 Remix Culture August 1, 2011

Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy

What’s at Stake: “The extreme of regulation that copyright law has become makes it difficult, and sometimes impossible, for a wide range of creativity that any free society...would allow to exist, legally.” (18) “I...want to spotlight the damage we’re not thinking enough about—the harm to a generation from rendering criminal what comes naturally to them.” (18)

What’s at Stake: “Never before in the history of human culture has the production of culture been as professionalized” (29).

What’s at Stake: Remix is “a critical expression of creative freedom that in a broad range of contexts, no free society should restrict” (56).

So here it is: The offending video:

Working Class Hero Exhibit Candice Breitz: “the idea is to shift the focus away from those people who are usually perceived as creators so as to give some space, some room, to those who absorb cultural products...” (6)

Girl Talk “We’re living in this remix culture...” (14) “From a financial perspective, this is how the music industry can thrive in the future...this interactivity with the albums. Treat it more like a game and less like a product”(14-15).

Sousa Goes to Washington “Today you hear these infernal machines going night and day. We will not have a vocal cord left” (24- 25). “These ‘machines’, Sousa feared, would lead us away from what elsewhere he praised as ‘amateur’ culture. We would become just consumers of culture, not only producers...his fear was that culture would become less democratic... ” (25).

Sousa Goes to Washington “[Sousa’s] fear was that people would be less connected to, and hence practiced in, creating [a music] culture. Amateurism…was a virtue— not because it produced great music, but because it produced a musical culture...(27)”

RW vs RO Culture RW  “ordinary citizens ‘read’ their culture by listening to it or by reading representations of it” RO

RW vs RO Culture RW  “ordinary citizens ‘read’ their culture by listening to it or by reading representations of it” + RO

RW vs RO Culture RW  “ordinary citizens ‘read’ their culture by listening to it or by reading representations of it” +  “they add to the culture they read by creating and re-creating the culture around them”(28) RO

RW vs RO Culture RW  “ordinary citizens ‘read’ their culture by listening to it or by reading representations of it” +  “they add to the culture they read by creating and re-creating the culture around them”(28) RO  “...a culture less practiced in performance, or amateur creativity, and more comfortable (think: couch) with simple consumption” (28)

Reviving Sousarian Sensibilities: 1) The importance of ‘amateur’ creativity 2) The importance of limits in the reach of copyright’s regulation, leaving free from regulation this amateur creativity (33)

The “hybrid” “For there need be no simple trade-off between the past and the future. Instead, all evidence promises an extraordinary synthesis of the past and the present to create a phenomenally prosperous future. This future need not be either less RO or more RW: it could be both” (34).

Copyright

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy

“The RW Internet is an ecosystem” (63).

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy Three-layered system:

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy Three-layered system: 1) Writing

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy Three-layered system: 1) Writing

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy  “Usenet” – conversation site into a spam “ghetto” Three-layered system: 1) Writing

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy  “Usenet” – conversation site into a spam “ghetto”  Blogs – the “writeable web” + the ability to write back Three-layered system: 1) Writing

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy Three-layered system: 1) Writing

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy Three-layered system: 1) Writing 2) Tags and Ranking Systems

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy  Add meaning to contentThree-layered system: 1) Writing 2) Tags and Ranking Systems

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy  Add meaning to content  Enable collaboration Three-layered system: 1) Writing 2) Tags and Ranking Systems

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy Three-layered system: 1) Writing 2) Tags and Ranking Systems 3) Tools to Measure the Significance of the Conversation

RW Culture as Ecology/Economy Three-layered system: 1) Writing 2) Tags and Ranking Systems 3) Tools to Measure the Significance of the Conversation (Oops. Also: Advertising.)

Is this Remix?



RiP!: A Remix Manifesto A Remixer’s Manifesto:

RiP!: A Remix Manifesto A Remixer’s Manifesto: 1. Culture always builds on the past.

RiP!: A Remix Manifesto A Remixer’s Manifesto: 1. Culture always builds on the past. 2. The past always tries to control the future.

RiP!: A Remix Manifesto A Remixer’s Manifesto: 1. Culture always builds on the past. 2. The past always tries to control the future. 3. Our future is becoming less free.

RiP!: A Remix Manifesto A Remixer’s Manifesto: 1. Culture always builds on the past. 2. The past always tries to control the future. 3. Our future is becoming less free. 4. To build free societies you must limit the control of the past.

 Remix Culture August 1, 2011