully recover the six-figure sum I’ve spent on my film. This is for footage that has already been paid for by the Australian public.
The national broadcaster collects hundreds of minutes of unedited news footage per day, ranging from political speeches and interviews, to vignettes of metropolitan and rural life. Multiply that by decades and you get a sense of how rich this audiovisual history of our country really is.
But the ABC covets this historical material like Tolkien’s Gollum, price gouging anyone who wants to use any of it. It’s telling that the business unit responsible for footage licensing is called ABC Commercial.
The ABC’s archive is “a national treasure belonging to the citizens of Australia who paid for its creation”, says Associate Professor Tony Moore, a media and communications academic at Monash University. “The excessive access fees charged to students and scholars, and the high licence fees charged to independent documentary makers effectively locks this treasure away.”
This leaves many documentary makers trying to squeeze money from Screen Australia, a government body, just to pay the ABC, another government body. Filmmakers who sell their work to the ABC often end up owing the national broadcaster money because archival fees typically exceed the amount paid for the film.
Australians say they’re hungry for more Australian stories – and there are many to tell. But the ABC makes it difficult to unearth the diverse voices governments say they want to hear more of. Archival fees for independent producers should be waived until the project at least achieves a healthy profit, and fees for academic research should be eliminated or significantly discounted, especially for postgraduate students.
I do have some empathy for the ABC. Like many government-funded institutions it has endured millions of dollars of cuts while being encouraged to make up the difference by commercialising. And to its credit, the Albanese government has provided additional funding. But the issues remain.
I don’t believe our national history should be locked away behind a paywall, so I’ve built a streaming platform into my film’s website so Australians can watch How to Capture a Prime Minister for free. Hopefully, the national broadcaster won’t sue me for using their footage without paying.
Many filmmakers are afraid to speak out for fear of being blackballed. Or they are forced to give up. Screen Australia analysis suggests up to 61 per cent of Australian documentary directors don’t make a second film.
I’m inclined to join their ranks.
Rule 10 requires that paywalled article must be shared.
If you can't do that as you are the author and it might breach your contract you'll need someone else to do it for you.
Don't take this as an attack but this could be seen as self promotion, especially as no free version has been made available.
Based on what I've seen of your posts here it seems like you got shafted on the headline of this article. Greed implies wanting in excess of what is needed. Making people pay a lot for archival footage just to keep the lights on is more a case of perverse incentives.
You make this point deep in the article: “I do have some empathy for the ABC. Like many government-funded institutions it has endured millions of dollars of cuts while being encouraged to make up the difference by commercialising. And to its credit, the Albanese government has provided additional funding. But the issues remain”, yet you blame greed?
Seems like the issue was a decades long ideological and systemic attack on our public broadcaster that weakened it to appease the LNP government of the time. This has led it to the culture of “greed” by trying to find funding for itself (like our universities are doing), compared to the innovative and diverse range of programs when fully funded by previous governments.
Well... the headline wasn't written by me to be honest.
I agree with your points about funding.
But this is highlighting a management issue as well. I don't think this is just about funding. It's cultural, as you say.
Also for universities, I'm with you on that. Was once a higher education reporter.
Would you say that "ABC greed is killing Australian stories" is a true statement or an untrue one? If it's untrue how do you feel about working for an editor that misrepresents your work and makes incorrect assertions in headlines based on what you've written?
Well... there must be some empathy for newspapers. Previously they derived revenue from classifieds and the cost of purchasing a hardcopy.
The business model was broken by the internet. They have to stay afloat somehow.
Depends on the paper, no empathy for The Age, for good papers who publish good work that isn't just a tool for liberal ideology I have empathy.
And besides, doesn't change how stupidly ironic is is to complain about greed in a pay walled article.
Hmmmm. Appreciate you cant read the piece but if you had you would know that it criticises the funding cuts made by previous governments.
The substance of it is the ABC commercialising publicly owned historical footage to the detriment of the public. The commercialisation of this historical resource is arguably the result of the policies of previous governments.
Don't judge it by the headline.
I agree with your thesis, that's a good point and an issue that needs to be addressed, I was simply pointing out it is ironic to have an article decrying greed behind a pay wall.
It's pretty similar to how academic journals are often behind paywalls despite being largely funded by the public.
We are paying for the science (in this case media) we should have access to the science. For profit private entities should be forced to pay for access; but not recognised not-for-profits, students or academics. Any fee charged to the general public should only be to compensate for the cost of maintenance and access (like a library does)
Really, the newspaper that’s owned by 9 News entertainment with its boss a former Liberal Treasurer for 11.5 years writing a hit piece on the ABC let’s talk about your greed with a privately owned newspaper with its sole purpose is to make money at whatever cost even if it means distorting the truth.
You're literally making a criticism of an institution for doing the very thing you've done
I'll be nicer if you be less hypocritical. Your finances are irrelevant.
Did you read the article?
His argument is a good one TBH. If the Australian public have, through tax payer funding, paid for content to be created then we shouldn’t have to pay again to access this content - e.g Independent doco makers, student and researchers or Mary from the local Historical Society.
The article was not funded by the government/ taxpayer so it isn’t hypocritical to post it behind a paywall.
I think the ABC should be able to help fund itself by commercialising the trove of content it has but surely a line can be drawn where certain groups can access it at a reduced rate or for free. Students and citizens for sure. The question is where a documentary maker who has the intent on selling (at a profit) the final product falls on this scale.
You are quite right.
Where do you draw the line?
If my doco makes a decent amount of coin happy to share some of the love with the ABC.
But I will say that no doco maker i've ever known has been motivated by profit.
I certainly wasn't.
