Remix Culture and Cultural Equivocacy

I recently had this fit of semi-Socratic logic:

Artists can be clever. People who are clever are not necessarily artists. Mash-ups are clever. Mash-ups are not art.

Creativity is artful and art is a blending of influences -- to wit one Paul Hewson, reflecting yet another artist, said "Every poet is a thief" -- but merely resequencing other artistic works in a furious technological cut and paste... Well, good on you if you think you're an artist.

All of this became clear to me recently as I looked at a video mashup by J.D. Lasica and others over at ourmedia.org. It not only uses copyright images and cultural iconography interspersed with popular music; but also, seems to imply that if it can be remixed it should be remixed. Is it right that if I can sample something then I can freely use it for mass distribution over the internet? Is making Charlie Schulz Peanut characters available with an alternate soundtrack -- a recording by commercial artists Outkast -- for free, a culturally relevant artistic endeavour?

Of course not.

In the comfort of my own home I can cut and splice to my heart's delight. That is personal entertainment. In America, that is fair use. Once I distribute the product of my remixing on the internet I need to be mindful of the source of my product. If I used copyright material without permission, I have just cut the artist off at the knees. It doesn't matter whether the artist makes 25 cents or $100 million dollars from their work; remixing is reuse and reuse without permission constitutes a major breakdown in the social-cultural contract.

I have heard all the arguments about large corporations controlling the cultural and copyright agendas. I have heard about how unfair it is that we can't play Led Zepplin on our podcasts. Big deal. Copyright law protects my nephew just as much as it protects Paul McCartney and I would like my nephew to earn a living as an artist. Copyright can be a force for good and, when combined with the internet, it can fuel thousands of really creative people with artistic careers.

Providing free "audience member" edits of commercial music and video is just a disrespectful stunt. Some people have a giggle when a politician is portrayed as a goof using heavily edited audio and video, but it's not a political statement, just a distortion. Directly inserting, cutting and pasting imagery from an animator or artist into a publically available "remix" just highlights a desperate lack of talent or resources on the part of the assembler.

Copying is not allusion and remixing is not an expression of influence. Public distribution of remixed mash-ups is a culturally equivocal and socially misdirected exercise.