The Incredible Copyright Laws

Above is a video I made when I was fourteen. I was a huge fan of Tony Jaa films and wanted to piece together the most epic moments of his two cult classics, Ong Bak and the Protector.

Originally I used to Death from Above tracks in the video. I was a huge fan of the Canadian band and felt that their high energy music would work well with my video.

In 2008, the video was taken down for a year, not due to the use of copyrighted footage, but because of the music.

In 2009 the video was allowed back on Youtube, however the music was dropped from it. Thus I had to swap the audio with a mediocre track provided by Youtube.

Months later, because of the amount of views it received, I got messages from various labels offering me money to swap the current audio with music from their label.

You would think that most labels would be satisfied with the use of their music being placed over popular videos. During the videos first years online, I received hundreds of messages requesting the titles of the original songs I used for the video.

In essence I feel like this video did more good then harm, I was able to promote a band that wasn’t familiar to Americans and other countries. I personally feel that the use of other peoples music in art, is ultimately a type of promotion.

Mercedes Augmented Reality

Anna Balsamo explains that “Access to multimediated or multimodal content is a compelling quality of virtual environments for the purposes of stimulating users to participate in learning activities”.

At the Toronto Auto show this year, one of the most intriguing exhibits was a Mercedes survey contest for a chance to win a new car.  The way the exhibit worked was by having a bunch of monitors surround a spinning platform that was big enough to hols a car.  Each monitor had a camera on it pointing towards the spinning platform.  By using augmented reality each camera  showed a virtual car that sat on the platform.

The use of augmented reality was intriguing to its viewers, thus the survey got tons of attention.  Therefore, proving Balsamo’s point, the promotional survey was a success due to it’s virtual environment that stimulated users to participate.

Digital Music: How Girl Talk Re-Invents a Genre

Girl talk is an artist that mixes songs from different generations and genres and transforms them by layering them with other tracks. Girl Talk’s music is a form of musical collage, because he takes certain samples, whether it be lyrics or instrumentals, and appropriates them into a hybrid, which in the end, becomes a new song entirely. By doing so, Girl Talk takes away the aura of the original samples he uses and creates a new unique aura, by remediating the original tracks. In every composition, Girl Talk manages to incorporate many layers of music by always including at least two samples at the same time; songs that usually exist within different realms sound musically cohesive. Girl Talk was one of the first DJs to experiment with this type of layering, and has become quite well-known for it. Do you think Girl Talk has created a new genre entirely through his interpretations, or is he the ultimate plagiarist?

The first video remix

The following is considered to be the first recorded example of video remix. The video is an appropriation of the Pooh movie, and Apocalypse Now.

The video was made over twenty years ago by Todd Graham, an OCAD student from Toronto. It was made

Apparently the birth of video remixing is in our home town. Cool.

Diplo: Is it authentic remixing?

Diplo is a DJ from the United States who creates music by mixing tracks from different cultures that are not yet noticed by the mainstream.

His work is comparable to Girl Talk’s techniques, however Diplo is often criticized for his work being unauthentic because of these four methods he uses for most of his work…

“1. musical genre or artist relatively unknown in the United States (save small immigrant groups still connected to the homeland or marginalized American communities of color) gets samples or featured in one of Diplo’s live sets, recorded mixes, podcasts, or via the Mad Decent blog (sometimes without the artist’s knowledge, though this is a common practice in DJ culture and not exclusive to Diplo)

2. said artist might be included as a headliner to the show of a more popular Mad Decent artist when applicable

3. genre and the artists performing it gain popularity as a result of their association with Diplo/Mad Decent

4. Diplo picks up a new genre/artist and the previous artist, often still unsigned, is left to continue self-promoting”

Most of the criticism towards Diplo comes from the fact that he often takes ideas from smaller cultures, genres and artists and does not leave them with credit.

If you are not familiar with the name DIplo, I’m sure you’ve heard his Grammy nominated track for M.I.A’s “Paper Planes.”