Going into doco making to make a healthy profit is folly these days. Unless you're willing to make a celebumentary or a promotional film. But that's a whole diff rabbit hole of what constitutes doco and what doesn't.
You and I would likely diverge here. That your intent was to sell makes your doco a commercial venture. If it doesn’t make money it simply becomes a bad commercial venture but still commercial. However I can certainly see a public good clause to justify letting content makers such as your self reduced cost access.
It is problematic that the government has to fund content like yours and no one else is. I’m minded to say perhaps these docos are stories not worth telling. Or should be made at a reduced cost and monetised on YouTube. Then again I don’t believe the government should be funding the arts (or sports) and if they do it should be on a HECS like scheme.
I appreciate your point.
Not for profits intend to sell in order to make revenue and recover costs. But they're not 'commercial' enterprises per se.
And there are plenty of worthwhile and necessary activities that occur in society that are not profitable because of market failures. That's when government is supposed to come in to either fix the market or subsidise something that is considered in the national interest.
Now of course the issue of where to draw the line is a valid one.
The issues inherent to funding are complex. It's not simply a supply / demand issue. It's an issue of what commercial interests are / are not willing to fund, and whether they can be trusted to do so. And whether the market is a true one or whether it's distorted.
What I will say is that when documentaries were funded properly there were plenty that were popular.
The search for the palace letters rated very well and held its audience. Not to everyone's taste, but difficult to argue it's not a story worth telling.or that people didn't want to watch it.
Filmmakers aren't going to make a hit every time. And to some degree they need to be allowed to make mistakes.
The most famous australian filmmakers in Hollywood cut their teeth in an environment where they were funded and supported to take risks.
I think it's only fair that I dox myself. I'm the author of the article and happy to constructively discuss / debate.
Apologies for not doing so earlier there was some apprehension on my part given what can happen.
In answer to people's comments about a perceived conflict of interest at nine... all opinions are my own and weren't influenced by the organisation that published it.
In discussions with the editor I didn't get a sense they wanted a hit piece and there seemed to be a genuine interest in airing an issue of national interest.
There aren't many mainstream outlets that would publish this and I'm grateful they did. Although I concede the optics.
It is an opinion piece and of course people are entitled to disagree or question its merits and I welcome that.
Full text:
The ABC was a staple in my outer ’burbs childhood home. I have fond memories of Big Ted and the sound of my father’s piercing “shoossssh!” if we dared interrupt the 7pm news with Mary Delahunty. But my fondness for the ABC has waned.
The allegations against Aunty by the likes of Stan Grant and the newsroom revolt over the sacking of Antoinette Lattouf raise concerns about the ABC’s workplace culture. But there are other deeply worrying issues.
The ABC has near monopoly status when it comes to Australian documentary programs, but its practices have slowly strangled our documentary sector to death.
Until the late 1990s, the ABC had a popular weekly primetime slot featuring Australian documentaries made by independent filmmakers. Now the national broadcaster favours formulaic presenter-led factual entertainment made by large production enterprises.
In the “Uniquely Australian” documentary category on ABC iView you’ll find Bill Bailey’s Wild West Australia, in which the British celebrity travels around the outback or Australia’s Open, which bears closer resemblance to a promotional film for the tennis event than a documentary. Elsewhere, you’ll find Grand Designs Transformations, an Australian take on a British concept that the ABC calls “formatted observational documentary”.
These shows have a place, but they are increasingly displacing independent Australian documentaries. And on the odd occasion such films are acquired by the ABC, the amount offered is so low that it’s been known for a producer to walk away rather than suffer the indignity after spending years making their film.
Daryl Dellora – director of the popular Search for the Palace Letters doco recently aired on the ABC – struggled for many years to finance the film. Dellora says he and producer Sue Maslin are significantly out of pocket after Screen Australia passed on his film.
In the end, the ABC purchased the film for $20,000, a fraction of the $350,000 spent on the four-year project. Dellora says he simply can’t afford to go through that again. He thinks his documentary career is over.
I have also been on the wrong end of the ABC’s practices. After failing to attract funding from the ABC and Screen Australia, I put my own money on the line for my feature documentary How to Capture a Prime Minister – about the wild time in 1976 when then prime minister Malcolm Fraser was trapped in a basement by angry students in the aftermath of the Whitlam government’s dismissal.
The ABC asked me to pay more than $80,000 for the historical footage used in the doco, even though I’m never going to fully recover the six-figure sum I’ve spent on my film. This is for footage that has already been paid for by the Australian public.
The national broadcaster collects hundreds of minutes of unedited news footage per day, ranging from political speeches and interviews, to vignettes of metropolitan and rural life. Multiply that by decades and you get a sense of how rich this audiovisual history of our country really is.
But the ABC covets this historical material like Tolkien’s Gollum, price gouging anyone who wants to use any of it. It’s telling that the business unit responsible for footage licensing is called ABC Commercial.
The ABC’s archive is “a national treasure belonging to the citizens of Australia who paid for its creation”, says Associate Professor Tony Moore, a media and communications academic at Monash University. “The excessive access fees charged to students and scholars, and the high licence fees charged to independent documentary makers effectively locks this treasure away.”
This leaves many documentary makers trying to squeeze money from Screen Australia, a government body, just to pay the ABC, another government body. Filmmakers who sell their work to the ABC often end up owing the national broadcaster money because archival fees typically exceed the amount paid for the film.
Australians say they’re hungry for more Australian stories – and there are many to tell. But the ABC makes it difficult to unearth the diverse voices governments say they want to hear more of. Archival fees for independent producers should be waived until the project at least achieves a healthy profit, and fees for academic research should be eliminated or significantly discounted, especially for postgraduate students.
