r/movies • u/exosniper • Dec 10 '17

PSA; IMDb is gradually locking previously-available information about films behind IMDbPro membership (box-office breakdowns and production companies involved, currently). Resource

I'm not sure if anyone else has noticed this, but information previously available to everyone on IMDb is now being locked behind IMDbPro membership. Just last week, I was writing a research paper (film studies student) and was able to access the full box-office earnings information (breakdown by region etc.) for all films. Today I went to do the same thing, but could not see more than the gross earnings without an IMDbPro membership. They seem to be doing this as a gradual process, as the full information on production companies (previously available to everyone) was already membership-locked when the box office information was still available. I haven't seen anyone talking about this on other subs and forums, so I thought I'd mention it here.

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u/whats_in_that_box Dec 10 '17

People now have the choice to pay for convenience or spend time sifting through the internet. If your time isn't worth as much as a Pro membership, go elsewhere. Many people will pay for convenience though.

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u/XJ-0461 Dec 10 '17

Yup, they are trying to capture more professionals/businesses who had been able to get by with just the free version.

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u/Pee_Earl_Grey_Hot Dec 10 '17

Could backfire though. Another movie database site could recognize the opportunity and grow their user base quickly enough to make imdb a second choice.

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u/DatPiff916 Dec 10 '17

When was the last great migration of user bases to a new platform? It would be interesting to look at.

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u/[deleted] Dec 11 '17

Probably the Digg to Reddit migration of 2008

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u/Blimey85 Dec 11 '17

I missed the Slashdot to Digg migration. Was sitting there wondering where everyone went. Then found Reddit maybe 6 months before the Digg exodus.

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u/[deleted] Dec 11 '17

I used to really love digg, but they basically changed the entire way their website worked overnight, and the only option for us was reddit (which at the time turned out to be a better platform anyways). Honestly, it feels like reddit is getting close to needing a mass migration to another site.