Warner Bros. Releases Dozens of Old Films for Free on YouTube, Bypassing Paid Streaming 52
Warner Bros. Discovery has quietly begun releasing dozens of its older films for free on YouTube, marking an unexpected shift in how the major studio handles its back catalog. Over the past month, the company has uploaded more than 30 full-length movies across five YouTube channels, without digital rights management or regional restrictions.
The collection includes both critically acclaimed films like "Waiting for Guffman" and "Michael Collins," as well as commercial disappointments like the 2002 Eddie Murphy film "The Adventures of Pluto Nash." Some releases have significant historical value, such as "Oh, God!" - a 1977 George Burns comedy that earned $51 million at release (equivalent to $265 million in 2024). This move represents a departure from traditional studio practices of protecting content through strict digital rights management and paid streaming services. Warner Bros. owns multiple distribution channels, including the Max streaming service and Turner Classic Movies, which makes the decision to release these films freely on YouTube particularly notable.
The collection includes both critically acclaimed films like "Waiting for Guffman" and "Michael Collins," as well as commercial disappointments like the 2002 Eddie Murphy film "The Adventures of Pluto Nash." Some releases have significant historical value, such as "Oh, God!" - a 1977 George Burns comedy that earned $51 million at release (equivalent to $265 million in 2024). This move represents a departure from traditional studio practices of protecting content through strict digital rights management and paid streaming services. Warner Bros. owns multiple distribution channels, including the Max streaming service and Turner Classic Movies, which makes the decision to release these films freely on YouTube particularly notable.
ad-supported? (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder if this is a test of Youtube's ad revenue vs paid subscriptions.
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2 hours of ads for erectile dysfunction treatments.
I think they'd have to split the movies up into 12 minute segments. That's my youtube attention span.
Or 200 youtube shorts, as so many channels I watch have started doing. I'd get 45 seconds of Oh God every time I use the bathroom.
Re: ad-supported? (Score:1)
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Naw. Even without adblock on my TV, it's not showing targeted ads to me. Though maybe all the adblock and noscript stuff means it's not cross referencing enough additional data to figure out my demographic (or maybe I'm a demographics of one). I get youtube ads about spanx. Granted, I might need a brassiere soon...
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.... the 2002 Eddie Murphy film "The Adventures of Pluto Nash."
Eddie Murphy has been in a lot of movies and they have all made more than $100 Million at the box office, EXCEPT, "The Adventures of Pluto Nash." This is just an attempt to get some money for their shittiest movies.
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Re:ad-supported? (Score:4, Insightful)
Could be. These could be movies that simply have no more commercial value. Put it up on streaming and no one would watch it. Put it up on YouTube and maybe you'll make a few bucks with the ad revenue.
A few bucks is bigger than zero, and hey, you get a bit of goodwill in the process. I mean, they could be left to rot in the archives - with no commercial value, they won't ever see the light of day again because no one would buy it on DVD or subscribe to stream it. Now they make it freely available, still copyrighted, and make a few bucks.
As a bonus, they're also likely part of the content match system.
As far as Warner Bros goes, I guess it's win-win-win. Make a few bucks off movies no one would pay for anymore, win a few friends by putting it online for free, and provide content for YouTube's content match system so others can't reuse clips of it.
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YouTube is streaming. It isn't* "subscription video on demand" which is what many non-technical users mean by streaming.
* There are a handful of "YouTube Originals" exclusive to Premium. I haven't seen a way for uploaders to apply to make their uploads Premium-only.
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I wonder if this is a test of Youtube's ad revenue vs paid subscriptions.
Probably. We'll likely never know about this, but I suspect that these particular movies also had very low physical disc sales. It's a really unimpressive group of films with maybe Mutiny On The Bounty being the only classic.
Start bitching and complaining (Score:1, Informative)
Come on. You can do it. I know you will find something to bitch and complain about this.
