Film Market Research Articles

Superstars Power, Mining the Paths to Stars’ Persuasion

This paper analyzes the influence of star power on the cinema market. The study adopts two gauges of star power, one based on the industry's opinion and one based on the market's interest. The article merges contributions in the persuasion and cinema market literatures to examine the influence of star power over spectators. This study use machine learning methods based on support vector ordinal regression to analyze the paths to superstars' persuasion. The present research shows differences in the persuasion effect of star power based on the industry and star power based on the market. Similarly, there are differences in the influence of star power among men and women. The results of this study help to explain the mixed findings of previous research on superstars' power.

What’s in a name? The art of movie titling

Similarly to more conventional products, films have to be given names to make them more distinguishable and, very importantly, marketable. Film titles are the one means by which both producers and potential movie ticket buyers may refer to particular films. To make film titling as effective as possible, marketers do not choose random phrases but rather make sure to include informative and highly connotative words, combine them to form recognizable structures, and present them in intriguing and telling fonts. These measures are taken in order to provide the potential moviegoer with as much advance information as possible by linking the films in question to a certain genre through their titles. The article shows just how many cues may be detected in film titles as a means of effective film marketing to make the product more easily graspable and desirable.

MUSIC POWER - KYLIE, BOWIE AND THE DELINQUENTS

This article looks at the significance of the soundtrack to the financing, production and marketing of the Australian feature film The Delinquents.

Experiencing film: Subjective personal introspection and popular film consumption

How and why audiences consume films is a much-researched yet inconclusive area of film marketing. Film is an experiential product and qualitative research methods are a suitable way of gaining insight into how people choose between different film offerings and how they assess their film viewing experience. Before we can understand others' choices and experiences, we first must understand ourselves. We therefore begin our investigation by taking a snapshot of our experiences facilitated by Subjective Personal Introspection (SPI) to gain insight into how the lead author makes sense of his film consumption. The key findings complement and advance current debates in film and experiential consumption. Indeed, the theoretical contribution is two fold; the development of a film consumption experience model based on three-interrelated classification dimensions (film characteristics, viewing environment, situational environment), which collectively impacts the lead author's consumption behavior, and our expansion of Schmitt's (1999) SEMs model.

Optimal Timing of Sequential Distribution: The Impact of Congestion Externalities and Day-and-Date Strategies

The window between a film’s theatrical and video releases has been steadily declining with some studios now testing day-and-date strategies (i.e., when a film is released across multiple channels at once). We present a model of consumer choice that examines trade-offs between substitutable products (theatrical and video forms), the possibility of purchasing both alternatives, a congestion externality affecting consumption at theaters with heterogeneous consumer groups, and a decay in the quality of the content over time. Our model permits a normative study of the impact of shorter release windows (zero–three months) for which there is a scarcity of relevant data. We characterize the market conditions under which a studio makes video release time and price selections indicative of direct-to-video, day-and-date, and delayed video release tactics. During seasons of peak congestion, we establish that day-and-date strategies are optimal for high-quality films with high content durability (i.e., films whose content tends to lead consumers to purchase both alternatives) whereas prices are set to perfectly segment the consumer market for films with low content durability. We find that lower congestion effects provide studios with incentives to delay release and price the video to induce multiple purchasing behavior for films with higher content durability. However, an increase in congestion effects can, in certain cases, actually lead to higher studio profitability. We also show that, at the lower range of quality, an increase in movie quality should often be accompanied by a later video release time. Surprisingly, however, we observe the opposite result at the upper range of movie quality: an increase in quality can justify an earlier release of the video.

Comparing Machine Learning Classifiers for Movie WOM Opinion Mining

Nowadays, online word-of-mouth has become a powerful influencer to marketing and sales in business. Opinion mining and sentiment analysis is frequently adopted at market research and business analytics field for analyzing word-of-mouth content. However, there still remain several challengeable areas for 1) sentiment analysis aiming for Korean word-of-mouth content in film market, 2) availability of machine learning models only using linguistic features, 3) effect of the size of the feature set. This study took a sample of 10,000 movie reviews which had posted extremely negative/positive rating in a movie portal site, and conducted sentiment analysis with four machine learning algorithms: naive Bayesian, decision tree, neural network, and support vector machines. We found neural network and support vector machine produced better accuracy than naive Bayesian and decision tree on every size of the feature set. Besides, the performance of them was boosting with increasing of the feature set size.

