Atom Films and Me…
Nov 5th, 2007 by Frank Fox
The saga gets a little weirder: just after uploading my animation entitled “The Internet, You Am A Winners!” to the Atom Films site I received a letter from yourfriend@atomfilms.com stating I had violated their terms of service. I replied with the following:
Dear User Abuse Manager,
It would be nice to know exactly what “abuse” my movie committed. I’ve seen some pretty offensive stuff right on your home page compared to this, so I’m baffled as to why it got rejected. I don’t expect to hear from anyone at Atom Films any further, but it would be civil of you to explain your decision. That way I could explain it in better detail on my blog. Wouldn’t want to have anyone commit a similar atrocity in the future.
I own every part of this movie’s intellectual property: music, writing, 3d animations, so if that is your concern, I would appreciate another look.
Frank L. Fox
Fling Films
So now I am left scratching my head after receiving the following email today from “my friend” (yourfriend@atomfilms.com):
——————- Dear Filmmaker, Thank you for submitting “The Internet, You Am A Winners!” to AtomFilms. We know how much hard work and energy goes into making a film and we appreciate you wanting to share your vision with our audience. Unfortunately, your film does not quite fit our current needs. Thanks again for thinking of us and please, send more of your movies to AtomFilms! We’d love to see them. Best regards, AtomFilms Submissions ***We’re sorry, but due to the volume of submissions we’re not able to respond to questions about why your film wasn’t selected.*** ——————-
So which is it: doesn’t fit their needs or violates their terms of service?
I hesitate calling “my friend” at Atom Films a coward, but sending me a polite rejection letter after banning my movie outright for bigotry or theft or porn or whatever violations they accused me of seems a bit disingenuous.
I’m not angry that “The Internet, You Am A Winners!” was rejected on the grounds that it’s not good enough to be on Atom Films and playing next to “Possum Death Spree.” It’s a crap shoot whenever you submit your stuff for review anywhere. I’ve long since given up on trying to figure out why any reviewer likes one thing and hates another. But to accuse me of being a thief, peddling porn or being a bigot one day and then telling me you’d love for me to upload my next movie, is altogether baffling and insulting!
Needless to say I won’t be volunteering to get that treatment again.
This whole scenario is just begging for overcast skit treatment…
(Overman dons his thinking cap)
LOL! I’ve also received two emails from angry viewers (I’m assuming) chastising me for making fun of people who are not nerdy enough to meet the unusually high Internet surfing standards I expect from users. At least I think that’s the point they were trying to make. I admit I’m at a disadvantage when it comes to deciphering today’s e-linguistics.
Fun stuff.
I’m just baffled here. This can’t be the same film I’ve seen; what the hell could anyone possibly find offensive or troubling about it? Atom films should be more forthcoming than that. I think they owe it to people like you who are trying to make interesting films and not pure crap like most of what they show. Hope someone from there is reading this.
Phil, you’ve got to do a skit. Perhaps a phone call? Customer service for Mota films? Like talking to Kafka.
Sorry about all this, Frank. Good luck.
How are you doing on YouTube, Blip, etc? And what sort of traffic does Atomfilms drive, anyway? Is it worth the hassle?
(FYI - I held off on mentioning your plight to people until more info arrived. Looks like this’ll be a bit of a tricky one to sell.)
Hey,
I had the exact same issue with Atom Films. I really don’t get it because my films have been well recieved everywhere else including features on Cold Hard Flash, Drawn.ca, Myspace and The Animation Show. It leaves me scratching my head too. Oh well, there’s better venues out there. I wouldn’t bother wasting any time worrying about it.