In the time since After the Deadline was last posted a lot has happened. A book has been written, Leeds International Film Festival attended, a new marketing firm has been launched (with the assistance of some great copy…) and a trip to Budapest to cover underground techno parties in Metro stations has been all but finalised. Great, but where’s the cash?

This is a problem that has perpetually been on the media professional’s mind forever, unless they are one of the chosen few secure in their staffing jobs, high in their media tower of ivory. But as staffing jobs become the focus for more budget cuts, this point was moot before the sentence was penned. So where is the money? It has, in a word, vanished. Where once stood an industry built on extravagance- a factor that excused the woefully low pay of many journalists- and spectacle now sits a cottage industry. Online every site is theoretically as legitimate as the next, so where once we had a handful of national newspaper titles, now our options are in the hundreds if we’re looking for online UK news.

The result is more competition, but from people who have little to no professional interest in their work. The repercussions are catastrophic- the continued slump in advertising based on market share has lead to an increase in staff budget cuts, in turn making more people work autonomously in what was already a saturated and highly competitive freelance market. As a consumer it means more confusion, less transparency and a greater chance of reading conflicting stories. As a content provider it means less recognition for work, less work for money, and less chance of surviving these dark times. Bankrupt the professionals and you may find your ‘free press’ in a very similar position. The Press Complaints Commission and the Editor’s Code of Conduct are just two examples wherein news agencies- even in their online models- have a higher benchmark than any amateur hack with a tape recorder and a bag of ideas.

Over at Vice magazine’s VBS.TV sits a painfully under-researched interview with The Fall’s Mark E Smith. During the video the legendary front man is asked what can be done in a world where everyone thinks they should be in a band? In this world, overrun by X Factors, Pop Stars and Academies of Celebrity, how can the real talent get noticed. The problem is that Britain, once a nation of shopkeepers, has turned into a nation of content providers. The wheat is now in the same basket as the chaff, and it’s a mammoth task to separate the two.

Take, for example, the news this week that John and Edward have signed a deal allowing Louis Walsh to handle their ‘careers’. The two boys were voted off X Factor by fans of the show that believed their abilities were not up to the standard of the rest of this year’s candidates- a decidedly weak bunch in comparison with previous competitions. So what’s the point in the show in the first place if, win or lose, you can become famous so long as you have a gimmick. Shows such as X Factor do not promote new talent, they promote new marketable faces, and make celebrities out of losers for people to blindly consume. Shows such as this may well be the final nail in the creative coffin, laid to rest under a headstone that reads “Why Bother?”

What to do, how to change this? Both are questions too large to answer and too complex to arrogantly presume there is one solution for. And perhaps this is the key to the solution. Lose the arrogance that you can do it to, and realise it’s not better when everyone has a crack, it’s more confusing, less interesting and excruciatingly poor-quality. Do what you do well- in the case of bloggers its personal opinion, not news and features, in the case of Jedward it’s cheap Jumpin’ Jacks style entertainment, not chart success and TV coverage. It takes all kinds of people to make up this world, as the saying goes, and to add a contemporaneous edge to the phrase, the sooner we all start to realise that, the better. Then we all might start seeing our paycheques a little quicker again.

A superb postmodern screenplay and performances in a rare directorial handling of the material combining emotional and intellectual intelligence. The photography, editing, sound and music, art direction (film after all is a combination of all these), the way Fellini dealt the cards in a largely ‘uneventful story’, critiquing the making of it in the story of making it is mesmerizing.

We love hate admire despise and ultimately accept and ignore the protagonist simultaneously. The greatest dramatic artists understood the utterly useless side to main characters, that a protagonist can ultimately be plagued by so many paralysing weaknesses that they sit like tubs of glue at centre of their stories – Achilles, Hamlet, Lear, Bloom.

The train of imagery is as staggering as it is effortless, in a brilliant use of lighting and camera with the spaces and movement of players. No one handled a crowd like Fellini, a director, filmmaker who understood that altogether simple theatrical relationship of foreground to mid-ground to background. The transparency of tones at times in the B/W photography, the use of natural and artificial light in concert, all makes this film a visual and dramatic masterpiece for me, probably the greatest film made in my years at least, that began consciously in 1963. It just so happens 8 1/2 came out early that year as well.

