After selling the film's soundtrack exclusively through the digital medium, the makers of Bollywood movie F.A.L.T.U, are releasing it online worldwide excluding India. Earlier, UK and UAE were also excluded, however, now these regions will also be part of the online premiere. This is in total contrast to music downloads which were restricted to the Indian region. The movie will release online on 1st April 2011 at 4pm GMT and a booking fee of $2.89 needs to be paid in order to watch the stream. We don't know if this fee entitles the viewer to watch the streaming once (Pay Per View) or multiple times. F.AL.T.U has tied-up with Zee TV which is hosting the premiere on its own website (www.zeetv.com/faltu). It is even running contests offering holiday trips to India and movie merchandise. - The producers might have done a Satellite+Internet rights deal with Zee. The internet premiere would help leverage the overseas market plus act as an additional revenue stream. - This is not the first time when a Production house has premiered a movie online. Rajshri Productions had taken this route with Vivah and had registered 6500 downloads at $9.99 per streaming in 2007-08. Another Bollywood movie, Striker premiered online on YouTube (again India was excluded). Although a majority of revenue for Bollywood movies comes from Satellite and Cable rights, it is still a little hesitant when it comes to taking the online route.F.A.L.T.U in many ways has embraced digital and is a step in the right…
