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In the sandbox you can '''play''' with ''wiki syntax'' and more.
In the sandbox you can '''play''' with ''wiki syntax'' and more.


The Earth Simulator Center/ Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology
You answered (11jan09):


Films and television programmes about climate change should be made
"As free software moves from the margins to center stage, more and more
freely available beyond their initial broadcast, argues Nalaka
Gunawardene.


Films and television programmes about climate change should be
corporations adapt to the model, and pay programmers to do such parts of the
designated a 'copyright free zone'.
free software as needed for themselves, but they use the open licenses.
So these corporations compete, but also collaborate through the common
platform of free software.


This was the call made by broadcasters and independent film-makers at
For Linux, 75% of programmers are now paid by such corporations, which means
an Asian media workshop held in Tokyo last month (October).
they have an increasing influence over the direction of development, have a
seat in the Foundations etc; (...)


For years, broadcasters have dutifully reported on evolving scientific
The reality of the various projects is then strongly influenced by the governance model,
and political aspects of climate change. They have also made or
which can be controlled primarily by a community-oriented foundation, or by
carried excellent documentaries analysing causes of, and solutions to,
a corporate-oriented format."
the problem. But these are often not widely available, because of
tight copyright restrictions.


Limited distribution
Some remarks about the existence of "hybrid forms" and about the dynamics of these forms.


Most media companies hang on to their products for years, sometimes
The reality you describe is a hybrid social form of production, borrowing aspects from both systems, capitalism and P2P, or peer production. Using your definition of peer production (free and open input; free volunteering production; universally available output), one can say that there are hybrid aspects at the three moments of the process: 1. input, raw material is partly capitalistic as the computers, the offices, etc. are privately owned by the corporations (as IBM), but, for software production, free/open software is also a "raw material"; 2. production is not based on free volunteering, but some aspects of the production are new, non capitalistic, as the cooperation between programmers of antagonistic corporations; 3. the output can be oriented by corporations more towards their own needs (commercial management software, for example) but the output remains universally available.
long after they have recovered their full investment.


Even when film-makers or producers themselves want their creations to
The "social networking" also generates hybrid forms. If you take MySpace or YouTube: 1. the input is partly capitalistic (the infrastructures and the financing by advertising), but for the rest most of the input (videos, blogs, etc.) are free and open; 2. the production process is based partially on capitalist wage relations for the infrastructure management, but the rest is based on free volunteering; 3. the output is supposed to be universally available but corporations impose limits and try to extend these limits, provoking open conflicts with users/producers. (See for example: http://bang.calit2.net/tts/2008/12/31/why-i-am-deleting-my-myspace-account-and-you-should-too/)
circulate beyond broadcasts, company policies get in the way. In large
broadcast or film production companies, lawyers and accountants — not
journalists or producers — decide how and where content is
distributed.


It isn't just climate-related films that are locked up with copyright
Hybrid forms also developed in the past transitions between modes of production. Between the 6th and the 10h century, many landlords, including the Church, had simultaneously slaves and serfs (or "coloni" which were the first form of serfs). Between the 12th century and the 19th century many hybrid forms developed especially in the cities where capitalism developed within feudal relationships.
restrictions. Every year, hundreds of television programmes or video
films — many supported by public, corporate or philanthropic funds —
are made on a variety of development and conservation topics.


These are typically aired once, twice or at best a few times and then
The evolution of these forms has been often slow, with periods of acceleration but also periods of recession. The example of the Arsenal of Venice, which in the early 16th century employed some 16,000 people and could produce almost a ship per day using production-lines, something not seen again after until the industrial revolution, illustrates how non-linear this evolution can be.
relegated to a shelf somewhere. A few may be released on DVD or
adapted for online use. But the majority goes into archival 'black
holes', from where they might never emerge again.


Yet most of these films have a long shelf life and could serve
The dynamic of that evolution depends on many factors. The evolution of technologies is one of them, but it is far from explaining everything, as the Venetian Arsenal example shows. Here the social consciousness, the social and political conflicts play a crucial role. The European wars of religion after the 16th century and the bourgeois revolutions where indirect or direct expressions of the conflict between the old feudal logic and the raising capitalistic one.
multiple secondary uses outside the broadcast industry.