I won’t compare it to other fine films – comparisons to me are meaningless because all works that succeed, succeed for different reasons and on different levels, but the big films that are often quoted to either equal or better 8 1/2 to me feel so forced and constructed set against this, the best of Fellini’s work.

8 1/2 anticipates and describes postmodernism still yet to happen when the film was first released. Fellini prefigured a whole movement – as Joyce did with the contemporary novel, Fellini did with film.

The New York Times‘ media writer, Adam Carr, has a great column in the Times about the “fall and rise” of Manhattan’s once-great media empires, like Conde Nast and the Times itself.

Beginning with a parable of the golden olden days of media work, he points out that the new landscape emerging is flatter, more diverse, riskier and more opportunistic:

Historically, young women and men who sought to thrive in publishing made their way to Manhattan. Once there, they were told, they would work in marginal jobs for indifferent bosses doing mundane tasks and then one day, if they did all of that without whimper or complaint, they would magically be granted access to a gilded community, the large heaving engine of books, magazines and newspapers.

Beyond that, all it took to find a place to stand on a very crowded island, as E. B. White suggested, was a willingness to be lucky. Once inside that velvet rope, they would find the escalator that would take them through the various tiers of the business and eventually, they would be the ones deciding who would be allowed to come in.

As we all know, those times are over.

Earlier in November, the New York comptroller said that employment in communications in New York had lost 60,000 jobs since 2000, a year when the media industry here seemed at the height of its powers.

I arrived in New York that same year as part of Inside.com, a digital news site conceived to cover a media space that was converging and morphing into something wholly new. The site covered the mainstream media’s efforts to come to grips with new realities and efforts by new players to cash in on emerging technology.

Few of us could have conceived that in the next decade some of the reigning titans of media would be routed.

But Carr sees an emerging upside in the entrepreneurial talents of younger writers and communicators unburdened by the expectations and responsibilities of past majesties and dead business models:

For every kid that I bump into who is wandering the media industry looking for an entrance that closed some time ago, I come across another who is a bundle of ideas, energy and technological mastery. The next wave is not just knocking on doors, but seeking to knock them down.

Somewhere down in the Flatiron, out in Brooklyn, over in Queens or up in Harlem, cabals of bright young things are watching all the disruption with more than an academic interest. Their tiny netbooks and iPhones, which serve as portals to the cloud, contain more informational firepower than entire newsrooms possessed just two decades ago. And they are ginning content from their audiences in the form of social media or finding ways of making ambient information more useful. They are jaded in the way youth requires, but have the confidence that is a gift of their age as well.

I’m not sure where the new jobs in media will come from; they won’t surely won’t come from “new media” as it is often described. But Carr is on to something when he points out that the very uncertainty of the current downturn also creates new opportunities for those smart, nimble and lucky enough to create new models for monetising writing, communication and news.

The Sentinel, the local newspaper for Stoke-on-Trent and North Staffordshire, recently ran an article on local company WOW Digital Media, currently working on a prestigious project with the Hong Kong government’s museums department. For the article, The Sentinel asked me to comment on the importance of the creative sector to the local economy. In response, I emphasised that the development of an innovative and thriving creative sector is crucial to future economic prosperity in North Staffordshire, and how a successful creative sector can act to link North Staffordshire’s local economy into the wider global economy. The article and full comment can be found through the following link:

http://www.thisisbusiness-staffordshire.co.uk/news/Chinese-artefacts-given-WOW-factor/article-1559818-detail/article.html

NESTA’s recent report It’s Time to Play suggests the UK video games sector faces ‘serious and mounting problems’ as a result of a variety of factors including the emerging trend for experienced staff to leave the UK in favour of competitor countries where government support is strong.

The report, based on a survey of 30 leading British video games developers, suggests widespread support among respondents for introduction of tax credit for cultural games.

Research in this field carries a particular relevance to the West Midlands which is host to 19% of the UK’s gaming workforce (Burns Owens Partnership, 2007). A cluster of high profile game developers include Codemasters, Blitz, Freestyle Games and the Serious Games Institute.

