iGeneration 08

Culture in the twentieth century was controlled by the ever-tighter grip of copyright law, protecting the rights of those who put time, effort and money into their music, film, book or whatever else they might create. This control, although protecting, maintained the distance between creators and consumers – until digital technology and the Internet. With the tools of creation and alteration in hand, users of cultural content have changed the way they interact with media and culture. Instead of being illegal as the law states, the practices of sharing information, building on existing works, cutting up and modifying culture both old and recent is a natural expression of creativity. The remix is a cultural form that exemplifies this idea, and this critical exegesis will briefly situate my video in the theory of participatory culture and remixing.

Before the Internet revolution, we copied cassette tapes on personal stereos, and photocopied text onto sheets of paper edged with grey. Whether for greed or simple pleasure, this was our way of sharing culture. However, since digital technology came to town, reproducing culture has become faster and easier, and the ways we interact with other people and with media has changed dramatically.

Numerous different forms of content are transferred between people and places. The enormous number of channels opened up by the internet – unimaginable in traditional broadcast media (Doctorow, 2008, 69) – means that information of all kinds proliferates. Much of the information passed around the Internet is ‘culture’ (and by ‘culture’ I mean products of an artistic or creative nature, often with an educative and/or entertaining purpose). The networks of the Internet see an enormous amount of culture being created and re-created, copied and distributed. The Internet enables sharing between peers like never before. Lawrence Lessig explores this in his book, Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity, stating that we are seeing ‘an effect of the Internet beyond the Internet itself: an effect upon how culture is made….the Internet has induced an important and unrecognized change in that process’ (Lessig, 2004, 23).

More than just sharing, ordinary people at home are able to create their own content, a process that is largely facilitated by the fact that the tools of digital technology are more readily available (Howard-Spink, 2004). Much editing software is now affordable for home users, while others are available for free download on the Internet. The consumer of culture now has the opportunity to change those very objects she views, reads and listens to. To modify, adapt, cut up, and build upon an existing work was previously a limited practice; but with the vast array of information and cultural items now available for downloading, sharing and transferring between devices – and the tools to modify them – re-creating is no longer restricted to professional studios.

With these new practices that digital technology has enabled come new opportunities for creativity. Before digital technology – and most importantly, before the Internet – creative works were produced and consumed, and those roles were enacted separately. That paradigm of the user/consumer has significantly shifted, so that the distinctions between authors and readers, producers and spectators, creators and interpretations blend into a single continuum (Levy in Jenkins, 2002). The model of “produsage” proposed by Axel Bruns accurately describes the way in which people increasingly interact with online media, creating content as much as making use of it (Bruns, 2007, 1).

This movement of ‘user-led content creation’ is re-defining the boundaries of creativity, most noticeably through the process of “remixing”. A remix (also seen in the form of a “mash-up”, which generally uses fewer sources than a remix) takes original tracks and combines them into one new blend. Originating amongst music DJs, remixing has extended to video as well and generally refers to the method of cutting up existing forms of culture and putting them back together to create something new (Howard-Spink, 2004). Like other forms of culture, remixes were originally the domain of those with professional equipment but have now become everyday practice – only a glance at YouTube will tell you this.

The amount of content on the Internet is, practically speaking, infinite, and when this is made accessible along with the means to modify and build upon it, the creative process is somewhat changed. In a shift from ‘a Romantic legacy that tells us that art must spring from the mind of a uniquely talented creator’ remixing culture undermines this modernist notion and introduces the idea that creativity does not belong to ‘a special class of creators’ (Howard-Spink, 2004). Thus creativity is democratised. This vast amount of accessible content also presents a dilemma of copyright – how can every user be expected to find every creator for every item they might post onto the Internet? (Doctorow, 2008, 68).

The law never used to be concerned with the creation and sharing of non-commercial culture, controlling only that section of culture produced for commercial ends (Lessig, 2004, 24). An exclusive hold on ownership of such commercial culture was allowed by copyright law in the twentieth century, but as the Internet became a primary site for cultural dissemination and production, things changed. As Lessig states, ‘[f]or the first time in our tradition, the ordinary ways in which individuals create and share culture fall within the reach of the regulation of the law, which has expanded to draw within its control a vast amount of culture and creativity that it never reached before’ (Lessig, 2004, 24).

What this attitude of ‘all rights reserved’ ignores is the reality that creative processes have never been isolated from the times and places in which they were produced. Individual creators certainly deserve recognition for the works they create, but to imagine that culture is not contributed to by many and varied influences is to forget the human impulse to share and create communities around culture. The strictures of copyright law have been accepted for so long because it is ‘a polite fiction that has been mostly harmless throughout its brief history’, but the Internet reveals the disjoint between the idea of sharing and building upon culture and exclusive control of culture (Doctorow, 2008, 83).

