Archive for the 'News' Category

Bizarre French Anti-piracy Strategy

October 16, 2010 0 Comments

This is the most bizarre but imaginative strategy I have heard of yet. And like many other anti-piracy strategies seems like a weak band aid.

For the next two years the French govt will subsidize half – that’s right half – the cost of a 50 euro ($70 USD) card to be used to download music from approved subscription-based online retailers. Consumers will be limited to one card a year.

Somewhere between a social service debit card and a tax break, this strategy appears to be both an admission of powerlessness in the face of piracy and also an assertion of state involvement that on the surface seems to run counter the “hands off” anti-regulatory ethos of neoliberalism and the Sarkozy regime. Additionally, this is a great example of the intensification of state surveillance regimes, surely there must be a way to then gauge the “taste” of the nation, or even to index the number of music files a person possesses against the number they buy with the card – any discrepancy and its the gulag for you! Alas, it may also be another case of the state funneling of public resources toward private interests. And this time, instead of a bailout to the finance industry, this is a way to direct tax payers’ money toward “legitimate subscription-based services.” It’s hard not to see how this doesn’t amount to paying twice. It also doesn’t seem clear if this is about nurturing French cultural production specifically, or just ensuring that for-profit distributors get a slice of the pie. However, in exchange for state aid

website operators will be required to cut the price of music, extend the duration of subscriptions, and contribute to the cost of advertising the card. Their benefit will be capped at 5 million euros each.

That said it also seems a rather ingenious way to promote cultural awareness and listening to music. I can’t imagine a British or North American government so blatantly funding the consumption of artistic work. Here we cut arts funding and gut humanities departments in universities. What else could be next: a tax break for every theatre ticket purchased? A granting system for reading materials? Still, if there’s a mood for state involvement these days, why not a lump sum to the download services and performing rights agencies via a blank media levy like we had on blank tapes and CDs and then let everyone download away? I’ve seen studies that suggest support for this. Or, even better, why not scrap the whole notion of state support for for-profit entities (not very “free market” anyway is it?) and instead support people with a universal living minimum wage that would also account for the purchase of cultural/creative works, which, following food, I’d say are pretty important for a well-nourished soul.

See also here.

Tags: , , . Categories: Media, Music, News and PhD Thesis

Chris Hedges “Globalization Goes Bankrupt”

September 24, 2009 0 Comments

Had the pleasure of seeing Chris Hedges speak last week for the release of his new book  Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle. His talk was sermonesque in quality as he spoke of the global financial system and its relationship to mainstream media’s reliance on spectacle. Invoking DeBord and Boorstin, he neatly outlined the smoke and mirrors job done by powerful elites as they try to claw what profits they can before it all comes crumbling down. A recent article appears here.

Our global economy, like our political system, has been hijacked by a tiny oligarchy, composed mostly of wealthy white men who serve corporations. They have pledged or raised a staggering $18 trillion, looted largely from state treasuries, to prop up banks and other financial institutions that engaged in suicidal acts of speculation and ruined the world economy.

Tags: . Categories: News and Politics

Park Forest Police are the RIAA’s Repressive State Apparatus

September 14, 2008 4 Comments

Louis Althusser wrote “The State Apparatus, which defines the State as a force of repressive execution and intervention ‘in the interests of the ruling classes’ in the class struggle conducted by the bourgeoisie and its allies against the proletariat, is quite certainly the State, and quite certainly defines its basic ‘function’.”  The “Repressive State Apparatus” was made up of organisations and institutions that “function by violence-at least ultimately (since repression, e.g. administrative repression, may take non-physical forms),” such as the police, the army, courts, etc.  According to Althusser, their non-violent corollary is to be found in the “Ideological State Apparatus”, those “realities which present themselves to the immediate observer in the form of distinct and specialized institutions”, that is, the educational system, the media, legal systems, religious systems, etc.; in other words, the means through which we are taught and come to identify with the dominant ideology.

Has there been a clearer articulation of the work of repressive and ideological state apparatuses in relation to contemporary concerns over media piracy than what recently happened in the Chicago suburb of Park Forest, IL?  On August 30 “Police arrested another alleged CD/DVD pirate last week during a traffic stop.”  In the inventory search of the car, officers found CDs and DVDs with handwritten labels, which prompted them to contact the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).  The RIAA is among the many media industry lobby groups responsible for spreading the notion that sharing media is not only illegal, but downright immoral.  The charges against the driver, who was pulled over for speeding, now include two that are related to copyright infringement thanks to a further search of his house.

