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First I want to say that I really enjoyed RIP! A Remix Manifesto (by the way, did anyone else recognize the voice of the narrator?). A lot of the concepts covered really frustrated me. For example the IRAA and their outrageous lawsuits have frustrated me for a while. I mean suing people for up to $250,00 per fucking song, how is this considered okay by anyone? I wanted to throw something at my screen when they interviewed the record lawyer after the trial.

On the other hand, I can understand both sides of the coin on some other issues. The M.L.F. versus Disney comes to mind. I do personally believe that what the M.L.F. was doing is fine. However, if I was Disney I would be pissed. Mickey is a character that they worked hard to cultivate and make popular, and his appearance on anything can potentially generate a good deal of revenue.

On to the reading.

Connection 1 - The commercial economy. The movie covers a lot of this. The recording industry for example. They are trying their damnedest to preserve the traditional commercial economy. They don't like remixing. They view it as copyright infringement. They are purely commercially motivated and don't give a rat's patootie about contributing to culture.

Connection 2 - Hybrid economy. Radiohead's release of Rainbows is the embodiment of the hybrid idea. In 2007 they broke away from their record label EMI and released the record online themselves. They allowed people to decide how much the record was worth to them, and pay accordingly. I can remember my room mate at the time, a huge Radiohead fan, being incredibly excited about this. He was also very poor. On the release date he wasn't able to pay (he did purchase the album on vinyl later though) but he was still able to download it legally. This is the hybrid economy at work.

Connection 3 - Collaboration spaces. The film itself participates in a collaboration space, Opensourcecinema.org, which unfortunately doesn't seem to exist anymore. They author uploaded all of the footage from the movie and invited users to remix it as they saw fit. Pretty freaking cool idea if you ask me. I was really hoping to try this but, like I mentioned before, the site seems to have disappeared.

Another thing I want to mention is the part in the book about the Harry Potter fans fighting back against the goons at Warner. This is pretty freaking cool. It also parallels one of my favorite snippets in the movie. Somewhere around the 1 hour mark, and a man states that we really have the power here. If we want to change things, we need to stop buying from the people we don't support. This is was the Potter fans did, they organized a large boycott and fought back against what I view as an oppressive corporation. Neat stuff for sure.

Commercial and Sharing Economies

"If we're in a place where we feel such simplicity should reign, where we're not insulted when someone mentions money, where we meter the relationship with price, then we're within a 'commercial economy'" - Lessig pg 121. We are constantly immersed in the commercial economy. Indeed America runs off of it. Staples of American culture such as Wal-Mart, McDonald's, and Starbucks would not exist without it. In a commercial economy people participate purely for monetary reward. I will write this book and publish it, but only if you buy it. Set prices are necessities in this economy.

A sharing essentially exists solely for the joy of those participating. There is no money being thrown around. Lessig uses romantic relationships as an example. Though money is very rarely being exchanged between partners, there is indeed a currency being used. This currency is emotional or spiritual assistance and validation. Price is not needed in this situation, though if both sides do not reciprocate the relationship will not last long. Price is an insult to the sharing economy, because it is an over simplification. In cases such as Wikipedia people participate purely for the pleasure of it.

But why are these distinctions needed? Simple really. When it comes to remix culture, the commercial economy is not needed. People remix and participate purely for the joy of being part of the culture. Some do end up receiving monetary compensation sometimes, but overall that is not the motivation.