Friday 30 November 2007

IM IN UR INTERNETS SHARING UR FILES

For a long time, so many conglomerates, and their brothers, have been looking at us with mistrust, spreading the word, whether they knew so through research or - more probably - not, that we were tapping into their much-needed, hard-earned revenue from their reasonably priced product. Video, television and, more so, music have all been part of this media misinformation-followed-by-adaptation dance for a while now.

Yet, slowly but surely, the industry has come to understand, to swallow the pill that filesharing is actually more to their benefit than not. So, other than the fact that they should appear as somehow going out of their way to maintain the status quo - especially if they're called Fox or CBS or whoever else is giving the WGA writers grief right now - they're trying to come up with ways to dip into the new media cash-pot tambien.

So, on the music front, we already had the labels doing a fair amount of their PR through myspace, but now that Radiohead are going about their own thing, with In Rainbows, one cannot say what will follow; no need for labels, no need for RIAA and the likes, no need for stupid amounts of cash to be paid by us if we don't have to? If we can download the new album over the 'net and pay as much as we want to - or don't - and be sure that our money goes straight to the pockets of Thom and his gang, we'll sleep better at night knowing that our cash is not lost paying intermediaries, now, won't we?

Then, the media nouveaux offer new ways for 'the product' to be distributed. With Jack and Meg White going the white way and releasing Icky Thump on USB flash drives, USB is officially the way to B now. Who needs those old... how-ya-call-em... See Dees, when you can have all your music on a hard drive, no, an mp3 player? Many of you that [are among the three that] read this must know that I called it, by transferring all my music, in the year 2000, when I left from Greece's Athens to Scotland's Edinburgh, watching what was previously my hundreds of CDs drive away in my friend RiverWind's car, and hence having nothing but a portable hard drive to carry on the plane with me.

So, where does TV follow suit, with youtube and Google Video being out there and staring at it threateningly? After my Distribution and Exhibition course yesterday morning, I spent some time talking to this coursemate of mine who is, reportedly, doing his thesis on something regarding how television will follow the music industry in weaving through the new media instead of fighting it, all to make money instead of losing money. And then I came back to find this 'ere article among my RSS feeds, which pretty much says that Comedy Central, always there to incorporate the new in useful and creative ways, is not only happy to share The Daily Show with Jon Stewart with us (sic) online, but will now be doing the same with all the backlogs of South Park.

Therefore, I honourably stipulate that time passes and the world thereby evolves, and that we won't remain stagnant and stuck in the past. I can sincerely guarantee you that, I know it to be true (since I can see the future so clearly, through the past and all) - while there's really not much I enjoy more than seeing it happen.

2 comments:

Oneiros said...

Miro is already here, offering several commercials channels as it happens (although it's a long way from complete coverage, and the best stuff there is grassroots); also, Joost, although I haven't found the time to check it out yet.

BunnyDee said...

Yup, I'd heard about Joost, but, not having checked it out myself, I wasn't to mention it here...

And when I went and checked Miro out, prompted by your comment (thanks), I found they have a whole page explaining why it's better than Joost! Good thing I hadn't, then, eh?