Re: Start bitching and complaining (Score:2, Offtopic)
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How about "Where are the Roadrunner cartoons?".
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How about "Where are the Roadrunner cartoons?".
I would happily pay money for a high-quality copy of the Road Runner cartoons, but on physical media of course, so they can't censor anything. "OMG the coyote was cross-dressing as a lady roadrunner! That's transphobic!" etc.
We need more open streaming services (Score:4, Interesting)
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it's not piracy, its UDHR article 27 sharing of culture.
This is great news (Score:3)
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Yes, only you. Dear God, man...
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Yes, only you. Dear God, man...
I know. I am not proud of it.
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Realizing you have a problem is the first step towards recovery.
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Also, you should try this movie I hear great things about, Gigli. It's a step up from your normal tastes, but a small one.
SubUrbia (Score:2)
SubUrbia, wow, that was hard to find a copy of, back when that was a thing. Cool.
Re: SubUrbia (Score:2)
There is always a catch (Score:2)
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No, I won't, because a certain python script still works.
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This article makes the move sound very altruistic, but in reality you will be watching ads every five minutes so not exactly generous.
Perhaps it was written by someone who is too young to remember when movies used to eventually make it to broadcast television. Yeah, it was usually edited to hell and if there was any profanity in the film it got dubbed over ("frig you, forkball!"), but hey it was free.
I'm not even sure why this is newsworthy, other than because YouTube is involved. There's already other free-with-ads streaming platforms that have older/less popular films from major studios. It doesn't represent a paradigm shift in the i
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Perhaps it was written by someone who is too young to remember when movies used to eventually make it to broadcast television. Yeah, it was usually edited to hell and if there was any profanity in the film it got dubbed over ("frig you, forkball!"), but hey it was free.
I'm not even sure why this is newsworthy, other than because YouTube is involved. There's already other free-with-ads streaming platforms that have older/less popular films from major studios. It doesn't represent a paradigm shift in the industry; if you want the latest popular films you're still gonna have to open your wallet.
I wonder if some of these older movies have some politically-incorrect scenes that Warner are trying to distance themselves from. This way they can release a heavily-edited version to Youtube for free, flooding the scene with their updated, sanitised versions. The originals won't ever be "censored" but all extant copies will have the questionable scenes scrubbed. So if you're looking for, I don't know, blackface scenes, or cross-dressing scenes, or whatever else you're not allowed to screen anymore, those s
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The catch: if rediscovered it goes back to rental (Score:3)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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More generous than never being able to see it, and more generous that having to wait for it to be on DVD somewhere.
Pluto Nash (Score:3)
Robot Chicken did a great segment on Pluto Nash. https://youtu.be/DrQcNwsjVEQ?s... [youtu.be]
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Relearning (Score:4, Informative)
Movie companies keep relearning the same lesson again and again. Make it as easy as possible to watch their movies, and they'll make more money. They learned it when putting movies on TV, then rentals, then sell-through, then paid streaming, and now ad-supported streaming.
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They make the most money when they have the most control, but the internet doesn't like them having control.
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You can make the "franchise" stronger by letting people share the original, then profit off it with new things or merchandise.
Except for pluto nash.
No regional restricttions, eh? (Score:4, Informative)
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Same.
'33 unavailable videos are hidden'.
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If they had sold exclusive regional distribution rights that haven't yet expired, they would have to wait for that to expire.
I don't know how long it'll last (Score:3)
All I can say is... (Score:2)
What strange combinations (Score:3)
To use Hollywood jargon: who greenlit this?
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Sounds like good business (Score:2)
If I had a piece of crap video that no one would ever pay to see, I'd post it to YouTube, write some puff pieces about it and finally collect some ad revenue from it.
unavailable in new zealand (Score:1)
copyright needs massive reforms
Bah, not in Australia... (Score:2)
The article about this talks about "region free" but none of the links work here in Australia :(
Oh joy (Score:2)