Language, Copyright and Geographic Segmentation in the EU Digital Single Market for Music and Film

The EU seeks to create a seamless online Digital Single Market for media products such as digital music and film. The territoriality of the copyright regime is often perceived as an obstacle that induces geographical segmentation. This paper provides empirical evidence on the extent of market segmentation in the EU on the supply and demand side and measures the contribution of several drivers of this market segmentation. We use data from the Apple iTunes country stores in 27 EU Member States to measure geographical market segmentation in supply (availability), demand (sales) and prices across the EU for downloadable digital music and film. We find that availability of EU media products across country stores in the EU is close to 80% for music and 40% for films but only 27% for EU-produced films. Recent industry initiatives to reduce the transaction costs of making digital music available across borders result in a reasonably wide availability though still short of the 100% mark. Vertical agreements in the supply chain of films remain an obstacle for wider availability of digital films. Consumer preference variables such as cultural proximity, a shared language or border and inherent preferences for home market products are the main drivers for the observed geographical market segmentation in supply and demand patterns. Supply side factors including copyright-related trade costs probably still play a role though we can only infer this indirectly in the absence of data on copyright licensing arrangements at product level. Commercial strategies in general and competition-restricting territorial agreements in film distribution in particular will also reduce availability. We also find evidence of price differentiation across iTunes EU country stores, correlated with overall country price levels.

Looking for Looking for Mr. Goodbar: Or, Strategies for Sitting with the Abject Archive

When Paramount Pictures released its “controversial classic” Looking for Mr. Goodbar (1977) for the last time in 1997, it promised viewers, “nothing can prepare you for this film's shocking ending.” That shocking ending turned out to be obscurity: the final VHS copies of Richard Brooks's once controversial film will become unplayable around 2027, but the movie has already been marginalized by film-historical economy of value dependent on commercial distribution. This article thinks through the ways that digital video platforms and economies structure scholars and viewers’ relation to film history. Artificial economies of scarcity are indispensible components of the classic film market, but the critic often feels an urge to save a beloved text, to somehow prevent its loss. That fear of loss engenders an affective response that I call the savior complex, which gives rise to two critical imperatives: an interrogative quest to uncover the truth about the text and compassionate redescription, which sustains viewers’ hope through the embrace of filmic pleasures. Working through both responses in relationship to Looking for Mr. Goodbar, I argue that the film forces a figural and material encounter with loss that pushes its viewer to sit with and accept rather than resist mortality and material transience. In so doing, she gains greater awareness of her own critical motivations and can figure out what it is she truly wants to know about film.

An Empirical Observation of Chinese Film Performance Drivers

This study focused on the performance drivers of Chinese-language films released and screened in Mainland China. The associations among potential motion pictures’ performance drivers (namely consumer-perceived quality, genre, release timing, director, and star power) and the box-office revenue for a sample of Chinese-language films released in China during 2010–2013 were assessed. The results showed that consumer-perceived quality significantly explained box-office revenue. Star directors, actors/actresses, and genre also accounted for both box-office revenue and consumer-perceived quality. These findings provide useful insights for making decisions in introducing foreign films to the Chinese film market.

Pursuing soft power through cinema: censorship and double standards in mainland China

The Chinese government is seeking to promote the country's soft power internationally through cinema as China becomes the world's second-largest economy. China's current censorship rules, which feature a dual-track censoring mechanism for films circulated on different channels, and a double standard for foreign and independent films in comparison with domestic and official productions, have become an obstacle for creativity. Whilst this dual-track and complex censorship mechanism can help release tension under the government's media control and offer market protection for domestic films, it will not help with Chinese cinema's ‘go abroad’ strategy. As economic globalization and new media technology constitute effective forces in opening up and diversifying China's film market, Chinese cinema will present more varieties of film despite the government's rigid censorship control. It is this pluralism that would boost creativity and help expand China's cultural influence through cinema around the world.

