Remix culture

Remix culture is a society that allows and encourages derivative works by combining or editing existing materials to produce a new product. A remix culture would be, by default, permissive of efforts to improve upon, change, integrate, or otherwise remix the work of copyright holders. In his book Remix, Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig presents this as a desirable idea.

Read-Only Culture vs. Read/Write Culture

The Read Only culture (RO) is the culture consumed more or less passively. The information or product is provided by a 'professional' source, the content industry, that possesses an authority on that particular product/information. Analog technologies inherently supported RO culture's business model of production and distribution and limited the role of the consumer to consumption of media.

Digital technology does not have the 'natural' constraints of the analog that preceded it. RO culture had to be recoded in order to compete with the "free" distribution made possible by the Internet. This is primarily done in the form of Digital Rights Management (DRM), which imposes largely arbitrary restrictions on usage. Regardless, DRM has proven largely ineffective in enforcing the constraints of analog media. .

As opposed to RO culture, Read/Write culture (RW) has a reciprocal relationship between the producer and the consumer. Taking works, such as songs, and appropriating them in private circles is exemplary of RW culture, which was considered to be the 'popular' culture before the advent of reproduction technologies. The technologies and copyright laws that soon followed, however, changed the dynamics of popular culture. As it became professionalized, people were taught to defer production to the professionals.

Digital technologies provide the tools for reviving RW culture and democratizing production. Blogs explain the three layers of this democratization. Blogs have redefined our relationship to the content industry as they allowed access to non-professional content. The 'comments' feature that soon followed provided a space for readers to have a dialogue with the amateur contributors. 'Tagging' of the blogs by users based on the content provided the necessary layer for users to filter the sea of content according to their interest. The third layer added bots that analyzed the relationship between various websites by counting the clicks between them and, thus, organizing a database of preferences. The three layers working together established an ecosystem of reputation that served to guide users through the blogosphere. While there is no doubt many amateur online publications cannot compete with the validity of professional sources, the democratization of digital RW culture and the ecosystem of reputation provides a space for many talented voices to be heard that was not available in the pre-digital RO model.

Examples

• Folklore existed long before any copyright law. All folk tales, folk songs, folk art, folk poetry, etc. was revised constantly through the folk process.

• Graffiti is an example of read/write culture where the participants interact with their surroundings and environment. In much the same way that advertisements decorate walls, graffiti allows the public to choose the images to have displayed on their buildings. By using spray paint, or other mediums, the artists essentially remix and change the wall or other surface to display their twist or critique.

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  Graffiti in Tehran, Iran

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  Another example of graffiti

• Sampling in music making is an example of reuse and remix to produce a new work. Sampling is widely popular within hip-hop culture. Grandmaster Flash and Afrika Bambaataa were some of the earliest hip-hop artists to employ the practice of sampling. This practice can also be traced to artists such as Led Zeppelin, who sampled many acts including Willie Dixon, Howlin' Wolf, Jake Holmes, and Spirit By taking a small clip of an existing song, changing different parameters such as pitch, and incorporating it into a new piece, the artist can make it their own.

• Wikipedia is a further example of remix, where the public is encouraged to add their knowledge. The website essentially allows a user to remix the information presented. Amazon.com called Wikipedia "the world's most exhaustive and up-to-date encyclopedia" because it is edited and produced by such a large pool of people.

• In film, remixing is often done. Most new Hollywood movies are adaptations of comics, graphic novels, books, or other forms of media. The majority of other Hollywood cinema works are typically genre films that follow strict generic plots. These forms of movies hardly appear original and creative, but rather rely on adapting material from previous works, which is a form of remix. A prime example is the film Kill Bill which takes many techniques and scene templates from other films.

According to Ramsay Wood, fables in the Panchatantra are the oldest known example of remix culture.

The Internet makes for a highly effective way to implement "remix culture". Remixes of songs, videos, and photos are easily distributed. There is a constant revision to what is being created, which is done on both a professional and amateur scale. Software such as GarageBand and Adobe Photoshop make it easy to remix. The Internet allows distribution of remixes to the masses.

Copyright

Under current copyright laws, anyone with the intent to remix an existing work is liable for lawsuit because copyright laws protect the intellectual property of the work. However, current copyright laws are proving to be ineffective at preventing sampling (as well as other forms of piracy) of intellectual property Lessig argues that there needs to be a change in the current state of copyright laws to legalize remix culture. He states that "outdated copyright laws have turned our children into criminals." One proposition is to adopt the system of citation used with book references. The artist would cite the intellectual property they sampled which would give the original creator the credit, as is common with literature references.

According to Kirby Ferguson, everything is a remix, and that all original material builds off of and remixes previously existing material. If all intellectual property is influenced by other pieces of work, copyright laws would be unnecessary.

Other (copyright) scholars, such as Yochai Benkler and Erez Reuveni, promulgate ideas that are closely related to remix culture. Some scholars argue that the academic and legal institutions must change with the culture towards remix based.

See also

• Anime music videos
• Banksy
• Culture jamming
• Free Culture (book) by Lawrence Lessig
• Good Copy Bad Copy
• Internet meme
• Machinima
• Mashup
• Plunderphonics
• Remix (book) by Lawrence Lessig
• RiP!: A Remix Manifesto 2008 documentary
• Vidding
• VJing

External links

• Video resources
  • Remix Culture Symposium: Panel 1: Creative Commons Music
  • Remix Culture Symposium: Panel 2: Legal, Licensing and CC
  • Remix Culture Symposium: Panel 3: Creativity and the Commons
  • Lessig in conversation with The Booksmith on his book, REMIX
• Total Recut
• Everything Is a Remix
• Remixthebook by Mark Amerika
• Remix Theory by Eduardo Navas
• RE/Mixed Media Festival