The author discusses current business practices relating to film distribution and shows how those practices are likely to change with the introduction of high-resolution digital media suitable for use in theatres. The central issue is how digital technologies may alter the equations of power in the movie industry to allow more players into the game of making and exhibiting profitable motion pictures. For our purposes, distribution is defined simply as the means by which something is moved from producer to consumer.
Motion pictures are forms of information embedded within images and sound.
The process of distributing information of any kind is inextricably tied to the medium that carries it, and the costs associated with that medium. For example, if you're moving written words, one medium for moving them is the printed page. Everything associated with the cost of producing and transporting printed pages impacts upon the price of distributing written words. The current medium for theatrically exhibited motion pictures is film. The new theatrical medium is computer-readable files, imprinted with billions of digitized electronic 'words,' known as bytes.