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Mixing it Up: How to Make New Content From Old Media
Girl Talk: The name conjures sugar and spice and everything nice, with a little Carrie Bradshaw thrown in for good measure. In reality, Girl Talk is the alter ego of Gregg Gillis, an artist who uses software to mix together bits and pieces of other musicians' songs; it's hard to understand the scope of the creativity involved without listening to a few of his songs, which you can do here.
The technique Gillis uses, called "remixing," was a hot topic at the recent South by Southwest (SXSW) festival in Austin, Texas, and is gaining more and more traction in the online world, begging the question - what is "original content," and who should have the right to appropriate music, film and other content shared online?
A new documentary called RiP: A Remix Manifesto, which had its U.S. premiere at SXSW, places Girl Talk at the center of an examination of current copyright law and its impact on art and creativity. Directed by web activist Brett Gaylor, who founded the Open Source Cinema project, the film itself is open source - which means that anyone can take content from the film and share it or create something new. In this clip, you can see how a group of students digitally rotoscoped footage from a Girl Talk concert that's featured in the film (think Richard Linklater's Waking Life).
Stanford professor Lawrence Lessig is a major character in RiP. Lessig, who founded the nonprofit group Creative Commons to help open up content on the Web, believes all content should be available for remixing - and says public media has a particular mandate to make its content is available for broad public use.
Gaylor and Lessig (in his PBS retro tshirt) at the film's premiere. Photo by Tammy Green.
"Businesses need to encourage artists by respecting them," Lessig said in an interview at SXSW. "Public broadcasting has got to stop focusing so much on the broadcasting half and focus more on the public half. We've not yet had any substantial movement for public media to start licensing their content so the public is able to do something with it."
Watch the full interview:
This is just one of over 30 interviews that PBS conducted at SXSW, all of which are open source and available online. You can check out the playlist on YouTube at youtube.com/pbs and see more related content at pbs.org/sxsw.
So what do you think? Should copyright law support remixing as a legitimate part of creative culture in the digital age? Is it within public media's mission to open up content so anyone can tell a story using PBS programming? And last, but not least: What business models are needed to support more open content sharing by rights holders?
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I absolutely think that
I absolutely think that remixing should be allowed.
The question however gets a little confusing when the material is used for profit however.
Perhaps we can define this line by a certain percentage range, or other methods?
I'm open to suggestions!
@Adrian
The question is no more confusing when the material is used for profit, IF middlemen are removed from the equation, or at least have their behavior altered. The problem is that under our current system, it is not the consumer, nor the artist who benefits the most. It is the media conglomerate that essentially owns the artist and what he can do with his artwork. This is proven by way of things like companies owning the copyright to artistic works well after the artist is dead.
I have no doubt whatsoever that many, many, many mainstream artists would be interested in seeing what people create from their own works. However, they do not have control over this, when they've all but handed over their souls to media giants like Time Warner. It is a pity that big artists cannot experience and share their art in the way they see fit. When they sign contracts, much of their artistic freedom rights are taken away.
Greed blindsides these giants from seeing the potential in everyone creating and remixing (i.e., that they could find many more artists to make money through, thus making up for any potential loss in sales). I don't think this is a bad thing, though, as the telecommunications industry has been dominated by most of the same players for a century now; they have become greedy, corrupt and often unethical in their behavior. The fact that they have lasted this long, despite poor behavior and public dislike, shows that there is not enough free market competition going on against them, partially because our politicians have been enticed by all the lobbying, thus creating laws that support and protect these key players. This won't change overnight. There is a lot of legal and political power behind these companies.
Remixing, particularly the for-profit side of it, has the potential to vastly change the artistic/entertainment and educational sectors. It will be good, when it is allowed to finally happen freely!
I am at the extreme: people
I am at the extreme: people can do anything they want with my stuff as long as they attribute it to me. I only care about exposure, not nickle and diming people.
Public Domain
Why should intellectual property pass into the public domain before real property? When will the buildings pass into public domain? I support the concept of transformation, but strategically, we need to put pressure on the politics of real property or intellectual innovators will remain in a legislative ghetto.
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