Redefinition of Authorship and Ownership in Media and Cultural Industries - Essay Example

?Topic: Redefinition hip and Ownership in Media and Cultural Industries Introduction The advent of technology has had influence in virtually all industries in society. From the way education services are conducted to the way communication is done; the way wars are fought to the way manufacturing is carried out; the way treatment is done in the field of medicine to virtually how everything else is conducted. There has been no industry which has not had the influence of the advances in technology both positively and negatively. The changes brought about by technology can be said to have been influenced to a great extent by the necessary steps that were required in ensuring the specific industries keep up with the changes in time (Straubhaar, LaRose and Davenport, 2011, p. 55). New and better ways carrying out activities have been invented or innovated upon with the result that the old and archaic methods are done away with every time a new way of handling things comes about. This paper will focus on the influence of technology and new forms of media have influenced the way materials are owned in comparison with the previous methods of ownership of the same material. The paper shall deal with these new forms of ownership in terms of materials such as books, songs, pieces of art and the ownership of media houses in general. The changes technology has brought on these industries shall be outlined and compared to the previous methods. Thereafter, the advantages and disadvantages of the changes shall be outlined and a verdict made on whether the overall changes are positive or negative. It should be known that the changes brought about by technology quickly spread around the world hence any noted changes are poised to became the universal norm in a very short period (Kunz, 2007, p. 34). Books The first case that shall be handled is the sector of books. Books are steadily changing from hardcover copies to electronic books or eBooks with the increasing popularity in especially tablet computers. With the advent from the first tablet computer, eBooks have gained so much popularity that they have virtually outdone the hardcover or physical forms of the same books. Each maker of a tablet computer or eBook reader gives the consumers a chance at obtaining the books not from the authors, but from the tablet maker through the publisher (Hesmondhalgh, 2012, p. 21). Not long ago, when the first marketable tablet came out in the form of an iPad, the chief executive officer of Apple, Steve Jobs, convinced several publishers to market their books through this type of computer which he promised would revolutionize the reading industry. He was right to a large extent since tablet computers have since then taken over from books and the education sector in general. Other tablet makers, who majorly consist of the Android market, followed suit with their contracts with publishers. Other companies that specialized in publishing like Barnes and Noble, Kobo, and especially Amazon made a lot of contracts with publishers and specific authors to have their material sold through their platforms. The contracts between the authors, the publishers and the tablet makers are the focus of this paper. The contracts consisted of allowing the tablet makers to market the books from several publishers and owners in one place the tablet makers unanimously called a store so that consumers, instead of going to each individual publisher to get a given title, would only have to search for the same title in one place. The eBooks cost differently from their hardcover counterparts from this moment (Straubhaar, LaRose and Davenport, 2011, p. 78). While the hardcover copies were priced differently due to for example the contents of the book, the popularity among its readers or the effort spent in penning the given piece of work, the tablet and eBook reader makers sought to unify the prices of these books due to several reasons they gave among them the fact that the books had an almost similar value in their electronic forms. Once the book was given to the final marketers who in this case are the tablet and eBook reader makers, the author lost almost all ownership of the material and the pricing of the same too. Research into the popularity of books in their electronic forms has found out the pricing of the books was not based on the actual cost of the books, but on what the publishers and eBook resellers thought the books would earn in the market. True ownership of the material is thus taken for the authors who would price books differently if given the chance. One of the reasons given for the low pricing of the books is that the long chain through which the books have to go through increases the costs of the eBook to the final consumer. To make the eBook market viable therefore, the cost of the eBooks is kept low with the effect being felt all the way down to the author. In a way, this is a total loss of control since one cannot determine the price of their work the way they see fit (Hesmondhalgh, 2012, p. 98). Another way ownership of the books has been taken from the owners is that their books can be easily gotten for free from some websites or accessed illegally in what is referred to as piracy. The terms of ownership then changed tremendously from that moment onwards on the part of the consumer. The ownership of books, in comparison to the traditional methods of ownership shifted from what many thought to be true ownership to virtual ownership on the part of the user. This is evidenced by the fact that once a book has been bought in its electronic form, the publisher and the marketer still have a majority of the rights to this piece of material. Most of the books have protection codes referred to as DRM (digital rights management) which restricts ownership and sharing to a large extent. The consumer therefore has little control on their part as far as ownership of the book is concerned (Mayer, Banks and Caldwell, 2009, p. 78). They cannot either share the book or make a physical library out of the books they would have purchased. They cannot also resale the books, trade them in or loan the way they would do with a physical book. One researcher even argues that the term ‘ownership’ as far as eBooks are concerned should be changed to ‘leasing’ there have been cases where the eBooks bought by consumers were taken back due to one reason or the other. The books ‘1984’ and ‘Animal Farm,’ both by George Orwell, were taken back from buyers who had obtained it from the Amazon store after it was realized that they had been obtained from an individual who did not have the full rights as to their ownership (Straubhaar, LaRose and Davenport, 2011, p. 80). The end result in this shift from the traditional ownership of books to the digital one is that the total control of the material is given to the final sellers who are the tablet and eBook reader sellers. This poses another challenge especially to the authors. Since books have left their traditional values and went into being electronic products, they have found new forms of competition which they never had in their original forms. The authors have found their pieces of work on the same shelves with computer games like Angry Birds and Crash Bandicoot with consumers, for the first time, having to evaluate between spending money on a book or a computer game when in the days that are gone they viewed the two as different and opposites. The final result is that many opt for computer games or movies which are found on the same platform with the effect that the price of books keeps on going down the more (Hesmondhalgh, 2012, p. 55). The changes in control have thus had negative effects on the books industry. Music The second issue that