CCV Week 12 - Remixing With Copyright Law In Mind

This is our last week of class and the topic is remixing and copyright law using StephenColbert's interview with Lawrence Lessig as the focal point of study.  Lessig, an advocate of change to the copyright law as it is now, has written a book titled “Remix:Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy.” 

Wikipedia gives an excellent bio of Lessig.  In it they note “he is a director of the Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics at Harvard University and a professor of law at Harvard Law School. Prior to rejoining Harvard, he was a professor of law at Stanford Law School and founder of its Center for Internet and Society. Lessig is a founding board member of Creative Commons and Rootstrikers, and also is on the board of MapLight.  He is on the advisory boards of the Sunlight Foundation and Americans Elect.  He is a former board member of the Free Software Foundation, Software Freedom Law Center and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.”

Lessig certainly has an estimable career and believes firmly that copyright law needs to be changed in order to move this society forward.  As it is, in Lessig’s view, the law makes criminals of our young instead of encouraging them to be creative and collaborative.

I find myself still believing firmly in the copyright law, but I am also going to try and look at copyright law through the eyes of Lessig.  His focus is more on video and music copyright rather than text.  He brings up the examples of kids mixing copyrighted music with YouTube video and in turn used by the same media companies who issue threats when that said music is downloaded.  What Lessig is looking for is a more lenient copyright law that would allow for downloading of music by kids for their own creative purposes. 

A suggestion for remix of the Colbert interview with Lessig was included with this assignment.  It was optional.  And, as I thought of ways to do it, I realized it could be done with music with a Creative Commons license.  Also, I find I cannot do it out of respect for Lessig. 

Resources:
http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/215454/january-08-2009/lawrence-lessig
http://www.amazon.com/Remix-Making-Commerce-Thrive-Economy/dp/1594201722#_
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Lessig

CCV Week 11 - The Long Tail Theory

The Long Tail theory explains expanding sales in the niche markets.  Chris Anderson, editor in chief of Wired magazine, writes about this phenomenon in his book published 2006  titled “The Long Tail: Why the Future ofBusiness Is Selling Less of More.”  

Using marketing resources such as reviews by customers and recommendations of similar products, companies such as Amazon, Netflix, Google, iTunes, Audible and eBay have expanded their sales from mass market products to more select niche items; in essence, selling less of one or two well known items to selling more of a variety of items not usually seen on shelves in stores. 

Anderson points out that accessibility of production tools (such as GarageBand for musicians or Audacity for radio show hosts now podcasters) and the internet for distribution of those products are also necessary to both produce a niche product and allow access to that product.

Thanks to the internet my world is enriched.  I have choices I never had before.  I can explore different interests through Amazon, Netflix, Google, iTunes, Audible and eBay.

I can give extraordinary gifts.  I can help support artists through purchase of their crafts or music. 

If I owned a business I could expand my customer base through the internet. I also could expand my inventory.  If I wanted to try my hand at podcasting or blogging or vlogging I could set up a website or build an audience and perhaps start a new successful career.

Indeed, the phenomenon of the “Long Tail”  affects everyone’s life by giving more choice.

Resources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Tail

http://www.longtail.com/about.html

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.10/tail.html

http://www.amazon.com/The-Long-Tail-Business-Selling/dp/1401302378

Week 10 - Thoughts about Podcasting

As an avid listener of National Public Radio shows in the drive to and from work each day, I questioned the value, success or even usefulness of podcasting when this venue was introduced this week in Multimedia Apps and Tools.  But the more I read about podcasting the more I see it as a viable form of broadcasting.

A few reasons to support the value of podcasting can be found in an interview with former radio show hosts Dave Jagger and Geri Jarvis at About.com titled “Dave and Geri: When Radio Turned its Back on Them - They Turned Up the Heat:  How Two Long-Time Radio Personalities Are Leveraging Podcasting” by Corey Deitz, About.com guide.  Jagger notes that podcasting is “having a conversation with the listener and at the same time trying to engage them to participate as well. Like radio... but not!”  He also notes the listener is able to stop the podcast, reverse it, and listen again to segments of the podcast.

Dave and Jeri’s podcasts can be found at their website: http://www.daveandgeri.com/.

A few other podcasts that look interesting can be found at these websites:
http://www.otrpodcast.com/  (Old Time Radio Shows)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts  (BBC Podcasts)
http://www.podcastingnews.com/content/  (Podcasting News)
http://www.npr.org/sections/technology/  (NPR’s audio stories)

And my favorite podcast:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/series/techweekly (The Guardian’s Tech Weekly Podcast)

A great definition of podcasting with useful reasoning about podcasting in general can be seen at Google Plus Today.  In essence it states that podcasts are audio files that can be downloaded to a portable digital media player and listened to at the listener’s convenience. 

Our project for the Week 10 is to create a podcast which I will post next week and which brings me to free apps for podcasting.  Most how-to articles and books about podcasting suggest Audacity and GarageBand.  In a one-day workshop I attended the instructor suggested Podomatic for that workshop.

There are many more aspects of podcasting that prove interesting for discussion and can be covered at another time.

Resources:

http://radio.about.com/od/podcastin1/a/aa073009a.htm

http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/podcasting-for-dummies/id129278483
http://www.podcastingnews.com/topics/Podcasting_Software.html