The Economic Opportunity of Intellectual Property and Fandom Culture

Hello creatives!

There is power in storytelling. It’s a hallmark of human creativity and a core means through which culture and knowledge have been passed down across generations. In the last few decades we have seen just how much stories can impact the economy as well, which is what I will be focusing on in today’s blog.

The economic opportunity of intellectual property and fandom culture is certainly one we may all be aware of in theory, but how is this done in practice? In recent memory, examples abound within media and entertainment:

• Games/Toys that have turned into movies/tv shows

  • Barbie made $1.46 billion at the box office

  • The Last of Us averaged 32 million views per episode

  • Dungeons & Dragons made $208 million at the box office and has a tv series in development

• Books that have turned into movies/tv shows

  • Hunger Games Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes made $337 million

  • Harry Potter movies made $5 billion at the box office

  • Star Wars franchise is estimated to be worth $65 billion

Without a doubt, intellectual property has become its own form of currency. Comicon generated $240 million in economic activity for NYC and San Diego in 2018 alone. So, there is a case to be made for the value of intellectual property with a strong fanbase.

It begs the question of how is money made off of an idea? Intellectual property is protected under federal copyright and trademark laws. Certain rights are given to the creator of the IP and the creator can choose to license (essentially rent out for set period of time) the ability for 3rd parties to leverage the imagery and essence of the story to cater to fanbases and the general public. These rights can be divided into various parts such as:

• publishing rights

• translation rights

• tv/film rights (which in and off itself can have various subcategories)

• merchandising rights

• music rights

• game rights

The list goes on, but hopefully you get the idea.

The tricky part of this all is that someone somewhere could have an amazing idea, with a budding fandom for the book, short film/web series, video game, music etc but how does IP get into the hands of the creator to the 3rd parties?

Gatekeepers.

How things have been done is that each industry has it’s own gatekeepers. Publishing has literary agents, filmmaking has talent agents, the music industry has their own managers, the video game industry has their own agencies that can help talented creatives.

All these gatekeepers whose job functions are only as effective as their contact lists. Their interests are divided based on how much they perceive the value of the intellectual property within their portfolio of clientele. It’s a decentralized mess with a bureaucratic landscape too dizzying for many smaller creatives to navigate alone. The right people need to connect at the right time with the right mix of IP in hand to hopefully spawn the workings of a licensing contract.

The cyclical nature of the value of an IP presents financiers with a certain level of security that any creative project derived from it could do well. Backing a well-executed adaptation of a book to a movie franchise or a video game to a tv series or even the story of a toy into a feature film in recent memory has yielded great results. The larger players have a sizable share of the talent and IP under their management, but there are far more independent artists and creatives out there than managed ones.

With the big creative strikes of 2023, I believe the industry is poised for an indie renaissance. Rotten Tomatoes has a whole article of 130+ book adaptations that are newly arrived in the last few years or are on their way. While many of these were no doubt handled by a number of gatekeepers, it shows the potential of the market for fresh content that goes beyond the big IP that has played out time and again in the last decade or so. In 2023, indie films generated $1.47 billion dollars which is a promising number for what could be a boon for smaller creatives.

All of this to say, I’m placing my bets on a strong independent market for intellectual property in the coming years. Book to film, video games to tv shows, and any other combination of adaptations you can think of may become more common than ever, but to ensure an indie renaissance there has to be a shakeup in how IP deals are made. Gatekeepers have had their time and place, but the indie market needs a democratized platform to capitalize on the economic opportunity of intellectual property and fandom culture.

This is why I’m building a web-based app to do just that.

I have a creative consultancy called Arxégos. I published my book through it and I’m producing a proof of concept short film derived from the book. My vision for Arxégos is to be THE place where stories can be transformed across different mediums for the independent space.

The web-based app will focus on book adaptations to start with so if you’re interested in being on the waitlist, you can sign up here. Authors, small publishing houses and indie filmmakers are welcome to join once it’s ready for beta launching. Books will be posted on the site for filmmakers to browse and buy the options rights to adapt it. The goal is for all of this to be done in-app. Eventually, I’d like to include other indie creatives like video game designers and developers.

I’m a one-woman team at the moment but I’m really hoping to have a minimum viable product available by the end of 2024. If you would like to support the project, feel free to reach out.

Until Next Time,

Rochele