The Business of Entertainment (3 volume set)

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The Business of Entertainment

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The Business of Entertainment VOLUME 1

Movies

Edited by Robert C. Sickels

 

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The business of entertainment / edited by Robert C. Sickels. p. cm. — (Praeger perspectives) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978– 0 –275–99838–7 (set: alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–275–99840–0 (vol. 1 : alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–275–99842–4 (vol. 2 : alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–275–99844–8 (vol. 3 : alk. paper) 1. Performing arts. 2. Performing arts—Economic aspects. I. Sickels, Robert. PN1584.B87 2009 790.2—dc22 2008030435 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available. Copyright © 2009 by Robert C. Sickels All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, by any process or technique, without the express written consent of the publisher. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2008030435 ISBN: 978–0–275–99838–7 (set) 978–0–275–99840–0 (vol. 1) 978–0–275–99842–4 (vol. 2) 978–0–275–99844–8 (vol. 3) First published in 2009 Greenwood Press, 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881 An imprint of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. www.greenwood.com Printed in the United States of America

The paper used in this book complies with the Permanent Paper Standard issued by the National Information Standards Organization (Z39.48–1984). 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

I stop somewhere waiting for you. —Walt Whitman

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Contents

Preface by Robert C. Sickels Acknowledgments

 1  2  3

xiii Behind the Greenlight: Why Hollywood Makes the Films It Makes Jeffrey Hirschberg

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The Six Faces of Piracy: Global Media Distribution from Below Ramon Lobato

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KingKong.com versus LOLTheMovie.com: Toward a Framework of Corporate and Independent Online Film Promotion Mary P. Erickson

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Reacting Synergistically: Batman and Time Warner Kimberly A. Owczarski

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“You believe in pirates, of course . . .”: Disney’s Commodification and “Closure” of Pirates of the Caribbean Anne H. Petersen

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The Business of Race in The Lord of the Rings Trilogy Sue J. Kim

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77 93

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 7  8  9

Contents

Dream Worlds: Film-Game Franchising and Narrative Form Harry Brown

111

Co-Opting “Independence”: Hollywood’s Marketing Label Mary P. Erickson

129

Entertainment in the Margins of the American Film Industry: “Orion Pictures Presents a Filmhaus Production of a David Mamet Film” Yannis Tzioumakis

 10 Piercing Steven Soderbergh’s Bubble

153 179

R. Colin Tait

 11 Celebrity Juice, Not from Concentrate: Perez Hilton, Gossip Blogs, and the New Star Production Anne H. Petersen

195

 12 Big Bucks and Fake Tears: Celebrity Journalism’s Hyperreality Zachary Snider

217

About the Editor and Contributors

233

Index

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Preface

The business of entertainment has always been in constant flux, but at the present moment the speed at which change is occurring is singularly unprecedented. As the entertainment industry seeks to evolve and adapt in light of the ascendance of all things digital, 100 years worth of structures and systems appear to be falling away like so much dross. The concomitantly nascent era of “new media,” so the assumption goes, must also by definition mean the death of old media. And in some ways this is true, at least as it concerns the various physical forms of older media such as records and cassettes, VHS tapes, analog television broadcasts, and newspapers actually made of paper. These sorts of things are either already long dead or at best replicating the experience of Homo habilis laying eyes on Homo erectus for the first time; the new era most certainly will not go well for them. In place of the old totems come the new ones—iTunes, HDTV, TiVo, Digital Cinema, and so on—seemingly disparate but unified by their digital make-ups. And this digital nature and the accompanying ease with which music, films, and TV shows can be accessed and made portable allows the new media to be “free.” But free in what sense of the word? Certainly free as concerns the unfettering of the former corporeal state of media. While we need something tangible on which to view it—made unbelievably simple by the proliferation of iPods and like devices—media can be converted into digital ones and zeroes and delivered via the ether almost anywhere in the world at any time. New media is portable and near infinitely accessible and only becoming more so as technology improves, just as the devices upon which we store our information

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grow increasingly infinitesimal (e.g., the iPod Nano). But of greater concern, at least to the giant international media conglomerates that own the rights to so much of what the entertainment industry produces, is the perception that media is actually free —that payment is neither required nor necessary, that the natural state of entertainment is that it should be wholly accessible entirely without cost. This way of thinking is increasingly prevalent in younger consumers, who bristle at paying 99¢ on iTunes for a song or $4 to their cable provider for a movie. Why bother paying for things when you can download them for nothing online with any number of free, very user-friendly, and increasingly hard to trace technologies? And this line of thinking rightfully scares the bejeezus out of the media congloms whose financial lifeblood emanates from their stranglehold on the distribution of their subsidiaries’ products. If, as Michael Wolff claims, “[t]he age of media-distribution monopolies is over,”1 then what comes next? And so the rush is on to answer this and other questions, although I would argue that the desire to bury the old business methods as being somehow inapplicable to new media is, as yet, premature. Yes, it does seem as though the old models aren’t efficient in the present moment and that companies are struggling to hit upon new ones that will be equally profitable. This is especially true as concerns just how the Internet will earn income for content providers. And, in fact, perhaps with the exponentially burgeoning number of opportunities for consumers to acquire and view their media, even the attempt to replicate what worked before is questionable. And yet it persists. The ubiquitously adopted concept of media convergence —when a company spreads the promotion and sales of a product across multiple subsidiaries— has yet to prove as profitable as had been hoped, but it’s not like money hasn’t been made. When Sony can make all the Spider-Man movies, which feature music by Sony BMG recording artists, and then sell soundtrack CDs or digital downloads, which can be played on Sony CD players, or ripped for play on a Sony MP3 Walkman, or converted into ring tones for use on a Sony Ericsson cell phone, and sell DVDs to be played on Sony DVD players, and sell video games to be played on Sony PlayStations, and license the images of Spiderman and accompanying characters to be featured on toys, fast food, and any number of other objects—all of which equals billions for the parent company’s bottom line—something is working out as planned. So, it’s no surprise that new media is quickly being bought up not just by other new companies but by the old ones as well—for example, Google owns YouTube while Fox News Corp. now counts MySpace among its subsidiaries. And while they’ve yet to capitalize on just how to maximize profits from these kinds of things or to corner the market on the distribution avenues for new media, it’s impossible to dismiss out of hand the idea that they will. After all, previous innovations and revolutions in the entertainment industry that were supposed to make the companies of old uncompetitive dinosaurs in the

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end only resulted in their becoming bigger and more omnivorous than ever. Who’s to say it won’t happen again? And while it’s fascinating to prognosticate what kinds of industrial changes the latest moment of revolution will result in for the companies involved, what often goes unmentioned in so many breathless glossy magazine features on industry tycoons is what this means for the many artistic folks working in the industry. The same tensions that have always been present between creators and companies remain, none more vivid than the question of whether or not the eternal conflict between art and commerce can ever be peaceably resolved, especially in light of the awesome international dominance of the so-called big six contemporary media conglomerates—Fox, Disney, General Electric, Viacom, Time Warner, and Sony—which control upwards of 90 percent of the U.S. entertainment industry. The creation of entertainment media is the provenance of the artistically minded, whereas the widespread dissemination of their work is the bailiwick of so many Ivy League–trained MBAs. But the digital renaissance has allowed creators more control over their work, especially as concerns making and distributing their art outside of traditional systems. As artists gain more control over their work, how will the media conglomerates, which are always looking to increase the size of their piece of the pie, seek to consolidate their power, and how will this effect what gets made and seen and heard and what doesn’t? How will art and commerce intersect differently in the digital age? And what will the results of their collision ultimately mean for consumers, whose lives are increasingly ensconced in an omnipresent and immediate entertainment industry? While it’s clear that the entertainment industry is once again going through one of its periodic upheavals, what that means is only now beginning to be debated. Are we really going into a new era in which all the old models cease to apply, or will the old behemoths weather yet another storm only to once again emerge intact and even larger than they were in previous incarnations? And how will artists trying to maintain their integrity and beliefs reconcile their visions with those of the corporate entities for which they must almost certainly work should they want their creations ever to be seen by a larger audience? It’s the answers to these questions with which the various authors contributing to The Business of Entertainment: Movies grapple. In the opening chapter, “Behind the Greenlight: Why Hollywood Makes the Films It Makes,” Jeffrey Hirschberg lays out what motivates the thought process behind the kinds of films that Hollywood most often produces. This is followed by Ramon Lobato’s “The Six Faces of Piracy: Global Media Distribution from Below,” which eloquently argues that “piracy is not only a form of deviant behavior but may also offer routes to knowledge, development, and citizenship.” Next is Mary P. Erickson’s “KingKong.com versus LOLTheMovie.com: Toward a Framework of Corporate and Independent Online Film Promotion,” in which she explores the history and meaning of

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online marketing campaigns for studio films and their independent counterparts. Kimberly A. Owczarski’s “Reacting Synergistically: Batman and Time Warner” examines a representative case of how a major media conglomerate uses a “tent-pole” film to spread product throughout its various subsidiaries. Likewise, Anne H. Petersen’s “ ‘You believe in pirates, of course . . .’: Disney’s Commodification and ‘Closure’ of Pirates of the Caribbean” details how Disney combined history and fantasy to create a new flagship corporate commodity rooted in society’s psyche. In “The Business of Race in The Lord of the Rings Trilogy,” Sue J. Kim discusses ways in which the LOTR films exemplify problems with our understanding of race and how the business of filmic entertainment relies on such distortions. Harry Brown’s “Dream Worlds: Film-Game Franchising and Narrative Form” fascinatingly discusses the convergence of Lucasfilm’s filmmaking and game design branches and what that might mean for the future of entertainment. Erickson’s “CoOpting ‘Independence’: Hollywood’s Marketing Label” comes next, and in it she elucidates the mirage of “independent” filmmaking, which she convincingly claims is now more often than not just a part of the marketing plans of major studios. But independent films financed primarily by studios outside the dominant system surely did once exist, as is clear in Yannis Tzioumakis’s “Entertainment in the Margins of the American Film Industry: ‘Orion Pictures Presents a Filmhaus Production of a David Mamet Film,’ ” in which he skillfully recounts the story behind the making of Mamet’s seminal indy film. And perhaps there’s hope for independent film yet, as convincingly posited in R. Colin Tait’s “Piercing Steven Soderbergh’s Bubble,” in which he discusses the possible industrial impact of the multiplatform day and date release of Soderbergh’s film. Finally, the book’s last two essays, Petersen’s “Celebrity Juice, Not from Concentrate: Perez Hilton, Gossip Blogs, and the New Star Production” and Zachary Snider’s “Big Bucks and Fake Tears: Celebrity Journalism’s Hyperreality,” forcefully, and at times hilariously, offer insight into what celebrity has come to mean in contemporary culture. Ultimately, it is our hope that these essays will serve to introduce their readers to the rich and myriad array of issues facing the contemporary film industry and how they might play out on a worldwide cultural stage. And perhaps they will also contribute to new ways of thinking about and researching the business of entertainment as it applies to the movies and what they continue to mean in a rapidly changing industry and world. Robert C. Sickels NOTE 1. Michael Wolff, “The Best of Enemies,” Vanity Fair, April 2008, 134.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks are due to my editor at Praeger Publishers, Jeff Olson, for his patience, invaluable input, and quality baseball talk, even if he is a Red Sox fan. Thanks are also due to Praeger’s Nick Philipson and Lindsay Claire, who helped immensely in getting this project off the ground and seeing it through to completion. Special thanks are also due to all the authors who contributed their pieces to these collections; I am very grateful and appreciative. I’d also like to thank Professor Michael Branch of the University of Nevada, Reno, for his tireless guidance, inspiration, and friendship over the years; he showed me a sterling path that I’ve tried my best to follow. Thanks to Whitman College and the support of my colleagues and friends here, especially Robert Withycombe and Jana Byars. And thanks to my dad, who taught me to always do your work and don’t make excuses, and to my mom, who always had time to take me to a movie or buy me a book. Lastly, thanks to my kids, Tallulah and Dutch, who put up with me throughout what was a long and arduous process.

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chapter 1

Behind the Greenlight: Why Hollywood Makes the Films It Makes Jeffrey Hirschberg

CUTTING THE $100 MILLION CHECK Have you ever sat in a movie theater and quietly asked yourself, “How in the world did this film get made?” Me, too. That’s why I wanted to delve into the underbelly of the studio system to explore that all-elusive decision to place a feature film into production, aptly called a “greenlight.” Put simply, when a studio issues a greenlight for a feature film designated for wide release in North America (typically, there are only one or two executives at each studio who yield such power), the studio is pledging, on average, over $100 million.1 That’s quite a sum, especially when one considers the abysmal failure rate experienced by the average Hollywood feature film. (According to Daily Variety, the research firm Global Media Intelligence says that “production costs for mid- to big-budget movies have risen much faster than revenues over the past few years, leaving the studios’ business model deep in the red.”)2 It should be noted there are different decision-making processes employed when television and cable networks decide whether or not a series or “Madefor-TV” movie goes into production or when a studio decides whether or not to make a movie designated “Direct to DVD.” This chapter, however, will focus on feature films intended for theatrical release in North America and beyond. THE BLUEPRINT It often is stated that the blueprint for any film is the screenplay. A featurelength screenplay, which typically runs between 90 and 120 pages, is the

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linchpin for a studio film project. It is the screenplay that inevitably attracts “elements” (a director and/or a star) to a project, and those elements in their totality assist a studio in deciding whether or not it is prepared to write that astounding check for $100 million. Even though screenplays are frequently the starting point of a feature film project (some projects simply begin with an idea, predictably referred to as a “pitch”), the journey a script takes from 120 pieces of paper to an internationally released feature film is as unique as the screenplay itself. In fact, some scripts are purchased with the understanding that a studio is interested not only in greenlighting the project but also putting it on the fast track. For instance, on April 14, 2004, Daily Variety reported that a screenplay titled The Passion of the Ark sold for $1.5 million against $2.5 million to Columbia Pictures (in this case, the writers were paid $1.5 million for their script and would receive an additional $1 million if the script went into production—an extremely high sale price in the world of Hollywood screenwriters). The script, written by Bobby Florsheim and Josh Stolberg, is a modern-day tale of a man approached by God to build an ark to save the world from a second flood. A month later, Daily Variety ran the following story: Sony Pictures Entertainment, Universal Pictures and Spyglass are in talks to mount a Bruce Almighty sequel based on the Bobby Florsheim/Josh Stolberg script The Passion of the Ark. Talks are just getting under way, but the plan is to court Jim Carrey to reprise and to have Tom Shadyac return as director . . . Turning a free-standing script into a sequel is not unprecedented. After fruitless attempts to make a third installment of Die Hard, Fox finally took the Jonathan Hensleigh’s script Simon Says and redrafted it as a vehicle for Bruce Willis’ John McClane cop character.3

In this case, even though The Passion of the Ark was written as a standalone original script, Universal Pictures saw the potential to modify the screenplay into a sequel for Bruce Almighty —a comedy that grossed $485 million worldwide.4 The studio undoubtedly sensed that the screenplay for The Passion of the Ark could benefit from a built-in audience (discussed later in this chapter) and thus gave the picture a greenlight. But Universal did not get the star they originally wanted. Jim Carrey passed on the project, and the studio instead hired Steve Carell in the starring role. While not as bankable a star as Carrey, Carell was on a positive career trajectory, mostly due to a hit series on NBC (The Office) and a well-reviewed and financially successful recent feature film (The 40 Year Old Virgin). But did the greenlight pay off ? On Monday, June 25, 2007, Daily Variety provided its assessment of the film’s opening weekend: Evan is the first sequel of the summer to open well below previous installments. Pic, starring Carell instead of Carrey, bowed to $32.2 million, less

