Floundering without Intellectual Property? - Week 5

One of this week’s readings really got me thinking about culture, intellectual property and content copyright. Lawrence Lessig (2004) painted a really relevant historical picture for me in relation to media content restrictions, by using Disney and Manga as examples. He introduced an interesting concept, “Creators here and everywhere are always and at all times building upon the creativity that went before and that surrounds them now.” Most of the content we have readily available to our culture is not an original idea – obviously, because where else would copies, spin offs and parodies come from? But not even that, and idea has to stem from something – essentially, another (different) concept.

From our tutorial discussion in relation to media content copyright and ISP restrictions, I got to thinking about the businesses and cultural segments dedicated to what can only be known as ‘illegal content distributors’. Limewire, Frostwire and Pirate Bay are 3 programs/websites which definitely don’t go unnoticed due to their mass redistribution and peer to peer sharing. It doesn’t help that with the rise in popularity for theses sites, and internet-enabled devices, has come the noticeable decline in sales for CDs and DVDs – a big blow for the music and film industries. It makes me wonder how it is that some people (which may or may not include myself…) fly completely under the radar when viewing or downloading media content, but in other instances – individuals are caught downloading the content and are consequentially restricted or even shut down by their ISPs.

I would have to agree with Lessig's idea that “A large, diverse society cannot survive without property; a large, diverse, and modern society cannot flourish without intellectual property.” But I can't help but wonder what would the world be like without copyright of our own intellectual property? I doubt we would all be swimming around in an ocean of free content, rather - everyone would be scrabbling over each others work, claiming it as their own. I feel that our culture currently has an appropriate system for copyright, considering the way we can so easily share and view content. I just wonder where it will head in the future, with the evolution of media production systems and technologies... 
Let me know your thoughts

The State of the Internet 2011

Have a look at this phenonmenal infographic I found, which is based on the State of the Internet in 2011...


Created by: Online Schools

Let me know what you think! :)

Week 4 Blog - Finding the Balance

To start off this weeks blog, I want to something that Deuze mentioned in the reading for this week "Work comes in many different shapes and sizes – paid and non-paid, voluntary and employed, professional and amateuristic – and we seem to be engulfed in it all of the time."

Engulfed... In work... Sound familiar? I bet. This perception and experience of working has truly come to define life and modern society, especially as work and leisure can increasingly be seen as extensions of each other. With the convergence of work and leisure, paired with vast advancements in information and communication technologies, our work and home life issues and projects can seemingly reach us whereever we are, at warped speeds. So, how do we find that ideal balance of work and home life?

In regards to my own work/home lifestyle, there really is no determinable boundary for the use of communication technologies. I get emails from one of my jobs, giving me details on a project outline or explaining something for me to research (we do operate computers all day long for it, being Graphic Designers and all - but still...) and calls to arrange meeting places and times for my other job. Disregarding my own personal use, it is a fact that we all use internet overwhelmingly for interpersonal communication, whether it is in the context of play, love, or work... My question for you my friends, is how would you feel keeping all of your employment-related communication and work, within only the hours you were paid? Can we necessarily do that in today's era? Leave that email till tomorrow, and do your research till you do it on your employers time?

I would personally find it much more difficult if I had to restrain myself from working outside of the workplace - Even if I had to log every bit of research, email or phone call I have done or taken outside of work, it really would become more effort than its worth. I would rather no restrictions at all (free to do all the extra work I please!) or complete restrictions. We are too far gone with our telecommunication and technology convergence within workplaces - I really would need to be under either one of the extremes. I think that with the convergence of technologies, our generation is blessed with the opportunity to multitask, in more ways than we could ever imagine.

Cyber world management? - Week 3

For this week's blog, I decided to sit and have a think about John Barlow's article, "A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace", where he introduces to us to Cyberspace - "the new home of the mind, which grows itself through collective actions". It really is the home of the mind, because the web is what we (- being thoughtful, intelligent and creative human beings) made it what it is today.

It seems like such a phenomenal, idealistic situation - we have managed to form and manipulate something that is quickly becoming one of the most successful industries in the history of our world. Full of so many lifetimes worth of information and entertainment - there really isn't much that the tech-savvy user cannot find or unravel online, with all of the most effective tools right at our fingertips. We can search, upload, download, stream, browse, buy, sell, play, email, blog, video call, voice chat, and simply create + edit a myriad of content... But how long will this list carry on?

On the darker side, we are having to reform new rules and laws to attempt to keep our cyber world controlled - whether its addressing privacy issues for the social network users, being security savvy for every online shopper, watching out for copyright infringment, or even just avoiding the average online scam... With our technological capabilities ever-growing and changing, my contemplative question for this week is - will the cyber world one day become too much for us to handle? May we accidentally fall into a downward spiral (perhaps for progress' sake)? And who will manage it when it does, if the world has no greater authority than ourselves? (I just hope it doesn't turn out like iRobot...) I guess for now, we can only wonder...


Over and out for this week. Leave your thoughts with me.

Slow Media Experiment - Week 2

During the past week, I was asked to undertake an experiment for another one of my uni subjects - called The Slow Media Experiment. The experiment was inspired by Jennifer Rauch, who we as a class group knew her as a blogger, but she is also a Media & Cultural studies teacher from NY. She did a 6 month "Digital Detox" of all recent technologies - going back to the basics of snail mail and land line phones. She also got her Media studies students to undertake a similar experiment, essentially giving up technology for a just a few hours over the week. Some of her students played musical instruments, wrote in journals, watched videotapes and practiced calligraphy for their Slow Media Experiment.

In our collaborative, simplified version of the experiment we stuck to a few rules: No texting, only phone calls. No TV, DVDs or gaming. No Internet, computers, iPods or MP3 players. We all decided to commit to having atleast 4-hours of digital media-free segments over the course of the week, totalling in atleast 16 (awake!) hours. During my digital detox I chose to work, read books, play board games (monopoly!) and even listen to the radio instead of my ipod. So - I couldnt text, watch DVDs or even check my emails... but only for those 4 short hours every day or so. Outside of this window we could technically do whatever we wanted. It was surreal having to actively stop myself from thinking about my possible Facebook notifications and unread emails, but when I got back online - I didn't really care about being back online again..?

It got me thinking how our generation has really become so habitual in our media consumption - that it is truly the representation of media that makes us want it. We do not necessarily receive any rewards from our social networks, it seems to be just a pattern that some of us are falling into. During my personal digital detox, I thoroughly enjoyed reading (and finishing) my novel, and laughing along with my boyfriend and his family whilst we played Monopoly. I found that I really didnt truly realise how much we depend on technology and digital media until you attempt to remove it completely from your routine.


It also got me thinking about a quote by Kevin Kelly (1999), "We now live in a new economy created by shrinking computers and expanding communications". There is no denying it, as our entire society and the social networks within it are being penetrated by digital media. This 'new economy' that is slowly advancing on us, deals with not only information - but relationships, copyright, entertainment and security. With the telecommunication industry becoming a larger industry than any of the past industry giants, where are we headed? How long until we completely cut out the slow media processes, and give in to our enabling technologies, which are already spurring innovation into newer technologies? These questions raised by Kelly (1999) over 10 years ago, makes me wonder what he would say today about our immersion into digital technologies.




 Jennifer's experiment & blog
http://slowmedia.typepad.com/slow-media/