Most producers won't do it, but Eric D. Wilkinson did send an email to RLSLOG sincerely thanking movie pirates for stealing his movie, The Man From Earth.
"Our independent movie had next to no advertising budget and very little going for it until somebody ripped one of the DVD screeners and put the movie online for all to download", Wilkinson said in his email. "After that happened, people were watching it and started posting mostly all positive reviews on IMDb, Amazon and other places. Most of the feedback from everyone who has downloaded 'The Man From Earth' has been overwhelmingly positive. People like our movie and are talking about it, all thanks to piracy on the net!"
"our website has had nearly 23,000 hits in the last 12 days, much of it coming from your website. In addition, our trailer, both on the www.manfromearth.com site and other sites like YouTube, MySpace and AOL has been watched nearly 20,000 times AND what's most impressive is our ranking on IMDb went from being the 11,235th most popular movie, to the 5th most popular movie in 2 weeks (we are also the #1 independent film on IMDb & the #1 science fiction film on IMDb). How did this all happen? Two words: Torrent / File Sharing sites (well, four words and a slash)."
"Thanks to everyone who has downloaded this torrent and watched the film, our awareness level is through the roof. For that I say, 'THANK YOU!'"
"In the future, I will not complain about file sharing. YOU HAVE HELPED PUT THIS LITTLE MOVIE ON THE MAP!!!! When I make my next picture, I just may upload the movie on the net myself!"
One can't help but think this story would have ended differently if said movie was not that good.