Hollywood will inevitably make the same mistakes, like Blockbuster before them, that the music industry did. The publishing industry seems likely to follow in the coming decade. Big business seems unable to make the swift and radical change that is required in these innovative times. Can an industry entirely change itself in a few years even with extremely strong incentive? I think not- but that strong incentive is capable of doing the task very quickly indeed.
These are not mistakes as much as they are inevitabilities. No business wants to cannibalize sales or reduce their prices but these results are almost a given with any form of digital distribution. The music industry tried to avoid this and failed miserably and the film industry will suffer the same fate. The place to look for lessons to be learned is possibly in publishing where so far e-books have been introduced at much the same price-point as the paper versions they might replace. This is greatly aided by the proprietary platforms for delivery so it is not clear whether a similar strategy could the pursued. That Netflix exists and is successful makes this unlikely. It is indeed an interesting time to be in the film business.
