Creative Industries: Week 11, Cultural Policy and digitalisation.

Digitalisation

Digital Natives.

Prensky outlines how children growing up in today's world 'have spent their whole lives surrounded by and using computers' to which he says is now an 'integral part of their lives.' (2001:1)

Could this label be applied to the internet then and make it a creative industry?

to an extent it could, the more the internet develops the more it can be labelled as 'creative'. However, the dynamics of the internet could suggest it to be a creative industry as digital immigrants are left to adapt to the rapid changes.

Web 2.0.

The challenges that Web 2.0. has presented from file sharing and online networking etc have impacted the digital world massively.

Now more than ever we can gain access to the internet within seconds, causing for regular instances of passive consumption of different media and other apps and advertisements.

Policy: Key Terms

Patents

Trademarks

'Patents protect ideas that are new, non-obvious and useful or applicable to industry.'

“trademarks protect symbols intended to distinguish the products of companies from one another (Hesmondhalgh, 2010:159)

Copyright protects those expressions defined in law as ‘literary and artistic works’ (the principle being that it protects the expressions, not the ideas)
“Copyright is the main means by which culture becomes commodified” (Hesmondhalgh,2010:159)
Celebrities can ‘own’ culture, for example, in the idea that they “might have rights in their own images” (2010:160).

70 years after an authors death, their work can then be picked up by creators as copyright expires.

In Film and broadcasting/dramatical works this may only take 50 or 25 years to be accessible to creators.

"Culture is the main means by which culture becomes commodified." (Hesmondhalgh: 2010:159)

Where copyright goes too far...

Since the birth of copyrighting creators, especially celebrities can 'own' culture.

Taylor Swift wanted to copyright certain words in her songs to protect her work. This is an instance were the power of copyright needs to be drawn in.

Another case of this was to do with a portrait on the GTA VI cover is arguably based on a picture of Lindsey Lohan.

She claimed copyright over this however failed to succeed as developers were supported by disclaimers such as

'All characters in this work are fictitious, any resemblances to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.' Therefore making Lohan's claim for copyright ineglible.

Ownership And The Public Domain.

DEFINITION: "A body of works which can be used by anyone because no one can claim exclusive rights to their use. National copyright laws determine when a work passes out of copyright and into this public domain." Hesmondhalgh

Culture owned by the public

'Hope' poster of Obama made in a single day by Shepard Fairey which came to symbolize his 2008 presidential campaign

This became part of a copyrighting scandal as Shepard became aware of the use of the poster.

He won his claim and subsequently owns half of the copyright. Which is shared with AP photographer Mannie Garcia

What New Media Means For Cultural Policy.

Characteristics of New Media.

Manipulable.

Networkable.

Dense.

Comprehensible.

Impartial.

Does copyright matter in an age of New Media?

In my opinion, it makes Copyright matter even more serious, as protecting a creators art is becoming more and more under threat from online sources.

Some may however argue against this, saying that New Media now makes copyright a non factor because everything is so available to use. However, what many forget is that this is only to a certain extent.

Hesmondhalgh's insight can help to gather a more rounded opinion, he states "Cultural creativity is dependant on the public domain because acts of creation work by 'sometimes unconscious' borrowing from and referring to other peoples work.'

"The result of extensions to the scope of copyright is that this public domain shrinks... with detrimental effects on creativity."

Considering this, I think it's difficult to argue against the importance of copyright. In order for creators to be able to work their magic they need copyright so that people can properly appreciate it.

The Future: To tackle such a big potential issue is daunting for those in the creative Indutries. Hartley suggests that the creative industries need "to return the concept to where it began", being "evenly available" yet "co-ordinated", "scaled" and "technologically enabled" at the same time.