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than half of the $68 million Bruce took in its 2003 opening. Still, the film is hardly sunk. Evan did finish the weekend at No. 1 and, pointing to positive exit polls and cinema scores, U execs say they expect the film to have good word of mouth and strong legs. They also report that auds were fairly evenly divided between families and adults, as well as between the religious and nonreligious. What’s causing U the biggest migraine is Evan’s cause celebre status as the most expensive comedy ever made. The minute word of the budget—estimated to be $175 million—began circulating, the studio knew it would be fighting an uphill battle, despite the fact that U had a co-financing partner in Relativity Media.5

It is worth noting that Relativity Media is one of several new private film financier/hedge fund partners that help defray the cost of big budget studio pictures. According to The Hollywood Reporter, “The emergence of the hedge fund, a form of investment company that enjoys wide latitude as to where it can place its money, has created millions of dollars in capital that is now being made available to the entertainment industry. Experts also note that the recent slowdowns of real estate and the stock market in delivering solid returns on investment have helped shift Wall Street’s focus to Hollywood.”6 So, what happened to Evan Almighty? As of August 15, 2007, the film has generated only $97 million in its U.S. theatrical release—an enviable gross for most films, but a disappointment for a film that reportedly cost $175 million to produce, excluding marketing costs.7 Having said that, Evan Almighty will still generate revenue from other countries as well as alternate distribution outlets (e.g., DVD rentals). So, did Universal Pictures make a prudent decision in greenlighting Evan Almighty? The proverbial jury is still out. As you have seen, a million dollar script does not necessarily equate to a financially successful film. And, what about the value of a major movie star in a film? Today, Julia Roberts may be the most likeable, bankable female star in the world, but that’s today. Tomorrow, no one knows for sure. In any event, the total value of the elements attached to a screenplay play an enormous role in a studio’s decision-making process. This high stakes Texas Hold’em game of motion pictures begs the obvious questions: Why do Hollywood studios choose to make certain films and deny others the light of day? What screenplays are worthy of attaching a check for $100 million? Is it as simple as, “Tom Hanks or Julia Roberts are onboard”? Or, “The first two Shrek films grossed over a billion dollars. How can we not make Shrek The Third ?”8 In some cases, greenlighting a film seems frightfully obvious. Or is it? Let’s pretend you are the president of TriStar Pictures in the late 1980s. One of your trusted development executives (a generic term for studio folks who are charged with acquiring and developing screenplays) bursts into your office and merrily exclaims, “We got Dustin Hoffman, Sean Connery, and Matthew Broderick in a three-generation mob comedy. And better yet,

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Sidney Lumet (Dog Day Afternoon, Network, and The Verdict) is going to direct!” If you were sitting in the presidential suite of TriStar on that fateful day, chances are you would have greenlit the film in question as fast as you can say, “Oscar.” But, when the film finally becomes Family Business (1989) and generates only $12.2 million in domestic box office receipts and primarily negative reviews, one must wonder: Does the concept of an obvious greenlight—in other words, a safe bet for your $100 million—even exist?9 It is the goal of this chapter to explore such questions and posit some theories as to why Hollywood bets tens of millions of dollars on some projects and passes on others. But first, as Carl Sagan was fond of exclaiming, “You have to know the past to understand the present.”10 A PASSION FOR THE PICTURES Hollywood was “invented,” for lack of a better term, by seven men of Eastern European descent in the 1920s who saw an opportunity to bring entertainment to the populous while enabling those individuals to assimilate seamlessly into the upper crust of American society. These visionaries— Harry Cohn, William Fox, Carl Laemmle, Louis B. Mayer, Jack and Harry Warner, and Adolph Zukor—and the story of their rise to fame and fortune is told meticulously in Neal Gabler’s award-winning book An Empire of Their Own.11 What process did these founders of Hollywood use to choose which screenplays were made into motion pictures and which screenplays would forever collect dust on a bookshelf tucked away in a bungalow on the studio lot? Is it possible that the global entertainment conglomerates of today can learn from their forefathers? On Jul 9, 2007, I had the opportunity to interview Gabler for this chapter. All subsequent quotes from Gabler are taken from this interview. His insights into the decision-making process of the Hollywood moguls helps inform us on how motion pictures are greenlit today. When one looks at the business models of today versus yesteryear, a glaring difference arises in terms of the distribution of feature films. “Years ago, each individual film was not sent out into the marketplace with marketing support to attract an audience,” says Gabler. “The reason for this was because, with the exception of Universal, virtually every studio owned firstrun theaters in every major market.” So, in stark contrast to today—where the Hollywood studios must negotiate with third parties that exhibit their films—the Moguls and the theaters were one in the same. This business model would begin to unravel with the Consent Decree of 1940 —a decision that would eventually prohibit Hollywood studios from owning theater chains, as expressed in The United States v. Paramount Pictures in 1948. The Decree and subsequent U.S. Supreme Court decision was a major blow to the Moguls and a central factor in the fall of the studio

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system. The fact that today’s business atmosphere requires studios to work with third-party exhibitors is just one of the many dynamics that separates decision making in the past from the present. So, what was the impact of this vertical integration—the studios’ ability to control every step along the supply chain? For one, the Moguls were able to choose the films they wanted to make without regard to third-party exhibitors. Because they believed their instincts were in line with what the public at large wanted, greenlighting decisions were often based on nothing more than the desires of the founders of each studio. Today, the process is much more complex (to be discussed later in the chapter). In addition, there was an emotional, ego-laden element to the Moguls’ decision-making process in that their name often was up on the screen. In other words, when Louis B. Mayer greenlit a film, he put his personal reputation on the line. In addition, the Moguls were very interested in making films that impacted the status of their studios and, thus, their own personal status. “The Moguls focused on quality pictures,” says Gabler, “not necessarily because they had an overwhelming desire to make great movies; rather, psychologically, they understood that great films were the surest way to raise their status. If they could raise the status of their motion pictures, they could raise their own status. They were very concerned with how they would be regarded.” There were two primary ways in which the Moguls were able to achieve status with their motion pictures: (1) winning Academy Awards (the first Academy Awards were handed out on May 16, 1929) and (2) attracting new audiences. Adds Gabler, “When movies began, it’s no secret that they made their chief appeal to immigrants and working class. In the 1920s, however, the major transformation of the motion picture industry was the attraction of the middle class.” Thus, the Hollywood studios were able to grow their audience base and therefore their prominence, or status. The Moguls invented the concept of motion pictures as mass entertainment—a notion taken for granted today—with the goal of legitimizing an industry that previously was regarded as low-class entertainment. Today, while the executives who run the major Hollywood studios have much less of an emotional investment in their films, they have other pressures that are perhaps more ominous: namely, to create a perpetual flow of hits that will generate a constant stream of revenue to their parent companies, thus serving the goals of the corporation and its shareholders. Finally, the Moguls had a far greater captive audience than the studio chiefs of today. Says Gabler, “Back in the 1920s, 30s, and 40s, Americans didn’t just go to a movie, they went to the movies—and often. Back in those days, over 110 million Americans typically went to the movies every week. And, there weren’t competitors for their attention like there are today in the form of television, the Internet, iPods, video games, and the like.” In contrast to today, the studio heads in the 1920s, ’30s, and ’40s relied more on their instincts

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rather than the multitude of factors that affect studio heads in today’s complex global economy. “The Moguls were substantial stockholders in the companies they founded,” says Gabler, “and they had the power and authority to make the pictures they wanted to make.” And while they relied on their gut instincts to make films they felt would increase the status of their studios and themselves, there was another factor that influenced the types of films the Moguls decided to make: movies that celebrated America and its ideals. According to Gabler, “Ever since The Jazz Singer, many studio films were explicitly about rejecting one’s ethnicity or religion and accepting America. Assimilation was a topic that was very much on the minds of the people who ran Hollywood and had an effect on the films they decided to make. The Moguls idealized America and then defined the images of America.” GREENLIGHTING TODAY The decision-making process in Hollywood has undergone a metamorphosis since the days of the Moguls. Today, the studios are horizontally integrated, global empires with interests in film, television, the Internet, video games, and so forth. Consider, for instance, Viacom and its modern-day mogul Sumner Redstone. According to Redstone’s official bio, “Sumner M. Redstone serves as Chairman of the Board of both Viacom and CBS Corporation, roles he assumed after the separation of Viacom into two publicly traded companies, which occurred at the end of 2005. Mr. Redstone is the controlling shareholder of both companies.”12 A careful look at Redstone’s media universe (comprised of Viacom and CBS) would make the moguls of yesteryear green with envy. Television holdings include: • • • •

BET Networks CBS Television Network The CW MTV Networks (including Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, Spike TV, TV Land, and VH1) • Showtime Networks

Filmed entertainment holdings include: • • • • • •

Paramount Pictures Corporation DreamWorks Studios MTV Films Nickelodeon Movies Paramount Home Entertainment Paramount Vantage

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Publishing holdings include: • Simon & Schuster

While Redstone’s empire does not include theater chains, his ability to synergistically produce and market a feature film via Hollywood studios, broadcast networks, cable networks, and publishing companies is extraordinary. This is the Hollywood of the twenty-first century—a Hollywood with global production and distribution systems across all media; a Hollywood that lobbies Washington and the world via the Motion Picture Association of America and its international counterpart, the Motion Picture Association; a Hollywood the Moguls could never have imagined. While the business models of today are far more complicated than the ones enjoyed by the Moguls, many of the fundamentals in deciding whether or not a film gets made are as timeless as storytelling itself: Will this story hit an emotional chord with a wide audience? Does it feature a hero who is relatable —someone the audience will root for? Is there an overarching lesson—a global theme that touches a part of our own morality and core beliefs? Will it make us laugh, cry, think, or sit forward in anticipation of what will happen next? These are only a few of the questions that studio chiefs have asked themselves for as long as feature films have existed. One of the most significant factors that affect the studio chiefs of today before issuing a greenlight is the subject of marketing. Prior to issuing a greenlight, studios want to understand how to market the film and to whom. One of the tools employed is the Four Quadrants (see Table 1.1). These Quadrants, as depicted in Table 1.1, are critical for studios to determine how they will spend their marketing dollars, often referred to as “P&A” (prints & advertising). As one can imagine, the ultimate film in terms of potential for financial success is one that effectively hits all Four Quadrants. For instance, consider the library of films created by Pixar Entertainment. Pixar has created eight of the most successful animated films of all time: Toy Story, A Bug’s Life, Toy Story 2, Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars, and Ratatouille. The studio has won 20 Academy Awards, and its seven films have grossed more than $3.5 billion at the worldwide box office to date.13 All of the company’s films have had one key aspect in common: They successfully hit all Four

Table 1.1 The Four Quadrants Male

Female

Under 25 Over 25

Under 25 Over 25

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Quadrants—which means that Pixar has effectively produced more than just children’s movies (that appeal to the Male and Female Under 25 Quadrants). They have produced family films that children and adults enjoy equally. A simple concept? Definitely. A difficult goal to achieve? An understatement of epic proportions. To the president of a Hollywood studio, a film that successfully targets all Four Quadrants equals revenue . . . and a lot of it. So, if a studio chief truly believes she has a Four Quadrant film on her hands, cutting a $100 million check may not be as risky as one might think. Having said that, studios often make many films that do not hit all Four Quadrants. For instance, Lionsgate’s popular Saw franchise (Saw, Saw II, and Saw III ), has generated over $400 million in box office receipts and sold over 15 million DVD units while primarily being targeted toward the Male Under 25 Quadrant (and, to a lesser extent, the Female Under 25 Quadrant).14 Clearly, the modest budget of a horror film sans major stars (who often require gross profit participation) was an attractive combination for Lionsgate that has paid off. While the studio bosses of yesteryear listened more often to their own instincts than market research, today’s global publicly traded entertainment conglomerates must answer to higher authorities: impatient Boards of Directors and anxious shareholders. The financial stakes are simply too high . . . and they are only getting higher. So, when it comes to greenlighting films, what is the impact of a corporate structure that is beholden to daily stock prices and quarterly reports? If you ran a Hollywood studio, would you bet your career on greenlighting “Script A” over “Script B” without sufficient quantitative information by which you can make an informed decision? That’s where marketing comes into the decision-making process. THE POWER OF MARKETING When it comes to Hollywood marketing, Peter Adee has seen it all. A former executive at The Walt Disney Company, DreamWorks, Universal, and MGM, Adee currently is the President of Worldwide Theatrical Marketing, Distribution & New Media for Overture Films (a division of Starz Entertainment). I interviewed Adee for this piece on July 18, 2007. All subsequent quotes from him come from this interview. Adee states that Hollywood films can be divided into three categories: (1) under $30 million, (2) mid-range films budgeted between about $30 million and $70 million, and (3) “tentpole” films that typically run over $100 million (e.g., summer blockbusters and sequels that, while expensive, are “event movies” designed to reach a mass audience and generate hefty ancillary revenue on a global scale). But, if you’re a studio chief, you aren’t done yet. Added to these production costs are P&A costs. Adds Adee, “For the average theatrical film that is released wide, you can usually add another $40 million to the cost of the production on order to effectively market the picture.”

