There were 5,400 new screens added and 1,000 new cinemas added in mainland China in 2014, which had a 33% rise in movie box office. Moviegoing internationally, especially in BRIC (Brazil-Russia-India-China) countries, is booming and has been for years. Moviegoing is stagnant to slowly dwindling in the US market.

The big blockbuster movies, especially the franchise films, are aimed at the global audience because they're making much more money overseas than they're doing domestically. And the studios/distributors want to make money. They don't care about art or cultural meaning. They care about money.

Several years ago, PG posted a YC article called "Kill Hollywood." I wrote a rebuttal with the mocking (and deliberately attention-grabbing) title "Kill Y-Combinator". PG and YC laid out a mission to invent new businesses and platforms that provided ways for content creators, creative types, etc, to not have to deal with the mess that is Hollywood. I replied that while I agree Hollywood is a mess -- it's a permission industry, they're obsessed with rights and are ruthlessly litigious if they sense any infringement -- I felt PG's article went too far. I suggested that all movies aren't the problem, some are, the big dumb franchise ones. I argued there is a ton of great brilliant artistic talent in the industry, but they have a hell of a time getting their work to an audience. The studios and the financiers (usually, nowadays, foreign investors; banks, oil sheiks, etc.) want big international blockbusters (read: franchise repeat hits). The artistic filmmakers/directors/acting talent is getting squeezed out. Why do you think Soderbergh stopped making movies? He got sick of the Hollywood BS. I advocated and still do that Silicon Valley ought to strive to build new platforms that facilitate the good movie content reaching audiences at sufficient scale so that good films have a future and can make a difference. I tried to do this with a startup, and got Silicon Valley money (seed round), but the resistance and loathing of anything M-word (Movie) related in the Valley is brutal. I could not get an A round, and my big seed investors walked away without even giving us a chance (lookin' at you, Google Ventures).

There remains an incredible opportunity for disruptive technology to come in and raise hell and make the moviegoing experience better for consumers, for filmmakers, for studios, and for the exhibitors. The movie theater industry--separate from the studios, I'm talking about the cinemas themselves, which they themselves call "exhibitors"--is appallingly bad and inept at embracing technology to attract larger audiences and keep them coming back. Some small chains like Austin's Alamo Drafthouse get it, and have figured out a way to make their theatres event destinations thanks to clever branding, great curation, great food and drink, and an overwhelming sense of entertainment and belonging. The AMCs of the world on the other hand exist basically to sell you insanely marked-up popcorn/soda/junk food, and could care less what is displayed on their screens as long as the entire experience is as monetized as possible. And franchise films help them keep their unimaginative business model limping along year after year.

I believe that if we could get some decent and COMMITTED funding for innovating mobile/social/local tech that relates to the moviegoing experience, we could do a lot to wake up the greedy Hollywood execs to fund better and more varied content and the exhibitors would be less fearful on taking a chance on showing that content. I would love to see this. I've already spent years of my life in this space, lost a ton of personal money in this space, but would be willing to give it a go again in a second if I could find the right alignment of stars (people, funding, filmmaker/exhibitor connections). I think it can be done without Hollywood's permission or even involvement. It's about the consumer and about the exhibitor. Hollywood only gives people what they believe they want. Better tech could make audiences way more aware of good movies they're not hearing about now. If they know about it, and hear their friends wanna see it too, guess what: you get scalable demand. An exhibitor will do ANYTHING where there is demand. You just have to show it's there. Who's with me?