Related links

• It’s time to Place: A survey on the impact of a tax credit for cultural video games in the UK development sector (pdf, 198kb)

Australian music sales in first half of 2009 versus the same period last year. Source: ARIA

A couple of years ago, it seemed as though the big four music companies were heading for rapid oblivion. CD sales were falling as fast as Lehamn Brother shares and the expected saviour of paid digital downloads had yet to figure significantly on balance sheets.

But in the Australian territory at least, Big Music is ack off the canvas and fighting on. As you can see from the ARIA sales figures above, music sales have finally stabilised, helpped by continued strong growth in digital music sales. While CD sales continued to decline, they were still substantial, grossing $131 million for the first half of 2009 on the back of superstars like Pink and the Kings of Leon. Meanwhile, the dollar value of digital music sales grew by 43% for the first six months of 2009 versus the same period of 2008.

The result is that the Australian music industry is climbing out of the abyss, stemming the bleeding and with broad sunlit uploads of future digital music sales just over the horizon. And remember: these are just sales of recorded music. Attendance at concerts and music festivals is a billion dollar industry in Australia.

Take home message? The record industry is here to stay – even the much-maligned majors, who are still finding and marketing musicians that audiences will pay to see and hear.

The Creativity World Forum 2009 will be held in Germany in the southern state of Baden-Württemberg, for the first time . It will have an interdisciplinary, international character that seeks to surpass traditionally defined spheres and encourage more lateral thinking. The event also plans to invigorate cooperation between creative industries in different countries. It will take place from 12/1/2009 – 12/3/2009 in Ludwigsburg, Germany.

Internationale Veranstaltung für kreative Talente und Entscheider
Das Creativity World Forum 2009 bietet in einem Kongress am 1. und 2. Dezember Redner/innen und Panels auf internationalem Top-Niveau, ein hochkarätiges künstlerisches und politisches Rahmenprogramm und zahlreiche Gelegenheiten zum Networking und knüpfen neuer Geschäftskontakte.
Die Ausstellung und Vorträge finden vom 1.12.2009 – 3.12.2009 in Ludwisburg, Deutschland statt.
Creativity World Forum

© Flavia Westerwelle

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Klaus Westerwelle
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Image – ElephantEars Press

The novel has seen so many developments on so fronts through its long history in many languages and periods of history. It began with Cervantes and still is going strong. ElephantEars Press through its Facebook group Progress of the Novel, wants to learn of innovative novels, ‘gems’ published in recent years.

(posting for ElephantEars Press)

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=199000248124&ref=mf

Live blogging from the Neu/Now Festival (7)

The white horse head at the entrance where you can put your ideas is beginning to fill. While we are brewing ideas for next year’s festival already, there is another question to address: What should you do to get picked? Of course, the jury is not going to give you a recipe for how to make your degree work in a way that will get you into next year’s Neu/Now, but for them as teachers, the issue is rather what to ask from your students. A good deal of their adult life as artists will go into getting selected, attracting attention, making a difference. And for many of them, the degree work will be what launches them.

Now the Neu/Now jury members are also teachers. So while in the jury they are looking for what makes a difference and have to ask themselves how to recognize it, but that is not all that different from what they have to do as teachers: finding the salient thing. Yet there is one thing they are supposed to do as teachers that is not required of a jury, and that is bringing it out.

What are we looking for? What can the teachers do? What should the students learn? These were the overlapping topics for a panel discussion with the jury chairs for each discipline, under the title Teaching for Now.

Ingo Petzke (film) holds that skill is not a priority. When he started out as a filmmaker you had to learn it the hard way with 16 mm; then came video; now you have digital cameras. It is the ideas that make the difference. In fact, those of his students that made the bigger steps and ‘got there’ where often the most experimental ones – and they got there in the industry precisely because people could see that they had an idea of what they were doing, not necessarily because it was well-made.

Ingo teaches his students to summarize their film in one line. (“It used to be one sentence, but then in German you can make very long sentences.”) Because the important thing is that a film has to get out. It is not finished when it’s finished. It only starts its life when it reaches an audience. “As I grow older, I grow increasingly concerned about my students’ prospects – even if that is not a ‘pure’ artistic concern. As teachers, we have the responsibility to prepare them for life after the academy.” And he adds that this is what festivals are for: being seen.