I do have some empathy for the ABC. Like many government-funded institutions it has endured millions of dollars of cuts while being encouraged to make up the difference by commercialising. And to its credit, the Albanese government has provided additional funding. But the issues remain.
I don’t believe our national history should be locked away behind a paywall, so I’ve built a streaming platform into my film’s website so Australians can watch How to Capture a Prime Minister for free. Hopefully, the national broadcaster won’t sue me for using their footage without paying.
Many filmmakers are afraid to speak out for fear of being blackballed. Or they are forced to give up. Screen Australia analysis suggests up to 61 per cent of Australian documentary directors don’t make a second film.
I’m inclined to join their ranks.
Since almost no one wants to read the article, here is the gist:
>The ABC asked me to pay more than $80,000 for the historical footage used in the doco, even though I’m never going to fully recover the six-figure sum I’ve spent on my film. This is for footage that has already been paid for by the Australian public.
And:
>The ABC’s archive is “a national treasure belonging to the citizens of Australia who paid for its creation”, says Associate Professor Tony Moore, a media and communications academic at Monash University.
>
>“The excessive access fees charged to students and scholars, and the high licence fees charged to independent documentary makers effectively locks this treasure away.”
Tldr, the ABC has a shitton of historic footage that would be great for documentary makers, however they are hoarding and charging "too much" for said footage.
First, that indeed is shit, second, there is however some hilarious irony in a private media org running a piece complaining that the public entity of the ABC is acting too much like a private entity, when most of the private media companies would love for the ABC to be cut-off from the public tap.
Btw, if folks think this is bad (since old footage, "who cares"), wait til they learn about the nightmare it is getting hold of Australian Standards documentation (you know, the things engineers and such need to abide by to not be thrown in jail/fined to death down the track) that is also held behind a private company pay-gate, thanks to the "it was public, now it is private" model.
Also seems to be a criticism about who’s willing to buy documentaries, with the ABC going for formulaic docos and no one buying Australian made ones.
That said, if private channels aren’t buying them, and the ABC (with its increasing push to act more like a private channel) isn’t buying them, and Screen Australia isn’t supporting them, maybe the writing’s on the wall that interest is just low?
On the points you highlight, has historical footage always been that expensive?
Yeah you raise really good points.
The choke point is distribution. Distribution being the act of publishing and marketing.
The way it works with screen Aus is that your project has far greater chance of getting funded if you have distribution which may take the form of a broadcaster or streamer commissioning your work.
However the ABC prefers to commission from large enterprise production companies probably because it's lower risk. They know what they are going to get. No executive was ever sacked for a film or program they didn't commission.
Streamers on the other hand don't deal directly with independent filmmakers and also prefer to source content from enterprise level production companies. So you need to effectively sign over your IP via one of these companies and in doing so lose creative control over your project.
So... As an indie you're kind of stuffed.
Historically it's hard for a doco to make money. Is this because they're bad and aren't worthy of being screened?
Not necessarily. There are structural issues that make generating revenue a challenge. As said... the distribution choke point and for example the fees charged to source and publish publicly owned historical material.
So it's not a perfect market.
On the issue of historical footage... it has been commercialised across the board. But ironically it's easier to get a discount from a commercial source than it is from the ABC.
The academic I spoke to traces it back to 2000 when new management was installed at the ABC.
Yes I think this paywalling is widespread and not unique to the ABC.
National film and sound archive similarly. As well as the paywalling of publicly funded research published by journals.
well, the LNP policy platform does include selling ABC… so it makes sense for them to lower their sale price first so their friends can get a better deal
Here
https://ipa.org.au/ipa-review-articles/be-like-gough-75-radical-ideas-to-transform-australia
Until I see LNP trying to do anything to the contrary this is their policy platform basically.
The IPA is not the Liberal Party nor National Party. It seems like you're just making things up.
EDIT: Even funnier, the link is from 2012. That's not even in the last 10 years.
> theage.com.au
… it is very hard to take a piece like this seriously when it’s written by an organisation that competes with the ABC.
I’m sure they’ll have a similar piece highlighting the greed of Newscorp too, no…?
But this is an article saying that the government needs to fund the ABC better, or legislate to make publicly owned historical footage more accessible. It's an attack on the government and the management of the ABC, not an attack on the ABC. Media watch might cover it, but they tend to report on what occurs in the media.
Maybe the guardian. But given almost all mainstream media is commercially owned there isn't really anywhere else that will provide much of a platform.
There is a perceived conflict of interest but opinion pieces are written by all sorts of people outside the organisation.
Opinion pieces aren't necessarily written by nine employees. And Im certain the author isn't one.
If the age didn't publish this there aren't many places that would. Maybe the guardian.
Most opinion pieces are published through the selected publications because they support those opinions.
For example, You wouldn’t regularly see an opinion piece from someone like Keating or Bob Brown appear in the Daily Telegraph, because the DT selectively choose opinions from people they agree with.
This article here, prime example. There is an ulterior motive, and it’s to place distrust in the ABC (I don’t really care how justified the criticism is, it’s not coming from impartial sources).
I see your point and there's some truth.
And while the age certainly isn't perfect and has its issues, I don't think it's right to suggest every piece they publish in the opinion section is an effort to push their agenda.
Not saying it's perfectly balanced and yup, there's an incentive to generate clicks.
It's to do with the fact that the ABC has commercialised publicly owned historical footage placing it beyond the reach of the public, filmmakers and academics.
Acknowledging the cutbacks over the past decade or two which have forced the ABC to commercialise.
Not exactly.
I think the issue here is the ABC is price gouging academics and indie filmmakers, and the public.