Indie, Inc.: Miramax and the Transformation of Hollywood in the 1990s * Hollywood's Indies: Classics Divisions, Specialty Labels and the American Film Market

Indie, Inc.: Miramax and the Transformation of Hollywood in the 1990s * Hollywood's Indies: Classics Divisions, Specialty Labels and the American Film Market

Analyzing the ticket purchasing behaviour of younger Afrikaans cinema attendees

The Afrikaans film industry is facing a difficult time, as many Afrikaans films are struggling financially. By determining the key factors contributing to the ticket purchases for Afrikaans films, the Afrikaans film industry can be assisted to increase ticket sales. Younger consumers are the future market for most industries, and since films are a leisure activity enjoyed by many young individuals, a better understanding of the needs and preferences of younger cinema attendees will contribute to the sustainability of the future market. The results revealed five key factors contributing to the ticket purchases of younger Afrikaans cinema attendee, namely Marketing, Proudly Afrikaans, Production Credentials, Quality Facilities and Quality Films. ANOVAs and t-tests were conducted to analyze the data further. It was found that all the factors have a stronger influence on the attendees the younger they are; attendees who prefer Afrikaans films over English films are also more influenced by these factors; and attendees who view three or more films in one month are more influenced by the factors Quality Facilities, Proudly Afrikaans and Production Credentials. The managerial implications of this are discussed and recommendations are made for Afrikaans film marketers and producers in order for them to better cater for the needs of this younger cinema attendee, and ultimately contribute to the growth of the Afrikaans film industry.

Soft power, global governance of cultural industries and rising powers: the case of China

This article addresses the importance of cultural industries for the strengthening of the soft power of the rising powers and it seeks to understand how the cultural industries allow rising powers to shape the structures of their international environment. More specifically, studying the cases of People’s Republic of China and of the movie industry, my article focuses on the current evolution of the relationship between the Chinese authorities and the film industry, as well as on the development of the domestic film market. I further aim to draw up an inventory of China’s role within the global governance of cultural industries. Finally, I aim to highlight the global cultural competition that China faces, emphasizing the practices of the US administration and Hollywood. I argue that even if China is the current centre of gravity within the world economy, it still has a long way to go in order to shape the distribution of resources within the global governance of cultural industries and to play a crucial role in the international battle of cultural symbols.

Through the Eye of a Film Festival: Toward a Curatorial and Spectator Centered Approach to the Study of African Screen Media

Through the Eye of a Film Festival:Toward a Curatorial and Spectator Centered Approach to the Study of African Screen Media Lindiwe Dovey (bio) Most scholarship on African screen media acknowledges outright that there have been, and continue to be, many trends and traditions in filmmaking across the continent and in the African diasporas, making it impossible to distinguish any particular coherence to the category of African filmmaking. Many scholars have advanced this argument through analysis of distinct production infrastructures, films, genres, nationally located cinemas, particular filmmakers, and critical concepts such as tradition and modernity.1 Furthermore, the rise of popular video-movie making in Ghana and Nigeria from the late 1980s onward, and the discussion and research that have grown around that practice, have compelled scholars of African screen media to pay far greater attention to the “different material conditions of creation, circulation, and consumption” of audiovisual cultural products.2 There has been relatively little [End Page 126] research, however, on the specific sites where films are screened, consumed, and interpreted: film festivals, multiplex cinemas, makeshift video halls, people’s homes and courtyards, and internet cafés. The focus of my current research, and of this essay, is film festivals, both as global sites for the curation and reception of films by Africans and as sites within the African continent for the curation and reception of films from all over the world.3 One apparent typology (and chronology) for analysis would group film festivals that screen films by Africans as follows: African film festivals on the African continent (founded from the mid-1960s, such as FESPACO, the Pan-African Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou, in Burkina Faso), international film festivals on the African continent (founded from the late 1970s, such as the Durban International Film Festival in South Africa), African film festivals outside of the continent (founded from the late 1970s, such as the New York African Film Festival), and international film festivals outside the continent that have particular curators and/or programs dedicated to films by Africans (where this specific focus on Africa has emerged since the late 1990s, such as at the Dubai International Film Festival). Other typologies worthy of analysis cut across this map, however. For example, in the category of international film festivals on the African continent (which have proliferated at a rapid rate since 2000), there are markedly distinct curatorial visions and practices. Where many (African) filmmakers feel that the Durban International Film Festival, with its Talent Campus and FilmMart (a film market) modeled on those of “A-list” film festivals, offers the most significant professional opportunities to filmmakers of all the festivals on the continent, other festivals bring a different version of the international and global into play to distinct ends. For example, the FiSahara Film Festival (founded in 2004), which is the only annual film festival in the world to take place in a refugee camp (Dakhla, in Algeria), has as its aim mobilizing international activism on behalf of a specific, local cause: the claim of the Sahrawi people to the Western Sahara, which was annexed from them by Morocco in 1975. The arrival in 2013 of a completely new kind of film festival related to African film—the first Online South African Film Festival—unsettles festivals’ typical relationship to live publics and suggests further productive typologies for analysis of both film festivals and online, digital platforms and their respective curatorial approaches to films by Africans. Initiated by the video-on-demand (VOD) platform AfricaFilms.tv, presided over by veteran South African filmmaker Ramadan Suleman, and curated by Lesedi Moche (former director of the Encounters Documentary Film Festival in South Africa), the first Online South African Film Festival ran from July 18 to September 22, 2013, and offered viewers the chance to rent or buy 150 rarely accessible South African films and television series. The impulse behind much of the African video-movie scholarship is the same as the impulse behind the study of film festivals, a relatively new academic subfield, and one that seeks to rematerialize film studies, albeit from an entirely different angle to the [End Page 127] video scholarship.4 My current research aims to take up the...