Audrius Klimas (design) has a different set of priorities: First comes social responsibilty. Second comes innovation. Last comes creativity. It’s about stimulating the commitment to make something new that matters and know what you’re doing, rather than teaching them to be an artist. In fact it’s the students that are all there at their education that will make it. (And sometimes, this means that they must be able to afford it, or be very committed otherwise.)

Andrea Brooks (dance & theatre) argues that ultimately, it’s all about effectiveness. And that is a physical process. To make something hit home you must make it physically tangible – what you have to tell about it will never replace the live thing. (She claims that only 7% of information comes verbally – which is a nonsense figure because there is no unit measure of information – but OK we get what she wants to say.) And if you want to get your project staged or nominated, pay attention to another sort of documentation: video. Don’t just film something from one camera standpoint in the audience! She has films like that of her own plays of twenty years ago, plays that are very dear to her, and she can’t watch the footage because it makes her eyes bleed to see them like a videotape slideshow.

There is nothing against innovativeness, for sure, but one can also be creative without being innovative. And one shouldn’t let one’s wish to be innovative get in the way of what you want to convey.

(This reminds me of Mogens Rukov advising a group of film students: “Don’t be original. You are not good enough to be original.” I doubt if Andrea would lend herself to such extreme views.)

Christine Peybus (visual arts) takes a different view. In visual arts, you can encounter installations, robots, self-built orchestras, documentaries, art books, posters, performances. How can one be an expert on that? You need to get a sense of what people are after. So she is very grateful that Neu/Now nominees had to present an artistic statement; for her, at least, some of the art works were profoundly altered by that.

As a matter of fact, there is no sculpture or painting whatsoever at Neu/Now: the closest you get to something pictorial is Izabela Kazcmarek’s Shaken, not stirred series of ironical posters. 75 % of submissions in visual arts wasn’t either – and maybe this 75 % had an advantage in being more fit for digital reproduction in the first place. (At least this goes for all work made in digital media.)

Now arts education of course isn’t all about preparing people for the work field. This may be precisely the thing art schools are not good at. The whole discussion about the “creative industries” that art schools somehow should accomodate to still revolves around what the creative industries are - in that sense it’s a sign of not knowing what we’re talking about.

From the cover of the current edition of the journal Cultural Science

I’ve always considered QUT researcher Terry Flew to be one of Australia’s sharpest thinkers on culture and its industrial manifestations.

Now he’s published an excellent review article that traces the intellectual history and surveys the current field of ideas around the “cultural economy.” It’s in the current edition of the journal Cultural Science and you can read the full text here:

The Cultural Economy Moment?
The term “cultural economy” has gained considerable intellectual currency over the course of the 2000s.We have seen edited collections on cultural economy (du Gay and Pryke, 2002), a reader on the subject (Amin and Thrift, 2004), and the launch of the Journal of Cultural Economy. Such developments arise in part out of a growing interest among both academics and policy-makers in the creative industries (Hartley, 2005) and the associated notion of a creative economy (Venturelli, 2005; Scott, 2008a; UNCTAD, 2008). The growing international interest in creative cities and global city-regions can be connected to such developments (Scott et. al., 2001; Florida, 2002, 2008; Scott, 2008b), as can the rise of hybrid fields such as cultural-economic geography (James et. al., 2008). Such developments are also reflective of shifts in cultural policy towards conceiving of culture as a resource (Yúdice, 2003), and the rise of economic discourses within arts and cultural policy which, in cultural economist David Throsby’s account, see cultural policy ‘rescued from its primordial past and catapulted to the forefront of the modern forward-looking policy agenda, an essential component in any respectable economic policy-maker’s development strategy’ (Throsby, 2008: 228). Throsby associates this with a reframing of the arts, which are now seen as ‘part of a wider and more dynamic sphere of economic activity, with links through to the information and knowledge economies, fostering creativity, embracing new technologies, and feeding innovation’ (Throsby, 2008: 229).

Flew goes on to survey the development of the academic literature in this field, drawing on work from the fields of communication studies, cultural economics, the sociology of culture and the cultural political economy. For the academic readers of this bog, you’ll notice all the important names in the field: Towse, Throsby, Lash and Urry, Garnham, Bordieu, Scott, Hesmondhalgh and so on. There’s also a fascinating discussion of the term “neo-liberalism” as a term of abuse amongst cultural theorists against the creative industries movement (remember Toby Miller?)