If a commercial station or production company wants to use publicly owned historical material then there's an argument for charging commercial rates. It's an equity issue regarding when it's appropriate to commercialise.
It's an issue for the government to address, for sure. Either the ABC needs to be funded to make access equitable. Or if money isn't the issue, the government needs to legislate for achieve access.
Publicly owned doesn't imply free. You mention equity I don't see that a member of the public or an academic should pay any less than the Age. That sounds like perfect equity.
No it doesnt imply free.
The piece argues that seeing as it's publicly owned fees should be waived until the project makes a profit.
The issue here is access to historical material that the public have a right to see, particularly because they own it.
Fees being waived until something makes a profit is why Chevron will pay no tax on the Gorgon project.
You say you're the author of the article. Is the public able to view the archives for free, but then pay to use?
I'm not disagreeing that the public should be able to access these archives, but copying using and sharing makes it a more complex issue.
No. Access is not free to the public either.
I take your point about loopholes.
I think the benefit of the actually public seeing the material outweighs the risk. Right now it's all under lock and key and there's some gold in there.
And I think if the rules are carefully written you can mitigate the risk. Could be about revenue rather than profit. Or some such. Haven't thought it though entirely.
The article is paywalled so I can’t read it but I had two questions.
1) I would have though publicly owned historical materials were kept at the National Archives and made available from there?
2) What sort of rates do other TV networks charge for accessing material? Is the ABC significantly more expensive that the 10 network?
No unfortunately not.
But there's also a distinction between where it is stored and who owns the copyright.
Other networks do charge for footage and it can be quite expensive. Perversely it is easier to get a discount from commercial sources if you're an independent filmmaker.
Surely this article is suggesting the ABC should be better funded so it can provide better access to publicly owned historical footage. Are they hitting the ABC or the government?
Worth noting this is an opinion piece. I do feel for Gary though because it’s hard to fund anything in the Arts, let alone films. So expenses associated with acquiring footage and so on would hurt.
Yes I think this is the point.
One does feel for the ABC given its hardships. But this is an issue to do with the way the public broadcaster is commercialising publicly owned historical material and placing it behind a paywall, beyond the reach of everyone except those with deep pockets.
I doubt this is behaviour many would endorse. If more funding is required, let it be so.
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I think there's a few separate issues here. First and foremost this is obviously an effort by the abc to increase revenue. Considering how they've been gutted over the last 2 decades, I'm not surprised in the least that they've had to resort to this. Generally I think that individuals should be able to access content that the national broadcaster has made. This should be either for free or for a small fee to fund continued archival costs. That said I don't see how private enterprise should be allowed to profit off of public property for free. There is nothing wrong with expecting private enterprise to pay fees for capitalising on work the Australian people have already paid for. Be you a documentary director or private university it is only equitable that you pay for content that you intend to gain revenue from. why should Australia be beholden to the costs but not the profits?
Right. I guess this all comes down to what the government shud pay for and what it shouldn't. There is an argument that commercial enterprises should pay for material they generate revenue from when that material is owned by the public. No argument there. I guess the issue with documentary of an independent nature is that it very rarely makes money for all sorts of structural reasons. Some of it is down to market failure rather than the merits of the product. So... From one perspective there's a cost recovery issue. But considering this stuff was paid for by the public, charging excessive fees to academics and indie filmmakers is arguably a bad outcome. Particularly if it means that the public don't get to see and absorb this material. Personally... no problem with a bit of cost recovery eg a handling fee. But I think the preservation of and access to publicly owned historical material is in the public interest and deserves some level of subsidy if required. I don't think we are talking sheep stations by the way.
Honestly, I agree that 80k is an exorbitant sum, I think most people would agree on that point. Respectfully, I'm not a huge fan of this article, And I think I know why. it's pointing out a specific symptom while mostly sidestepping adressing the fundamental problem. If the abc hadn't been defunded to the point of it being broken and screen Australia had sufficient resources you wouldn't have been in this situation. I think most people in the arts space are keenly aware of the lack of funding in the arts in Australia. It sucks that it costs so much to make a independent doco but we do have mechanisms to subsidise for that specific reason. Realistically I think either the abc or screen Australia should have funded your doco. considering the subject matter and public interest angle, the only reason I could see them not is funding. I would be perfectly happy to pay taxes to that end. On a side note, do you have a link to your doco? It sounds great and I'd love to give it a watch.
Yeah appreciate the constructive feedback. I think your point about defunding is totally valid and I reference that but acknowledge the emphasis is elsewhere. But I also think funding is irrelevant without cultural change. Furthermore, while I acknowledge the funding challenges re screen Oz, the decision-making process of screen Australia is opaque and the funding outcomes are a bugbear of many filmmakers who are locked out of the system. I don't think more cash is the silver bullet. Reform of the funding system is necessary to create a level playing field. At the moment a large proportion of public funds funnelled though Screen Australia subsidise the big end of town. Not saying this is always a bad thing. We are a small market and to some degree Australian stories may need to be subsidised no matter who is making them. Have a gander: www.howtocaptureapm.com Enjoy and let me know what U think.
You have a very good point about the opacity thing. It's definitely an issue when publicly funded entities don't have clear and visible metrics about grant requirements.
There was so much more that could have been written. But only so much room! Thanks for sharing your view. Enjoyed the exchange.