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Even though those numbers can be daunting, a studio must not simply look at a film’s financial prospects in domestic theatrical distribution. Another important factor in assessing a film’s success is the global shelf life of the property. “For instance,” says Adee, “how much revenue will be generated from home entertainment, free TV, pay TV, international outlets, and payper-view in hotels and airlines? All of these issues will influence a studio’s decision-making process to greenlight a film.” The Hollywood studios of today truly serve an international audience. According to Adee, about half of the average film’s revenue is generated from countries other than the United States. So, how does a film’s international prospects impact studio decision making? “As an example,” says Adee, “we do know that action films play better internationally, especially in Asia.” While the marketing department plays an important role in the greenlighting of films, marketers are not usually brought to the table until the screenplay has been purchased and there is potential talent attached. Adee explains, “What the studios do is develop projects for a long period of time, then have a greenlight meeting where marketing (as well as other groups) give their opinions as to how much revenue they feel the particular project will generate. That said, greenlighting a film is a process that is constantly in flux.” Even if marketers don’t necessarily have the last word, that doesn’t mean the discipline is not critical to greenlighting. “Studio chiefs generally have a marketing point-of-view going into the decision-making process,” says Adee. “They have to know if they are going to reach an audience, so studios will often make a movie with a specific audience in mind or they think they will get all audiences—thus, a Four Quadrant movie. The bottom line is that if a studio greenlights a movie, they better have a very good understanding as to who they think is going to see it.” The frenetic pace created by the greenlighting, production, and marketing processes must be executed with perfect precision because there is little room for error. If a large consumer company spends $100 million on a new product, there is usually time to build and grow the product’s brand with consumers. Not the case in the high-stakes world of Hollywood. “In Hollywood, we don’t have the luxury of building a brand over a long period of time,” says Adee. “We have Friday night of the opening weekend. That’s it. The first few days of a film’s release will determine if that movie is going to be successful. By utilizing exit polling—which tells the studio how much the audience likes the film—and historical models, the studio has a pretty good sense of how much a film will make during its run based on the first weekend’s gross.” Studios can make such predictions because of the historic first weekend gross multiplier that has been used. For instance, according to Adee, the multiplier used to be about four for the average movie. So, if a film enjoyed an opening weekend of $25 million, it should have expected to gross about

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$100 in the domestic theatrical market. That number, however, is shrinking. “Today, the multiplier is about three,” adds Adee, “and no one is sure if the industry has trained more of the audience to go to a movie on its opening weekend—thus precipitating a larger fall-off—or if there is another factor we have yet to discover.” It should be noted that occasionally there are films that defy this methodology by starting modestly and actually building an audience over time. Adee points out My Big Fat Greek Wedding (which grossed over $240 million domestically) as a film that defied the multiplier theory, but he acknowledges that the film was an anomaly.15 It has been said that “the planets must align” in order for a film to be packaged with the right elements, greenlit, and successfully marketed to a wide audience. An example of this synergy came to fruition with Universal Pictures’ The Fast and Furious (2001). Adee, who was the head of marketing for the film’s campaign, explains: “The picture was not made for a great deal of money. But, when we test screened it in Sacramento the audience loved it. We originally had planned to release the movie in the spring, but after the test screening, Stacey Snider [the Chairman of Universal] decided to move the release date to June, which is a very competitive time of the year. Since we had to compete against all of the other summer releases, we significantly upped our marketing spend for the film, which resulted in a strong box office [The Fast and the Furious earned over $175 million in global box office receipts].16 This project was even more satisfying, in light of the fact that the film did not even feature any major stars at the time. Marketing really had an impact on the film’s performance.” The bottom line is that even with the right script, talent, budget, and marketing campaign, getting a movie made will always be a Herculean achievement. “It’s so hard to keep all of the parts moving in the right direction,” says Adee. “Everything is in flux. There are a lot of people who have a vested interested in a movie being made—production executives, producers, actors, writers, and directors to name a few—so these constituent groups will always be pushing the studio to say yes, and ultimately it is up to the Chairman of the studio to greenlight a film. The process is part collaborative, part dictatorial.” Still, very few aspects of a potential film increase its likelihood of going into production more than an idea with a built-in audience. THE BU ILT-IN AUDIENCE To illustrate how the concept of a built-in audience can affect a studio’s decision to greenlight a film, consider the following oversimplified hypothetical scenario. Picture you are the newly minted president of Warner Bros. You still need to prove yourself to the creative community, your Board of Directors, and the shareholders. The stock price of Time Warner (the parent company of Warner Bros.) has been depressed, and the CEO is pressuring you

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to produce more blockbusters. In addition, you have been receiving demands from the creative community to greenlight more “quality films” (a grossly overused term that is truly in the eye of the beholder). Fortunately, two screenplays have landed on your desk. The first script (Script “A”) has been highly lauded by your entire management team—one of the best they have read in years; the other is Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed—a script that is not as highly regarded. Both scripts have similar budgets. Script “A” does not yet have an element attached (although your team says that it will easily attract an A-list actor and/or director), and the second script has commitments from the cast of the original Scooby-Doo film. Your instincts tell you that Script “A” just may be good enough to earn one or more Academy Awards—a mark of distinction you and your team have been striving to achieve. Let’s continue the scenario and suppose that your budget only allows you to greenlight one more film for the fiscal year. What to do? You call a meeting of your management team and ask, “How much did the original Scooby-Doo gross in its worldwide theatrical release?” The answer? Over $222 million.17 The sequel, you reason, has the same cast, the same director, and that all-important built-in audience. (For the purposes of this discussion, let us define a built-in audience as “a significant population that is predisposed to attend a film, based on the success of the film’s source material: for instance, the original film on which a sequel is based, a novel, comic book, television program, or play.”) That stated, you and your team believe that the overall quality of Script “A” far surpasses the Scooby-Doo script. And, one cannot overstate the importance of industry recognition if Script “A” attracts the right elements. Finally, your head of production argues that Script “A” will have “moderateto-high box office potential.” Your head of marketing, however, respectively disagrees, exclaiming, “While this script will undoubtedly attract an A-list star and director, it is likely to appeal only to women over 25, thus limiting its overall revenue potential. In addition, the subject matter of Script “A” is uniquely American—thus, the outlook for international sales seems minimal. If we make a modest box office prediction for Scooby-Doo 2, say, 50 percent of the original, we are looking at a guaranteed worldwide theatrical gross of at least $111 million—a far better risk.” Suffice to say that this scenario is completely fictitious and overly simplified, but as a rule, studio chiefs are faced with situations like this on a consistent basis. We may never know what discussions went on behind closed doors when Warner Bros. decided to greenlight Scooby-Doo 2, but the fact that the property had a built-in audience surely played a large role in the studio’s decision-making process. Incidentally, Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed earned over $140 million in worldwide box office receipts, not including ancillary revenue such as DVD sales and licensing (achieving over 63% of the original film’s gross).18

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Times have certainly changed since the days of Louis B. Mayer and his Mogul counterparts. Today, the motion picture industry is a complex, global enterprise with a multitude of factors influencing those who run Hollywood studios. With production and marketing costs outpacing inflation, studios will continue to operate in a way that best mitigates its risks. And while committing $100 million to the average film is in of itself a considerable financial risk, studio chiefs always will look to proven talent and built-in audiences to increase their prospects for success. It is difficult to predict how an increasingly connected society will impact Hollywood studios regarding the films they produce in the future. Clearly, the advent of YouTube, MySpace, and countless Web sites devoted to motion pictures has had a significant effect on how movies are marketed and consumed today, but it is still unclear how the power of the Internet affects studio greenlighting. One guess is that film concepts (and trailers) will be tested more in the marketplace on the Internet—in essence, creating a 24/7 international focus group. As we have discussed, Hollywood studios are always looking for ways to increase their potential for profitability and mitigate risk. Finally, a note about the quality of motion pictures in today’s American multiplexes (one could argue that this topic could be a book unto itself ). While this chapter has focused on the factors that go into the greenlighting process, little has been mentioned about the quality—or lack thereof—of the final product. Because of the structure of the Hollywood studios in the 1920s, ’30s, and ’40s and the relative stature of the Moguls, it can be argued that during that period of time, a greater emphasis was placed on quality than in today’s complex, high-stakes environment. Having said that, common sense would suggest that in a business as competitive as the entertainment industry—with so many more individuals vying to write, produce, direct, and act in films than there are slots available—one reasonably could conclude that the entertainment industry must be a meritocracy and that only the best films would be greenlit. As any savvy consumer knows, unfortunately, that is not the case. Studios cannot afford simply to select the “best scripts” to go into production. It is a cruel reality of the entertainment industry and one that ultimately hurts the very people who have kept the movie business thriving for almost a century—the moviegoers. NOTES 1. According to the Motion Picture Association of America, the average negative cost for a feature film (including marketing) in 2006 was $100.3 million. 2. Daily Variety, November 12, 2007. 3. Daily Variety, May 13, 2004. 4. Ibid. 5. Daily Variety, June 25, 2007.

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6. The Hollywood Reporter, April 11, 2007. 7. EDI FilmSource. 8. According to EDI FilmSource, Shrek and Shrek 2 grossed over $1 billion in worldwide box office receipts. 9. EDI FilmSource. 10. Carl Sagan, Cosmos (New York: Random House, 2002). 11. Neal Gabler, An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood (New York: Anchor Books, 1988). 12. http://www.cbscorporation.com. 13. http://www.pixar.com (2007). 14. Lionsgate Films (2007). 15. EDI FilmSource. 16. Ibid. 17. Ibid. 18. Ibid.

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chapter 2

The Six Faces of Piracy: Global Media Distribution from Below Ramon Lobato

The VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone. —Former Motion Picture Association of America president Jack Valenti Rip, mix, burn. —Apple iTunes marketing slogan The public profile of debate around intellectual property (IP) issues has never seemed higher than in the last decade. Newspapers regularly feature coverage of piracy prosecutions, columnists debate the pros and cons of copyright extensions, studio-funded antibootleg promos appear on DVDs and in cinemas, and Hollywood trade papers overflow with updates on changes in copyright law, international trade regulation, and studio IP policy. A familiar cast of characters appears again and again—the teenage downloader, the corporate bigwig, the struggling independent artist, the “foreign” pirate-cumterrorist. In most public discourse, piracy either looms large as scourge and scandal or is talked up as the way of the future, but rarely is it analyzed systematically or contextualized historically. Rarely is the focus shifted away from the ethics of piracy and toward its broader contexts—its legal history, its economic functions, and its implications for knowledge and information distribution on a global scale. Through a series of six critical readings of piracy, I argue that we should understand it as, among other things, an alternative

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distribution system for media content, one of considerable complexity and potential. Piracy’s “cockroach capitalism” seeks out profit in markets untouched or underserviced by existing media institutions, providing in many instances the only available forms of film culture.1 From this perspective, piracy is not only a form of deviant behavior but may also offer routes to knowledge, development, and citizenship. DEFINING PIRACY Piracy networks can be considered part of the informal sector, that subterranean zone of the economy that is largely untaxed, unregulated, and unmeasured.2 However, piracy is distinct from other areas of the informal economy, such as the drug trade, because pirate goods are not technically illegal in their own right. Rather, the illegality of pirate products is usually a function of their reproduction and sale. The U.S. film industry’s flagship lobbying body, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), defines piracy as “the unauthorized taking, copying or use of copyrighted materials without permission,”3 and is keen to remind us of its economic and social cost by invoking dramatic statistics such as these: • The major U.S. studios lose $6.1 billion globally each year as a result of piracy. • Losses to audiovisual industries worldwide are estimated at $18.2 billion annually. • More than 34 million illegal discs and 3,362 burners were seized in antipiracy operations in 2005. • 80% of global piracy originates from outside the United States, with especially high levels of pirate audiovisual consumption occurring in China (90%), Russia (79%), and Thailand (79%). • Piracy operations have links to terrorist outfits, prostitution rings, drug smugglers, and other organized crime syndicates.4

Other industry bodies such as the Cable and Satellite Broadcasting Association of Asia (CASBAA) define piracy more broadly, as “any form of revenue leakage from any point in the value chain”5—a definition that perhaps highlights the way in which piracy often functions as a scapegoat for the industry’s own structural problems. It is important to note that piracy is as old as cinema itself. Every new distributive technology has given rise to its own bogeyman. In the early years of the medium, U.S. distributors were plagued by “bicycling” and “jackrabbiting,” whereby film prints were screened in unapproved venues or extra screenings were put on without the distributors’ permission.6 The market for 16 mm bootleg prints and private projection equipment that emerged in the

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postwar period also irritated the studios. And with the invention of the VCR, home-based illegal dubbing became the biggest nightmare yet for the movie industry, which feared that its entire existence was under threat. As ludicrous as this sounds today, it tells us something interesting about both the history and the future of the “war on piracy.” While the studios strategically play up their purported financial woes when it is useful to do so, global theatrical revenues in fact rose 20 percent in 2006, which suggests that despite all the hype piracy is having little impact on the industry’s bottom line.7 A recent study by the criminologist Majid Yar supports this conclusion, arguing that the piracy “epidemics” decried by industry moguls are often a product of PR campaigns by the studios combined with legislative changes that declare more and more everyday audiovisual activity illegal.8 I shall have more to say later about the extent to which piracy threatens or bolsters the existing power structures within the entertainment industry. However, to fully appreciate the implications of piracy, we must first examine the legal framework against which it is defined. A BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO COPYRIGHT Copyright law is conventionally understood as a common-sense way of protecting the rights of cultural producers, rewarding them for their efforts and fostering future innovation. The extent to which copyright in its present form does these things is open to some debate; however, what I would like to suggest here is that, as well as being a legal framework, copyright is also a historically and culturally specific ideology, one founded upon modernist notions of innovation and deeply embedded in capitalist thought and practice. For this reason, it is important not to take its normative claims as gospel. The history of copyright is a long and convoluted one and has been the subject of numerous scholarly works from across the disciplines.9 Interestingly, one of the earliest forms of copyright was a de facto form of state censorship—in sixteenth-century England, a group of publishers known as the Stationers Guild were granted the right to publish commercially on the condition that they steer clear of anything critical of the Crown. Other precedents can be found in ancient Greece, Italy, and The Netherlands. However, most scholars trace the origins of modern copyright to early eighteenthcentury England—and specifically to the passing of the Act of Queen Anne in 1710. The Act of Anne provided authors and publishers with the first enforceable period of monopoly control over their intellectual labor (for a period of 14 years, extendable once only), after which a work would enter into what would become known as the public domain. This was considered to be a fair trade-off between the competing demands of individual authors and civil society, which was presumed to benefit from a freely accessible archive of cultural production.

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The globalization of copyright law has been underway since the late nineteenth century. In 1886, the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works was signed by a number of European nations and would go on to become the key template for global copyright regimes of the twentieth century.10 An Anglo-American agreement was also signed in 1891, harmonizing some of the discrepant traditions in both nations. This process was consolidated and extended with the 1948 Brussels Convention (which granted copyright protection to cinema) and the 1994 Agreement on TradeRelated Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), which formed part of the final Uruguay round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). The GATT’s successor, the World Trade Organization (WTO), has been a prime disseminator of the “new world order in knowledge” ever since, supporting policies that tend to favor established players in the agribusiness, information technology, entertainment, and other IP-based industries.11 Those few recalcitrant states that have attempted to water down their copyright protections—a group that has included, at various times, Hong Kong, China, and Brazil—have generally either been bought off with trade incentives or disciplined with restrictions and embargoes.12 Three key points can be extracted from this potted history of copyright. First, copyright regimes—particularly in their current “hard” incarnation— function to convert knowledge into capital. Copyright is thus inextricably linked to the development of free-market capitalism and what is sometimes dubbed information capitalism. Furthermore, we should be aware that copyright’s reach extends beyond the realms of the economic and the legal and into the cultural: It designates forms of cultural production as either legitimate or illegitimate based upon a set of values that privilege “progress” and “innovation.” In contrast, the public domain is always defined negatively—as that which is “left over after all other rights have been defined and distributed.”13 Second, copyright terms have been steadily increasing, meaning that knowledge and cultural production are kept out of the public domain for longer and longer periods. Copyright terms now extend up to 70 years after the death of the creator in many territories. Term extensions have been a key feature of recent U.S. trade deals, such as the 2004 U.S.–Australia Free Trade Agreement, which required that Australia fall into line with the restrictive IP framework outlined in the U.S. 1998 “Sonny Bono” Copyright Term Extension Act. (As one would expect, this Act was the result of intensive lobbying on the part of American software and media corporations. Disney led the charge, motivated by the fact that its copyright on the infinitely profitable Mickey Mouse was set to expire. For this reason the Extension Act is commonly referred to as the “Mickey Mouse Protection Act.”) Similar agreements have recently been signed with many other nations. The U.S.–Korea FTA is expected to have a particularly harsh effect on the Korean film industry, which has been booming