This is probably the best  short review of the field extant.

One of the ways I get myself to do big things is to commit to doing them in public. That way I face the shame of failure amongst those that know me if I don’t do them.

So, seeing as I’ve just got back from my first run since Berlin Marathon 7 weeks ago (something i did after publicly committing to it!) where my kneecap didn’t feel like it was trying to escape my leg, I feel ready to commit to training again. Here’s some stuff I plan to do:

• By the end of next year i want to have done a triathlon. Anyone with me?
• I’ve been meaning to give 100 push-ups a try for months. I start today.
• I’m going to re-attempt Al Humphries “daily cold shower” thing. Going to be tough over the coming winter!
• I’m going to re-start fencing (think this, not this) after losing touch with it during marathon training.
• I’m going to re-start kung-fu. After a ten year hiatus. Time to dust off those belts!

Finally, here’s two great creative industries sites: SightUnseen (behind the scenes of the creative industries), and Creative Boom (a creative industries news site). And there’s some cracking music industry stuff over on the latest Dizzyjam blog post.

“The state of British fashion

The second in a new Times series to map the current landscape of British business

Fashion is one of those industries in which Britain is still a leading world power.

About 131,000 people work across the designer fashion industry in Britain and the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts has calculated that, from 2009 to 2013, creative industries — including fashion — will grow by an average of 4 per cent a year. That is more than double the rate at which the rest of the economy is expected to grow.

There are plenty of examples of how Britain’s fashion industry punches above its weight on the world stage. Burberry, recently elevated into the ranks of the FTSE 100 index, is one of the world’s biggest fashion brands, while many of our designers — such as John Galliano, at Dior — have been sought out by fashion houses elsewhere in the world.

Meanwhile, London Fashion Week is firmly established as one of the global fashion industry’s key annual events, rivalling similar events in Paris, Milan and New York. This is despite London, once regarded as brimming with edgy, avant-garde talent, losing many of its best-known designers — including Mr Galliano, Alexander McQueen and Stella McCartney — to Paris and Milan in recent years. This is proof that Britain’s fashion schools are still turning out some of the most innovative people in the industry.

At the same time, other designers from around the world have sought to ply their trade in Britain, such as the French-born Nicole Farhi, who recently described London as “the birthplace of fashion today”.

It isn’t just at the luxury end of the market that Britain is turning out some of the key players on the global fashion and designer stage. At a mass level, too, Britain is doing well. Topshop, Sir Philip Green’s high street fashion empire, opened its first store in New York this year and the billionaire retailer is now mulling openings elsewhere in the world, including Milan and Paris.

Yet the industry has been through a tough recession. Getting on for 18 per cent of the UK’s fashion retailers have gone bust during the recession and, while that has allowed the survivors — such as Marks & Spencer, Primark, Next and Sir Philip’s Arcadia — to continue to increase their market share, it has cast a shadow.

One issue that has hit retailers, in particular, has been the reluctance of credit insurers to do business in the sector. In many cases, these firms have withdrawn their cover, leaving suppliers nervous and exposed.

Life has also been particularly difficult for those fashion retailers who were previously owned by Icelandic companies. Mosaic Fashions, whose stable of clothing brands included Principles and Karen Millen, was broken up after its main shareholder, Baugur, collapsed.

A number of otherwise solid businesses found themselves caught in the crossfire and having to spend time in Iceland sorting out their banking arrangements instead of getting on with their regular work. The fashion chain All Saints, for example, came close to going to the wall despite having shown 40 per cent year-on-year growth. It was forced to spend time calming the fears of its suppliers, who were concerned about its banking arrangements. With new banking arrangements in place, All Saints survived the turmoil and is now expanding.

Other examples of British fashion ingenuity abound. Asos, the online fashion retailer, has come from nowhere in recent years to become a big player in the industry and has shown how the internet can be profitably harnessed.”

- TIMES ONLINE

‘Digital Horizons: Commercialising Innovation for 2009-2012′ Webcast

As our Creative Industries Technology Strategy outlines, innovation is key to developing new business models for the digital future. In this live session we explore the key issues with our panel of experts and contribute to the debate.

