Remix culture
Encyclopedia
Remix culture is a term used to describe a society
which allows and encourages derivative work
s. Remix is defined as 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 2008 book, Remix
, Lawrence Lessig
presents this as a desirable ideal and argues, among other things, that the health, progress, and wealth creation of a culture is fundamentally tied to this participatory remix process.
which allows only the viewing of its content. Modern consumptive culture is a form of permission culture
. Advocates of copyright protection argue Read Only culture is necessary to nurture creativity. They argue that without protection of their work, artists would have no incentive to produce original material because their work will be taken and modified by others.
where the owner can change their material on the disk. Amateur producers make and distribute the content. Lessig argues that Read/Write culture will nurture creativity by all individuals to produce and influence their culture. In this culture, all members are producers who continually consume, remix, and produce new material. By taking input of all the participants, the culture will become richer and more inclusive. Remix and participatory cultures can provide significant social benefits.
Author Ramsay Wood
argues that the fables in The Panchatantra
are the oldest known example of remix culture.
The Internet makes for a perfect way to implement the theory of "Read/Write culture". Remixes of songs, videos, and photos are easily distributed. It means that there is never a final project to anything. There is a constant revision to what is being created, which is done on both a professional and amateur scale. One very simple and common way people remix is through music and advertisements. Programs like Garageband
and Adobe Photoshop
make it extremely easy to rework what has been done on a professional scale. The internet makes remix an art available to the masses to produce and distribute.
, anyone with the intent to remix an existing work is liable for lawsuit because the copyright laws protect the intellectual property of the work. However, the current copyright laws are proving to be ineffective at preventing the piracy and sampling of intellectual property. Lessig argues that there needs to be a change in the current state of copyright laws to legalize remix culture. One proposition is to adopt the system of citation
used with book references. The remix artist would cite the intellectual property they sampled which would give the original creator the credit, as is common with literature references.
Kirby Ferguson argues that 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.
Society
A society, or a human society, is a group of people related to each other through persistent relations, or a large social grouping sharing the same geographical or virtual territory, subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations...
which allows and encourages derivative work
Derivative work
In United States copyright law, a derivative work is an expressive creation that includes major, copyright-protected elements of an original, previously created first work .-Definition:...
s. Remix is defined as 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
Remix
A remix is an alternative version of a recorded song, made from an original version. This term is also used for any alterations of media other than song ....
the work of copyright holders. In his 2008 book, Remix
Remix (book)
Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy is Lawrence Lessig's fifth book. It is available as a free download under a Creative Commons license...
, Lawrence Lessig
Lawrence Lessig
Lawrence "Larry" Lessig is an American academic and political activist. He is best known as a proponent of reduced legal restrictions on copyright, trademark, and radio frequency spectrum, particularly in technology applications, and he has called for state-based activism to promote substantive...
presents this as a desirable ideal and argues, among other things, that the health, progress, and wealth creation of a culture is fundamentally tied to this participatory remix process.
Read Only Culture
In his book, Lessig describes modern culture as Read Only. In a Read Only culture, a small professional group produces all the culture that is then consumed by the masses. The public can only absorb and take in the culture, but it leaves no room to interact with the culture. This is analogous to a Read Only CDRead-only memory
Read-only memory is a class of storage medium used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be modified, or can be modified only slowly or with difficulty, so it is mainly used to distribute firmware .In its strictest sense, ROM refers only...
which allows only the viewing of its content. Modern consumptive culture is a form of permission culture
Permission culture
Permission culture is a term often employed by Lawrence Lessig and other copyright activists to describe a society in which copyright restrictions are pervasive and enforced to the extent that any and all uses of copyrighted works need to be explicitly leased...
. Advocates of copyright protection argue Read Only culture is necessary to nurture creativity. They argue that without protection of their work, artists would have no incentive to produce original material because their work will be taken and modified by others.
Read/Write Culture
Remix culture is a culture where the public is free to add, change, influence, and interact with their culture. This is analogous to a Read/Write CDRead-write memory
Read-write memory is a type of computer memory that may be relatively easily written to as well as read from . The term RAM is often used to describe writable memory. RAM actually referring to memory that can be accessed at any "location"....
where the owner can change their material on the disk. Amateur producers make and distribute the content. Lessig argues that Read/Write culture will nurture creativity by all individuals to produce and influence their culture. In this culture, all members are producers who continually consume, remix, and produce new material. By taking input of all the participants, the culture will become richer and more inclusive. Remix and participatory cultures can provide significant social benefits.
