How a fact becomes a factoid

A few days ago, commenter “Downbeat” quoted former AFM VP/Canada Dave Jandrisch on the state of the Canadian film scoring scene:

Speaking of Canada, here's an interesting fact:

"Canadian film productions (television and theatrical) have increased from an average of 17 per year to 160 productions in the last two years! [since the passage of the Canadian low-budget buyout agreement by the IEB] Why? Because the producers like the paper signed by the AFM that gives them a "clean buy" on their final product."
-    David J. Jandrisch, AFM Vice-President from Canada.

Interesting, I thought – but wasn’t Jandrisch a while ago? Today, I got my weekly EMAIL from the COMMITTEE. In it was quoted the letter from Jandrisch to Local 802 from which the above quote came. Interesting, I thought again – but wasn’t Jandrisch a while ago? So I asked my good buddy Google for more information.

It turns out that the letter from Jandrisch to Local 802 was published in March 2000. By my quick finger-count, that’s almost nine violist-years ago (sometimes violists have to count up to 12, so I computed this without external help or even having to use any toes.)

Why does either Downbeat or the COMMITTEE think that what Jandrisch (hardly a disinterested observer) said in 2000, even if true, matters now? And why didn’t they let us know that the quote was, shall we say,… well-aged?

Comments

[Antony Cooke]

As a few more points relating to recent posts:

* Tom Lee won't speak to certain officers of the RMA, including its President. It is his obligation to communicate with Player Conferences, not his choice. In fact, Phil Ayling has dozens of unanswered letters to Lee.

* The result of buyouts in Canada resulted in a short term surge, and is a long term failure. Why would we dare risk a repeat performance on any other contract? Besides, Canada is miniscule regarding any relevant discussion of Motion Picture scoring. As proof, a single recording musician in Los Angeles now pays more in work dues than the entire nation of Canada.

* San Francisco is Lee's darling. In typical fashion, he prefers to serenade the towns that do 5 pictures a year, while ignoring and vilifying those that do 150 pictures a year. What does this tell you: Lee wasted the entire 2 day AFM caucus preceding the last MP negotiation discussing a buyout proposal from SF's main contractor! We don't doubt that he is planning a repeat of this destructive agenda come February.

[sessionman]

Anthony, you are spot on.

[Antony Cooke]

The last few posts bring up the most interesting point about all this nonsense: Research.
The AFM does no research regarding MP/TV, or Video Games for that matter. No due diligence, no comprehensive studies. Just guesswork inspired by “those who are working less”.
For those dozens of recent one-off VG agreements, the only thing Lee, Schaffner and Co. went by was the politically motivated private meetings with VG composers and employers, and complaints from “those who are working less”.

Who does tons of research? RMA. The very group that Lee chooses to completely disregard.
Who has members who know the business? RMA. Lee and the IEB don’t know this business at all.
Who has members that deal directly with the money sources? Who has members that know exactly how and why numerous financial decisions are made regarding film scoring? RMA.

Is this all becoming any clearer? Who does Tom Lee get info from? Should they be driving this bus?

Lee’s answer: Ignore all data provided by RMA and declare them the enemy. Here’s the big question: RMA is the enemy of whom?

[Disillusioned Dizzy]

ACCORDING TO 'downbeat':

“Nobody's got (or says they have) great data about AFM marketshare.”

- MOST ESPECIALLY:YOU.

“We're all dealing with bits and pieces”.

- YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE ANY BITS AND PIECES. YET YOU'RE READY TO FLUSH THE WHOLE CONTRACT DOWN THE TOILET, BASED ON YOUR OWN ADMISSION THAT YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT.

“We sure don't know the big picture yet”.

- NO, JUST: YOU. ONLY DANGEROUS IMBECILES PRETEND TO HAVE THE ANSWERS IN THE FACE OF THEIR OWN STUPID IGNORANCE AND ARROGANCE.

[downbeat]

Dizzy, nobody's got (or says they have) great data about AFM marketshare. We're all dealing with bits and pieces and trying to figure out the big picture from that. It doesn't mean we know nothing, but we sure don't know the big picture, yet.

[Disillusioned Dizzy]

"It would be interesting to see what has happened stats-wise to Canadian production since then. Frankly I wish the AFM and the Canadian branch would publish a lot more statistics so we all could have a better idea where things stand." - downbeat January 5/09

Now he asks! And we thought he knew!

[downbeat]

Hi Robert -

I wasn't aware of the date myself - thanks for the research work on this. However, the point is still quite relevant - it illustrates the "before" and "after" when the Canadians adopted their low-budget film buyout agreement - that was all I was trying to illustrate - the immediate effect of adopting such an agreement. It would be interesting to see what has happened stats-wise to Canadian production since then.

Frankly I wish the AFM and the Canadian branch would publish a lot more statistics so we all could have a better idea where things stand. Of critical importance is the marketshare of overall work that the AFM currently has - it tells us how well the agreements are really doing, and how much work is being lost. Without reference points such as overall marketshare, we only get partial glimpses and snapshots and reference-less trends, no big picture of how much of the overall available work we're actually being awarded and losing, and that's the true measure of the current agreements.