I think it’s excellent that you can read their strategy online (not to mention how recent it is…hint hint to Qld). View the Strategy Here.

One of the main discussion points revolves around metadata. I think that this will play a role in terms of semantic search, or the future of search in general. However, it’s worth a listen to if you are keen in keeping updated on digital industry strategy and innovation.

Several points I touched on in the lectures are covered here.

The website has more:

Once we get back from Frankfurt, we’d like to see you on morning talk shows like the “Today” show and “The View,” so please get yourself booked on them and keep us “in the loop.” If I’m not here—which I won’t be, since after the book fair I go on vacation for two weeks—just tell Jenni, my assistant, when she gets back from jury duty.

Remember in your blog to tabskim your readers’ comments. You can use Twitter, Chitt-chaTT, or Nit-Pickr. When you reply to comments, try to post at least one photo per hour of you doing everyday tasks around the house, such as answering comments and posting photos. Please make sure they’re pre-scorched. Let me know, when I get back from Retreat a week after my vacation, if self-surging is a problem.

Very funny. In a painful way. [AR]

CReATE

So while all of the main programme was going on at c&binet, there were some fringe sessions that were being run on particular topics. And then there was some beyond-the-fringe activity that we as a group labelled an unconference to address the issues that had fallen down between the cracks of all the topics being discussed at the conference over those few days.

I guess it was attended by a number of us relative up-starts (i.e. *not* the majors represented on that incredibly glittering list of delegates) along with the uber-cool, very switched on editor from Wired UK), David Rowan, and a very sound bloke from Edelman (PR company running the show for the c&binet folks). Between us we determined that there were two topics of we wanted to discuss and make some points on.

The first one was grouped under collaborations (how we find ways of working together to do some really cool stuff), and the other was what did we want out of both c&binet in the future and also in terms of government support.

I took barely legible notes for the latter group discussion and so here I am reporting back as promised, and will blog it on both our site and also c&binet, for the record.

Ok so the specific question was: “what do we want out of the government and or c&binet in terms of support for creative industries?”

1) Funding: heh ok. So yes, everyone wants funding and wants it now (it would certainly help cover base costs as the recession sets in). When we dig further however (i.e. beyond that obvious desire), it’s probably fair to say that we want the processes for finding it, applying for it and getting it to be easier. We’re not accountants, and in many instances we need to be to fight the damn paperwork..

2) Partnerships, collaborations and facilitations: that old adage “it ain’t what you know but who you know too” springs to mind. It’s all very well having big names at conferences like these but for the shy little company in the corner (and in some instances those corners could get rather crowded) sometimes it’s enough to just do a bit of a loaded introduction within the context of potential work together. After all, the government has influence over all those who want to have influence on the government (i.e. the majors). Why not use it??

3) Legal support: this is a very interesting one. Some recurring themes and words came up throughout the formal part of the conference, like “copyright”, “rights management”, “P2P” (which incidentally was branded an evil technology by some at the conference – P2Pilia?? or perhaps P2Pillage), carrots and sticks. With all of this baggage it has become evident that if you’re creating content in any way, you probably need a legal team in order to protect it or at least protect your right to distribute it the way you want to. So yes, legal support. Good, comprehensive legal support sympathetic and knowledgeable about creative industries and issues facing them.

4) More regional support: that’s basically anyone not within the London area

5) Courses in Leadership: now this came up because apparently Ashridge had run something like that for creatives before. Access to that would be very nice, thanks!

6) PR support: no good having a great idea if no-one knows about it. And some of us just simply have no resource to devote to PR activity. I think some of this activity is taken care of by cluster groups around the country, but I think some specialist PR support is what might be needed.

7) Business Links need educating about the value of the creative sector and an understanding of the technologies. Perhaps that’s one for membership bodies like PACT?

As for c&binet itself, the next event should have access to plug points (having been cut off mid-tweet myself I think they’d have had alot more interaction and engagement had the venue thought of this). The physical layout of the event was also not conducive to intimacy (in terms of quality of conversations, questions from the floor etc). Cheaper accomodation options would have also been handy (though as I understand it, £280 a night *was* cheap for the venue!!)

9) We want to think of c&binet not just as an event or a forum but a network/partnership. Also want more workshop activity to enable discourse between the majors and the minors(?).