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over the last decade, as it mandates the partial dismantling of one of the key drivers of the industry’s success: a domestic screen quota. Finally, wherever IP industries have political clout, constant pressure for further extensions exists. For example, an alliance of British record companies, with the help of aging rock stars such as The Who’s Roger Daltrey, mounted a high-profile campaign in 2007 to lobby for legal changes in the European Union (EU) with the aim of instituting a new music copyright term of 90 years.14 This proposal was eventually rejected by the British government—however, it is only a matter of time before it is put back on the agenda. Third, it is important to note that art and business are not always diametrically opposed in IP debates. The history of copyright is full of examples of cultural producers who, understandably, have been more interested in their incomes than in the future of the public domain. Wordsworth, Twain, and Dickens were all champions of copyright, as are the band Metallica and the director George Lucas contemporarily.15 Even Spike Lee, a radical filmmaker acclaimed for his unflinching analyses of contemporary racial politics, has been a vociferous defender of his own IP rights.16 We should also note that copyright law has on many occasions been used as a legal tool to protect the rights of individual artists against corporate interests. For example, the “moral rights” (droit d’auteur) provision of European copyright law (to which the United States has long objected) was the basis for John Huston’s court victory over MGM in relation to the colorization of the 1950 film The Asphalt Jungle.17 This complication duly noted, the implications of current copyright regimes for many types of cultural production are quite alarming. One frequently cited example concerns an independent filmmaker whose documentary on opera stagehands unintentionally included four seconds of The Simpsons. (During one take, the program had been playing on a TV set in the background.) Despite obtaining the personal blessing of Simpsons creator Matt Groening, the filmmaker was threatened with a lawsuit by the copyright holder, Fox, which demanded a whopping $10,000 clearance fee. The filmmaker’s legal advice suggested that even though the sequence would probably be covered by “Fair Use” provisions in U.S. copyright law, which allow the use of copyrighted material in certain circumstances, the potential court battle would most likely be decided by the size of each side’s legal team—and given the resources of Fox’s parent News Corporation, the filmmaker had little chance of success.18 As this episode suggests, copyright has strayed a long way from its original purpose, and Fair Use provisions cannot always be relied upon to protect the rights of cultural producers. So where does this leave piracy? Violations of an ethical/legal system can only be considered inappropriate if we believe in the principles and the efficacy of that system to begin with. Thus, if we accept that copyright is a flawed system built around a specific political and

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economic worldview, does this not occasion a reappraisal of pirate reproduction? Given the high visibility of current debates around file-sharing and digital IP law, is it not time to complicate the common-sense assumptions that inform our understanding of copyright and, in so doing, to open up a series of vantage points on its opposite number—piracy—which do not necessarily involve its reflex condemnation? With this aim in mind, what follows is a series of critical readings of piracy from six different perspectives.

RETHINKING PIRACY: SIX CONCEPTUAL MODELS Piracy as Theft Let us begin with the most common understanding of piracy. As I have outlined so far, IP regimes understand creativity to be a form of capital. Copyright is the regulatory mechanism that oversees this property system, ensuring that markets remain healthy and that levels of protection for IP rights-holders are on a par with those extended to other property owners, such as land owners or car owners. From this perspective, it is suggested, copyright is something that should be not only defended but also legislatively boosted and pedagogically entrenched. Piracy, on the other hand, is imagined as a parasitic act of social and economic deviance. Writers such as Pat Choate and Paul Paradise are representative of this conventional reading of piracy, which is in line with mainstream political and legal thought throughout the West.19 In the arena of film, this approach to piracy is best exemplified by the aforementioned Motion Picture Association of America. The MPAA’s antipiracy activities have been the envy of other sectors of the IP industries because they resulted, at least until the emergence of peer-to-peer (P2P) technologies, in the virtual eradication of largescale commercial movie piracy in the United States, Australia, Canada, and most of Western Europe. No one has been more vocal in their denunciations of piracy, nor more florid in their rhetoric, than the MPAA’s former president Jack Valenti. A former aide to Lyndon Johnson, this powerful lobbyist ran the MPAA from 1966 until 2004. He contributed significantly to several landmark legal offensives, including the failed 1984 Sony Corp vs. Universal City Studios (“the Betamax case”), which sought to stamp out the booming home video industry, and the much-maligned Digital Millennium Copyright Act in 1998. Now deceased, Valenti was a legendary orator in his day. During Congressional hearings for the Betamax case, he famously quipped that “the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone.” He regularly referred to piracy as “a pandemic” that robs IP industries of what is rightfully theirs, and he was

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also fond of making (frequently unsubstantiated) connections between piracy operations and terrorist groups including Hezbollah, Hamas, the IRA, Al Qaeda, and Lashka-e-Toiba.20 The MPAA’s war on piracy has sought to embed an ethics of copyright in the global mindset. In the past, MPAA ad campaigns have attempted to counter the widely held belief that piracy only harms the stock options of studio moguls by presenting the audience with stories from Hollywood technicians and tradespeople regarding the threat posed to their livelihoods by illegal copying. MPAA competitions such as the “Xcellent Xtreme Challenge” offer DVDs and Hollywood studio trips to children who submit antipiracy essays. The organization’s Web site even promotes a cheerful “Copyright Kids” game (www.copyrightkids.org) where children can familiarize themselves with the virtues of IP by registering their own poems, paintings, and drawings for protection.21 However, much of the MPAA’s rhetoric unravels upon closer inspection. Statistics from the MPAA on piracy losses tend to defy the most basic tenets of economics because they are often based on calculations that presume that for each movie accessed illegally a legitimate version of the same film goes unsold. This logic is fundamentally flawed, for it ignores the influence of pricing levels and distribution in media consumption. For example, legal VHS/VCD hire in Korea has traditionally been very cheap and accessible thanks to an extensive network of local family-run stores.22 As a result, piracy levels have been very low for much of the last few decades. In China, however, where cinema admission and legal movie purchasing is much more expensive in comparison to average wage levels, piracy is rampant.23 Furthermore, reports of industry “losses” are usually based on gross rather than net figures and are necessarily suspect given that piracy’s subterranean and disreputable nature means attempts to quantify it are speculative at best.24 And even if such figures were reliable, the purported piracy boom of recent years has as much to do with increasing amounts of everyday activity being criminalized as with verifiable increases in illegal activities. As Majid Yar argues, piracy statistics tend to function as self-fulfilling prophecies: [ H ]igh figures put pressure on legislators to criminalize, and on enforcement agencies to police more rigorously; the tightening of copyright laws produces more “copyright theft” as previously legal or tolerated uses are prohibited, and the more intensive policing of “piracy” results in more seizures; these in turn produce new estimates suggesting that the ‘epidemic’ continues to grow unabated; which then legitimates industry calls for even more vigorous action.25

Like the music industry’s campaigns against illegal downloading, the film industry’s war on piracy is in many senses a public relations exercise aimed

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at reinforcing a deferential relationship to copyright at the level of everyday consumption and showing the “vulnerable” side of a profitable and quasioligopolistic industry. However, this rhetoric is somewhat disingenuous, for piracy is still above all a form of film consumption, and this consumption can often be made profitable for the studios in other ways. As Toby Miller has argued, piracy breeds a “Hollywood habit,” familiarizing global audiences with American product and softening up markets for future exploitation.26 It also adds value to prenegotiated product placement deals, increasing revenue streams via the back door. Finally, it is worth recalling that digital piracy is actually Hollywood’s own digital Frankenstein: Not only is it a side-effect of technology developed by the major studios, but it is also made possible in many cases by DVD preview discs secretly copied by U.S. technicians during postproduction—and even, in one memorable case, by an Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences member.27 Let us move now to another perspective on piracy, one that sees copying as a potential business model rather than a form of deviant behavior. Piracy as Free Enterprise While several of the alternative approaches to piracy that I outline here involve a critique of capitalism, one does not. This perspective—what we might call the extreme laissez-faire model—reads piracy as the purest form of free enterprise. Unimpeded by restrictive legislation and monopolistic market structures, piracy from this vantage point can be appreciated as a flourishing of commercial activity catering directly to market needs. For example, certain economists have argued that greater economic efficiency can be achieved in a liberalized regulatory environment where the reduced returns to copyright holders would be offset by the productivity gains arising from lower prices and wider availability of cultural goods.28 A recent editorial in The Economist (July 2, 2005)—which is hardly a bastion of anticapitalist sentiment—even suggested that copyright terms should be stripped back to 14 –28 years in order to boost innovation. In other words, a persuasive argument can be made on economic grounds alone that strong copyright is undesirable. Indeed, if we push this argument to its logical limit, it becomes possible to read piracy as the quintessential form of free enterprise. This view suggests that the two competing objectives that copyright seeks to balance —collective progress and individual profit—are in fact collapsible into a brave new world of unbounded capital and information exchange. Contemporary China provides an excellent example of these contradictions. The nation’s thriving pirate economy is often represented as the Mr. Hyde to global capitalism’s Dr. Jekyll, but it is more than this. In many ways, piracy is a side-effect of the boom in “legitimate” enterprise that has followed China’s accession to the WTO, as it is based upon factors such as increased consumer

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activity, the rise of digital technology, new levels of commercial autonomy for Chinese businesses, and the technologization of mass production practices. In fact, Warner Bros’ Chinese operation chose as its first home video licensee a well-known piracy outfit (the Xianke company), which makes a mockery of the MPAA’s moralistic IP rhetoric.29 My point here is that piracy is still a lucrative form of business, that wealth is still created and exchanged—it’s just that the distribution of this wealth takes a different form. The recent history of DVD technology offers another example. Consumers shopping for new DVD players are often faced with an interesting choice. One can buy an expensive brandname unit loaded with all the irritating anticopying mechanisms that make life difficult (region coding, Macrovision, copy protection, and so on). Or, for half the price, one can choose a generic brand that will allow you to play what you want, where you want, when you want—for, in many cases, the manufacturers of these units are not part of vertically integrated audiovisual empires and have little to gain from the extra time and expense that is required to install copy-prevention technology in their players.30 Here we have two competing models of capitalism: on the one hand, an oligopolistic, vertically integrated, top-heavy capitalism that perpetuates itself through collusion with the state via technical standards, trade deals, copyright regimes, and so on; and, on the other, a less formal, often extra-legal variety of enterprise that operates between the cracks in existing economic structures and frequently outstrips its legally sanctioned counterpart in efficiency, speed, and flexibility. This second model resembles what film theorists Chuck Kleinhans and Darrel Davis refer to as “cockroach capitalism.”31 This is an apt metaphor: cockroaches, like pirates, tend to live in cracks and other dark spaces; they move fast and multiply quickly; they feast on whatever scraps are available; and they are extremely difficult to squash. Over the years Sony has evolved from cockroach status to pest-killer. During the aforementioned Betamax case, the Japanese electronics giant was still largely a hardware manufacturer and was thus on the receiving end of the MPAA’s anti–home video offensive. It was portrayed by the studios as a rogue company trying to erode copyright protection and destabilize the industry. Two decades later, Sony is now in the opposite position. Its recent attempt to shore up IP protection in the face of cockroach competition involved concealing spyware and data-collection utilities in the copy-protection software on Sony BMG CDs—a sneaky strategy that became a public relations disaster.32 The laissez-faire approach to piracy is gaining traction as the P2P revolution forces the culture industries to develop business models based around revenue sources other than box office admission and record sales. It has precedents in other informal economies. One example is the adult industry—a grey zone that remains one of the more profitable sectors of the entertainment market even though piracy levels may run at up to 85 percent.33 However,

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rather than bemoaning the loss of their customers astute porn distributors accept piracy as a given and build this into their business models. As the CEO of adult distributor Nectar Entertainment has commented, “If someone’s stealing my stuff, I see it as great PR and great marketing.”34 Whereas Valenti sought to damn piracy through discursive connections to porn and the criminal underworld, the laissez-faire brigade might notice something more productive in this connection. Such is the logic of the shadow economies. However, this fact reminds us that piracy is always more than an ethical issue—it is at the same time economic, social, and, as we shall now see, political. Piracy as Free Speech Arguably the most effective critiques of current copyright regimes have been coming from a group of vocal, tech-savvy American liberals. Often affiliated with the open-source movement and such bastions of “technolibertarianism” as Wired magazine and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, writers including Lawrence Lessig, Siva Vaidhyanathan, Michael Strangelove, and J. D. Lasica have published popular critiques of copyright culture over the last few years, helping to give the issue a degree of public visibility.35 They argue that copyright’s intended balance between free speech and the free market is increasingly favoring the latter over the former: Consumer rights are being compromised, and the future of innovation is under threat. Furthermore, these writers—and many others—feel that the piracy issue is inextricably linked to the right of free speech. The sympathies of Lessig and his contemporaries tend to lie with consumers and “creatives.” They are concerned, on the one hand, with the harsh penalties that P2P downloading attracts, with our inability to legally transfer data between different pieces of hardware, with the bugs and spyware that jam up our computers, with the monopolistic practices of Microsoft, and with other user-related issues. At the same time, they seek a way through the copyright minefield for directors, writers, musicians, DJs, animators, and, above all, software developers, via legal recognition of appropriative cut ’n paste techniques as legitimate forms of expression. In his book Copyrights and Copywrongs, Vaidhyanathan analyzes the history of copyright as it has applied to literature, film, music, and software, arguing that the current hard-lockdown phase of IP regulation is stifling creativity. He proposes a system of “thin protection” as the best way to ensure the fair compensation of creatives while still fostering a culture of innovation and freedom of information. Strangelove takes a more anarchic approach in his study The Empire of Mind, lamenting the Internet’s devolution from a space of culture-jamming and activism into a commercialized sphere ruled by IP autocrats. For Strangelove, piracy is a progressive act designed to take back

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what should rightfully belong to us all—the liberating potential of digital technology. However, it is Lessig, a former Young Republican turned Stanford law professor and free-speech activist, who is the most prominent figure in this group. Lessig is the man behind Creative Commons, an easy-to-use alternative to copyright that has been attracting considerable attention within creative industries circles.36 Creative Commons operates on a “some rights reserved” principle. Artists who license a work under the Creative Commons system may still benefit financially from copyright protection, but they also give permission for the work to be used creatively by others (as samples, as source code, and so on) or for nonprofit purposes. Lessig’s influential books The Future of Ideas and Free Culture have become bibles for the online libertarian movement. The latter is grounded in the information-wants-to-be-free rhetoric of cyberpunk. It argues that important forms of cultural production are under threat from the “copyright warriors” whose restrictive IP laws are in fact harming free enterprise. In Lessig’s words, Overregulation stifles creativity. It smothers innovation. It gives dinosaurs a veto over the future. It wastes the extraordinary opportunity for a democratic creativity that digital technology enables.37

The sentiment expressed here is libertarian in that, like the laissez-faire extremists referred to earlier, Lessig sees state regulation as a threat. His argument valorizes innovation for its own sake; it is a reformist position that seeks a softening of certain aspects of the existing IP regime rather than the wholesale overthrow of the political and economic systems of which it is a component. Lessig is very clear about this, insisting at one point that his “message is absolutely not antimarket.”38 Although Lessig notes that piracy has been a constitutive feature of the content industries since the invention of mass communication technologies, he shies away from celebrating piracy per se. In fact, he declares on many occasions his opposition to “theft,” drawing a line in the sand between acceptable piracy (cut ’n paste cultural production, culture jamming, remix culture) and stealing. But as Kativa Philip correctly notes, there is something a little U.S./ Euro-centric about this argument, given that many of the “bad” pirates Lessig has in mind are “foreign” in origin, or at least are constructed as such. This is a point to which we will return shortly. But in the meantime, let us consider a fourth reading of piracy, this time from the vantage point of cultural theory. Piracy as Authorship While the readings of piracy offered so far have revolved around material issues of access and economy, it is possible to approach the phenomenon from