Beyond the boundary between China and the West: changing identities of foreign-registered film theatre companies in Republican Shanghai

This article re-examines the film theatre companies managed by Chinese individuals but registered under foreign laws, focusing on the representative film theatre owner. He Tingran and his companies. The article elucidates three roles of the foreign-registered film theatre companies: the capitalist, nationalist and social reformer. The owners of these companies occasionally switched between their Chinese and foreign identities to obtain various benefits, enjoying the various privileges of extraterritoriality, as well as maintaining control over the unconditional oligopoly of foreign distributors. This tactic included proclaiming the interests of the entire Chinese film industry within the foreign companies' association, on which they exerted a strong influence. The identity of being a foreign-registered film theatre company became crucial for resisting foreign pressures and protecting the domestic film market and film theatre culture post 1930s. However, these practices by the foreign-registered film theatre companies were not concluded either in terms of simple capitalist activities or blind nationalism; the many owners of those companies aimed to reform society through establishing a universal cinema culture.

Unexpected Alliances: Independent Filmmakers, the State, and the Film Industry in Postauthoritarian South Korea by Young-a Park (review)

Reviewed by: Unexpected Alliances: Independent Filmmakers, the State, and the Film Industry in Postauthoritarian South Korea by Young-a Park Jiyeon Kang (bio) Unexpected Alliances: Independent Filmmakers, the State, and the Film Industry in Postauthoritarian South Korea, by Young-a Park. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2014. 224pages, notes, bibliography, filmography, index. $39.95 cloth. Young-a Park’s Unexpected Alliances is a rich ethnographic study exploring how formerly radical film activists during South Korea’s authoritarian era turned into “independent filmmakers” after democratization—taken up as symbols of political legitimacy and cultural capital in a democratic, market-driven, globalizing Korea. The “unexpected alliances” that these filmmakers forged with new civilian governments, the growing cultural industry, and a middle-class audience illuminate the complex and intimate texture of the political and cultural transformation of radical activism in the post-authoritarian era. For film scholars, this work offers the sociohistorical formation of the Korean “independent film” (dongnip yongìhwa) in the 1990s and describes the fascinating connection between the radical movement tradition and the emergence of a Korean cinema of diverse content and style, which later constituted an important wing of the global hallyu (Korean wave). More broadly, scholars of contemporary Korea will find an insightful analysis of the reform era (Kim Dae-Jung, 1998–2003, and Roh Moo-hyun, 2003–8) and the lasting influence of democratic struggle in the postauthoritarian culture and politics of Korea. Methodologically, Park follows a collective of activist filmmakers, KIFA, from 2000 to 2013, and in doing so she zooms in on a number of individuals, historical junctures, and spaces. The reader is invited to observe KIFA members who continue to pursue social justice goals, other members who turned into independent auteurs, and yet others who joined the collective later not for activism but for the resources and network necessary to enter the film industry. She studies the organizational dynamics and tensions between these individuals and the collective by examining important scenes of cultural politics, including the 1990s screen-quota movement, feminist filmmakers in the collective, and the fervor over international film festivals. The introduction situates the project in the historical context of the reform era. Challenging the popular notion that the former activists of “Generation 386” were “co-opted” in postauthoritarian Korea, Park instead proposes a complex interplay with the civilian governments that sought legitimacy through expanding the boundaries of expression, with the corporate conglomerates that seized the new film industry, and with an expanding middle class searching for taste and culture. The first two chapters focus on the transformation of activist film during the authoritarian era into “independent film” after democratization [End Page 111] in 1987. Chapter 1, “Film Activism,” analyzes the politics and aesthetics of film activism as a wing of the radical anti-authoritarian struggle—a homogeneous community of producers and viewers who shared the experience of state oppression. Chapter 2, “Independent Film,” illuminates the sociopolitical changes that reconfigured these dissident film activists into a new type of cultural producer. The civilian state not only relaxed censorship but rallied filmmakers both as programmers of newly installed film festivals and as high-ranking officials in government institutions. At the same time, corporate conglomerates sponsored the booming film industry of the 1990s and invited filmmakers into new art centers that catered to viewers in the expanding middle class. These changing conditions explain the establishment of the uniquely Korean “independent film,” which cannot be described as simply a traditional art-house film. This chapter offers a social account of how Korean independent film came about, positioning filmmakers as power brokers in negotiations with the state, as new contributors of capital, and as purveyors of elite cultural venues. Chapter 3, “Beating Titanic,” follows up on this by showing how independent filmmakers became a symbol of cultural nationalism against Hollywood. During late-1990s protests over American pressure to open up the Korean film market, KIFA mobilized its social movement network and style in concert with the old agenda of nationalism. Chapter 4 offers a fascinating picture of the complex cultural power of the independent film collective. Here, Park follows two female filmmakers who joined KIFA to acquire the social capital to survive in the rigidly hierarchical and...

