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(Image source: Google)
BY JAMAL ANDRESS
After putting millions of dollars into a film, you can bet any movie company would love to
know how that film will fare opening weekend. Well now, according to Google, predicting
the future is not out of the question.
A new research paper on the Google Think Web page says Google can predict opening weekend
box office numbers with 94 percent accuracy by factoring trailer-related searches, the
current movie season and a film's "franchise status," which is a metric that determines
if a movie is part of a successful franchise. (Via Google)
This formula was used to predict movie magic: the success of "Magic Mike," the Warner Bros.
film, which pundits thought would produce $15-$20 million on opening weekend. Google
predicted the film would make a whopping $40 million, more than anyone expected. Opening
weekend box office numbers were $39 million. (Via Warner Bros.)
And the Google crystal ball doesn't stop there.
According to Yahoo!, "Should one want to look beyond the opening weekend, the study
found a combination of search ad clicks during the week, previous weekend box office, theater
count and Rotten Tomatoes score was quite predictive."
Now this information is obviously valuable to Google, but the people who would really
like to get their hands on it seem to be big movie marketers.
NBC writes, "Armed with that kind of information, a studio could change its marketing technique,
try to open on more screens, or just take it easy knowing their film will probably do
just fine."
So what will become of the Google crystal ball? Will it be sold to highest bidder or
stowed away in a Silicon Valley vault? According to the The Hollywood Reporter, we're going
to have to wait and see.
"Google hasn't yet said what it intends on doing with its newfound predictive powers.
... Google doesn't plan on selling its data, but sharing it with clients, they say."
No matter what Google plans to do with this information, they definitely picked the right
industry to go into. In 2012 movie theaters sold an estimated $10.8 billion worth of tickets
domestically.