I have often wondered, while sitting and watching a movie, if anyone else is sitting and watching the same movie that I am at the very same time. [sub]Yeah, I know this means I’m pathetic and have no life…[/sub]
Now, I know that the answer will directly depend on the popularity of the movie. I know that if I hop on down to my local Blockbuster and get a copy of Star Trek: Nemesis (which was just released this week) and start watching, there is an extremely high probability that someone else, somewhere else is watching the very same movie.
But what if we don’t use recent movies. What if we use a really popular old movie (think Gone With the Wind, The Wizard of Oz, The Sound of Music, et al)? What then?
What about an older movie that is not as popular? Pride of the Yankees comes to mind. Or 12 Angry Men. Or Notorious.
What about an older B-list sci-fi movie such as This Island Earth (forgetting about the MST3K Movie for a moment)? What are the odds that if I am watching that at any given time that I am the only one in the world currently watching it?
What if we get down to obscure old-old movies that I may happen to have a print of. What if I was watching It’s the Old Army Game (W.C. Fields, 1926)? What are the odds that some other old-film buff (Eve, do you have your copy handy? ) might be watching it at precisely the same moment.
Unfortuantely, I have no idea of even beginning to figure out the math on this. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
If you’re watching the movie on cable, satellite or broadcast TV, the chances are really, really good that someone else is watching it at the same time.
Fascinating, zev. Good examples. My wild guesses as to the chance of someone watching at the same time:
Gone with the Wind- I’d say very likely. There are enough copies of that in circulation that I would think at any given time, someone on the planet is watching it. 75-100% chance.
Pride of the Yankees- Unless it’s being shown on cable somewhere, I’d say very slim chance. 0-10% chance
The Island Earth and It’s the Old Army Game- I’d say you are very probably the only person on the planet watching at that time.
Of course, if it was ever broadcast, then perhaps aliens are watching it. Something aired in 1973 could be watched now by aliens 30 light years away. Who knows, they may attack Earth as revenge for watching Ishtar.
No cite on this and probably an UL, but apparently it was calculated at least 100 million people are having sex on any given night. Considering it’s night somewhere in the world right now, while you are reading this, 100 million other folks are not reading this!
I’d say that it’s very likely that, no matter what movie you’re watching, it’s no more than six degrees of separation from a Kevin Bacon movie that someone else is watching.
Let’s assume we are talking about movies on home video, because if we are talking about movies on television, obviously hundreds, thousands, or millions of people are watching at the same time.
First find out how many units of that title have been sold (= n). There are trade journals for the home video industry that publish this info. Then guess that everybody watches a movie they own at least once a year, so divide n by 365. Then, to narrow it down to people who are watching the movie within the same two-hour time period as you, divide the result by 12.
Flaws: This assumes that people who own a home video of the movie are evenly distributed among the time zones, and that all home video copies of the movie ever sold are still in usable condition.
It’s an interesting question, but without a specific, the general answer, for lack of a better description, is circular.
If you watch a popular movie at a popular time, then of course it’s likely someone else is watching. That’s what popular means.
If you watch an obscure movie at an unusual time, then of course the odds are remote another is doing likewise. That’s what unpopular means. If the odds are small someone is watching movie “A” at time “B”, those odds applies to the population which means it applies to you too.
We’re back where we started – if you do something unusual, then it’s unusual.
theres probably a good chance that theres a movie playing on cable, satellite or terrestrial at any one time thats got either michael caine or gene hackman in it, if thats any good to you
Take yourself out of the equation, so you aren’t deliberately trying to alter the odds. . .
Estimate the probability of watching a particular movie at a particular time. The probability of having “n” veiwers can then be estimated by the Poisson distribution.
Be sure to define “watching.” Parents of small fy probably watch sometihng like Lilo and Stitch or Veggie Tales several times a day for a couple of years - but not because they want to.
And if TiVi is letting out data about what people are watching…
This is actually very clever, but how do we estimate the probability? I don’t think it should be that hard, based on the sales data. You can estimate the % of sold units that are rented at any given time by looking at video-store shelves.
a few weeks ago a co-worker and i discovered that we had both watched the same movie the previous night. Not only had we both watched it, we both had the same totally embarrasing problem figuring out how to make the DVD play… after nearly 15 minutes of confusion, we both gave up on trying and went to take the movie back to the rental place, only then disovering that it was a two CD set.
(Catch Me If You Can - worth 15 minutes of embarrasement)
This observation gets you no closer to the answer, but it simplifies it.
The question restated is what are the odds “The Dark Side of the Moon” is being watched during time period “x”. It’s the same whether you are watching Oz or not.
) might be watching it at precisely the same moment.