Week 2: Reading... A Response to Nick Briscoe

CONVERGENCE CULTURE CHAPTER 4 DISCUSSION WK2 PST1

Here’s the deal. I am not against copyright. I don’t have an issue asking for permission to use material created by others. I do however have an issue with the way certain corporate entities have dealt with the issue thus far. “Marketers have turned our children into walking, talking billboards who wear logos on their T-shirts, sew patches on their backpacks, plaster stickers on their lockers, hang posters on their walls, buy they must not, under penalty of law post them on their home pages. Somehow, once consumers choose when and where to display those images, their active participation in the circulation of brands suddenly becomes a moral outrage and a threat to the industry’s economic well-being.” (Jenkins, 2006, p.142) I completely agree with the aforementioned statement. Corporations desperately need to catch up to the times, and accept the fact that consumers want more interaction.

Companies want their products to become infamous, and love when their products become part of culture, only on their own terms. However, societies and cultures do not work in such a fashion. Once an item becomes part of popular culture and becomes embedded into everyday life, it should be expected that consumers will want to share images, quotes, music, and so on. Particularly when that piece of media means something to the individual, will the desire to express themselves by using favorite media as that outlet. Isn’t imitation the sincerest form of flattery? The point being that a monolithic empire such as Star Wars (1977), for instance, is an example of a beast that cannot be stopped. Countless fan films, posted images, and such. Yet the franchise remains strong, because of its continued discussion and sharing among fans to help keep the flame alive.

I agree that the artists who create material by all means should receive credit, and their due worth. I also believe that corporations and conglomerates such as the RIAA and MPAA need to devise a better solution in which to deal with the issues at hand. Suing fans, criminalizing consumers, locking down products with DRM and the like have not only not worked as well as they would like, but have put them in a bad light.

I don’t only blame the media companies; I blame the law too. There needs to be clearer guidelines written into copyright laws with expansion on fair use (for education, social/cultural freedoms, and other non-commercial usages). As Jenkins (2006, p.142) states “...media companies are giving out profoundly mixed signals because they really can’t decide what kind of relationships they want to have with this new kind of consumer.” Jenkins (2006, p.138) quotes Greg McCracken as stating “Corporations must decide whether they are, literally, in or out. Will they make themselves an island or will they enter the mix? Making themselves an island may have certain short-term financial benefits, but the long-term costs can be substantial.” The cost may be already apparent. There are a growing number of web “television” sites that offer original creative content for free, and allow the downloading, and sharing of their shows. They make their money off of advertisements, which they count on being spread. There are bands that are forming their own record labels that allow free downloading, and sharing of their content, and put more focus back onto the artists. Changes are happening.

Source: Jenkins, H. (2006). Convergence culture: Where old and new media collide. New York: New York University Press.

EL WRAY
THURSDAY, JULY 16, 2009 - 11:32 AM

Every quote you have cited in this post, I have highlighted in my own copy of Jenkin's Convergence Culture. Particularly poignant is the listing of all the ways/places marketers want their brand or message displayed. God forbid anyone take the initiative to post something somewhere they didn't think of first! Marketing is all about endearing a product to the consumer - sending such mixed messages is not the way to do that.


Source: CONVERGENCE CULTURE CHAPTER 4 DISCUSSION WK2 PST1, Nick Briscoe, http://web.me.com/nicholasjbriscoe/NicholasBriscoe/Blog/Entries/2009/7/14_Convergence_Culture_Chapter_4_Discussion_Wk2_Pst1.html retrieved on July 16, 2009
Image Credit: Stock photography purchased by Emily Wray from http://www.photos.com.