Recently I’ve read a lot of things about the attacks against Sony. I’ve read that they’re nothing more than extortion attempts by hackers that probably live in their parents basements (based on the fact that the initial demands didn’t mention North Korea at all). I’ve read they were orchestrated by China by people who felt North Korea was being picked on and couldn’t stand up for themselves. I’ve read highly unconvincing reports from the FBI that they were orchestrated by North Korea. No one really knows. I can send traffic to servers from anywhere in the world. Anyone can anonymize their web traffic as easily as using a ToR plug-in with Firefox. I’ve also spoken to friends at Sony that told me that they’re concerned about the future viability of Sony due to the business impacts of these attacks. I’ve also spoken with people at other studios freaking out about not wanting to “be the next Sony.”
But in all of it, there’s something kicking in the back of my head. You see, if someone tried to blackmail me, I’d go to the press (or government) and allow the public to judge me for whatever it is, not cave to demands that are only likely to recur. Not giving into extortion demands is the right thing to do. If someone threatened the safety of people to go to a movie, I’d pull it as well, so that’s the right thing to do as well. There have been enough shootings in theaters and while financially potentially devastating it’s not worth the loss of a single human life to show The Interview in theaters. Of course, now that the attackers have backed off their stance, The Interview will be shown in hundreds of theaters. And it will likely be viewed online by millions of people over the next few days. And if this was carried out by North Korea, they couldn’t visit all of our homes to pull it (although the awful remake of Red Dawn by MGM might indicate differently).
I believe that the good, American thing to do is show our support to Sony for all the brain candy they’ve given us in the past. More than that, our support for doing what’s right. And what’s more capitalistic of us than spending $6 on a movie (other than spending more)? What’s better for Sony than to make a little money? In America, we tend to root for underdogs. We love Rocky (which btw cost less than a million to make and brought in a breathtaking $225M – 1:225 ROI there). We wanted Rudy to score a touchdown for the Irish (TriStar – part of Sony). We practiced our kicks like the Karate Kid (Columbia Pictures – part of Sony). We watched Jerry Maguire (TriStar – part of Sony again) even though we couldn’t stand Tom Cruise and rooted for the guy who risked it all to do the right thing (Money, baby). We threw up in our mouth a little when we watched Dodgeball (Fox but a fun movie anyways). We adore Gandhi (Columbia – again part of Sony) because it won an Oscar and taught us the story of one of the greatest men of all time. We loved Charlie Sheen when he was Winning in Major League (Mirage). And we loved Kick-Ass (Lions Gate), one of the unlikeliest heros of all.
Sony made Bond great again. Sony brought us Spiderman to the big screen. Sony told us about The Social Network (and were still allowed to have Facebook accounts. Sony gave us Eat Pray Love. Sony killed zombies awesome sauce in Zombieland. Sony gave us Superbad. Sony taught us a history lesson with The King’s Speech. Sony brought The Da Vinci Code to the big screen. Sony made a great movie in the Lords of Dogtown. Sony brought us Hell Boy, Adaptation (as a writer, a movie I love), Ali, Black Hawk Down and countless other movies. Some great, some not. That’s the game.
Now, we have a chance to do a very small part by helping Sony escape financial ruin. And yes, they make more movies that suck than are awesome. Because that’s what all studios do. And yes, the film industry seems like a bunch of rich people being silly sometimes. But there are real people that work there. Normal people. With boys and girls and installations at burning man. Some of the best people I know. And they do great work. And sometimes the studio makes brilliant movies. And whether this was spearheaded (yes, bad pun on spear phishing) by a dictator with a bad fade, the remaining communist hardliners in China, another studio or something else, it’s up to the market to dictate the outcome. That’s capitalism. ‘Merica
PS – It’s hilarious.