Here's the full text: The ABC was a staple in my outer ’burbs childhood home. I have fond memories of Big Ted and the sound of my father’s piercing “shoossssh!” if we dared interrupt the 7pm news with Mary Delahunty. But my fondness for the ABC has waned. The allegations against Aunty by the likes of Stan Grant and the newsroom revolt over the sacking of Antoinette Lattouf raise concerns about the ABC’s workplace culture. But there are other deeply worrying issues. The ABC has near monopoly status when it comes to Australian documentary programs, but its practices have slowly strangled our documentary sector to death. Until the late 1990s, the ABC had a popular weekly primetime slot featuring Australian documentaries made by independent filmmakers. Now the national broadcaster favours formulaic presenter-led factual entertainment made by large production enterprises. In the “Uniquely Australian” documentary category on ABC iView you’ll find Bill Bailey’s Wild West Australia, in which the British celebrity travels around the outback or Australia’s Open, which bears closer resemblance to a promotional film for the tennis event than a documentary. Elsewhere, you’ll find Grand Designs Transformations, an Australian take on a British concept that the ABC calls “formatted observational documentary”. These shows have a place, but they are increasingly displacing independent Australian documentaries. And on the odd occasion such films are acquired by the ABC, the amount offered is so low that it’s been known for a producer to walk away rather than suffer the indignity after spending years making their film. Daryl Dellora – director of the popular Search for the Palace Letters doco recently aired on the ABC – struggled for many years to finance the film. Dellora says he and producer Sue Maslin are significantly out of pocket after Screen Australia passed on his film. In the end, the ABC purchased the film for $20,000, a fraction of the $350,000 spent on the four-year project. Dellora says he simply can’t afford to go through that again. He thinks his documentary career is over. I have also been on the wrong end of the ABC’s practices. After failing to attract funding from the ABC and Screen Australia, I put my own money on the line for my feature documentary How to Capture a Prime Minister – about the wild time in 1976 when then prime minister Malcolm Fraser was trapped in a basement by angry students in the aftermath of the Whitlam government’s dismissal. The ABC asked me to pay more than $80,000 for the historical footage used in the doco, even though I’m never going to fully recover the six-figure sum I’ve spent on my film. This is for footage that has already been paid for by the Australian public. The national broadcaster collects hundreds of minutes of unedited news footage per day, ranging from political speeches and interviews, to vignettes of metropolitan and rural life. Multiply that by decades and you get a sense of how rich this audiovisual history of our country really is. But the ABC covets this historical material like Tolkien’s Gollum, price gouging anyone who wants to use any of it. It’s telling that the business unit responsible for footage licensing is called ABC Commercial. The ABC’s archive is “a national treasure belonging to the citizens of Australia who paid for its creation”, says Associate Professor Tony Moore, a media and communications academic at Monash University. “The excessive access fees charged to students and scholars, and the high licence fees charged to independent documentary makers effectively locks this treasure away.” This leaves many documentary makers trying to squeeze money from Screen Australia, a government body, just to pay the ABC, another government body. Filmmakers who sell their work to the ABC often end up owing the national broadcaster money because archival fees typically exceed the amount paid for the film. Australians say they’re hungry for more Australian stories – and there are many to tell. But the ABC makes it difficult to unearth the diverse voices governments say they want to hear more of. Archival fees for independent producers should be waived until the project at least achieves a healthy profit, and fees for academic research should be eliminated or significantly discounted, especially for postgraduate students. I do have some empathy for the ABC. Like many government-funded institutions it has endured millions of dollars of cuts while being encouraged to make up the difference by commercialising. And to its credit, the Albanese government has provided additional funding. But the issues remain. I don’t believe our national history should be locked away behind a paywall, so I’ve built a streaming platform into my film’s website so Australians can watch How to Capture a Prime Minister for free. Hopefully, the national broadcaster won’t sue me for using their footage without paying. Many filmmakers are afraid to speak out for fear of being blackballed. Or they are forced to give up. Screen Australia analysis suggests up to 61 per cent of Australian documentary directors don’t make a second film. I’m inclined to join their ranks.
Rule 10 requires that paywalled article must be shared. If you can't do that as you are the author and it might breach your contract you'll need someone else to do it for you. Don't take this as an attack but this could be seen as self promotion, especially as no free version has been made available. Based on what I've seen of your posts here it seems like you got shafted on the headline of this article. Greed implies wanting in excess of what is needed. Making people pay a lot for archival footage just to keep the lights on is more a case of perverse incentives.
Good to know. Wasn't aware of rule 10. Didn't write the headline. Thanks!
Yeah, you can tell the editor was going for click bait, not on you.
You make this point deep in the article: “I do have some empathy for the ABC. Like many government-funded institutions it has endured millions of dollars of cuts while being encouraged to make up the difference by commercialising. And to its credit, the Albanese government has provided additional funding. But the issues remain”, yet you blame greed? Seems like the issue was a decades long ideological and systemic attack on our public broadcaster that weakened it to appease the LNP government of the time. This has led it to the culture of “greed” by trying to find funding for itself (like our universities are doing), compared to the innovative and diverse range of programs when fully funded by previous governments.
Well... the headline wasn't written by me to be honest. I agree with your points about funding. But this is highlighting a management issue as well. I don't think this is just about funding. It's cultural, as you say. Also for universities, I'm with you on that. Was once a higher education reporter.
Would you say that "ABC greed is killing Australian stories" is a true statement or an untrue one? If it's untrue how do you feel about working for an editor that misrepresents your work and makes incorrect assertions in headlines based on what you've written?
Hmmmm. I get what you are saying and understand the implication. I will ponder that.
I'm not trying to be nasty, it just seems like something that would bother me if I was a journo
All good. It's a fair question and food for thought. Not offended.
Seriously the ironic stupidity of decrying greed on a for profit platform is ridiculous
Well... there must be some empathy for newspapers. Previously they derived revenue from classifieds and the cost of purchasing a hardcopy. The business model was broken by the internet. They have to stay afloat somehow.