10) beyond c&binet there needs to be more opportunities for showcasing new business ideas, new models, new innovations and technologies coming out of creative industries.

11) specifically aimed at the Technology Strategy Board (Alex Stanhope was in our circle), we wanted to know how to take a project forward after a scheme like Fast Track for example i.e. what happens next to the IP that is created – what are the options and pathways? (I’d actually like more support for actually getting that sort of funding in the first place!)

That’s quite a list and there are probably loads more we could add.

I also personally wanted there to be meta-data for every delegate distributed so that we can find people based on interests (likes/dislikes/technologies/business interests etc). So much more could have been made of the network had we known this stuff, and also what everyone is up to. That sort of contextual information instantly adds value, which means that you don’t have to read peoples’ bios in order to get a feel for what they’d be interested in chatting about.

The lovely chap from Edelman was very open to suggestions, especially this is the first conference of its sort and that they needed companies/people to support them or want to become involved in order to make the next one even better. There was also a suggestion that the next one could be in Bristol (*no* idea who made that suggestion lol).

If I’ve missed anything then please say so. In the mean time I’ll post this to the c&binet blog. A brilliant bloke called Evan took the business cards of everyone who attended our little unconference and so if you want to know who else attended, just ask .

cheers,

Jaya (in need of more caffeine in order to make more sense!)

nameless

P.S. You can also take a look at Clare Reddington’s summary of the other discussion on collaboration going on in the unconference

If anything, we need to simplify how rights management happens. Encourage reuse of content and related income generation, and allow the artists whose content is being used the ability to make money too (along side the artist doing the reusing). Are pirates of today the content producers of tomorrow? Dunno. I don’t really understand rights management well enough to debate it. I do know however that it’s not working. Somehow they need to wrap up ownership of content with the right to reuse it provided income goes back to the original artist. Reusers shouldn’t need their own legal department in order to do this. If we think in terms of Darwin and evolution, more robust organisms come out of reuse of the original blueprints (DNA ) and improving on them (we’re basically DNA mash-ups!). If each new “product” or organism had to pay a royalty in order to make use of those blueprints this planet would be a whole different place. Ok the analogy is a bit dodgy but perhaps you get my point.

Ok so now onto the fantastic folks I’ve met so far. It was great to see a familiar face in Paul Tarplee from twofour (sitting on my right at this moment). Also a really cool guy from a company that owns the rights to the Enid Blyton estate (noddy through famous five, mallory towers…). How cool is that?! Then there’s Robert from an independent record company, audio networks (they work with Nik Kershaw). Very progressive business model there and also very transparent. Alex Stanhope from the TSB (running the next session after coffee). Managed to heckle the Secretary of State (Ben Bradshaw) last night. In a friendly way ofcourse – he’s actually a really good bloke. Genuinely gives a damn. Also met a very clever Canadian from Nordicity. Actually there are a number of great Canadians in the audience. Coincidence? I think that in many ways perhaps they’re tackling a lot of the issues we’re discussing here in far more open ways. I’ll probably want to look more closely at what they’re doing over there now after being exposed to their thinking.

Clare Reddington of course from iShed, flying the flag for Bristol and the Watershed.

Lots of random thoughts occurring as I listen to the folks on the stage. Forgive me if they don’t form full sentences!

We seem to be going around in circles on this “protect copyright at all costs” thing. Lots of big boys looking to preserve that status quo. Strong words being used like “theft”. Adding value to content is the only way to make money from it in the future.

Great guy asking a question and saying that content authors/musicians fear obscurity more than piracy.

Another saying piracy dropping in the world by 40% without any strong arm tactics (lots from the establishment saying you need carrots and sticks with the emphasis on sticks). That’s the guy from the open rights group (of which we’re members!).

Interestingly and sadly this conference, which is all about digital and content really, doesn’t have power points available in the room which means that twitterers with hardware that has crappy battery life can only participate for the first half hour lol.

Perhaps we need to look at where people do buy on a pay per use. The public don’t really understand licencing (and their rights to use the content that they buy in the way that they use).

On the stage is the publisher behind Dan Brown. Obviously very defensive about ensuring that their content is protected. Says that the publisher adds value by selecting, editing and then publishing. Filtering out the crap. I don’t think there’s an argument against that.