Beyond broadcast
In the conflict you refer to about the management of Free/open software foundations, between "community-oriented" and "corporate-oriented" formats, we are witnessing the same kind of conflict between the old logic and the new. Its dynamic depends and will depend not only on material-technological realities but also on social and "political" struggles, at micro and macro scales. And things should become harsher when peer production will pretend to extend to the realm of material production.


Communicating the need for social change is a slow, incremental
process. Broadcasts can flag important issues, but real engagement
happens in classrooms, training centres and other small groups where
screenings stir up deeper discussions. Combining broadcast and
'narrowcast' outreach vastly increases the chances of changing
people's attitudes and, ultimately, their behaviour.


But if moving images are to play a decisive role in the climate
You also wrote:
debate, television programmes and video films on the subject need to
be more freely available, accessible and useable, as argued at the
Tokyo workshop.


One example is the 2006 documentary 'Climate in Crisis', co-produced
"This is inevitable, as no free software project can survive in the long run
by Japan's public broadcaster NHK, along with The Science Channel and
without a core of developers being paid."
ALTOMEDIA/France 5.


The film draws heavily on the Earth Simulator — one of the world's
Yes. As long as the material means of production (and thus the material means of consumption) remain under the capitalist logic governance, the peer production realities will be in a way or another limited.
most powerful supercomputers, used to predict climate patterns over
(At a certain level, the problems to finance the 4th Oekonux Conference, or your personal difficulties to keep working the P2P Foundation while being obliged to work in order too feed your family are also materializations of that reality).
the next century.


The results are both mind-boggling and alarming. In the coming
The development of the present economic crisis should make more visible at a social scale the need to overcome the dominant logic. The "invisible hand" is paralyzing an increasing share of the material means of production while workers are made redundant and unsatisfied material needs explode. Let's hope that this evidence will help to develop the consciousness of the urgency to extend peer production principles to the material sphere.
decades, atmospheric temperatures may rise by as much as 4.2 degrees
Celsius. This could lead to more frequent and intense hurricanes,
spreading deserts and significant loss of the Amazon rainforest. The
documentary discusses whether and how humankind can avoid these
impacts, drawing on rigorous scientific data.
 
Yet this hugely important film has not been widely seen, talked about
or distributed in Asia — because of copyright restrictions. Only the
highest bidders are allowed to acquire it for hefty licence fees.
 
That is standard broadcast industry practice. Whatever the crisis and
however important the cause, most media companies and film-makers keep
tight control over copyrights. This is true even in the "majority
world" (the global South), where they are unlikely to make any money
from the films. Their policy: no fee, no see.
 
Making a difference
 
My organisation, TVE Asia Pacific, supplies hundreds of films about
development issues. Our non-profit service clears copyrights for top
television and video films and then distributes them to broadcast,
civil society and educational users in over two dozen developing
countries in Asia. We operate outside the crushing licence fee
arrangements — copyright owners participate on a purely goodwill
basis, allowing their creations to be used far and wide for awareness,
advocacy, education and training purposes. End users pay only for
copying and dispatch costs.
 
Such secondary distribution does not change producers' balance sheets,
but it gives a whole new life to their films.
 
For example, when we supplied a television series called Climate
Challenge to Vietnam Television last year, it was the first time
climate change received in-depth coverage in Vietnam. It marked a
turning point in the country's public understanding of this issue.
 
This is particularly significant because a 2007 survey revealed low
levels of interest in climate issues in the Vietnamese media. The
World Bank lists Vietnam, with its 3,000 kilometre long coastline, as
one of the countries most vulnerable to climate change.
 
Profit or planetary survival?
 
Broadcast mandarins routinely support global struggles against
poverty, HIV, corruption and climate change by offering free airtime
to carry public interest messages. But few let go of their own
products on these very subjects for non-broadcast uses.
 
Making climate change a 'copyright free zone' for media products would
increase the resource materials available to thousands of educators,
social activists and trainers struggling to communicate this complex
topic to audiences across the world. Moving images would make their
task easier.
 