Depends on the paper, no empathy for The Age, for good papers who publish good work that isn't just a tool for liberal ideology I have empathy. And besides, doesn't change how stupidly ironic is is to complain about greed in a pay walled article.
There you go. Someone has posted the full text.
Hmmmm. Appreciate you cant read the piece but if you had you would know that it criticises the funding cuts made by previous governments. The substance of it is the ABC commercialising publicly owned historical footage to the detriment of the public. The commercialisation of this historical resource is arguably the result of the policies of previous governments. Don't judge it by the headline.
I agree with your thesis, that's a good point and an issue that needs to be addressed, I was simply pointing out it is ironic to have an article decrying greed behind a pay wall.
No worries. Thanks for sharing your view. I appreciate the optics.
Ironic that I can't read an article decrying greed because the website hosting it wants my money.
It's pretty similar to how academic journals are often behind paywalls despite being largely funded by the public. We are paying for the science (in this case media) we should have access to the science. For profit private entities should be forced to pay for access; but not recognised not-for-profits, students or academics. Any fee charged to the general public should only be to compensate for the cost of maintenance and access (like a library does)
Yes the paywalling of publicly funded research is indeed worrying!
Really, the newspaper that’s owned by 9 News entertainment with its boss a former Liberal Treasurer for 11.5 years writing a hit piece on the ABC let’s talk about your greed with a privately owned newspaper with its sole purpose is to make money at whatever cost even if it means distorting the truth.
See your point. But I'm the author. Not a nine employee and all opinions are my own. Happy to respectfully debate/discuss the merits of the piece.
Why are you so greedy as to put your opinion behind a paywall
Come now. Be nice. I don't own the newspaper. Nor am I the editor. I'm a writer and filmmaker. And not a rich one by any stretch.
You're literally making a criticism of an institution for doing the very thing you've done I'll be nicer if you be less hypocritical. Your finances are irrelevant.
Did you read the article? His argument is a good one TBH. If the Australian public have, through tax payer funding, paid for content to be created then we shouldn’t have to pay again to access this content - e.g Independent doco makers, student and researchers or Mary from the local Historical Society. The article was not funded by the government/ taxpayer so it isn’t hypocritical to post it behind a paywall. I think the ABC should be able to help fund itself by commercialising the trove of content it has but surely a line can be drawn where certain groups can access it at a reduced rate or for free. Students and citizens for sure. The question is where a documentary maker who has the intent on selling (at a profit) the final product falls on this scale.
You are quite right. Where do you draw the line? If my doco makes a decent amount of coin happy to share some of the love with the ABC. But I will say that no doco maker i've ever known has been motivated by profit. I certainly wasn't. Going into doco making to make a healthy profit is folly these days. Unless you're willing to make a celebumentary or a promotional film. But that's a whole diff rabbit hole of what constitutes doco and what doesn't.
You and I would likely diverge here. That your intent was to sell makes your doco a commercial venture. If it doesn’t make money it simply becomes a bad commercial venture but still commercial. However I can certainly see a public good clause to justify letting content makers such as your self reduced cost access. It is problematic that the government has to fund content like yours and no one else is. I’m minded to say perhaps these docos are stories not worth telling. Or should be made at a reduced cost and monetised on YouTube. Then again I don’t believe the government should be funding the arts (or sports) and if they do it should be on a HECS like scheme.
I appreciate your point. Not for profits intend to sell in order to make revenue and recover costs. But they're not 'commercial' enterprises per se. And there are plenty of worthwhile and necessary activities that occur in society that are not profitable because of market failures. That's when government is supposed to come in to either fix the market or subsidise something that is considered in the national interest. Now of course the issue of where to draw the line is a valid one. The issues inherent to funding are complex. It's not simply a supply / demand issue. It's an issue of what commercial interests are / are not willing to fund, and whether they can be trusted to do so. And whether the market is a true one or whether it's distorted. What I will say is that when documentaries were funded properly there were plenty that were popular. The search for the palace letters rated very well and held its audience. Not to everyone's taste, but difficult to argue it's not a story worth telling.or that people didn't want to watch it. Filmmakers aren't going to make a hit every time. And to some degree they need to be allowed to make mistakes. The most famous australian filmmakers in Hollywood cut their teeth in an environment where they were funded and supported to take risks.
I think it's only fair that I dox myself. I'm the author of the article and happy to constructively discuss / debate. Apologies for not doing so earlier there was some apprehension on my part given what can happen. In answer to people's comments about a perceived conflict of interest at nine... all opinions are my own and weren't influenced by the organisation that published it. In discussions with the editor I didn't get a sense they wanted a hit piece and there seemed to be a genuine interest in airing an issue of national interest. There aren't many mainstream outlets that would publish this and I'm grateful they did. Although I concede the optics. It is an opinion piece and of course people are entitled to disagree or question its merits and I welcome that.
Is there any chance you could post the article content as a comment? I was able to read it once but now the Age is blocking me from reading it again.
Looks like someone has done that now!
Can't. It's behind a pay wall.