Remixed culture, set on the stage of the Internet, is where ideas of participation and interaction, community and sharing can intersect. My video remix, titled ‘Build/Create > Change’, picks up several threads from the idea of collective change as a result of the Internet and digital technology. From audio samples that pick up on key words such as ‘create’, ‘together’, ‘build’, ‘new’, ‘change’ and ‘distribution’ I spliced together music and speech from many different sources to create a single cultural object on one theme – culture that everyone can participate in. The visual side of my project used video and digital photographs from an even wider range of creators to build on the message conveyed by the audio samples. One of the main objectives I had was to take images of building physical objects and remix them in a context that gave them a new meaning – that of building culture out of what already exists.

In the process of sourcing my material and deciding what to use, I came across some remixes, both of music and video, which were ultimately useful to my concept. The result was that amongst the ‘original’ content, I have remixed remixes. This is a kind of picture of the idea that culture is not created in a vacuum, but draws (consciously or otherwise) on what has come before. Not only does my video visually and audibly represent the creation of new content out of old, it participates in the very practice it is speaking about.

Creating a remix video has expanded my knowledge of digital culture and the possibilities the Internet opens up for sharing and participation. By involving myself in that very process of ‘produsage’ – albeit in one small corner of the entire world of user-led content creation – I have come to understand more clearly why a different framework for ownership of created works is necessary in a digital landscape. After all, in the words of the Creative Commons, ‘creativity always builds on the past’.

CRITICAL REFERENCES:

Bruns, Axel (2007) ‘Produsage: Towards a Broader Framework for User-Led Content Creation’ Paper presented at Creativity & Cognition conference, Washington D.C., USA, 13-15 June 2007. http://produsage.org/files/Produsage%20(Creativity%20and%20Cognition%202007).pdf (accessed 30 October 2008)

Doctorow, Cory (2008) Content: Selected Essays on Technology, Creativity, Copyright, and the Future of the Future. San Francisco: Tachyon Publications, 2008. http://craphound.com/content/Cory_Doctorow_-_Content.pdf (accessed 29 October 2008)

Howard-Spink, Sam (2004) “Grey Tuesday, Online Cultural Activism and the Mash-up of Music and Politics.” First Monday 9.10, 2004. http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue9_10/howard/ (accessed 29 October 2008)

Henry Jenkins, ‘Interactive Audiences?: The “Collective Intelligence” of Media Fans’ in Dan Harries (ed.), The New Media Book, London: British Film Institute, 2002. web.mit.edu/cms/People/henry3/collective%20intelligence.html (accessed 23 October 2008)

Lessig, Lawrence (2004) Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity. New York: Penguin Press, 2004. http://www.free-culture.cc/freeculture.pdf (accessed 30 October 2008)

REMIX SOURCES:

Photos:

Thomas Hawk, ‘Step’ (photo), July 21 2005, http://www.flickr.com/photos/thomashawk/27598027/, CC BY NC 2.0.

photoJENic2, ‘Lighthouse Stairs’ (photo), September 9 2006, http://www.flickr.com/photos/jennydinardo/243055350/, CC BY NC 2.0.

Thomas Hawk, ‘She Climbs’ (photo), May 17 2006, http://www.flickr.com/photos/thomashawk/148632756/, CC BY NC 2.0.

radiant guy, ‘Hey you! Climb to success!’ (photo), November 9 2005, http://www.flickr.com/photos/lexrex/61841422/, CC BY NC 2.0.

flamingoo, ‘stairs’ (photo), April 8 2006, http://www.flickr.com/photos/pewits/127885345/, CC BY NC SA 2.0.

Torley, ‘Scenes from my SL (2007-08-02 to 2007-11-11) 210’ through ‘Scenes from my SL (2007-08-02 to 2007-11-11) 213’ (photos), July 27 2008, CC BY SA 2.0.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/torley/2706110169/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/torley/2706111295/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/torley/2706112013/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/torley/2706931508/

Matti Mattila, ‘Construction site – Week 12’, 14, 17, 18, 20. (photos), March 21 2008, CC BY 2.0.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mattimattila/2348869837/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mattimattila/2391410947/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mattimattila/2442045301/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mattimattila/2455953279/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mattimattila/2498248409/

Steffe, ‘4 photos I took today’ (photo), November 20, 2005, http://www.flickr.com/photos/steffe/65118195/, CC BY NC SA 2.0.