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other perspectives as well. Postmodern theory, for instance, has critiqued IP law by attacking a concept at the very heart of the discourse: authorship. Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, and Roland Barthes, among others, have all offered trenchant critiques of such concepts as originality, innovation, and expression, revealing the ways in which these common-sense notions are in fact saddled with all kinds of historical and ideological baggage.39 By pushing some of these ideas to their logical limit, it may even be possible to appreciate piracy as a form of cultural production in its own right. However, before examining the postmodern critique of copyright let us consider how the legal frameworks around IP define originality. Copyright law makes a distinction between an idea and its expression. While ideas cannot be copyrighted, their expressions, in the form of films, books, poems, songs, and so forth, can be. This distinction presents several problems. First, the line between an idea and an expression is often a rather arbitrary one.40 Second, it has also been argued that the definition of authorship that is codified in copyright law is tipped in favor of those types of cultural production that are commodifiable (and thus marketable and saleable) and that are “fixed” in certain types of recognized sign systems, such as written language or musical notation. Many other forms of cultural production are excluded from copyright’s scope —for example, oral texts and traditions, physical forms of dance and theatre, and community-based knowledge and information.41 So, in effect, the kind of authorship privileged by copyright and IP discourse frequently functions as a gate that tends disproportionately to favor the developed countries’ contribution to world science and culture. Curare, batik, myths, and the dance “lambada” flow out of developing countries, unprotected by IP rights, while Prozac, Levis, Grisham and the movie Lambada! flow in.42

As a result, copyright tends to privilege those forms of cultural production in which Western cultural industries specialize. This is no accident; on the contrary, it accurately reflects the historical, social, and cultural specificities that have shaped the Euro-American legal traditions upon which copyright is founded. Copyright also tends to erect boundaries between “legitimate” and “illegitimate” cultural activity. What passes for originality or appropriation, as opposed to theft or forgery, is in most cases determined by IP law rather than any universal standards of creative conduct. Some interesting examples of these tensions can be found in postmodern art of the 1980s. The American artist and provocateur Jeff Koons was famously sued for producing a sculpture (String of Puppies, 1988) based on a kitsch postcard image. His contemporary Sherrie Levine rephotographed the Depression-era images of Walker Evans and exhibited them under her own name, while the video artist Douglas

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Gordon screened a slowed-down version of Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) and called it 24 Hour Psycho (1993). All these works were attempting to make important points about what constitutes an “original” art work and to highlight the blind spots of copyright law, which offers many artists little more in the way of protection than the easy publicity of a ready-made scandal. A famous attack on conventional notions of authorship was mounted in the late 1960s by the French semiotician and cultural theorist Roland Barthes, whose canonical essay “The death of the author” is one of the key texts of postmodern theory. Arguing, among other things, that “it is language which speaks, not the author,” Barthes seeks to cut the text loose from the anchors provided by what we understand as authorship. Instead, Barthes sees creativity not as the unique expression of an artist’s subjectivity but as the selection and combination of fragments of already-existing discourse: We know now that a text is not a line of words releasing a single “theological” meaning (the “message” of the Author-God) but a multi-dimensional space in which a variety of writings, none of them original, blend and clash. The text is a tissue of quotations drawn from the innumerable centres of culture . . . [ T ]he writer can only imitate a gesture that is always anterior, never original. His only power is to mix writings, to counter the ones with the others, in such a way as never to rest on any one of them.43

This model of authorship has significant implications for the categories of originality, innovation, and authenticity upon which copyright law is founded. If, as the saying goes, there is nothing new under the sun, and the role of the artist or writer is simply to rearrange existing discourse in new combinations, then what makes a pirate any different from an artist? Only the fact that the pirate rests too long on one particular site, resisting copyright’s call to move along in a timely fashion. Now, this argument may work at a theoretical level, but how useful is it when applied to today’s mediascape? Well, recall the famous Apple slogan “rip, mix, burn,” which explicitly situates creativity at the point of reproduction. Or consider the form of originality valued in DJ culture and how this differs from the modernist model of the self-contained, unified art work. From here we are only a small step away from the interpretation of piracy as a creative act in its own right. This argument is especially pertinent to film, a profoundly collaborative medium which is subject to an array of value-adding processes in its voyage from studio to consumer—processes that have traditionally swallowed up the lion’s share of a film’s revenues (distributors retain upwards of 80% of home video takings, for example)44—and that at the level of narrative and style frequently involve slight variations on a handful of well-worn themes anyway.

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Taking all this into account, can we really claim that it is the copyright holder who is the sole “author” of a film? Piracy as Resistance While film industry lobbyists decry piracy, postmodernists read it as an intrinsic component of authorship, and the IT community sees it as either a necessary evil or a potential business model, others have read piracy as a form of subversion. Numerous studies by progressive cultural critics and Marxist political economists have drawn our attention to issues of ownership, power, and resistance within the media industries. Rather than being the creative expressions of their copyright holders, films are understood differently within this tradition—as “commodities whose value is derived from the labour that makes them.”45 Seen from this perspective, copyright is a legal institution that converts information and labor into capital for the benefit of a small coterie of multinational corporations. Thus, piracy—as a rejection of this economic order—has a certain political value. Some of this may sound similar to the libertarian readings discussed earlier. Key differences exist, however. Unlike Lessig, many political economists are decidedly “antimarket.” They consider the media to be a system of control and exploitation that operates in the service of capitalism. Furthermore, they insist on the importance of class, whether in reference to the IP-rich capitalist barons or the workers whose surplus value they extract. For example, Ronald Bettig’s authoritative 1996 study Copyrighting Culture argues that copyright represents a strategy of property regulation and market colonization. He provides a detailed history of copyright law, highlighting the “essential connection between the rise of capitalism, the extension of commodity relations into literary and artistic domains, and the emergence of the printing press.”46 He notes how the U.S. government, in close consultation with industry bodies like the MPAA, has institutionalized copyright culture globally through such means as trade sanctions against recalcitrant nations, FTAs with built-in IP boosters, multilateral initiatives such as GATT and the WTO, and increased infringement penalties and enforcement efforts.47 For Bettig, pirate circuits are spheres of commercial activity that have yet to be “recolonized” by transnational audiovisual empires. Bettig thus implicitly positions piracy as a practice that, in its obstruction of capitalist domination, represents a form of resistance. A similar argument is posed by Toby Miller and others who, in their influential book Global Hollywood, opened up a new area of class analysis within media studies by exploring the political economy of film labor. Their interpretation considers not only the creative talent but also the “below-the-line” workers who paint the sets and drive the delivery vans. They argue that intellectual property laws are one of the key enablers of the major studios’

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exploitative practices: “IP’s transformation of knowledge into property traditionally prioritizes ownership over use, creators over audiences and production over reception.”48 Global Hollywood lists numerous examples of heavy-handed IP “enforcement,” such as Disney’s lawsuit against a Florida school over the copyrighted cartoon characters painted on its buildings. They argue convincingly that the MPAA’s war on piracy is about markets rather than morals: In their eyes, IP law is a “strategic weapon” used to “lubricate international exhibition and open up new areas of information management.”49 Here, as in the work of Bettig, piracy is implicitly valorized for its challenge to Hollywood’s hegemonic “new international division of cultural labor.” The Hong Kong–based film theorist Laikwan Pang puts forward an extreme version of this argument in her recent book Cultural Control and Globalization in Asia. In what often amounts to a romanticization of piracy, Pang attempts to theorize pirate media “as a critical interrogation of today’s international cultural politics.”50 She argues that Hollywood pilfers content (styles, stars, and so on) from Asian cinemas while hypocritically waging rhetorical war against the East on the grounds of copyright infringement. For Pang, the only difference between the two forms of piracy is the technical issue of legality, which is itself defined according to legal structures that favor Hollywood. However, Pang’s totalizing rhetoric—and the propiracy argument in general—can tend to obscure more than it reveals. There is little point exalting all pirates as subversive agents, just as there is little to be gained from blindly damning Hollywood and all it represents. We should not only be thinking of piracy in terms of theft and resistance, of right and wrong; we also need to start thinking about what it can do for communities across the globe by assessing its social, cultural, and economic effects as well as its moral implications. We need to think in terms of access. Piracy as Access Recent work from postcolonial, legal, and development studies has offered a compelling, new interpretation of piracy, one that is concerned less with its ethics than with its potential. This approach is interested in the transformative aspects of piracy—in piracy’s capacity to disseminate culture, knowledge, and capital. It interrogates the relationship between technology and development, asking not “whose property?” but “whose future?” Earlier on, I referred to the familiar cast of characters that populate the debates around piracy: the teenage file-sharer, the struggling cultural producer, the corporate bigwig, the pirate-terrorist syndicates, and so on. Missing from this picture are those forms of everyday piracy that take place in

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the developing world. For instance, many communities aren’t included in the kind of Marxist or libertarian critiques outlined previously because they may not belong to a working class per se, much less the creative class to whom Lessig addresses his arguments. Political economy’s binary division between owners and workers has less to offer those who exist beyond the boundaries of the latter category and who may indeed have something to gain from the technological modernity of pirate media. In a compelling essay, the feminist/postcolonial theorist Kativa Philip unpacks some of these issues. Drawing on the work of Michel Foucault, Philip invites us to reconsider the familiar narrative of “technological authorship” from the perspective of “sites in the global south which are perceived, in the liberal democratic discourse of development stages, to be mired in the ‘not yet.’ ” What does it mean that, at the very historical moment that technological authorship seems to become widely accessible, the law marks off certain authorial spaces as transgressive? What difference does it make that a particular kind of ripping off happens on the margins of the industrialized world, among the “less developed” members of the WTO, at the apparent edges of the reach of western liberal democratic law, where the lines between authentic original and corrupted copy are being blurred by street vendors and high-tech entrepreneurs?51

Philip thus suggests that the libertarian reading of piracy exemplified by Lessig uses the type of commercial piracy practiced in Asia as a kind of black sheep against which the free-software movement can define itself. In other words, she argues that the war on piracy is also about the struggle for authority and power on the global stage. In this geopolitical arm wrestle, “copying” has a double meaning: On the one hand, Asia is encouraged to imitate the West by replicating its political and economic systems and by promoting responsible digital citizenship; but on the other hand, alternative forms of “copying” (pirate reproduction) are strictly forbidden. Such an argument pushes debates around piracy into a whole new territory. By connecting everyday piracy to development and global politics, Philip makes a compelling case for taking piracy seriously as a route to social, economic, and political change. One of the inspirations of Philip’s critique is Lawrence Liang, a legal scholar based at Bangalore’s Alternative Law Forum (www.altlawforum. org) whose work has also been influential in this debate. In the essay “Porous Legalities and Avenues of Participation,” Liang develops this argument by emphasizing the fact that legality itself is a relative concept. He notes that millions of Indians live in a state of illegality every day of their lives, forced by socioeconomic circumstances to bribe officials for essential services or to

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steal electricity because no “official” sources exist. According to Liang, the “porous legalities” that characterize life in much of the developing world may be the only routes through which contact with the modernity that the West takes for granted may be realized. Piracy is therefore not solely about morality, freedom, or even resistance; it’s also about “ways through which people ordinarily left out of the imagination of modernity, technology and the global economy [find] ways of inserting themselves into these networks.”52 A third and final writer who has been able to give some experiential detail to these arguments is the Indian new media theorist Ravi Sundaram. In the absorbing essay “Recycling Modernity: Pirate Electronic Cultures in India,” Sundaram defines “recycled pirate modernity” as an urbanized, everyday, nonlegal sphere characterized by speedy, small-scale practices of circulation (rather than production). This is a culture of cassette-based music trade, DIY computer networks, cheap mobile phone repairs, and pirate VHS/VCD movies; a “world of informal technological knowledge existing in most parts of India, where those excluded from the upper-caste, English-speaking bastions of the cyber-elite learn their tools.”53 Sundaram’s “recycled modernity” is a set of practices that conform neither to the boosterist hype of economists (India as a brave new world of service-sector innovation) nor to Marxist models of economic imperialism (India as a source of cheap labor and an object of exploitation). It is founded upon a variety of piracy that is not by definition oppositional or countercultural and has little in common with the kind of cut ’n paste postmodernity fetishized by Western academics. Instead, Sundaram presents recycled modernity as “a strategy of both survival and innovation on terms entirely outside the current debates on the structure and imagination of the net and techno-culture in general.”54 These three theorists alert us to the fact that there is a great deal at stake in debates around piracy, more than just the revenues of Hollywood studios and the leisure options of metropolitan elites. They help us to see that consumer rights issues, important though they are, tend to pale in comparison to piracy’s potential as a productive force. As a form of information distribution, piracy has made a plethora of new social practices possible: grass-roots organization through pirated spreadsheet software, photocopied technical manuals, bootleg copies of banned novels, online activism facilitated by cheap IBM PC knock-offs, new forms of youth culture based around illegally procured CDs and tapes, and so on. In other words, piracy is a distributive technology—it enables ideas, knowledge, and cultural production to circulate in and through society—and should be recognized as such. Film is particularly important in this regard. As the most prestigious of the culture industries (if no longer the most profitable), cinema is still an enormously influential educative technology. It teaches us how to think and feel; it offers pleasures of immeasurable power and value. This is why

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the issue of film distribution is as important as access to software or books. Pirate circuits disseminate all kinds of media, from Hollywood blockbusters to more localized forms of cultural production. A prime example of this can be found in Nigeria’s enormously successful video-film industry. Sometimes dubbed “Nollywood,” this network of producers and distributors pumps out hundreds of films a year, none of which get shown in cinemas (most cinemas in Nigeria have shut down or been turned into churches). Instead, films are shot quickly on video or on digital and distributed cheaply on VHS and VCD. Operating completely outside conventional channels of film production, distribution, and exhibition, Nollywood has become the country’s most vibrant form of popular culture, not to mention a booming economic force in its own right. It has its own star system and a rising international profile. But the keys to its success have been low production overheads and efficient distribution networks that, as the anthropologist Brian Larkin has documented, evolved from pre-existing pirate circuits radiating out from the city of Kano, circuits that had previously moved bootleg Indian and American movies around the country and into neighboring nations.55 This is a powerful example of the productivity of piracy—of how illegal film distribution cannot only redistribute existing content according to market demand but also open up a space for whole new industries, new economies, new forms of cultural production, and new possibilities of change and survival.56 CONCLUSION Bearing in mind the maxim that those who engage in crystal-ball gazing end up eating crushed glass, I would like to conclude by offering some tentative speculations as to the immediate future of the war on piracy. It seems likely that the protections offered to rights-holders by global IP law are unlikely to be diluted in any meaningful way in the short term, notwithstanding the odd reprieve for early-adopting Western consumers. IP debates will, however, become increasingly visible in public discourse and will continue to function as a crossover issue for development NGOs (nongovernment organizations), antiglobalization activists, technolibertarians and consumer groups. As broadband penetration and technological literacy levels rise, digital piracy will flourish despite the obstacles that studio-funded digital rights management (DRM) technology will place in its way. In the wake of iTunes, digital technology will present the entertainment industries with new distributive models, but it is likely that these will tend to favor the established players or to replace old corporate giants with new ones. In other words, the distribution bottleneck will continue to be the primary obstacle for both consumers and producers, even as our cultural industries become increasingly complex and interconnected.

