[p2p-research] the retrenchment of free video

[Michel Bauwens]

thanks a lot Michael, it's slated for tomorrow

remember my offer to make your book "Book of the Week"?

 Michel

On Tue, Apr 13, 2010 at 7:50 PM, Dr. Strangelove <Michael at strangelove.com>wrote:

> Michael,
>
> here is a brief reply for the P2P blog, if it suits...
>
> On Writing Obituaries for Amateur Video Culture
>
> Over the past twenty years there has emerged a clear pattern in how we have
> responded to innovations in online communicative freedoms and digital
> cultural production. A new form of expression is developed and quickly
> adopted, corporations jump on the bandwagon, then left-wing critics cry foul
> and predict that all is soon to come to and end. We saw this with the world
> wide web, with digital piracy, with innovations such as peer to peer, and we
> are now seeing obituaries being penned for the future of online video.
>
> I first wrote about online video in 1994, but the real revolution in online
> video is merely five years old, launched with the birth of YouTube.
> Nonetheless, Christian Sandvig offers<http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/niftyc/archives/324>a somewhat hysterical judgement on the impending 'retrenchment' of online
> video by the old mass media system.
>
> Sandvig argues that alternative sources of online video, such as amateur
> productions, will be squeezed out by distribution bottlenecks. Yet this is
> mere speculation and fails to account for the utter failure of the music
> industry to control online distribution of music (of which 90% remains
> pirated).
>
> Arguing that a bottleneck of distribution will significantly stifle amateur
> video culture overlooks market forces of competition. Internet users always
> migrate to system that enable the greatest communicative freedom.
>
> Sandvig also grossly overstates the failure of amateur culture to depart
> from the styles and genre of American television. Similarities certainly
> exist, but amateur video is most certainly a field of tremendous innovation
> in aesthetics and genre. Amateur cultural production, contrary to Sandvig,
> does not require intellectuals to valorize its existence. There is no
> necessary goal for a truly revolutionized video, other than mass
> participation in cultural production which, as I argue in *Watching
> YouTube<http://www.amazon.com/wATCHING-YOUTUBE-Extraordinary-Videos-Ordinary/dp/1442610670/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1257216021&sr=1-1>
> *, is in itself revolutionary.
>
> One must take a very narrow slice of the world of deinstitutionalized video
> production to conclude that innovation and participation online video is
> being significantly thwarted by market forces. Sandvig admits that his
> argument is based on 'anecdote and suspicion' and we do have good reason to
> be suspicious of YouTube's long term business plans. We do have good reason
> to fear for the future of mass participation in unconstrained cultural
> production. But contra Sandvig, *Charlie bit my finger -- again*! does
> have a public advocate. It has the voices of hundreds of millions of
> individuals who are discovering new productive capabilities, and who will
> not easliy let go of their new found expressive freedoms.
>
> Sandvig's obititury is not signifcant for its arguements but for what it
> represents -- a tendency to dismiss the staying power of newly established
> modes of networked amateur cultural production in a world dominated by
> privatized  commercialized, value systems. We have reason to be vigilant,
> but this is a century that will bare the stamp of amateur cultural
> production.
>
> Dr. Strangelove
> University of Ottawa
> Author of *Watching YouTube: Extraordinary Videos by Ordinary People*(University of Toronto Press, 2010)
> Strangelove.com/blog
>
> Twitter.com/doc_strangelove
> YouTube.com/user/EmpireofMInd
> Facebook.com/michael.strangelove
>
>
>
>
> On 13/04/2010 4:10 AM, Michel Bauwens wrote:
>
> a must read, http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/niftyc/archives/324 , on how
> mass media is coopting video sharing and changing its nature
>
> Sepp, Michael: a comment for our blog would be most appreciated!
>
> See his detailed treatment of 'bottlenecks' for example,
>
> Michel
>
> --
> Work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhurakij_Pundit_University - Think
> thank: http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI
>
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>
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>
>
>
>


-- 
Work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhurakij_Pundit_University - Think thank:
http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI

P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net

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