The climate crisis challenges everyone to adopt extraordinary
measures. Broadcasters and film-makers need to balance their financial
interests with planetary survival.
 
What use is intellectual property on a dead planet?
 
Nalaka Gunawardene is director of TVE Asia Pacific, a regional
non-profit media foundation. He blogs on media, society and
development at http://movingimages.wordpress.com.

Latest revision as of 11:40, 29 January 2009

In the sandbox you can play with wiki syntax and more.

You answered (11jan09):

"As free software moves from the margins to center stage, more and more

corporations adapt to the model, and pay programmers to do such parts of the free software as needed for themselves, but they use the open licenses. So these corporations compete, but also collaborate through the common platform of free software.

For Linux, 75% of programmers are now paid by such corporations, which means they have an increasing influence over the direction of development, have a seat in the Foundations etc; (...)

The reality of the various projects is then strongly influenced by the governance model, which can be controlled primarily by a community-oriented foundation, or by a corporate-oriented format."

Some remarks about the existence of "hybrid forms" and about the dynamics of these forms.

The reality you describe is a hybrid social form of production, borrowing aspects from both systems, capitalism and P2P, or peer production. Using your definition of peer production (free and open input; free volunteering production; universally available output), one can say that there are hybrid aspects at the three moments of the process: 1. input, raw material is partly capitalistic as the computers, the offices, etc. are privately owned by the corporations (as IBM), but, for software production, free/open software is also a "raw material"; 2. production is not based on free volunteering, but some aspects of the production are new, non capitalistic, as the cooperation between programmers of antagonistic corporations; 3. the output can be oriented by corporations more towards their own needs (commercial management software, for example) but the output remains universally available.

The "social networking" also generates hybrid forms. If you take MySpace or YouTube: 1. the input is partly capitalistic (the infrastructures and the financing by advertising), but for the rest most of the input (videos, blogs, etc.) are free and open; 2. the production process is based partially on capitalist wage relations for the infrastructure management, but the rest is based on free volunteering; 3. the output is supposed to be universally available but corporations impose limits and try to extend these limits, provoking open conflicts with users/producers. (See for example: http://bang.calit2.net/tts/2008/12/31/why-i-am-deleting-my-myspace-account-and-you-should-too/)

Hybrid forms also developed in the past transitions between modes of production. Between the 6th and the 10h century, many landlords, including the Church, had simultaneously slaves and serfs (or "coloni" which were the first form of serfs). Between the 12th century and the 19th century many hybrid forms developed especially in the cities where capitalism developed within feudal relationships.

The evolution of these forms has been often slow, with periods of acceleration but also periods of recession. The example of the Arsenal of Venice, which in the early 16th century employed some 16,000 people and could produce almost a ship per day using production-lines, something not seen again after until the industrial revolution, illustrates how non-linear this evolution can be.

The dynamic of that evolution depends on many factors. The evolution of technologies is one of them, but it is far from explaining everything, as the Venetian Arsenal example shows. Here the social consciousness, the social and political conflicts play a crucial role. The European wars of religion after the 16th century and the bourgeois revolutions where indirect or direct expressions of the conflict between the old feudal logic and the raising capitalistic one.

In the conflict you refer to about the management of Free/open software foundations, between "community-oriented" and "corporate-oriented" formats, we are witnessing the same kind of conflict between the old logic and the new. Its dynamic depends and will depend not only on material-technological realities but also on social and "political" struggles, at micro and macro scales. And things should become harsher when peer production will pretend to extend to the realm of material production.


You also wrote:

"This is inevitable, as no free software project can survive in the long run without a core of developers being paid."

Yes. As long as the material means of production (and thus the material means of consumption) remain under the capitalist logic governance, the peer production realities will be in a way or another limited. (At a certain level, the problems to finance the 4th Oekonux Conference, or your personal difficulties to keep working the P2P Foundation while being obliged to work in order too feed your family are also materializations of that reality).

The development of the present economic crisis should make more visible at a social scale the need to overcome the dominant logic. The "invisible hand" is paralyzing an increasing share of the material means of production while workers are made redundant and unsatisfied material needs explode. Let's hope that this evidence will help to develop the consciousness of the urgency to extend peer production principles to the material sphere.

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