So, the ideological work of the RIAA in creating a public “awareness” of piracy as evil has certainly done its work on the cops in Park Forest who, upon seeing the handwritten labels “naturally” noted this as a criminal activity and sought counsel from the very group who in part help construct their understanding of the phenomenon in the first place.  Torrentfreak notes that “They might be searching iPods next.”  The success of the RIAA’s propaganda also seemed to work on the man who was arrested in as much as his first reaction was to deny that the infringing materials were his, offering instead that they belonged to “a friend.” (Who, upon questioning, also denied knowledge of the materials – some friend.)

It makes us question who is really calling the shots here. The police are clearly, in this case, representing the interests of a coprorate music industry, and are not working in the interests of the citizenry, who have demonstrated time and again the desire to share and copy music.  Especially given the recent criminal charges brought agains Alan Ellis, the former OiNK admin, and the four OiNK uploaders in the UK, perhaps we also need to ask: Do we need another force to keep the public safe from the long arm of the corporate media industry?

Perhaps this could have the unintended effect of making all “pirates” drive slower, while allowing those dutiful citizens who have purchased their music legitmately to drive as fast as they want!

Full stories at Torrentfreak and at the Park Forest “enews” site.  It also appears that the Park Forest police do this thing fairly often.

Read Louis Althusser’s “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses.”

Tags: , , , , , . Categories: Media, News and Rant

BandAid

March 30, 2008 1 Comment

Oh “Earth Hour“, how quaint.  It puts me in mind of “Buy Nothing Day”, a similar guilt-assuaging activity for those whom Žižek calls “liberal communists”.  As far as I can tell, it provided the opportunity for those who otherwise have no idea how to address things like the climate crises, or rampant consumerism for that matter, in a way that makes them feel as if they are actually doing something.  It also provides a great opportunities for politicians to make the electorate feel like they are doing something too.

Dark TorontoBut let’s face it, most suburbanites can turn off their lights at 8pm on a Saturday night.  “The CN Tower soon darkened in the city’s skyline,” reports the CBC, “along with highrises, sports arenas such as the Rogers Centre and Air Canada Centre”  Jeez, on a Saturday, aww…thanks big business, for taking an hour out of your weekend to show how much you care! (1)

I’d like to see Toronto participate in an Earth Hour on a Monday, say around 10am.  Let’s see how many takers there would be for that!  Of course, the effect isn’t so dramatic is it – you can’t see all those lights that are always on during the day go out when its still daylight!

My favourite quote from the CBC article comes from a stalwart Albertan, who like many wasn’t about to let Earth Hour get in the way of the Battle of Alberta:  “Not a chance, I’m sorry to say…Let’s celebrate Earth Hour at four in the morning. That will be a lot better time, I think.”

Just as Buy Nothing Day hasn’t caused a massive rethinking of consumerism in the lives of many, Earth Hour isn’t going to all of a sudden make people use less energy.  In fact, because these events are promoted in a such a dramatic fashion, and involve a dramatic action (turning all the lights out, buying nothing) they can actually undermine their stated goals.  They make consuming less seem to be a dramatic thing when in actuality, consuming slightly less over longer periods of time (say, walking to work, taking public transit, turning out lights in rooms that you’re not in, sucking up the hot weather in summer; the cold in winter, etc.) would likely be much more effective.  By casting environmental action as a dramatic, Earth Hour runs the risk of scaring people off because the task of acting responsibly becomes too large, to unobtainable:  “how can we live without the lights on?”

Other things to consider:

  • I wonder how many people drove to Earth Hour events like the one described in this article?
  • I wonder how many enjoyed a nice hot coffee or tea in a paper cup with a cardboard ring around it and a plastic lid while at the event?
  • How many rushed to their computers to frantically check email after one hour of blackout – were computers even part of the items turned off, or was it just lights?
  • Were energy saving compact fluorescent lights turned off? By my recollection I think those things use more power when they are turned on than when they are left on.

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(1)  According to TheStar.com, “the ACC participated in Earth Hour by dimming exterior and corridor lights” – playing on a darkened ice surface would be chatoic, despite the “lights long turned off on the Leafs’ playoff hopes”.  Ha!

Categories: News and Rant