Archive for the ‘ Free Culture ’ Category

Exit Stage6 & the way forward…

This post was originally an obituary of sorts for Stage6, but I have added to it over the last few days and brought in a strand which looks at online video in certain areas in more depth. I also suggest some ideas in a Q&A with myself at the end!

stage6 shutdown

Stage6, the high quality video hosting / sharing site operated by DivX withdrew it’s service last Thursday (28/01/08). This was sad news for the community of users who had used the site to share videos over the last year and a half or so. I’ve been meaning to post this over the last few days, but was waiting to see if there was any other developments. On Monday last (25/01/08) the news was sent out that the video site Stage6 is to close down. Tom (aka Spinner) was the messenger who broke the news which was displayed as a blog post on the front page. Read more

U 'Steal This Film' 2

pb

I’ve just finished watching the second installment of ‘Steal This Film‘. Put this on top of the first part and it is a damn good look at the ‘culture of copying’ which has existed (as a form of communication) since the dawn of time. I met with one of the makers behind this worthy project at Picnic Network last year and was very impressed with the idea behind the film. It does the necessary job of putting into motion pictures the issues surrounding copyright which are being written about so much these days by forward thinking scholars. The first part focuses largely on the debate surrounded piracy online and in particular the story of The Pirate Bay. This recently released second part takes a closer look at the history of ‘copying’ with good sections on the printing press (which was accused of being black magic on it’s dawning!) and on the rise of the internet from it’s inception as a reaction to Sputnik.

Anyway I won’t ruin the film, that would be worse than stealing it…so go ahead and download it!

Steal This Film II

RELATED LINKAGE

I Wouldn’t Steal
Good Copy Bad Copy

Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger.

daft punk single

Oh no, I’m losing it! Yet another YouTube craze which I’m a bit slow to pick up on (well YouTube isn’t the only site on the internet you know!). So maybe you’ve seen it, maybe you haven’t, either way this is a blast. Back at the end of November 2007, this hit cyberspace…. (pay attention)

It was influenced by this from June 2007..

Well there are loads of spin offs of these now, the top one is on an official Daft Punk YouTube page, so that makes if official, but it doesn’t give any history about it. Posted on the day before elsewhere is this one of the two girls doing the routine without boxes on their heads. Well their choreography is spot on, especially of course in the official version. This video here gives credit to the original by mashing the two together.

In my opinion, these are far better than Daft Punk’s original video, done in the anime style of cartoon. As much of a fan of this art I am, I wasn’t all that impressed by that concept for these music videos / film that is ‘Interstella 555’. Read more