Examples
- FolkloreFolkloreFolklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
: the culture of the commons was always a remix culture and it existed way before any copyright law. All the Folk tales, Folk songs, Folk artFolk artFolk art encompasses art produced from an indigenous culture or by peasants or other laboring tradespeople. In contrast to fine art, folk art is primarily utilitarian and decorative rather than purely aesthetic....
, Folk poetry etc. were revised constantly, much the same way as it happenes on the internet today.
- GraffitiGraffitiGraffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....
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 paintAerosol paintAerosol paint is a type of paint that comes in a sealed pressurized container and is released in a fine spray mist when depressing a valve button. A form of spray painting, aerosol paint leaves a smooth, evenly coated surface, unlike many rolled or brushed paints. Standard sized cans are portable,...
, or other mediums, the artists essentially remix and change the wall or other surface to display their twist or critique.
- SamplingSampling (music)In music, sampling is the act of taking a portion, or sample, of one sound recording and reusing it as an instrument or a different sound recording of a song or piece. Sampling was originally developed by experimental musicians working with musique concrète and electroacoustic music, who physically...
in music making is a prime example of reuse and remix to produce a new work. Sampling has had wide spread popularity within hip-hop culture. Grandmaster FlashGrandmaster FlashJoseph Saddler better known as King Grandmaster Flash, is an American hip hop musician and DJ; one of the pioneers of hip-hop DJing, cutting, and mixing....
, and Afrika BambaataaAfrika BambaataaAfrika Bambaataa is an American DJ from the South Bronx, New York who was instrumental in the early development of hip hop throughout the 1980s. Afrika Bambaataa is one of the three originators of break-beat deejaying, and is respectfully known as the "Grandfather" and the Amen Ra of Universal...
were two of the early artists in the hip hop community to employ the practice of sampling in their music. However the practice of sampling can be traced to earlier artists. Led ZeppelinLed ZeppelinLed Zeppelin were an English rock band, active in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s. Formed in 1968, they consisted of guitarist Jimmy Page, singer Robert Plant, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham...
sampled many acts including Willie DixonWillie DixonWilliam James "Willie" Dixon was an American blues musician, vocalist, songwriter, arranger and record producer. A Grammy Award winner who was proficient on both the Upright bass and the guitar, as well as his own singing voice, Dixon is arguably best known as one of the most prolific songwriters...
, Howlin' WolfHowlin' WolfChester Arthur Burnett , known as Howlin' Wolf, was an influential American blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player....
, Jake HolmesJake HolmesJake Holmes is an American singer-songwriter and jingle writer who began a recording career in the 1960s...
, and SpiritSpirit (band)Spirit was an American jazz/hard rock/progressive rock/psychedelic band founded in 1967, based in Los Angeles, California.- The original lineup :...
as remix within the legal dimensions of copyright. By taking a sample or small clip of an existing song and distorting and incorporating into a new piece, the artist has remixed the song and made it their own.
- WikipediaWikipediaWikipedia is a free, web-based, collaborative, multilingual encyclopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Its 20 million articles have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world. Almost all of its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the site,...
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.comAmazon.comAmazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
called Wikipedia "the world's most exhaustive and up-to-date encyclopedia" because it is edited and produced by such a large pool of knowledge.
- In FilmFilmA film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
, remix is often used. Most new Hollywood movies are adaptations of comicsComic bookA comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
, graphic novelsGraphic novelA graphic novel is a narrative work in which the story is conveyed to the reader using sequential art in either an experimental design or in a traditional comics format...
, bookBookA book is a set or collection of written, printed, illustrated, or blank sheets, made of hot lava, paper, parchment, or other materials, usually fastened together to hinge at one side. A single sheet within a book is called a leaf or leaflet, and each side of a leaf is called a page...
s, 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 BillKill BillKill Bill Volume 1 is a 2003 action thriller film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. It is the first of two volumes that were theatrically released several months apart, the second volume being Kill Bill Volume 2....
which takes many techniques and scene templates from other films.