Latente /dev/null. ‘Polaroid 600 Manipulation – Torri di Lorenteggio’ (photo), March 6 2008, http://www.flickr.com/photos/e-coli/2315051432/, CC BY NC SA 2.0.

Latente /dev/null, ‘Polaroid 600 Manipulation’ (photo), March 11 2008, http://www.flickr.com/photos/e-coli/2326890389/, CC BY NC SA 2.0.

I, Timmy, ‘the grabbing hands…’ (photo), May 30 2008, http://www.flickr.com/photos/apoptotic/2540055580/, CC BY NC SA 2.0.

hidden side, ‘Addio Polaroid’ (photo), February 9, 2008, http://www.flickr.com/photos/hidden_vice/2251780221/, CC BY NC SA 2.0.

Darwin Bell, ‘what are word for’ (photo), November 30, 2005, http://www.flickr.com/photos/darwinbell/395970515/, CC BY NC 2.0.

Darwin Bell, ‘wired to go’ (photo), November 30, 2006, http://www.flickr.com/photos/darwinbell/310941758/, CC BY 2.0.

Chalky Lives, ‘Panograph’ (photo), July 30, 2006, http://www.flickr.com/photos/traitlinburke/201009136/, CC BY SA 2.0.

Chalky Lives, ‘Tokyo Skyline Panograph’ (photo), July 30 2006, http://www.flickr.com/photos/traitlinburke/201627863/, CC BY SA 2.0.

Chalky Lives, ‘Lower East Side – New York City Panograph’ (photo), August 1 2006, http://www.flickr.com/photos/traitlinburke/203561085/, CC BY NC SA.

Bolandrotor, ‘look! gold!’ (photo), September 25 2007, http://www.flickr.com/photos/bolandrotor/1438898121/, CC BY NC 2.0.

Ben Harris-Roxas, ‘Suburbs’ (photo), December 4, 2007, http://www.flickr.com/photos/photosydney/2085204048/, CC BY NC SA 2.0.

B Tal, ‘The Skyscraper’s Battle With The Heavens’ (photo), July 8 2006, http://www.flickr.com/photos/b-tal/185198606/, CC BY NC 2.0.

Videos:

justin.blip.tv, ‘iSummit ’06 Opening Panel – Lawrence Lessig’ (video), June 24 2006, http://blip.tv/file/44308/, CC BY.

MusicFilmBroth, ‘art pod the build mr 14.9.08.wmv’ (video), September 16 2008, http://blip.tv/file/1266869/, CC BY.

Matchbook Films, ‘Brick Wall (Run IX)’ (video), February 16 2008, http://blip.tv/file/673306/, CC BY NC SA.

Apperceptions, ‘The Winning Spirit of Collaboration’ (video), January 12 2006, http://blip.tv/file/9587/, CC BY NC SA.

dcd, ‘Collaboration’ (video), October 6 2008, http://blip.tv/file/1329908/, CC BY NC.

Creative Commons, ‘Building on the Past’ (video), July 24 2007, http://blip.tv/file/314905/, CC BY.

Creative Commons, ‘Wanna Work Together?’ (video), June 29 2007, http://blip.tv/file/285260/, CC BY.

Creative Commons, ‘A Shared Culture’ (video), August 21 2008, http://blip.tv/file/1192356/, CC BY NC SA.

C’est le Toon, ‘Eindhoven Skyline’ (video), May 29 2008, http://blip.tv/file/945098/, CC BY NC.

Lawrence Lessig, ‘5 minutes to withdraw’ (video), February 25 2008, http://blip.tv/file/693889/, CC BY.

EyeSteelFilm channel, ‘*Trailer* RiP: A Remix Manifesto’ (video), October 6 2008, http://blip.tv/file/1329162/http://blip.tv/file/1329162/, CC BY NC SA.

Music/Audio:

duckett, ‘THIS IS OUR MUSIC (Thruewiddit mix)’ (music), June 27 2008, http://ccmixter.org/files/duckett/15556, CC BY 3.0.

Blackberry, ‘Certain Death (Still Alive Remix)’ (music), October 8 2008, http://ccmixter.org/files/Blackberry/17059, CC BY NC 3.0.

Gregory Carr, aka Mr Gosh, ‘Dialog 2’ (audio), http://www.mrgosh.com/audio2.html, CC BY NC SA 2.0.

Gregory Carr, aka Mr Gosh, ‘Night Sounds’ (audio), http://www.mrgosh.com/audio2.html, CC BY NS SA 2.0.

Tags: build, change, create, participate, share, together

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