Don't give songs, clippings to TV channels for free, TFPC tells producers

The newly elected office bearers of the powerful Tamil Film Producers' Council (TFPC) have issued an advisory to producers of Tamil films urging them not to give away any songs, clippings, trailers and letters of consent to television channels free of cost.

The advisory has suprised many in the industry since as a standard practice producers have shared songs, videos and trailer clippings free of cost to television channels for publicity of their films.

The advisory, which was sent by actor Vishal, who was only recently sworn in as the president of the TFPC, reads, 'Dear Producers, We hereby request you to not to give any songs/clippings, trailers and letters to any channel for free of cost. Lets bring back our honour and value for our content.' (sic)

It is not for the first time that the producer council is looking to make channels pay for the content provided to them. In fact, the producer council has been trying for at least a decade now to get the channels to pay for the songs and clippings. The TFPC thinks that they can bolster the income of the producers this way.

However, it remains to be seen what stand the television channels are going to take. There is a risk that channels might choose to boycott the films of the producers shying away from sending the clippings for free. Only time will tell if this move by the council helps in boosting the producers' standing, or leads to a rift between channels and the film industry.