The fanbase couldn't even guarantee a decent take at the box office for Serenity, I have strong doubts whether it could (partly) fund a TV show. And direct audience to creator funding leaves me cold. What if the fanbase wants one thing and the creator wants another? If the fans had funded Serenity, I think the movie would have been very different and not as good.

The buyer does decide what is "like Firefly". They vote with their wallets. If the studio's guess on what will be "like Firefly" is wrong and the wallets are not opening, they will go back to the drawing board and try to refine their assumptions.

Isn't this what network TV does every year? Not to make things "like Firefly", but to make shows similar to the last season's hit.

As Cindy states, efficient distribution systems create economies of scale which support the creation of expensive product. Without these middlemen diluting the the money stream, there would be no product and we would all be headed to our local playhouse to see a crappy local production with crappy local talent.

I understand what you are saying, Gus. Your analysis just seems too idealistic and you leave out necessary (yes necessary) components of the system. Efficient distribution is the reason NetFlix is a booming business, Amazon can sell you almost anything, and Wal-Mart is the leader of the free world.

It is simply a business model that works and until artists want to take all the risk and financial gamble upon themselves and beam content free out over the Internet hoping that viewers will send in money, it is simply the best system.

Distribution by the creator would take time and resources away from creating.

Strong point. However, I am sure Whedon spent more time with the purse-string people than he strictly wanted to, with any of his projects. My sense is that he kinda likes us buyers. If we were also festooned with green dollars, he might have found us downright pretty.

Dude! If we all lived in L.A. and Whedon relied on that, he would have to live in L.A. fulltime.

I very much like living in LA.

I also suspect that many creators wouldn't be very good at distribution and/or would hate every minute of it.

As Cindy states, efficient distribution systems create economies of scale which support the creation of expensive product. Without these middlemen diluting the the money stream, there would be no product and we would all be headed to our local playhouse to see a crappy local production with crappy local talent.

Yes, exactly. Well put.

I had more to add here but it's really what's quoted up there. Well, except for one brief pitch for the modern corporate model and markets: the separation of creation, management and ownership allows for big investments like films and TV shows that combine westerns and space opera. It's specialization like that of distributors and artists that allows for people to be full creators, rather than trying to make their own...well, everything.

How would the creators be able to ask us for money if there's no large-scale way for them to reach their audience? Can they actually raise $50 million in wadded-up ones and fives, in order to produce a season's worth of a low-budget TV show? And how will the audience know whether they want to see the final product before it ever exists? Are the creators going to guarantee refunds to people who don't like it once they've seen it?

It sounds like you're proposing that all TV should work on the PBS model, with pledge drives every few months. But PBS shows get money from corporate sponsors and the gov and god knows where else, in addition to viewer donations.

we would all be headed to our local playhouse to see a crappy local production with crappy local talent

Ouch. I think there is still room for live theatre (having different strengths than tv or film) and not all local productions/talent are crappy. >/obligatory defense<

Sure, dogpile on Gus.

The fanbase couldn't even guarantee a decent take at the box office for Serenity...

Up the thread a bit is breakdown of who got paid what for Serenity. It is an object lesson in the failure of the perspective that box-office is the measure of success.

Could the audience have supplied $40M to the production of Serenity? If they had a way to do it? Yes.

How the audience became aware of the project after the mass exposure on TV is another problem. Getting "known" is always a problem.

Someone will always be the mediator of audience attention.

I know I am an idealist. Here is what I know: A system that does not produce more Firefly is broken.

Sorry, aurelia. I didn't mean to denigrate local theatre.

The point I was trying to make is that without the studio system that is currently in place, we would be left with what is produced locally as that is all that would be accessible.

If you lived in Columbus you would not be able to ever expereince Joss' brilliance.