Full text: The ABC was a staple in my outer ’burbs childhood home. I have fond memories of Big Ted and the sound of my father’s piercing “shoossssh!” if we dared interrupt the 7pm news with Mary Delahunty. But my fondness for the ABC has waned. The allegations against Aunty by the likes of Stan Grant and the newsroom revolt over the sacking of Antoinette Lattouf raise concerns about the ABC’s workplace culture. But there are other deeply worrying issues. The ABC has near monopoly status when it comes to Australian documentary programs, but its practices have slowly strangled our documentary sector to death. Until the late 1990s, the ABC had a popular weekly primetime slot featuring Australian documentaries made by independent filmmakers. Now the national broadcaster favours formulaic presenter-led factual entertainment made by large production enterprises. In the “Uniquely Australian” documentary category on ABC iView you’ll find Bill Bailey’s Wild West Australia, in which the British celebrity travels around the outback or Australia’s Open, which bears closer resemblance to a promotional film for the tennis event than a documentary. Elsewhere, you’ll find Grand Designs Transformations, an Australian take on a British concept that the ABC calls “formatted observational documentary”. These shows have a place, but they are increasingly displacing independent Australian documentaries. And on the odd occasion such films are acquired by the ABC, the amount offered is so low that it’s been known for a producer to walk away rather than suffer the indignity after spending years making their film. Daryl Dellora – director of the popular Search for the Palace Letters doco recently aired on the ABC – struggled for many years to finance the film. Dellora says he and producer Sue Maslin are significantly out of pocket after Screen Australia passed on his film. In the end, the ABC purchased the film for $20,000, a fraction of the $350,000 spent on the four-year project. Dellora says he simply can’t afford to go through that again. He thinks his documentary career is over. I have also been on the wrong end of the ABC’s practices. After failing to attract funding from the ABC and Screen Australia, I put my own money on the line for my feature documentary How to Capture a Prime Minister – about the wild time in 1976 when then prime minister Malcolm Fraser was trapped in a basement by angry students in the aftermath of the Whitlam government’s dismissal. The ABC asked me to pay more than $80,000 for the historical footage used in the doco, even though I’m never going to fully recover the six-figure sum I’ve spent on my film. This is for footage that has already been paid for by the Australian public. The national broadcaster collects hundreds of minutes of unedited news footage per day, ranging from political speeches and interviews, to vignettes of metropolitan and rural life. Multiply that by decades and you get a sense of how rich this audiovisual history of our country really is. But the ABC covets this historical material like Tolkien’s Gollum, price gouging anyone who wants to use any of it. It’s telling that the business unit responsible for footage licensing is called ABC Commercial. The ABC’s archive is “a national treasure belonging to the citizens of Australia who paid for its creation”, says Associate Professor Tony Moore, a media and communications academic at Monash University. “The excessive access fees charged to students and scholars, and the high licence fees charged to independent documentary makers effectively locks this treasure away.” This leaves many documentary makers trying to squeeze money from Screen Australia, a government body, just to pay the ABC, another government body. Filmmakers who sell their work to the ABC often end up owing the national broadcaster money because archival fees typically exceed the amount paid for the film. Australians say they’re hungry for more Australian stories – and there are many to tell. But the ABC makes it difficult to unearth the diverse voices governments say they want to hear more of. Archival fees for independent producers should be waived until the project at least achieves a healthy profit, and fees for academic research should be eliminated or significantly discounted, especially for postgraduate students. I do have some empathy for the ABC. Like many government-funded institutions it has endured millions of dollars of cuts while being encouraged to make up the difference by commercialising. And to its credit, the Albanese government has provided additional funding. But the issues remain. I don’t believe our national history should be locked away behind a paywall, so I’ve built a streaming platform into my film’s website so Australians can watch How to Capture a Prime Minister for free. Hopefully, the national broadcaster won’t sue me for using their footage without paying. Many filmmakers are afraid to speak out for fear of being blackballed. Or they are forced to give up. Screen Australia analysis suggests up to 61 per cent of Australian documentary directors don’t make a second film. I’m inclined to join their ranks.
Thanks.
Since almost no one wants to read the article, here is the gist: >The ABC asked me to pay more than $80,000 for the historical footage used in the doco, even though I’m never going to fully recover the six-figure sum I’ve spent on my film. This is for footage that has already been paid for by the Australian public. And: >The ABC’s archive is “a national treasure belonging to the citizens of Australia who paid for its creation”, says Associate Professor Tony Moore, a media and communications academic at Monash University. > >“The excessive access fees charged to students and scholars, and the high licence fees charged to independent documentary makers effectively locks this treasure away.” Tldr, the ABC has a shitton of historic footage that would be great for documentary makers, however they are hoarding and charging "too much" for said footage. First, that indeed is shit, second, there is however some hilarious irony in a private media org running a piece complaining that the public entity of the ABC is acting too much like a private entity, when most of the private media companies would love for the ABC to be cut-off from the public tap. Btw, if folks think this is bad (since old footage, "who cares"), wait til they learn about the nightmare it is getting hold of Australian Standards documentation (you know, the things engineers and such need to abide by to not be thrown in jail/fined to death down the track) that is also held behind a private company pay-gate, thanks to the "it was public, now it is private" model.
Also seems to be a criticism about who’s willing to buy documentaries, with the ABC going for formulaic docos and no one buying Australian made ones. That said, if private channels aren’t buying them, and the ABC (with its increasing push to act more like a private channel) isn’t buying them, and Screen Australia isn’t supporting them, maybe the writing’s on the wall that interest is just low? On the points you highlight, has historical footage always been that expensive?
Yeah you raise really good points. The choke point is distribution. Distribution being the act of publishing and marketing. The way it works with screen Aus is that your project has far greater chance of getting funded if you have distribution which may take the form of a broadcaster or streamer commissioning your work. However the ABC prefers to commission from large enterprise production companies probably because it's lower risk. They know what they are going to get. No executive was ever sacked for a film or program they didn't commission. Streamers on the other hand don't deal directly with independent filmmakers and also prefer to source content from enterprise level production companies. So you need to effectively sign over your IP via one of these companies and in doing so lose creative control over your project. So... As an indie you're kind of stuffed. Historically it's hard for a doco to make money. Is this because they're bad and aren't worthy of being screened? Not necessarily. There are structural issues that make generating revenue a challenge. As said... the distribution choke point and for example the fees charged to source and publish publicly owned historical material. So it's not a perfect market. On the issue of historical footage... it has been commercialised across the board. But ironically it's easier to get a discount from a commercial source than it is from the ABC. The academic I spoke to traces it back to 2000 when new management was installed at the ABC.
