Open Source Hollywood

splash image

Inspiration

My uncle, Kourosh Bibiyan, escaped the repressive and dangerous direction in Iran. He left in 1979, and moved to Los Angeles where he founded the first Iranian-American television and production studio Jaam-e-Jam Television. This studio and production house was named after the national broadcasting channel in Iran, and under the mullahs' tyrant rule my uncle was a wanted man: they wanted his death, and hated the music and arts he produced that they considered blasphemy. His work made millions upon millions of people happy from 1979 until 1999, when his station closed -- he was foresaken by his disciples.

Fast-track forward to 2009, when I made the decision to leave academic dentistry. I began writing a treatment about Shah Ismail I, the founder of the Saffavid dynasty in the 16th century: the man was the biggest drunkard in history, and by the time he died at 36 years of age he had established the modern drug trade shuttling hashish from the Moghuls and opium from Iran (i.e. present day Afghanistan) to European distribution that coincided with the separation from the Vatican's influence, and also changing the national identity of Iran from a Sunni / Suffi population to the present-day Shi'ite population. This is a significant story highlighting the flaws of men, in the story Ismali (pen name "Xetaī") neglects his wife who falls in love with his science advisor and who poisons him at the end. This treatment got me interviews for the Producer Program at UCLA and AFI, however, I decided to focus on building Open Source Hollywood.

Why Open Source Hollywood is necessary

Modern production is hampered by old and outdated contracts. We provide the means to build safe and secure decentralized smart contracts for team, asset, and resource building. A team may be built on the combination of pay and donation considerations in return for credit and equity. Resources, such as locations, are currently underutilized. Traditional channels have dried, and no one has yet introduced a scalable and sustainable solution for it's replacement to date.

What it does

Open Source Hollywood is an instrument for producers. They can build teams, raise acquire resources such as funds, and manage projects with our app.

There is a mechanism to obtain resources such as gear, locations, costumes, etc. Team building is for cast and crew. Crew can include makeup, wardrobe, set design, audio, legal, marketing, management, and others. No one else is doing this.

We implement smart contracts that are responsible for the payout of pre-agreed funds to cast and crew. Our system runs on blockchain, and includes security / permissions mechanisms as well as dispute resolutions.

How I built it

Loads of discovery with producers and artists.
Gaining an understanding of the current landscape.
Finding the ways to provide maximum benefits to users.

Competitors

Patreon => does not support team and resource building, assumes project is built and ready on it's own
Singular DTV => uses a weird cryptocurrency mechanism that relies on sole distribution
Live Tree => not offered in the United States
Seed&Spark => have unreasonable restrictions to creating a project, and control distribution

Challenges I ran into

The most challenging aspect of building Open Source Hollywood was incorporating the views and expectations of different users. Since we accommodate a wide range of user types, it was important to identify and integrate the most essential elements that benefitted projects, producers, and users.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

I'm proud that Open Source Hollywood was recognized at Scale 2018 (Pasadena Convention Center) and Hollywood Film Conference 2018 (Los Angeles Convention Center).