Our responsibilities as consumers of open media
February 12, 2008 – 11:02 am by Mur LaffertyThe glut of free information on the Internet can make you drunk with its excess. Free content galore, much of it open. But when creators of open content put it out there, more often than not we have an expectation to the consumers. (For the record, I’m mainly talking about CC licensed stuff here.)
The biggest thing we expect from consumers is that the media doesn’t stop with them. Open source programmers want people to build and improve on their code. Authors of CC licensed fiction and music want the work to be passed on, to widen the exposure. Musicians who use Share Alike or the Remix CC license want their work remixed, and authors using the same license want to see fanfic.
In any open situation, at the very least, we want you to talk about it. Blog about it. Tweet about it. Do not download the media, consume the media, and sit there. See, the real trick is we do want payment for our work. It’s just that said payment is rarely monetary in nature.
What got me thinking about consumer responsibility was this fantastic post about science fiction ezines over at Bloggasm. The subscriber numbers of the classic magazines are dropping, and people are blaming the Internet. But are the ezines profiting? Most zines run on a donation model (two sites not mentioned in the article are Escape Pod and Pseudopod*, audio podcast magazines that work quite well on a donation model. I don’t know if they can be considered zines, though, and mean to get publisher Steve Eley to talk to me about his views) and seem to do OK that way. But can online publishing ever match the golden age of pulp?
Many consumers, I’ve found, do their part in this cycle of open media. It’s a thrill to see someone blogging about your work, or mentioning it on Twitter, or using your art as an avatar. But a lot of open media does include paypal donate button, and it’s been gratifying to see consumers use it. One of the best recent examples of this has been when author Matt Wallace’s computer recently died a horrible death. Besides being a full time working writer, Matt is also an open media creator, an award-winning author of works released via the short fiction podcast Variant Frequencies and Podiobooks.com. Matt has delivered a novel and many short stories to his listeners, and when they found out his computer died, they began to donate, rewarding Matt for all the free content he’s given them (He’s nearly at his goal, click here if you want to help him out.)
I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not one to follow this all the time. I’m always downloading new podcasts and it’s hard to keep track of what I should talk about at any one time. (That’s one of the reasons I started this blog!) But think about what you’ve gotten recently that’s free, and think about if you can pass it on, blog about it, or throw a couple of bucks to the creator to keep them creating. You don’t need to spend $15 for that book you just downloaded - but I bet the creator would be thrilled to see $5.
*Full disclosure, I am a former co-editor of Pseudopod.
4 Responses to “Our responsibilities as consumers of open media”
I can only speak for my self here but being a fairly young consumer of podcasts (Im a college freshmen) I have very conflicting views on this. I want to give money to many of the podcast’s I listen to but I have enough trouble getting food for me to eat which Im sure non of the podcasters want the money thats going to feed me. But As you said there are many other ways to help said podcasters out in many other ways and can also help your self as a possible content producer.
Back last year I made a short film for Scott Sigler “Cheating Bastard” at the time I was in a bind I needed a film to round out my college portfolio and at the same time wanted to adapt one of Scott’s works to the screen. He gave me the script and I immediately started production. The film was a great success for Scott rounding out the end of the Rookie with his bonus episodes and also gave him about two episodes of content to use. and it gave me a great film that ended up winning me a state sponsored film Festival for high school students and which in no small part helped me get into college.
So I fully agree that other ways besides monetary returns can be made towards the podcasters. I think for both me and Scott the situation worked out great and not only did the original creator of the content (Scott) benefit but so did the consumer that built content on the original.
By Brent Weichsel on Feb 12, 2008
That doesn’t sound conflicting at all. That sounds exactly like my point.
Keep the media going, that’s the way most people can help out.
By Mur Lafferty on Feb 12, 2008
I don’t know. As someone who uses the Creative Content license on images and text, I don’t really expect people to reuse what I create. The act of creation is really something personal for me. The fact that I am willing to share it might be my toss into the global open content vs. closed content potlatch.
I don’t know about podcasts. I don’t like them, really, and they are inefficient for me. A lot of people do. What would be nice to see as ‘remixes’ would be those magical things called ‘transcripts’. But what do I know.
By Taran Rampersad on Feb 12, 2008
Heartily agreed.
While some would argue that by purchasing a book, you are just making a transaction for a product, I think the broader “consumer” economic philosophy applies - we speak with our dollars, and so if we want more of a certain thing to come our way, we’ll give it our financial support. When I purchase more than one magazine or story from an author, I’m not just acquiring the goods - I’m directly telling them with my hard-earned pay that I want to see more of their work.
As such, “consuming” free things, like podcasted audio, isn’t just about getting something for free. From the above perspective, I think one can argue that there is a consumer obligation to give something back to an author of open media, to let them know that their art is excellent and that we want more of it. Whether it is through financial donations, or spreading the word via blogging, Tweeting, or *gasp* word of mouth, it’s an important part of the burgeoning open media “economy.”
By Cmaaarrr!!! on Feb 12, 2008