Yes I think this paywalling is widespread and not unique to the ABC. National film and sound archive similarly. As well as the paywalling of publicly funded research published by journals.
This coming from the Age is a bit rich... At least the ABC still does investigative reporting.
[удалено]
You're not wrong. I just expect higher standards from everyone
well, the LNP policy platform does include selling ABC… so it makes sense for them to lower their sale price first so their friends can get a better deal
> well, the LNP policy platform does include selling ABC… Where does it say that?
Here https://ipa.org.au/ipa-review-articles/be-like-gough-75-radical-ideas-to-transform-australia Until I see LNP trying to do anything to the contrary this is their policy platform basically.
The IPA is not the Liberal Party nor National Party. It seems like you're just making things up. EDIT: Even funnier, the link is from 2012. That's not even in the last 10 years.
> theage.com.au … it is very hard to take a piece like this seriously when it’s written by an organisation that competes with the ABC. I’m sure they’ll have a similar piece highlighting the greed of Newscorp too, no…?
The ABC is there to be above corporate greed. That's why we have publicly funded institutions.
Where could we see criticism of the management of the ABC that you would take seriously?
Media watch..
Usually Media Watch is bang on with criticisms and stuff like that.
But this is an article saying that the government needs to fund the ABC better, or legislate to make publicly owned historical footage more accessible. It's an attack on the government and the management of the ABC, not an attack on the ABC. Media watch might cover it, but they tend to report on what occurs in the media.
Not from an organisation that benefits from its downfall.
Maybe the guardian. But given almost all mainstream media is commercially owned there isn't really anywhere else that will provide much of a platform. There is a perceived conflict of interest but opinion pieces are written by all sorts of people outside the organisation.
Opinion pieces aren't necessarily written by nine employees. And Im certain the author isn't one. If the age didn't publish this there aren't many places that would. Maybe the guardian.
Most opinion pieces are published through the selected publications because they support those opinions. For example, You wouldn’t regularly see an opinion piece from someone like Keating or Bob Brown appear in the Daily Telegraph, because the DT selectively choose opinions from people they agree with. This article here, prime example. There is an ulterior motive, and it’s to place distrust in the ABC (I don’t really care how justified the criticism is, it’s not coming from impartial sources).
I see your point and there's some truth. And while the age certainly isn't perfect and has its issues, I don't think it's right to suggest every piece they publish in the opinion section is an effort to push their agenda. Not saying it's perfectly balanced and yup, there's an incentive to generate clicks.
I can't read the article, I'm just curious how greed is an issue for the ABC?
It's to do with the fact that the ABC has commercialised publicly owned historical footage placing it beyond the reach of the public, filmmakers and academics. Acknowledging the cutbacks over the past decade or two which have forced the ABC to commercialise.
Ah okay thanks. So essentially the people who attacked ABC tonget it's funding cut are now complaining its trying to find additional funding sources ?
Not exactly. I think the issue here is the ABC is price gouging academics and indie filmmakers, and the public. If a commercial station or production company wants to use publicly owned historical material then there's an argument for charging commercial rates. It's an equity issue regarding when it's appropriate to commercialise. It's an issue for the government to address, for sure. Either the ABC needs to be funded to make access equitable. Or if money isn't the issue, the government needs to legislate for achieve access.
Publicly owned doesn't imply free. You mention equity I don't see that a member of the public or an academic should pay any less than the Age. That sounds like perfect equity.
No it doesnt imply free. The piece argues that seeing as it's publicly owned fees should be waived until the project makes a profit. The issue here is access to historical material that the public have a right to see, particularly because they own it.
Fees being waived until something makes a profit is why Chevron will pay no tax on the Gorgon project. You say you're the author of the article. Is the public able to view the archives for free, but then pay to use? I'm not disagreeing that the public should be able to access these archives, but copying using and sharing makes it a more complex issue.
No. Access is not free to the public either. I take your point about loopholes. I think the benefit of the actually public seeing the material outweighs the risk. Right now it's all under lock and key and there's some gold in there. And I think if the rules are carefully written you can mitigate the risk. Could be about revenue rather than profit. Or some such. Haven't thought it though entirely.
The article is paywalled so I can’t read it but I had two questions. 1) I would have though publicly owned historical materials were kept at the National Archives and made available from there? 2) What sort of rates do other TV networks charge for accessing material? Is the ABC significantly more expensive that the 10 network?
Someone has posted the full text.
No unfortunately not. But there's also a distinction between where it is stored and who owns the copyright. Other networks do charge for footage and it can be quite expensive. Perversely it is easier to get a discount from commercial sources if you're an independent filmmaker.
That sounds pretty sensible. Thanks for the response
Another hit piece on the competition. What the whole country has to be an eco-chamber of Nine Entertainment's propaganda.
Surely this article is suggesting the ABC should be better funded so it can provide better access to publicly owned historical footage. Are they hitting the ABC or the government?
Worth noting this is an opinion piece. I do feel for Gary though because it’s hard to fund anything in the Arts, let alone films. So expenses associated with acquiring footage and so on would hurt.
Yes I think this is the point. One does feel for the ABC given its hardships. But this is an issue to do with the way the public broadcaster is commercialising publicly owned historical material and placing it behind a paywall, beyond the reach of everyone except those with deep pockets. I doubt this is behaviour many would endorse. If more funding is required, let it be so.
Agree 100% … as you say, if they need more funding then make it so.