Author Ramsay Wood
Ramsay Wood
Ramsay Wood is a writer best known for his modernized compilation of the ancient animal fables derived from The Panchatantra. His Kalila and Dimna-- Selected Fables of Bidpai was published by Knopf in 1980...
argues that the fables in The Panchatantra
Panchatantra
The Panchatantra is an ancient Indian inter-related collection of animal fables in verse and prose, in a frame story format. The original Sanskrit work, which some scholars believe was composed in the 3rd century BCE, is attributed to Vishnu Sharma...
are the oldest known example of remix culture.
The Internet makes for a perfect way to implement the theory of "Read/Write culture". Remixes of songs, videos, and photos are easily distributed. It means that there is never a final project to anything. There is a constant revision to what is being created, which is done on both a professional and amateur scale. One very simple and common way people remix is through music and advertisements. Programs like Garageband
GarageBand
GarageBand is a software application for Mac OS X and iOS that allows users to create music or podcasts. It is developed by Apple Inc. as a part of the iLife software package on Mac OS X.-Audio recording:...
and Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Photoshop is a graphics editing program developed and published by Adobe Systems Incorporated.Adobe's 2003 "Creative Suite" rebranding led to Adobe Photoshop 8's renaming to Adobe Photoshop CS. Thus, Adobe Photoshop CS5 is the 12th major release of Adobe Photoshop...
make it extremely easy to rework what has been done on a professional scale. The internet makes remix an art available to the masses to produce and distribute.
Copyright
Lessig argues that "outdated copyright laws have turned our children into criminals." Under current copyright lawsCopyright
Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
, anyone with the intent to remix an existing work is liable for lawsuit because the copyright laws protect the intellectual property of the work. However, the current copyright laws are proving to be ineffective at preventing the piracy and sampling of intellectual property. Lessig argues that there needs to be a change in the current state of copyright laws to legalize remix culture. One proposition is to adopt the system of citation
Citation
Broadly, a citation is a reference to a published or unpublished source . More precisely, a citation is an abbreviated alphanumeric expression Broadly, a citation is a reference to a published or unpublished source (not always the original source). More precisely, a citation is an abbreviated...
used with book references. The remix artist would cite the intellectual property they sampled which would give the original creator the credit, as is common with literature references.
Kirby Ferguson argues that 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
Yochai Benkler
Yochai Benkler is an Israeli-American professor of Law and author. Since 2007, he has been the Berkman Professor of Entrepreneurial Legal Studies at Harvard Law School. He is also a faculty co-director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.- Biography :In 1984, 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
- Free Culture (book)Free Culture (book)Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity is a book by law professor Lawrence Lessig that was released on the Internet under the Creative Commons Attribution/Non-commercial license on March 25, 2004."There has never been a...
by Lawrence Lessig - Vidding
- Anime music videos
- MachinimaMachinimaMachinima is the use of real-time 3D computer graphics rendering engines to create a cinematic production. Most often, video games are used to generate the computer animation...
- Remix (book)Remix (book)Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy is Lawrence Lessig's fifth book. It is available as a free download under a Creative Commons license...
by Lawrence Lessig - RiP!: A Remix ManifestoRiP!: A Remix ManifestoRiP!: A Remix Manifesto is a 2008 open source documentary film about "the changing concept of copyright"directed by Brett Gaylor.Created over a period of six years, the documentary film features the collaborative remix work of hundreds of people who have contributed to the Open Source Cinema...
2008 documentary - BanksyBanksyBanksy is a pseudonymous England-based graffiti artist, political activist, film director, and painter.His satirical street art and subversive epigrams combine irreverent dark humour with graffiti done in a distinctive stencilling technique...
- Good Copy Bad CopyGood Copy Bad CopyGood Copy Bad Copy, A documentary about the current state of copyright and culture, is a documentary about copyright and culture in the context of Internet, peer-to-peer file sharing and other technological advances, directed by Andreas Johnsen, Ralf Christensen, and Henrik Moltke.It features...
- MashupMashup (music)A mashup or bootleg is a song or composition created by blending two or more pre-recorded songs, usually by overlaying the vocal track of one song seamlessly over the instrumental track of another...
External links
- Video resources
- Total Recut
- Everything's A Remix
- Remixthebook by Mark Amerika