Every year, Andy Baio tracks [online leaks of Oscar-nominated films](http://waxy.org/2016/01/pirating_the_oscars_2016/):
> The median number of days from a film’s release to its first leak online was only nine days, the shortest window since 2008.
> More than a month before the ceremony, 97% of Oscar nominees have leaked online in DVD or higher quality, more than last year at this time.
Baio notes that since Blu-ray screeners have proven unpopular with studios and voters, ((Each year, the studios send voters a postcard asking which format they would like for screeners. I have a Blu-ray player, but always choose DVD so I can watch screeners on vacation.)) most of the leaked films are “only” DVD quality. And the number of cams (surreptitiously recorded in the theater) has dropped.
As Baio pointed out [last year](https://medium.com/message/pirating-the-2015-oscars-hd-edition-6c78e0cb471d#.ymoj592i9), there’s no point torrenting a DVD rip if there’s already a higher-quality telecine or HD version available. You only need one, which creates a race to be the first to put up a given movie.
One group, Hive-CM8, was responsible for 15 of the leaked films, including The Hateful Eight. Afterwards, they offered an [apology-slash-justification](https://torrentfreak.com/hive-cm8-apologizes-for-leaking-hateful-eight-dvd-screener-151230/) to Quentin Tarantino:
> “If let’s say 5% of the people planned to watch this movie at cinema date, due to this media push we unintentionally created, we believe that now 40% of the people will watch this movie in the cinema [because] everyone is talking about it and everyone wants to see the movie that created so much noise. This will push the cinema ticket sales for sure.
> “We really hope this helped out the producers in the long-run, so that the production costs are covered and more.”
So by leaking the movie before it was released, then backtracking, they’re pretty sure Miramax will make its money back because imaginary math is magic.