영화 흥행 실적 예측을 위한 빅데이터 전처리

The Korean film market has rapidly achieved an international scale, and this has led to a need for decision-making based on analytical methods that are more precise and appropriate. In this modern era, a highly advanced information environment can provide an overwhelming amount of data that is generated in real time, and this data must be properly handled and analyzed in order to extract useful information. In particular, the preprocessing of large data, which is the most time-consuming step, should be done in a reasonable amount of time. In this paper, we investigated a big data preprocessing method for predicting movie box office success. We analyzed the movie data characteristics for specialized preprocessing methods, and used the Hadoop MapReduce framework. The experimental results showed that the preprocessing methods using big data techniques are more effective than existing methods.

The differential success of movie trailers

The idea underlying the empirical investigation reported in this contribution is that the success of movie trailers is moderated by Modes of Reception (Suckfüll, M., 2004. Rezeptionsmodalitäten. Ein integratives Konstrukt für die Medienwirkungsforschung [Modes of Reception. An Integrative Construct for Media Effects Research]. Fischer, München). Modes of Reception are a four-dimensional construct consisting of the interdependent factors Identity Work, In-Emotion, Imagination and Production. Three different trailers for the movie THE PIANO (Chapman, J., & Campion, J., 1993. The Piano. Santa Monica, CA: Miramax Lionsgate) were produced. The hypothesis was that the trailers appeal to viewers who predominantly use corresponding Modes of Reception. An online survey with 554 participants was conducted. A moderated regression analysis revealed that the relation between a trailer that focuses on the story told in the movie and the dependent variable Success of the Trailer (in terms of liking and intention to watch the movie) is significantly influenced by the Mode of Reception Identity Work for women, whereas the success of a trailer that focuses on the quality of the movie is significantly lower in men that predominantly use the same mode. This contribution introduces the construct Modes of Reception as a tool for audience segmentation. By considering Modes of Reception as consumer characteristics, a target group-specific distribution of intentionally created movie trailers could increase the efficiency of film marketing campaigns. The idea is discussed in contrast to the popular view that genre is the silver bullet for target group-specific film marketing.

Film and Television Policies in English-speaking Countries

This one-day conference was organised by CinEcoSA (Cinema, Economie & Societes Anglophones - Cinema, Economy in English-Speaking Countries), a research group which brings together academics working on the cinema and television industries of English-speaking countries. It is part of a new series of events on “Film & TV Policy” (2013-2014); the first such series organised by this research group was “Film Marketing” (2010-2011). This conference was itself the second installment in the cycle, a...