Chappy from govt keeps talking about stopping people breaking the law. Great chap, Chris, heckling from LBI making the point that prohibition has never worked. He rightly says that you need to build your business models around human behaviour.

Content will always be king – but it’s the route for other businesses to access highly targetted audiences. Advertising models will need to change a bit but there’s alot to that approach. Carrots and no sticks – sounds about right. Trying to stem P2P is pointless and futile.

The word “rights” comes up constantly. Think we need a show: “whose rights are they anyway?” because they’re all living in fear of a lawsuit because they don’t know who owns the rights in order to safely release or give access to certain bits of content (museums for example).

Content as a service/subscription seems to be a really good way forward. Quantising content into content “products” is opening up a whole world of pain in terms of regulation, DRM, protection etc. Don’t know about anyone else in the room but I’m feeling quite frustrated that the act of letter-writing to 14 year old kids is cited as something that is going to sort everything out. Stop thinking about consumers as the criminals. Think of them as VOTERS. They vote with their money. If there is something worth buying, they will buy it.

Battery life is now practically gone so I’ll publish. More when I find more juice!

It’s the debate that just won’t die. Australian films continue to draw just a few percent of total Australian box offices, and the local industry continues to scratch its head and wonder why.

On October 22nd, Metro Screen held a sold-out forum on the issue, chaired by Andrew Urban and featuring a panel of distinguished panelists including Margaret Pomeranz, Tony Ginnane, Troy Lum, Rachel Ward and the new boss of Screen Australia, Ruth Harley.

The debate swirled around many of the same-old, same-old standards of the “what’s wrong with Australian film” issue, which has been debated extensively in the press and the industry by critics and commentators like Jim Schembri, Luke Buckmaster and Lyndon Barber.

Does “Australian film” have a branding issue? Are Australian scripts and movies too depressing, mundane and dull? Are the marketing budgets unrealistic? Does cultural imperialism mean Hollywood is a natural advantage? Should we abandon “telling stories” and instead concentrate on “creating myths”? Do Austraolian film-makers and funding bodies even understand their audiences and why they go to see movies? And is it all about to change with the coming of digital delivery anyway?

One issue that came to my mind immediately was the uphill struggle most Australian cinema faces. Not only is it competing with the Hollywood juggernaut, but the small size of the Australian market means limited sources of capital investment, development funding and ultimately cinematic audiences.

There’s also no doubt that, structurally speaking, the market for film production in Australia is skewed towards blockbusters and against independent productions. That’s just an unsurprising fact of life; even though film has certain unique facets it is still hostage to the sorts of competitive advantages and economies of scale that make it easier to market and screen Transformers than an indie Australian drama.

Having said that, as a cultural economist I am constantly amazed at the lack of price differentiation in cinema. If audiences aren’t going to see Australian films, why not drop the price? It seems insane to me that we expect audiences to pay the same to see a Michael Bay special effects monster as for a $1 million Australian indie. Maybe it would not be more profitable in the long run to do this, but in the name of market share alone it seems to me a no-brainer. Maybe Australian dramas would sell at $9 or $7 or even $5. Of course, there are structural issues to do with distributors and exhibitors that would make this unlikely.

“The UK has no problem starting creative businesses, but it struggles to grow them. Many lack the necessary skills and commercial awareness for sustained growth, and the ability to respond to increasing foreign competition.

Stronger entrepreneurship education for creative graduates is crucial and is a focus for policy, but current provision is not adequately preparing students for growing their own businesses beyond the start-up phase.

There is no agreed effective practice and provision varies widely between institutions. Often students aren’t aware of facilities in their own institutions that are supposed to support entrepreneurship.

As a result students appear confused: 45 per cent of them expect to run their own business, but mainly as a means to peer recognition and ‘making a difference’ rather than building a commercially successful enterprise.

Entrepreneurship education needs to be made explicit, effective and sustainable. Links between education and industry must be improved, funding and quality assurance systems need to be revised, and more appropriate models of creative entrepreneurship need to be developed.

Doing so will ensure that students leave university with the ability not just to set up a company, but with the skills and aptitudes to convert it from a start-up into a sustainable and successful business.”

NESTA