Blockchain and Beyond: Innovations in Distribution

Is self-distribution worth the effort? How do you keep traditional investors happy when distributing directly to audiences? What ingredients make for crowd-funding success? Could blockchain one day eliminate the industry’s middle-men and give filmmakers a direct and transparent line to financing, distribution and monetisation?

Sonya Pemberton is an Emmy award-winning filmmaker and Creative Director at Genepool Productions. For the release of her latest film Vitamania: The Sense and Nonsense of Vitamins (2018), the Genepool team successfully coordinated a 16-day influencer-driven global release across broadcast, SVOD, TVOD and special event screenings.

Torsten Hoffmann is a technology geek and, as distributor, has licensed innovative factual content since 2012. In 2015 he made and self-distributed a Bitcoin documentary and recently smashed his Kickstarter goal for his Screen Australia supported follow up film #CRYPTOPIA: Bitcoin, Blockchains & the Future of the Internet.

David Doepel is co-founder and CEO of Demand Film, a global theatrical distribution company combining a blockchain loyalty program, crowdsourcing, and data analytics to deliver a new way of promoting film in cinemas.

This session looks at some of the exciting opportunities and challenges faced by filmmakers in the field of self-distribution — on both conventionally and unconventionally funded projects.