is to be dealt with is the impact of technology on the ownership of music in the view of the musicians and the final consumer or the audience. In terms of music ownership in the days before technology took over the operations of the industry, consumers would buy the music then have the full ownership rights to it. They would resell it, loan and do whatever they liked with it provided they respected they respected the copyright laws concerning the given piece of music. Artists and other kinds of musicians received the money after their respective recording houses had sold the music and take their share of the proceeds. Music was sold using either compact discs, DVDs or other forms of storage which allowed the users feel they really owned the music (Straubhaar, LaRose and Davenport, 2011, p. 85). It was quite an easy model to handle and the various participants handled it with the normal procedures in place. Cases of piracy were few and not necessary given the nature of the model. With technology came many changes to this harmonious structure with the main players in this industry being the intermediaries between the music composers and the final consumer. With the introduction of such online music stores as Apple’s iTunes, Pandora and YouTube, consumption of music changed to a great extent. Contrary to the prevalent structure where music only came from the musician’s specific recording house and was duly paid for, the new structure allowed several players to enter the market and create a niche for themselves. Before iTunes and YouTube, musicians received their income from the sale of their music through recording houses and live performances. Technology in the music industry changed most things for the better (Kunz, 2007, p. 47). First of all, since music depends on its popularity to flourish, the online stores that came into being gave musicians a platform to market their music to a wider audience than before. This increased the sales of their music besides allowing them a wider audience than before (Mayer, Banks and Caldwell, 2009, p. 90). One notable issue though with music is that, unlike with eBooks where the impact of technology has changed the structures of ownership, musicians are duly recognized by their audience to be the rightful owners of their pieces of work. A given genre of music is identified with a given group of artists and on the most common websites; the musicians earn a fee for every view that is made of their music. Though the fees are usually small, the influences of accumulation have a compounding effect on the amount they receive. Such a site is YouTube where professional artists receive a fee for every click on their songs. The ownership rights to the songs have a dark side though. The musician’s loss a significant part of their ownership rights as outlined by several acts and laws that strip them of these rights. One such law is the Right of First Sale which a provision in the Copyright act and states that ‘The owner of a particular copy or phonorecord lawfully made under this title, or nay person authorized by such owner, is entitled, without the authority of the copyright owner, to sell or otherwise dispose of the possession of that copy or phonorecord.’ This issue came about due the existence of companies such as ReDigi Inc. which resales legitimately bought digital music. Capital Records sued ReDigi Inc. for violation of several rights of ownership due o the fact that a digital file resale created a secondary copy of the file that was in essence unauthorized and in violation of intellectual property laws. ReDigi, on the other hand, used the First sale doctrine to have the ruling of the court in its favor (Straubhaar, LaRose and Davenport, 2011, p. 89). This doctrine is a dangerous one since it literally allows other individual to earn from the work of other people. Media Houses The third impact of technology this paper shall deal with is its influence on the ownership of media houses and other corporations in the media sector (Straubhaar, LaRose and Davenport, 2011, p. 103). The main corporations in this sector include media houses that concern themselves with the dissemination of news or other issues around the world. Such houses include Bloomberg, News Corporation and BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) among others. Others in this classification include film companies such as 20th Century Fox. Technological changes have seen a shift to most of the media houses being owned and controlled by either governments or powerful families. The corporations that are owned by the governments in their countries of origin include the BBC and most media firms in China. The Chinese government controls most of the media content and has ownership rights to most of the media houses too. The BBC was founded and runs on funds from the taxpayers’ money (Hesmondhalgh, 2012, p. 120). There are several reasons as to why a government can control or won a media house. Most reasons point to the issue so of costs which are deemed to be low due to the government’s participation. The seeking of information by private individuals would be an expensive task to undertake. Other reasons point to the freedom of the press as a result of government dissemination of the information about the goings-on in the country since it is in control of most of the happenings. This is in contrast to private companies which would serve the governing classes’ interest. The advent of technology has brought changes in this sector in reference to the types of information given out. There are families and other private individuals who won media houses and who have a great influence on the goings-on in this sector. News providers like News Corporation and Bloomberg, which are owned by Murdoch and Bloomberg respectively, are the best examples for this case. Before the advancements in technology, only governments could afford to own and run a media house profitably (Kunz, 2007, p. 66). Changes in technology lowered the operational costs to a large extent; enough to allow private individuals venture into news dissemination and other media activities. These individuals were sparred further on in their endeavors by the fact that the public needed an unbiased source of news different from the government. The unbiased news provider would uncover government conspiracies since governments could give out news based on what it needed the public to know and not what the truth held. These media houses have lived to their expectations as far as those who vouched has them are concerned. Murdoch also owns the film studio 20th Century Fox which he used to force other film studios to allow films before they were available for renting. This showed that technological advancements have enabled individuals grow powerful and greatly influential to the extent of controlling a whole industry. Murdoch also used his ownership of The Sun newspaper to promote the satellite company he owned called Sky Broadcasting (Kunz, 2007, p. 105). The Sun did competitions where individuals could win subscriptions and satellite dishes. This gave Murdoch so much popularity and powers that other media houses followed in Murdoch’s footsteps. The fact that he used technological implements like satellite dishes to market his business given the equipment’s many shows that technology has had a serious impact on the news and media industry. References Hesmondhalgh, D., 2012. The Cultural Industries. New York: SAGE. Kunz, W., 2007. Culture Conglomerates: Consolidation in the Motion Picture And Television Industries. Chicago: Rowman & Littlefield. Mayer, V., Banks, M. and Caldwell, J., 2009. Production Studies: Cultural Studies of Media Industries. New York: Routledge. Straubhaar, J., LaRose, R. and Davenport, L., 2011. Media now. Chicago: Cengage Learning. Read More