Paper Planes came out in 2009, Interestingly enough the same track is used in 1982 by The Clash’s “Straigfht To Hell.”

The Clash was credited for their track by DIplo, however is this type of appropriation to be considered to be authentic remixing.  Often times when we think of remix, we think of the appropriation of two or more works to create something new.  However a lot of artists including Diplo, take from older and/or obscure musicians and establish it as their own. Considering that according to Knobel and Lankshear, “music remix involves taking bits and pieces of existing songs and splicing them together or over one another, is this real remix?  Do you think artists deserve to make money and win awards by doing this?

To read more about it, http://www.racialicious.com/2011/04/13/it%E2%80%99s-complicated-djs-appropriation-and-a-whole-host-of-other-ish/

Q&A 5

Q: Go back and look at your previous blog entries. Refer back to remix pieces and discuss whether or not it is an example of remix culture. If it is, why? If not, how does it differ?

I think its interesting to look back on Hitchcock’s tutorial on the Kuleshov effect when talking about the remix culture of today.

As a reminder the Kuleshov effect explains the power of montage, and how a juxtaposition between scenes can convey certain meanings. In the video, Hitchcock uses two of the same scenes, the first being man staring at something that is off frame, and the second, being a man smiling. He then places different images between these two scenes to explain how the montage of film clips can establish different meaning. In his video, the difference is between a jolly old man, and a perverted old man.

To me, this relates to the remix culture because often times when people video remix, films, television shows and commercials, they often alter the editing of a sequence to establish a different narrative. I find the techniques used by Hitchcock to demonstrate how the Kuleshov effect works is also an example of the remix culture, because so many of these video remix artists, use the same techniques when altering videos.

The EyeChannel

http://prezi.com/qjaukrjaz01h/eyechannel/

Q: In groups 2-3, develop an idea for digital media application using Internet in some capacity that fosters the development at least 3 new media skills in youth at any age under 18.

A: Here’s a brief Prezi of Quinn’s, Steph’s & my idea for a new way to educate kids. Essentially it’s a spin-off of the 90s toy “Viewmaster”, but our product would be connected to wifi in an attempt to make education fun and entertaining for kids. Watch the Prezi if you want to learn more about our product. Hope you enjoy it… if you have any questions, please feel free to ask them here and I’d be glad to answer them.

The three media skills applied are:
Play– With the interactive features on the glasses, kids could answer multiple choice questions about a topic and comparing scores with their friends online.

Multitasking– By playing the games, hearing audio clips and watching videos simultaneously, kids can effectively learn to multitask.

Simulation– Since the glasses only emulate reality, kids can travel different parts of the world by accessing footage from across the globe, as well as gain information about those places.

“Flub and Utter”: Form and Content Synchronized Through Speech

http://flubandutter.nfb.ca/#/flubandutter

by Courtney, Quinn, and Steph

My group and I decided to do our 2nd case study on “Flub and Utter”, an autobiography about a man and his speech impediment. What intrigued us most about this interactive video found on the NFB website was just how much the form and content were synchronized. Not only is the poetry about speech, but the four views the user can click all represent the different aspects of Jordan’s difficulties with speech: struggling on stage, the audience’s reaction, a zoom-in view of Jordan’s mouth, and the poem itself. Within that poem, certain words and phrases are highlighted, and the user can choose to click them. If the user does click, he is brought to a new scene where Jordan tells a story about that said word or phrase and learns why Jordan used that specific terminology. This not only represents the many layers of Jordan’s story, but also the many layers of meaning found in poetry. Therefore, the content (poetry about speech) and the form (poetic layering with hyperlinks) make the whole theme apparent. Moreover, when the user clicks an aspect to zoom into, he is immersed into the story, but is not forced to follow a linear path; depending on what the user clicks, the interpretation of the story changes, despite its content remaining the same. And in many ways, this related to Lev Manovich’s thoughts about syntagmatic vs paradigmatic order as well as Prompolini’s goal with his theatre (Grau 145/Hayles 180).