It seems to me that there are two separable issues here, and some of the comments you’re getting may be causing you to mix the two.

One issue is “Artists should give their work away for free”. A second, separate issue is “Filmmakers should make their works available via digital download, not simply DVD.”

No one sensible — or at least, no one that you care about — seriously thinks you are obligated to not make a living. But there are some of us out here (and I suspect there are many of us) who would be glad to pay $20 to see your movie, but who have _no interest whatsoever_ in paying $20 for a silly piece of plastic, that we have to wait a week to obtain, and that will clutter up our house and, eventually, get scratched and lost.

In short: I’d buy your movie immediately if it was available on iTunes (or some similar service), but I can’t be troubled to purchase a DVD. Perhaps this means I’m a very specific type of fool. Be that as it may, that’s how I’m wired. I suspect that today I am in a minority, but I also suspect that I am in a rapidly growing one. It’s no shame that you want to make a living as an artist. It’s just a shame that you haven’t found a way to sell you product to (potential) customers like me in a way that gives immediate gratification to us, while preserving your income stream.

Kind regards.

After visiting this site last summer and reading about the film, I knew I would want to see it, based on the list of interviewees. I also knew there would be tons of interesting material that would have to be left out. When Gary mentioned there would be another 90 minutes of outtakes on the DVD, it was an instantly guaranteed purchase for me right away. I didn’t bother with the screening at the ICA because I was not particularly interested in listening to a debate about the film, and I didn’t think I would gain anything from the experience of seeing it on a bigger screen than a 36″ TV. I was perfectly content to wait for the DVD with the additional content. That’s what I paid my money for and that was what justified my purchase when the DVD actually arrived, plus I can watch the main feature in any order I like and skip the bits that bore me.

So if the film were suddenly available for free, as it was to everyone who saw it - or a significant portion of it - on the BBC, it’s irrelevant to me. I expect that one day a few years from now the DVD may become substantially cheaper, but that doesn’t really matter to me either. It’s worth the money to me to watch what I want to watch now. As long as I feel the content justified the price that I paid for it, there’s nothing else to be said. And I think it did that all right. I would have liked to see/hear more from Mike Parker and much less from Michael C Place, for instance… but there you go. I’m sure everyone has their own list.

I was with you till that question. I am buying this DVD because I believe it is worth $19. If I did not believe this were so, I would not pay for it. If I wanted to see it for free, I would pirate it and would likely receive a better copy than that on google video.

That something should (in the future) decrease in price (even to the point of being free) does not retroactively influence my current value assessment that it is worth my $19. This line of reasoning should even apply to those who, for instance, bought an iPhone at $600 this summer only to see it drop to $400 a month later: if they didn’t deem it worth that price, why did they pay for it?

Please do not bait your commenters with such banal arguments.

Sooo Gary if I watch it over and over again on Netflix do you get paid more? hehehe.

Thanks for making the film!

http://digg.com/design/Helvetica_Film_Maker_Responds_To_Google_Video_Leak_Piracy