"Let's Talk-Girl Talk" , "DJ Spooky"

Just some thoughts I've had on remixes, innovation, copyright, etc....

-I've become incredibly fascinated with remixes, "idea thieves", "rip off artists", and "copiers", recently. If you refer to one of my past blog posts, I shared a series of videos, "Everything is a Remix." This series discusses the idea that media has built upon itself. Music, movies, etc. have stolen ideas from each other. "New technologies are based on existing technologies."

-Today in class while going over examples for our next assignment, we viewed a portion of a video presentation given by a University of Minnesota student, Christopher Austin. When the professor brought up the video I sat up in my seat. I am a huge fan of Girl Talk and have been for years. I've been fortunate enough to get to see one of his shows. I love the way he mixes songs that I love (or dislike!) with other songs to produce something that is fun, interesting and new.

-I'm not going to pretend that I know all the details of copyright and fair use laws so please excuse me if I seem ignorant. I would agree with Austin as he states "...I believe copyrights are crippling artistic and creative growth.” I believe that in order to create something new, there needs to be some influence or imitation present. Copyright hinders the use of this tactic so it cannot be used to its full potential. I agree with DJ Spooky in that copyright law seems to be related to the "18th century’s relationship to physical goods. And as things move more and more to a digital media, hyper-connected world we need to transform the models of how we think of ownership." Along with his discussion on why he is fine with people downloading his music for free, I believe that if copyright laws were to be altered, advertising and marketing through digital media would skyrocket.

-I sometimes ponder the thought that maybe we've reached a point where nothing genuinely "new" can be created. We've come so far as human beings and the technology we have available to us is simply amazing. Is it possible to create something without the influence of an existing idea? Are we nearing a metaphorical brick wall in terms of innovation? In the future will copyright law exist or be as strict (or soft?) as it is today, and how will this affect innovation?

I am very interested in class discussion on copyright and fair use in the next few days.