Native American Film outside the Margins of Filmmaking

Native American Film outside the Margins of Filmmaking Beverly R. Singer (Tewa-Diné) Smoke Signals: Native Cinema Rising. By Joanna Hearne. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2012. xxxiv + 242 pp. Illustrations, notes, bibliography, index. $30.00 paper. Seeing Red: Hollywood’s Pixeled Skins: American Indians and Film. Edited by LeAnne Howe, Harvey Markowitz, and Denise K. Cummings. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2013. xix + 225 pp. Illustrations, notes, references. $29.95 paper. A momentum that began over forty years ago in Canada and shortly thereafter in the United States changed filmmaking history and film practice when Abenaki, Makah, Métis Cree, Inland Tlingit, Inuit, Blackfeet, and Diné/Navajo peoples began filming their own stories. Among the filmmakers who became known after participating in varied film and television production programs1 are Alanis Obomsawin (Abenaki), Sandra Sunrising Osawa (Makah), Gil Cardinal (Métis-Cree), David Poisey (Inuit), Carol Geddes (Inland Tlingit), George Burdeau (Blackfeet), Lena Carr (Diné/Navajo), Phil Lucas (Choctaw), and Victor Masayesva Jr. (Hopi). Their inaugural films used nonfiction storytelling methods as an opportunity to challenge the master narratives of fictional films produced for colonial American audiences featuring “the Native savage.” The current trend of Native American production is a migration to fiction narrative filmmaking, advanced by Native film directors Randy Redroad (Cherokee), Shelley Niro (Mohawk), Chris Eyre (Cheyenne-Arapaho), Sherman Alexie (Spokane-Coeur d’Alene), Sterlin Harjo (Seminole-Muscogee Creek), Blackhorse Lowe (Diné/Navajo), Zacharias Kunuk (Inuit), and Sydney Freeland (Diné/Navajo). Entrance to the feature film market has been a daring pursuit, requiring independent financial support earned on the basis of their film scripts. In spite of the obstacles thwarting access to the commercial marketplace for their films’ theatrical releases, the filmmakers persevere. Nonfiction productions did not stop being made; in fact, greater attention is being given to contemporary stories focused on community, such as Water-buster (2006) by J. Carlos Pienado (Mandan-Hidatsa), [End Page 387] who returns to his ancestral homeland in the upper Missouri River basin in North Dakota and documents the devastating impact of the Garrison Dam project, constructed in the 1950s, that submerged 156,000 acres of fertile Mandan-Hidatsa land. This essay is a response to and reflection on the evolving practice of Native filmmaking discourse inspired by two relatively recent publications concerning American Indians and film and Native American filmmaking: Smoke Signals: Native Cinema Rising (2012), by Joanna Hearne, and Seeing Red: Hollywood’s Pixeled Skins (2013), edited by LeAnne Howe, Harvey Markowitz, and Denise K. Cummings. To manifest oneself as a filmmaker evokes such traditional professional titles as lawyer, doctor, engineer, writer, teacher, and plumber, where established institutional access is built on hierarchy and where acceptance into the profession opens opportunities for employment. One of those doors of access to filmmaking was opened to Native Americans in an exchange that took place at the Sundance Film Festival in 1997. Along with other Native filmmakers, including actor and producer Gary Farmer (Cayuga), I was invited that year to the festival to screen our productions.2 While there, we were invited to a consultation with the Sundance Institute executive staff to discuss how to enhance and improve the production of Native-made films to make them competitive with any film in the program. Robert Redford, founder of the Sundance Institute and Sundance Film Festival, was not present at that meeting, but we were told he was aware of it. When asked how the Sundance Institute could help improve the participation of Native American films at the Sundance Festival, we found the conversation wavering from helping to fund filmmakers, to the need for professional training and support for distribution of films. Of most interest to me during the meeting was the discussion of the quality of films produced by Native American filmmakers. In evidence was a demonstration of the power held by the Sundance Festival to promote films that fit specific aesthetic preferences and expectations by festival audiences comprised of film critics, entrepreneurs, and Hollywood “types.” To that end, Native American films had not yet achieved that appeal, but executive staff members thought it was possible. Hearing the familiar phrase “We really do want Native American participation,” I instinctively sensed that...