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In highlighting piracy’s productive potential, let me reiterate that I am not mounting a moral defense of piracy per se. Piracy does indeed hurt (some) filmmakers and artists, but given the extremely low rates of return offered to independent artists by most existing market structures, which privilege distributors over producers, it is worth taking all other alternatives seriously. In other words, we should be open to the possibility that pirate distribution often functions as an enabling energy rather than—or as well as—a form of economic parasitism. The open-source movement is helping to show that profit and ethical information management are not necessarily incompatible, but this alone is unlikely to lead to progressive forms of copyright law. Instead, what is required over the medium to long term is a deeper interrogation of the very foundations upon which our proprietary models of IP are constructed. This is by nature an interdisciplinary project, one in which academics, filmmakers, programmers, economists, lawyers, artists, consumers, and community groups may all find a voice. After all, there is more at stake here than entertainment. Skirmishes over DVD ripping and music downloading are linked in important ways to debates over affordable AIDS drugs, agribusiness patents, the “evergreening” of pharmaceuticals, and the future uses of the human genetic code. As the most visible tip of this IP iceberg, the piracy debate may well influence outcomes in these related fields. For this reason, media scholars have both the opportunity and the obligation to become more involved with issues of distribution and to contribute in some small way to the debates taking place around one of the most pressing issues of our time. NOTES Many thanks to Kyle Weise, Polona Petek, Audrey Yue, Sean Cubitt, and Sun Jung for generous feedback and assistance. 1. Darrel William Davis, “Compact Generation: VCD Markets in Asia,” Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television 23, no. 2 (2003): 165–76. Davis credits film theorist Chuck Kleinhans with usage of this term. 2. Philip Mattera, Off the Books: The Rise of the Underground Economy (London: Pluto Press, 1985). 3. “Anti-piracy,” Motion Picture Association of America, http://www.mpaa.org/ piracy.asp. 4. “MPAA Asia/Pacific Piracy Fact Sheet,” Motion Picture Association, http:// www.mpaa.org/AsiaPacificPiracyFactSheet.pdf; LEK Consulting, “The Cost of Movie Piracy” (Singapore: Motion Picture Association, 2005). 5. Magz Osborne, “Pirates Find More Ways to Plunder,” Variety, June 30, 2003, 21. 6. Kerry Seagrave, Piracy in the Motion Picture Industry (Jefferson, NC: MacFarland and Co., 2003); see also Jane M. Gaines, “Early Cinema’s Heyday of Copying: The Too Many Copies of L’arroseur arrosé (The Waterer Watered),” Cultural Studies 20, no. 2–3 (2006): 227– 44.

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7. “Global Theatrical Revenue Rebounds in ’06,” The Hollywood Reporter, July 25, 2007, n.p. 8. Majid Yar, “The Global ‘Epidemic’ of Movie ‘Piracy’: Crime-Wave or Social Construction?” Media, Culture and Society 27, no. 5 (2005): 667–96. 9. See, for example, Ronald V Bettig, Copyrighting Culture: the Political Economy of Intellectual Property (Boulder: Westview Press, 1996); Laikwan Pang, Cultural Control and Globalization in Asia: Copyright, Piracy, and Cinema (London: Routledge, 2006); John Frow, “Public Domain and the New World Order in Knowledge,” Social Semiotics 10, no. 2 (2000): 173–85; Lawrence Lessig, Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity (New York: Penguin, 2004), and The Future of Ideas: the Fate of the Commons in a Connected World (New York: Random House, 2001); Siva Vaidhyanathan, Copyrights and Copywrongs: The Rise of Intellectual Property and How it Threatens Creativity (New York: New York University Press, 2001/2003). 10. Interestingly, the United States was not a party to the Berne Convention until 1989. Berne’s moral rights (droit d’auteur) provisions were not recognized by the United States—though some legal protections for creators can be found in other areas of U.S. law—and were phased out in the final version of the GATT. This fact is as a reminder that America’s championing of unified global copyright regimes has been rather selective in nature. 11. Frow, “Public Domain.” 12. See Bettig, Copyrighting Culture; Shujen Wang and Jonathan Zhu, “Mapping Film Piracy in China,” Theory, Culture and Society 20, no. 4 (2003): 97–125. 13. Frow, “Public Domain,” 182. 14. See Katie Allen, “Musicians’ Copyright Pleas Fall on Deaf Ears,” The Guardian, July 24, 2007, http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,2133762,00.html. 15. Vaidhyanathan, Copyrights and Copywrongs. Lucas, on record as a strong defender of IP regimes, is nonetheless considerably more lenient than his contemporaries when it comes to Star Wars fan activity, and his championing of digital technology has had some positive implications for alternative models of film production and distribution. 16. “When Mr. Lee’s film Malcolm X came out in 1992, he took some of his friends, ‘muscle,’ he calls them, to 125th Street with baseball bats to clean the bootleg copies off the street.” Linda Lee, “Bootleg Videos: Piracy with a Camcorder,” New York Times, July 7, 1997, D1. 17. Toby Miller et al, Global Hollywood 2 (London: British Film Institute, 2005). 18. Lessig, Free Culture. 19. Pat Choate, Hot Property: The Stealing of Ideas in an Age of Globalization (New York: Knopf, 2005); Paul Paradise, Trademark Counterfeiting, Product Piracy, and the Billion Dollar Threat to the US Economy (Westport, Conn.: Quorum Books, 1999). 20. Miller et al., Global Hollywood 2; Nitin Govil, “War in the Age of Pirate Reproduction,” Sarai Reader 4 (2004): 378–83, http://www.sarai.net/publications/readers/. 21. “Tipping Hollywood the Black Spot,” The Economist, August 20, 2003; Govil. 22. The VCD (Video Compact Disc) format has an interesting history, though most people outside Asia and certain parts of Africa and Latin America are oblivious to its existence. Essentially, the VCD is a CD-rom containing a single MPG file that can be played on standalone VCD players, often around the size of a Discman, as well as on most DVD players and computers. They can store 74 minutes of audiovisual content,

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which means that two or three separate VCDs are required for most feature films, and offer audio and video of slightly lower quality than a VHS cassette. VCDs have no menus, copy protection, or region coding. Invented in the early 1990s by Philips and Sony, who soon abandoned the format, VCD technology went on to become especially popular in Asia (except Japan) during the mid-1990s. See Kelly Hu, “The VCD Experience,” in Asian Media Studies: Politics of Subjectivities, eds. John Erni and Siew Keng Chua (Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2005), 55–72; Davis, “Compact Generation,” 173. 23. “Asia Fights Piracy with Gov’t, Corporate Help,” Variety, November 13, 2000, 88. 24. Wang and Zhu, “Mapping Film Piracy in China.” 25. Yar, “The Global ‘Epidemic’ of Movie ‘Piracy,’ ” 690. 26. Toby Miller, “Hollywood 2010,” address to the Centre for Screen Business, Australian Film, Television and Radio School, May 2006, available at http://csb.aftrs. edu.au/. 27. Carmine Caridi, who once played a cop on NYPD Blue, was investigated by the FBI in 2004 for copyright infringement. An Academy member (and thus an Academy Awards judge), he had reportedly been selling his Oscar screener DVDs to a pirate operation. See Danny Birchall, “Thieves Like Us,” Sight and Sound, October, 2000, 32–36. Similar links between “official” film industries and the pirate underworld also exist in other countries: In Hong Kong it is widely known that producers sell finished copies of their own films to piracy outfits in order to recoup tax-free profits. “The Triads and the Hong Kong Film Industry,” BBC World Service, April 2006, 22 minutes, http:// www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/programmes/ram/globalperspective/part4.ram. 28. Bettig, Copyrighting Culture, 103–6. 29. See Shujen Wang, Framing Piracy: Globalization and Film Distribution in Greater China (Lanham, Mass.: Rowman and Littlefield, 2003), 87; Douglas Clark, “IP Rights Protection will Improve in China—Eventually,” The China Business Review, May– June, 2000, 22–29. 30. Cheap Chinese VCD and DVD hardware is not entirely outside the established circuits of transnational audiovisual industry capital as chip and component patent licenses have to be leased from the likes of Time Warner, Hitachi, Sony, and Philips. Wang, Framing Piracy, 51–53. 31. Davis, “Compact Generation.” 32. Miller et al, Global Hollywood 2, 246; “How Sony Became an Ugly Sister,” The Observer, Dec 18, 2005, 6, Business section. 33. This figure is an estimate by Australia’s Adult Industry Copyright Organisation Limited—see http://www.aico.org.au/access—and thus is likely to be somewhat exaggerated; however, the fact that the porn market is subject to higher levels of piracy than other sectors of the entertainment industry is commonly accepted. 34. Dana Harris, “Porn Pirates Go Unpunished,” Variety, January 24, 2005, 8. 35. Lessig, Free Culture; Vaidhyanathan, Copyrights and Copywrongs; Michael Strangelove, The Empire of Mind: Digital Piracy and the Anti-Capitalist Movement (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005); J. D. Lasica, Darknet: Hollywood’s War against the Digital Generation (Hoboken, NJ: J Wiley and Sons, 2005). 36. See, for example, Tony Flew, “Creative Commons and the Creative Industries,” Media and Arts Law Review 10, no. 4 (2005), http://www.law.unimelb.edu.au/cmcl/ malr/contents104.html; Brian Fitzgerald, “Creative Choices: Changes to the Cre-

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ative Commons,” Media International Australia Incorporating Culture and Policy 114 (2005): 83–86. 37. Lessig, Free Culture, 199. 38. Ibid., 227. 39. This field of literary theory has been the subject of enormous debate across several decades, and it is impossible to do any kind of justice to the argument here. However, the following texts are good places to begin: Roland Barthes, “The Death of the Author,” in Image-Music-Text, trans. Stephen Heath (London: Fontana, 1977), 142– 49; Michel Foucault, “What is an Author?” in Language, Counter-Memory, Practice: Selected Essays and Interviews, ed. Donald F. Bouchard, trans. Donald F. Bouchard and Sherry Simon (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1977), 113–38; Jacques Derrida, “Limited inc a b c,” in Postmodernism: Critical Concepts, ed. Victor E. Taylor and Charles E. Winquist (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1977/1998), 416–503. 40. Pang, Cultural Control and Globalization in Asia. 41. For an interesting discussion of the relationship between Western IP law and Maori cultural production, see Barry Barclay, Mana Tuturu: Maori Treasures and Intellectual Property Rights (Auckland: Auckland University Press, 2006). 42. James Boyle, cited in Miller et al., Global Hollywood 2, 224. 43. Barthes, “The Death of the Author,” 143, 146. 44. For details on home video royalty structures, see Edward Jay Epstein, The Big Picture: The New Logic of Money and Power in Hollywood (New York: Random House, 2005); Janet Wasko, How Hollywood Works (London: Sage, 2003). For further information on the cultural dimensions of film distribution, see Ramon Lobato, “Subcinema: Theorising Marginal Film Distribution,” Limina: A Journal of Cultural and Historical Studies 13, http://www.limina.arts.uwa.edu.au/__data/page/59120/Lobato.pdf. 45. Miller et al., Global Hollywood 2, 5 (emphasis added). 46. Bettig, Copyrighting Culture, 9. 47. This argument is especially pertinent at the present moment given the U.S. government’s ongoing attempts to combat piracy in China and to bring the PRC into the global IP fold. 48. Miller et al., Global Hollywood 2, 226. 49. Ibid., 216. 50. Pang, Cultural Control and Globalization in Asia, 82. 51. Kativa Philip, “What is a Technological Author? The Pirate Function and Intellectual Property,” Postcolonial Studies 8, no. 2 (2005): 207. 52. Lawrence Liang, “Porous Legalities and Avenues of Participation,” Sarai Reader 5 (2005): 12, http://www.sarai.net/publications/readers/. 53. Ravi Sundaram, “Recycling Modernity: Pirate Electronic Cultures in India,” Sarai Reader 1 (2001), 93, http://www.sarai.net/publications/readers/. 54. Ibid., 96. 55. Brian Larkin, “Degraded Images, Distorted Sounds: Nigerian Video and the Infrastructure of Piracy,” Public Culture 16, no. 2 (2004): 289–314. 56. Ibid; Sean Cubitt, “Distribution and Media Flows,” Cultural Politics 1, no. 2 (2005): 193–214.

chapter 3

KingKong.com versus LOLTheMovie.com: Toward a Framework of Corporate and Independent Online Film Promotion Mary P. Erickson

The Web phenomenon of The Blair Witch Project (Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez, 1999) during the movie’s theatrical run in 1999 was heralded as revolutionizing the entire structure of movie marketing. The fan-driven Web campaign generated buzz around this low-budget film, propelling it to garner over $140 million at the domestic box office. Movie studios hurriedly created Web sites for their films, hoping to cash in on what Christopher Grove called the “Holy Grail” of Web marketing.1 One industry insider predicted, “Currently, Hollywood studios only spend a few percent of a movie’s total budget on Internet promotions. Blair Witch’s surprise performance will increase that commitment tenfold.”2 Since Blair Witch, major studios have, for the most part, included Web sites as a medium in their marketing campaigns, although the degree to which they rely on Web sites for promotion varies from film to film. Despite steady growth over the past several years, Web sites and other online promotions account for only 3.7 percent of major studios’ advertising costs.3 Independent filmmakers, meanwhile, tend to hinge their entire film marketing campaigns on the use of Web sites for promotion. As we examine who uses Web sites for movie promotion, we must also examine to what end they are used. How do these Web sites, for example, reflect the promotional objectives of a filmmaker or studio? How is the Web site visitor expected to interact with the site?

