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Amazon targets indie film world

The Seattle-based online retailer is now targeting fans and makers of independent films through a program called Video Advantage.

Kim Girard
Kim Girard has written about business and technology for more than a decade, as an editor at CNET News.com, senior writer at Business 2.0 magazine and online writer at Red Herring. As a freelancer, she's written for publications including Fast Company, CIO and Berkeley's Haas School of Business. She also assisted Business Week's Peter Burrows with his 2003 book Backfire, which covered the travails of controversial Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina. An avid cook, she's blogged about the joy of cheap wine and thinks about food most days in ways some find obsessive.
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Kim Girard
Amazon.com is now targeting fans and makers of independent and special-interest films with Amazon Video Advantage.

The Seattle-based online retailer is adding the independent video offering to its existing Advantage for Books and Music, which helps customers locate obscure or rare titles.

According to Amazon, Video Advantage will help independent filmmakers tackle one big problem: distribution after a film is made.

Through the program, filmmakers will send Amazon the videos that they want to sell in bulk, along with content descriptions they want posted on the site.

"It will look like any other video we're selling," said Amazon spokesman Paul Capelli. "It will be just like when you click on a blockbuster."

Amazon collects about 45 percent of every video sale, with the rest going back to the filmmakers, he said.

Video Advantage will be open to any genre of film or video, including film noir, spoofs, fitness, film documentaries, and instructional videos, the company said.

To launch, Amazon is offering films by University of Southern California students. Called Cameras on Campus, the 62-minute compilation of art house, drama, and comedy films is available for $14.95.