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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Indeed an interesting topic.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I tend to agree that the concern reflects an
imposed notion of "value". I prefer to use the term "gratification" in
these things. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>People will post/read content because they achieve
a gratification by doing so. For some, that gratification reflects a commercial
imperative (selling songs on iTunes or promoting the band via MySpace), for some
a narcissistic imperative (individuals blogging or commenting on MySpace, etc).
As long as neither is entered into without appreciation, it's all ethical to
me.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Youtube and MySpace offer a service of
aggregation. They construct an audience in the same way a TV station
does and can commercialise it in the same way a TV or radio station does. The
audience, individually, is free to leave whenever they wish - but their
individual participation (including content) is not the part that has value in a
commercial sense. The commercial value is in the aggregation of the audience and
that value is generated by the service providers: the owners of YouTube or
MySpace. The participants provide their eyeballs in exchange for a service they
don't pay for - just like a free-to-air TV audience does.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>It would seem odd indeed if we were to argue that
the TV audience should be distributed the proceeds of the advertising revenue
generated by the TV company ... but they all participate in the transaction
...</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>In the case of Amazon, the commercialisation is a
little more diverse, but essentially the same, I think. Ditto with MySpace
commercialising content via SnowCap. Happy to tease this one out further
...</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Cheers,</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Hughie</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV>----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px">
<DIV
style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A title=john@johnsobol.com href="mailto:john@johnsobol.com">john sobol</A>
</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A title=trebor@thing.net
href="mailto:trebor@thing.net">Trebor Scholz</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Cc:</B> <A title=idc@bbs.thing.net
href="mailto:idc@bbs.thing.net">IDC list</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Friday, January 05, 2007 11:31
AM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> Re: [iDC] The Ethics of
Participation</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>Trebor, <BR><BR>I think that your call for a discussion of the
the ethics of participation is useful and important and I look forward to
hearing people's thoughts on this vital issue.<BR><BR>My own belief, however,
is that your articulation of the problem is predicated on certain assumptions
about what constitutes value in the participatory networked culture, and I'd
like to challenge or at least address those assumptions. First I'll try to
intelligently and concisely articulate them:<BR><BR>You quote Nicholas Carr's
point that<BR><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>"putting the means of production into the hands of the masses
but withholding from those same masses<BR>any ownership over the product of
their work, provides an incredibly efficient mechanism to harvest the
economic value of the free labor provided by the very many and concentrate
it into the hands of the very few." (1)<BR><BR></BLOCKQUOTE><BR>This analysis,
and others like it, are obviously deeply indebted – both for their terminology
and critical framework – to Marxist traditions that are themselves based
on thorough and reasonable analyses of industrial economic paradigms. But the
networked economy is not an industrial paradigm and I think that neither these
terms nor concepts can be ported to it without bringing along certain
potentially misleading assumptions.<BR><BR>Carr says first of all that users
do not have 'ownership of the product of their work' when they post to Amazon,
Youtube etc. But is this really so? On one level, users who submit content are
still free to do whatever they want with their work, including sell it, or
post it elsewhere. So it's hard to argue that they do not own it, although
what is certain is that they do not own it with the same level of exclusivity
as they would if they didn't post to YouTube or Amazon. But I'm pretty sure
that the Terms and Conditions you go on to quote<BR><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>"Content on the Website... may not be used, copied, reproduced,
distributed, ... sold, licensed, or otherwise exploited for any other
purposes whatsoever without the prior written consent of the respective
owners. ... For clarity, you retain all of your ownership rights in your
User Submissions. However, by submitting the User Submissions to YouTube,
you hereby grant YouTube a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free,
sublicenseable and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute,
prepare derivative works of, display, and perform the User Submissions..."
(2)<BR></BLOCKQUOTE><BR>only apply to content that has been uploaded. And once
it has been removed then the conditions no longer apply. But in either case, I
want to make a larger point about what constitutes 'the product of one's
work'. <BR><BR>
<HR>
</BLOCKQUOTE>
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