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An examination of various components of a given Web site begins to reveal these objectives and expectations, particularly when we compare Web sites across the spectrum, from those Web sites for major Hollywood blockbusters to ones for independently produced microbudget films. Varieties of Web marketing activity, as applied to online movie marketing by Adam Finn and others, demonstrate a range of purposes, including communication, sales, content, and networking, that vary depending on the objectives of the producer.4 One can locate some combination of these characteristics within most movie Web sites, but the degree to which emphasis is placed on each one indicates which aspects and functions of the Web site are considered most useful. In particular, there are accentuated differences between corporate and independent movie promotional goals; while major studios and independent filmmakers both seek to promote films via movie Web sites, they do so in significantly different ways. This chapter presents an examination of various Web sites in order to highlight how major studios approach the Internet at a fundamentally different level than do independent filmmakers. The Internet is an appropriate site for an exploration of the differences and similarities of corporate and independent film promotion because it is one of the few promotional vehicles through which independents and majors can be assessed with similar criteria. The nature of the Internet is such that anyone with a computer and Internet access (and we can say that most filmmakers in the United States have these) can create a Web site. Indeed, this leveled playing field was the catalyst for the success of The Blair Witch Project, prompting major studios to join the online competition for audiences. The major studios had to adapt their traditional marketing practices to encompass new technologies; oftentimes, they have found the Internet particularly conducive to locating target audiences, giving those audiences multiple ways in which they can interact with an entire film brand. Independent filmmakers, for whom traditional marketing practices might be out of reach, have also been able to locate their target audiences. For them, the Internet is a useful and cheap marketing tool and is considered, according to The Ultimate Film Festival Survival Guide, as “the most important promotional tool for the independent filmmaker.”5 MAJOR STUDIO AND INDEPENDENT FILMS Major studio films (also termed “corporate” or “Hollywood”) are those produced within or distributed by major Hollywood studios; these studios include Paramount Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox, Warner Brothers, Universal Pictures, Walt Disney Pictures, and Sony Pictures. Janet Wasko describes the Hollywood film industry as “an industry that produces and distributes commodities, and thus is similar to other industries that manufacture and produce products for profit.”6 Thus, major studios are concerned primarily

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with generating revenues and maximizing profits, which is not surprising given the fact that these companies are part of multinational entertainment conglomerates.7 One must note that there are other production and distribution studios that exist outside the majors, but they are not classified as independents. Such studios are Lucasfilm and Lionsgate Films, which, although they maintain some level of autonomy from six major studios, also seek to maximize profits in order to compete with their major studio competitors. It is estimated that Lucasfilm generated over $1 billion in annual revenues in 2005.8 Lionsgate’s acquisition of a British film distribution company in 2005, for instance, according to Lionsgate’s CEO Jon Feltheimer, “is consistent with our commitment to make accretive, strategic transactions to accelerate our growth and enhance margins in our core businesses.”9 This frank admission of corporate objectives prompts me to categorize Lionsgate as a corporate studio. Applying a solid definition to “independent” is a less precise task. The term has been defined in myriad ways: “a film’s source of financing; the industrial affiliations of the film’s distributor; the sites in which the film is exhibited; the status of the talent in relation to Hollywood; and the ‘spirit’ of the film (usually interpreted to mean its aesthetic or generic ties to commercial or alternative media traditions).”10 Tzioumakis proposes that independence used in the context of describing film has developed into a discourse to reinforce power dynamics, particularly those that manifest in industrial or economic relations.11 We can witness appropriation of the term independent by major studios to create meaning that suits corporate objectives of profit-seeking. This manifests most obviously in the so-called indie or specialty divisions of major studios, which specialize in art-house or foreign fare. While these labels (such as 20th Century Fox’s Fox Searchlight, Disney’s Miramax, or Warner Brothers’ Warner Independent Pictures) produce and/or distribute quite different films from their mainstream studio counterparts, they still face the same profit imperatives as their sibling and parent divisions. Therefore, even though these divisions very often acquire independently produced films, the investment of money and labor into these films’ marketing campaigns drastically changes the tone and nature of promotional Web sites as these are vehicles through which the company can draw revenue. Independent films, on the other hand, generally have small budgets (as low as a few hundred dollars) with unknown cast and crew and rely on alternative and more readily accessible modes of promotion (the Internet or the film festival circuit, for example) to secure interest and, possibly, eventual distribution. An independent filmmaker’s access to resources will determine the function and style of the Web site in ways that are very different from major studio counterparts.

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MOVIE WEB SITES—A RANGE OF PROMOTIONAL APPROACHES As mentioned previously, Adam Finn and others examined movie Web sites according to four characteristics, modifying four levels of general Web marketing activity to apply to movie promotion. These characteristics are: 1. Communication: Web sites communicate promotional messages about the film using movie reviews, links to film listings in newspapers, or ticket purchase sites such as Fandango.com or Movietickets.com. 2. Sales: Web sites sell traditional products, such as DVDs, soundtracks, or film-related merchandise. 3. Content: Web sites provide content as a supplemental service for narrower market segments, which might include behind-the-scenes footage or interviews with cast and crew. 4. Networking: Web sites provide an arena for networking among audiences through online chat rooms or discussion boards.

The characteristic of sales, coupled with many of the parameters that define the communication category, reflect overall promotional goals of generating revenue through the sale of theatrical tickets, home videos, and film-related merchandise. Therefore, I have collapsed them into one category: sales. The second two, content and networking, reflect goals of maximizing audience interaction to develop demand for the films themselves. I have expanded the content characteristic to incorporate those portions of the communication category that do not explicitly address sales, which include the use of movie reviews. Therefore, my adapted framework does away with the communication category altogether. While Finn and other’s framework encompasses a general range of possible movie Web site activities, it was not originally used to identify differences in the motivations of Web sites’ producers. Finn et al. compare how Canadian and American producers/distributors use the Internet as a promotional vehicle, concluding that Canadian films might perform better at the box office if they took advantage of the potential of Web marketing. Fred Zufryden also concludes that a well-designed movie Web site is an important component of a film’s promotional strategy.12 However, both of these studies assume that all movie Web sites set out to achieve the same goals; I contend, however, that major film studios and independent filmmakers differ greatly in their motivations for Web site function. This reverberates to the intended role of the Web site visitor as well, in that producers have certain audience expectations and assess the value of the audience in very different ways. An analysis of 50 Web sites for American narrative feature films provides the basis for my evaluation of motivations and intended audience interaction. By paying particular attention to the characteristics of sales, content, and

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networking, we can examine Web sites in terms of written content, links, and graphics. What is the tone of the content? Can we tell who wrote it? How sophisticated is the Web site’s design? The user’s initial contact with the Web site is a key element because it provides clues as to the Web site creator’s expectations of the Web site user. The links on the main page, for example, indicate how the user is supposed to interact with the site. We can observe three streams of Web site–based promotional efforts, two of which serve primarily corporate goals of maximizing revenue through saturated merchandising and fan devotion through monetary gestures, while the third relies on organic viral marketing. The elements featured on corporate Web sites (or those residing within the first two streams) indicate an overarching goal: to maximize revenue generation. Therefore, Web sites for major studio films contain a multiplicity of purchase opportunities. Every content- and networking-based feature works toward reinforcing sales. Even when fan interaction is a Web site’s chief feature, with content and networking features serving that interaction, profit maximization is still the Web site’s primary function. Conversely, independently produced Web sites (in the third stream) favor content and networking and tend to offer very few purchase opportunities. These sites focus on building relationships with fans in order to build audiences for their films. While I do not intend to say that all Web sites fit into one of these three categories, these three types, as outlined in the following table and later, do provide a useful way of thinking about how a given Web site operates and what its design and content might say about its producers.

Table 3.1 Type of Film Website

Types of Websites for Online Film Promotion Function

Focus (according to revised Film et al. model)

Examples

Extension of Traditional Media

Opportunities to buy merchandise saturate the website

Sales

King Kong, Fun With Dick and Jane, The Guardian

Controlled Interactivity

Fans prove their devotion through the purchase of merchandise

Networking and content in service of sales

The Chronicles of Narnia, Star Wars

Organic and Word-ofMouth Marketing

Filmmaker relates Networking and personal journey content of the process of filmmaking

The Last Romantic, LOL, Deadroom

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EXTENSION OF TRADITIONAL MEDIA—SATURATED MERCHANDISING The Internet as an extension of traditional media is the most prominent way in which major studios use the Internet to promote movies. Within Finn et al.’s framework, major studios primarily sell products on their film Web sites. They do use such interactive features as supplemental content and networking in order to entice and retain audiences. I contend, though, that these Web sites include such content only to support the central objective of generating sales. Appealing to a broad audience is a subordinate effort. The underlying assumption is that if more people visit a film’s Web site and make repeat visits, more tickets and related merchandise will be sold, thereby serving the central objective of maximizing sales. Major studios incorporate Web sites into their promotional strategies as a method of reaching targeted audiences. Studios’ movie Web sites typically feature the same content as they would offer in other promotional mediums: trailers, cross-promotions and tie-ins, and reminders to buy movie-related merchandise. These are all used to feed studios’ main objectives, which are, according to Janet Wasko and other film industry scholars, to generate as much revenue as possible for a given movie.13 The Internet simply allows major studios to provide this content in a more synergistic package; instead of offering purchase opportunities in piecemeal newspaper or television ads, the Internet provides a one-stop shop for studios to entice consumers with a complete arsenal of purchase opportunities. Regardless of whether the film is currently being released in theaters or on home video, the Web site is consistently used to promote merchandise; the focus merely shifts from buying tickets to preordering or ordering the DVD. Universal Pictures’ 2005 film King Kong is an example of how a major studio created an all-inclusive Web site to encourage audience interactivity with a film’s Web site with the goal of buying tickets and film-related merchandise.14 From one’s very first interaction with the King Kong Web site on its home page, a visitor to the site notices that opportunities to purchase movie-related items are continually reinforced. The site features no less than four reminders that the DVD of King Kong is available for purchase; one of these reminders links to the Universal Studios Home Video and DVD Web site. Should the visitor be reticent to purchase the DVD, the film’s trailer plays automatically as the page loads as temptation to see the film. The home page is also rife with cross-promotions, from Papa Johns pizza to The Sci-Fi Boys (another of director Peter Jackson’s feature films) to a King Kong game to a King Kong MasterCard offer. Clicking on “Enter the Site,” the visitor is led to another page that includes more reminders that the DVD is available for purchase. Links line the bottom of this page: “Mobile” links to Gameloft.com where cell phone ringtones, games, and wallpapers are available for purchase;

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“Trailer” features the theatrical trailer, enticing visitors to want to see the full film; “Game” links to Peter Jackson’s King Kong—The Official Game of the Movie, available for purchase for all major game platforms; “Soundtrack” links to the music composer’s Web site, where visitors can purchase the movie soundtrack from Amazon.com or iClassics.com, a division of Universal Music Classics Group; “Kongisking.net,” a production-related forum; “Partners,” which brings up links to various companies involved in cross-promotions and tie-ins (Nestle Crunch, Papa Johns Pizza, and Kodak EasyShare Gallery, among others); and “Own the DVD now!,” which yet again gives the site visitor the opportunity to own one or all of six versions of the film. The “Kongisking.net” forum presents itself as a Web site for fans to interact with the film. However, one cannot help but be overwhelmed with purchase opportunities: the King Kong DVD Countdown lists the number of days, hours, minutes, and seconds until the Deluxe Extended Edition DVD and Deluxe Extended Limited Edition DVD are released. If fans can’t wait for the release of these versions, they are encouraged to purchase other DVDs, such as The World of Kong: A Natural History of Skull Island, the film’s Production Diaries, the 1933 King Kong 2-Disc Special Edition, and The King Kong Collection, all conveniently linked to Amazon.com for easy purchase. One can also apply for the King Kong MasterCard here. While King Kong can be cited as one of the most blatant examples of saturated merchandising, we can examine the Web sites of various other major releases to see similar trends. The Web site for Sony Pictures’ Fun With Dick and Jane, for example, continually reminds the visitor that the movie is available for purchase on DVD and PSP (PlayStation Portable).15 A graphic of the actual DVD case is prominently displayed as reinforcement of this message, and visitors are able to click a link, “About the DVD,” in order to find out more information about the product they will be buying. Production notes, photographs, and other content-related items are featured on this Web site; a prominently displayed graphic reminding the visitor to purchase the DVD or PSP version of the film never leaves the top right quadrant of the Web page. Similarly, the Web site for The Guardian (distributed by Disney-owned Buena Vista Pictures) features a permanent heading, during the film’s theatrical release, that encouraged the visitor to be “First in Line, Online!” by buying tickets from an online ticketing service.16 Once the DVD was released, The Guardian’s Web site began to prominently display advertisements to purchase the DVD, including notifications that an alternate ending for the movie is but one of many special features on the DVD. Also, the “Mobile” page sells various ringtones and wallpaper for cell phones. Granted, this Web site does feature quite an extensive collection of content that reminds us that the film is about Coast Guard rescuers. No matter which area of content the site visitor chooses to view, however, there is never any question as to when

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the movie will be released in theaters or, later, on DVD. Each of these content pages has an announcement: “The Guardian. Risk Everything 9/29.” Soon, this statement is replaced with a similar announcement: “The Guardian. On DVD January 23.” We can observe similar trends on the Web sites for films released through the specialty divisions of major distributors, such as The Thing About My Folks, released by Picturehouse (a company formed by New Line Cinema and HBO, both owned by Time Warner).17 These films are marketed to specialized and often discerning audiences interested in the quality of the film in terms of acting and writing. Web sites for these types of films still reflect the overall goal of maximizing revenue. The Web site features the film’s actors, Peter Falk and Paul Reiser, bantering about the Web site’s usefulness in “finding out where to see the movie.” A DVD case of the movie sits in the very center of the screen, reminding the viewer that the film is now available for purchase; a link to a New Line Cinema store facilitates that purchase. These sites reveal the overall objectives of major studios to turn films into havens of merchandise possibilities. With regards to Finn et al.’s rubric, these Web sites encourage viewing of the films in all of their various formats; indeed, they actively sell tickets and home videos. More prominently and, arguably, fundamentally important to the film’s distributor, these sites offer limitless opportunities to purchase movie-related merchandise. King Kong, as a highly marketed blockbuster movie, represents an intense display of purchase opportunities that outweighs the merchandising on many other studio film Web sites. It is, however, not unreasonable to say that if the market for merchandise affiliated with other films such as The Guardian or Fun With Dick and Jane existed in as many forms as it does for King Kong, these Web sites would feature more merchandise. CONTROLLED INTERACTIVITY—SELLING DEVOTION Some films are more conducive to maximizing site visitor interaction in that they encourage fan participation. Web sites for these films continue to encourage sales of tickets and merchandise, but they are more firmly couched within interactive features. These film Web sites enable studios to secure a loyal fan base in such a way that fans feel less manipulated and therefore more like integral participants in the film’s success. Often, these films are blockbuster franchises (high-budget films with sequels) with a pre-existing dedicated fan base that has carried over from the text’s previous incarnation as another media form, such as a book, graphic novel, comic, or video game. Web site visitors are reminded again and again that the text exists in a variety of formats, whether it is a film or book or game, and they are encouraged to choose their preferred format through

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which to interact with the text. They are also encouraged to express their own interpretations of the text through films and blogs. The Star Wars franchise is the quintessential example of a franchise that is promoted online to cultivate fan loyalty and interaction in order to sell tickets and merchandise. Lucasfilm established the official Star Wars Web site in 1996 as the studio recognized the promotional potential of the Internet well ahead of its contemporaries and even before the success of The Blair Witch Project.18 It built a large and sophisticated community of Star Wars-affiliated Web sites and generated a giant web of fan sites dedicated to some aspect of Star Wars, of which the latest installment of the series, Episode III—Revenge of the Sith (George Lucas, 2005), is part. The main features of this Web site emphasize membership and community first and foremost.19 Visitors are encouraged to sign in to the site as recognized members of the community; if they are not yet members, they are encouraged to become members. A selection of fan blogs is featured on the home page, as are profiles of artists who have worked in some capacity with the Star Wars universe and fan-created films. A “Community” button provides links to news and events, fan clubs, message boards, and blogs, among others. Fan involvement is free of cost if one is content to participate on a basic and minimal level. Fans are, however, given plentiful opportunities to interact with the film franchise by purchasing services and merchandise that provide what can be perceived as a much more fulfilling experience. At $39.95 for an annual membership, the Official Star Wars Fan Club, Hyperspace, has been “created to unify and spotlight worldwide fan activity, give exclusive inside access to the cast and crew of the movies, provide a way to buy really cool exclusive stuff, and most of all . . . to celebrate Star Wars.”20 This membership also permits fans to create an officially sanctioned Star Wars blog, which is linked on the Star Wars Web site. Fan involvement of this nature was, in 2001, offered gratis; with an estimated minimum of 12,000 blogs at the time of this writing, this type of fan involvement has turned into a guaranteed moneymaker for Lucasfilm. Film franchise Web sites are deft at reminding its audiences that they are indeed franchises and that there are multiple other ways to interact with a text. Because many of these films derive from other media (novels or games, for example), there are many different ways in which a potential audience member might learn of the franchise. Lucasfilm is adept at exploiting these multiple points of entry, both to garner new audiences and to expand a fan’s engagement with the text to include various formats, be they books or films or collectibles. A quiz on the Web site asks, “What do you know of Shadows of Empire? ” (Shadows of Empire is a novel that builds on the Star Wars film saga.) Visitors are prompted with answers such as: “I read the novel,” “I read the comics,” “I played the game,” and “I collected the toys.” The fan is alerted that this story exists not only in the form of a novel but also as a comic, a game,

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and various toys. Therefore, a fan’s interaction with a text is defined by their interaction with commodified products. And regardless of one’s point of entry, the Star Wars Web site assumes that fans will want to display their devotion monetarily. This is why, months before the release of The Phantom Menace, Lucasfilm “produced a poster-sized, color-coded chart circulated among the hundreds of Star Wars licensees that details, month by month, every merchandising and marketing event related to Star Wars from early last year [1996] until the millennium.”21 This admission of the use of formalized marketing strategies indicates expected results and has even been called “the most ambitious attempt to date to exploit a film franchise.”22 Other film franchises have arguably modeled their Web sites on Star Wars’ foray into online fan involvement. Disney’s The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is another such example.23 Based on a series of children’s books, this franchise released its first film in 2005, with a second film in the series to be released in 2008. Disney, the Web site’s producer, assumes an already dedicated audience base that has grown up with the Narnia book series; the Web site also seeks to cultivate a new generation of fans by introducing them to the series through the film adaptation. As is the case with Star Wars, there are multiple points of entry to access the text, and the Web site enables the site visitor to interact in any number of ways. A window in the center of the screen cycles through various options that the Web site offers (buy the DVD, play the game, read the books, etc.); these options are also all available along the toolbar at the top of the screen and alongside this center window. No one item is emphasized more than the others—not even those options that encourage the visitor to purchase merchandise. The Narnia Web site seeks to engage fans through an “Ultimate Fan Contest,” the winner of which will visit the production set of the second Narnia film and have their experience documented and posted on the Narnia Web site. While certainly not as interactive as Star Wars fan participation, Narnia fans can submit photographs or videos of themselves that illustrate their dedication to the series. Nick, from Astoria, New York, submitted a picture of himself dressed as a character from Narnia and writes: “I made my outfit for a Halloween party, and I’ve taken it to a rain forest in Puerto Rico to take additional photos.”24 This level of fan dedication is rewarded; Nick became a finalist in the Ultimate Fan Contest. While not as complex as Star Wars or even Narnia in terms of participation, the Web site for Saw II, one film in a four-part franchise, also incorporates many of the elements of this Web site model.25 The terminology used on the Web site connotes an interaction on the part of the fans; visitors are invited to “engage,” “experience,” and “participate.” An example of participation is the “Post Your Fear” section, which is a discussion board on which visitors can post entries about things that scare them, upload accompanying

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pictures, and leave their email addresses, which serves to, presumably, verify the authenticity of the postings. There is also a link to the Saw III message board, on which fans can interact with each other. It is assumed, however, that fans will express their interest in the franchise by purchasing merchandise, and there are endless opportunities to do so. Half of the home page screen is taken up with a graphic of the Saw II DVD case (“Own it on DVD!”). When the Web site invites fans to “engage” with the movie, it means that fans will buy the DVD, mobile phone ringtones, the soundtrack, and iPod downloads. Truly dedicated fans will even seek collectible items; thus, an “auction” is offered in which props, autographs, and other items are open for bidding. Film franchises, with their origination often in other media forms, tend to have built-in audiences, and it is the exploitation of these audiences that provides studios with the means to achieve their promotional ends: to maximize sales. Finn et al. deem the use of the Internet for networking and to relay content as significant in movie marketing campaigns. It is obvious that film franchises like Star Wars use the Internet for these purposes. One must remember, though, that Lucasfilm and others do so in subservience to the overarching objective of maximizing revenue. Their strategy is somewhat different than that employed for nonfranchise films because they must cultivate audience loyalty and sustained interest in the franchise as more films in the series are released. Therefore, these Web sites tend to emphasize the availability of multiple points of entry in order to maximize the reach of potential audiences. Essentially, they are saying that the fans do not need to interact with the film, per se; any interaction with the franchise as a whole is sufficient, so long as a purchase is made. ORGANIC VIRAL MARKETING—A PERSONAL JOURNEY With comparatively fewer resources at their disposal than their corporate counterparts, independent filmmakers and small distributors must find ways to connect with film audiences so that those audiences serve as film promoters themselves. One can say that this is the independent filmmaker and small distributor’s primary promotional goal. Thus, these filmmakers are drawn to the sort of campaign modeled by The Blair Witch Project; this campaign, initiated by fans, was allowed to develop organically and virally and turned out to be an inexpensive and extremely efficient mode of promoting the film. Networking and content are key characteristics in the design and structure of these Web sites because their intended audiences seem to be drawn to the do-it-yourself nature of independent filmmaking. While a precise definition of the term viral marketing has been contested, several agree that viral marketing is a “process of encouraging honest

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communication among consumer networks.”26 The word organic is attached to viral marketing to denote a natural development of the communicative and networking process. The independent filmmaker relies primarily on Web site visitors to promote the film; as such, he or she places a great deal of trust in the role and activity of the audience. In contrast, while major film studios often incorporate viral marketing into their promotional campaigns, they do not rely solely on this tactic to promote their films. As mentioned earlier, television and newspaper advertising still represent the majority of a film’s marketing budget. Independent filmmakers often wear many different hats: They design the film’s Web site, conduct promotions, and interact personally with fans. All this happens, often, while they continue working to finish the film for which the Web site exists. Independent filmmakers emphasize their personal journeys on their Web sites; with relatively limited resources, there is little else to include. This entrée into the filmmaker’s world, via the Web site, is often met with active fan support of the film. Fans will then often spread word about the film in various online and offline venues. Thus, one promotional strategy of the independent film Web site is to make the film and the filmmakers accessible to audiences. The Web site for the film LOL is such an example.27 Made for $3,000, LOL enjoyed its theatrical debut at the 2006 South by Southwest (SXSW) Film Festival in Austin, Texas. Joe Swanberg, the film’s director (and writer/ producer/cast member), has maintained a production journal blog since the film’s inception. The blog’s entries carry an informal tone, giving the impression that the reader is participating in a comfortable conversation with Swanberg as he relates the ups and downs of independent filmmaking. “I am really excited about the fact that LOL has no real ‘cringe’ areas for me. I’m sure I will notice plenty of cringe-worthy things as I spend more time with the finished cut, but it’s nice and fresh right now, and I’m able to watch it and almost enjoy it.”28 Similarly, the Web site for Deadroom encourages its audience to visit the directors’ personal blogs, which offer a glimpse into their lives.29 These blogs serve to not only promote this film; they also document the filmmakers’ musings about other film projects. And the blog for The Cassidy Kids monitors every stage in the film’s production, from its submission to the Sundance Film Festival (Sundance turned down the film) to colorcorrecting the film print to recapping a radio interview with the director prior to the SXSW Festival in 2006.30 On the LOL Web site, Swanberg gives site visitors other opportunities to get to know him. They can communicate directly with him by posting responses to his blog, and Swanberg also posts a link to the film’s MySpace online community Web site. In addition to delivering film-related information, this site also features links to the film’s actors’ personal MySpace profiles (as well as Swanberg’s profile) and allows others to connect their MySpace

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profiles back to the LOL MySpace site.31 The producers of The Last Romantic also utilize MySpace to provide a more comprehensive Web site about the film; in fact, the movie’s official Web site is fairly minimalist, while the directors’ personal blogs are updated through MySpace.32 A significant element differentiating the organic and viral marketing Web site from that of a major studio film is the distinct lack of focus on sales. Unlike studio sites, which are saturated with merchandise purchase opportunities, LOL does not feature any links to merchandise. The filmmakers would rather their film is seen rather than make money: “[We are] all trying to figure out ways to get the movie into as many hands as possible. We all agree that giving out free DVDs is a good start, so keep checking in to find out how to get your free copy of the movie in April.”33 There are products that the LOL Web site could sell but that are instead available for free; 12 songs from the film’s soundtrack, for example, are downloadable without cost, and the site offers a free subscription to an iTunes video podcast. Even intentions to sell merchandise fall short and with seemingly little concern; the Deadroom Web site notes, “This film should be available for purchase in early 2006,” but the home video was still not available months later.34 While these freebies do often serve as calling cards of sorts for independent filmmakers hoping to break into the mainstream industry, they also signal a common belief that films should be accessible to their communities of audiences. Independent films especially are community efforts that continue to rely on their communities even after production has wrapped. Only when an independently produced film is picked up for distribution does its Web site begin to change tone. The extent to which it changes, however, is reflected in the kind of company that distributes the film. For example, The Oh in Ohio is distributed theatrically by Cyan Pictures, a small New York–based distribution company. Its Web site retains the feel of other independently produced Web sites, with links to festival appearances and critical accolades.35 The option of buying tickets to the movie is the only purchase opportunity on this Web site; one must click to another Web site in order to do so. The Web site for Boynton Beach Club features the independent aesthetic even more prominently.36 After this film secured distribution from the partnered independent distributors Samuel Goldwyn Films and Roadside Attractions, this Web site’s home page was redesigned to reflect a more stylish approach to promotion, with flash animation and a trailer that automatically plays when the page is loaded. When one clicks on “Enter Website,” however, we are led to what one can assume is the original Web site used prior to the film’s distribution deal. With amateurish design, a mish-mash of fonts, and text-heavy pages, the Web site relies on content to fill its pages. There are no purchase opportunities; there are no networking opportunities either. It is a purely functional Web site, linking to production notes and cast and crew biographies, as a supplement to the film.

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Lacking the financial wherewithal of their corporate counterparts, independent filmmakers rely on the cultivation of relationships with audiences to generate support for their films. They also use the Internet to offer information to potential distributors and film critics. The Internet has been the most effective tool with which to do so, particularly because of its accessible, affordable, and interactive characteristics. In accordance with Finn et al.’s model, Web sites are used for networking and to offer content, so that filmmakers like Swanberg can develop a rapport with fans. Purchase opportunities are almost nonexistent on these Web sites—while the filmmakers may have little to sell, they may also prefer to give unlimited access to a project of love. The independent filmmaker’s long-range marketing plan tends not to include color-coded charts à la Star Wars; in fact, a film’s promotional timeline often does not extend beyond film festival submission. CONCLUSION As movie attendance in theaters takes a hit (the Motion Picture Association of America reports that ticket sales have declined 11.5% from 2002 to 2006), major studios continually seek ways to reach audiences in order to draw them into theater seats.37 And as theater attendance declines, the reliance on ancillary markets continues to rise, and major studios pour even more resources toward sales of home videos and film-related merchandise to generate revenue. The potential for some film properties is huge; New Line Cinema has reportedly generated upwards of $2.5 billion from worldwide sales of The Lord of the Rings merchandise that includes home videos, action figures, videogames, and apparel, among other goods.38 Certainly, few films promise this phenomenal level of profits, but with DVD sales dipping (2007 saw the first decline of DVD sales by 4.5% since the format was introduced 10 years prior), studios look to expand all opportunities for revenue; this objective centrally underlies most major studio films’ Web sites.39 The major studios witnessed the success of The Blair Witch Project and thought they had found the secret ingredient to harnessing audiences and ensuring a successful theatrical and home video run. They have tried to emulate the most successful elements of the online promotional campaign, failing to realize that some of the most successful parts are successful because of something that is difficult for major studio sites to replicate: The filmmaker relates his or her personal journey taken with the film. Hollywood has undoubtedly tried to utilize this element, as studio film Web sites often feature production notes and director’s commentary. One can’t help but wonder, however, who is behind the production of these features and if they are created primarily to be included on special edition DVDs. Major studio-backed directors such as Peter Jackson, who directed the 2005 version of King Kong, face a different set of problems with filmmaking

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than their independent counterparts, which makes them less accessible to the average audience member. While one can say that Peter Jackson is traveling a personal journey with his film (which he does do on the King Kong Web site), he does not face the same trials as Joe Swanberg, for whom filmmaking is more financially risky. In an online video production diary, Jackson counts down the time before King Kong is released in theaters around the world. When he then attends the film’s world premiere in Wellington, New Zealand, Jackson thanks the “thousands and thousands of people” who helped with his film, as fans hug giant inflatable bananas.40 Joe Swanberg, on the other hand, counts down the days until a given film festival submission deadline, to which his film may or may not be accepted. The film is finally accepted and so Swanberg relates the experience of his film’s world premiere at the SXSW Film Festival in 2006: “We had the World Premiere. It was great. We’re all sick and tired and doing our best not to fall asleep at the parties. This is really the first bit of time I have had to sit down and write anything. It’s been non-stop since we arrived in Austin.”41 The categories of Web sites set forth here serve to begin the process of understanding how film studios and individual filmmakers use the Internet for promotional purposes. They highlight how disparately the Internet is approached depending on the entity that creates the Web site, for differences in resources and expectations of the audience alter the purpose of Web site promotion. The categories are not intended to be the definitive voice on Internet movie marketing; they can only describe the state of movie Web sites as they appear today. With rapidly evolving technological features and equipment, tomorrow may yield an entirely new approach to using the Internet in a film promotion campaign. As illustrated by the Web site for LOL and other independently produced films, we can observe that the social networking Web site MySpace is a significant component of the promotional campaign. The major studio film Web sites examined here did not utilize this feature; only very recently has MySpace been incorporated as a vital component for major studios. We are now starting to witness the integration of YouTube, a videosharing Web site, as a marketing tool, primarily for independent filmmakers. Susan Buice and Arin Crumley’s film Four Eyed Monsters (2005) became the first feature film to be premiered in full on YouTube. It has been the trend for independent filmmakers to first explore alternative modes of online film promotion. Only once these alternative modes have proven successful do major studios copy those tactics, translating strategies into those that fit more firmly within major studios’ promotional goals. Whether or not those strategies translate to encompass corporate objectives, such as maximizing sales to benefit the bottom line, is often subject to interpretation. Because there is relatively little research on online film marketing, there is much room for the development of ways to analyze promotional campaigns.

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This study denotes ways in which both independents and majors have adapted their practices to encompass new technologies. We can extend the distinctions made here to analyze Web sites of other kinds of movies not explored here; how do we understand activist-oriented Web sites for some documentaries? Where do foreign-produced film Web sites fit, given a range of resource availability and more practical, offline modes of promotion in other regions of the world? This structure can also perhaps be used to analyze other media through which film is promoted. Where and how do we observe the promotional objectives of sales, networking, and content in other media? Just as important, though, is the distinction between corporate and independent promotion. The Internet provides a chance for majors and independents to compete with each other on the relatively level playing field; their success is determined by how they are both able to hone their strategies. How, then, might we analyze other circumstances of corporate versus independent promotion in other media? This study is intended to initiate a more structured conversation into how the parameters of film promotion are defined. With technology constantly changing the online promotion landscape, these parameters are constantly shifting, but here, they are frozen for a moment in time so that we may examine them a little more closely. NOTES 1. Christopher Grove, “Web Gaming has Revenue Potential,” Variety, February 29, 2000, http://www.variety.com/summit/article.asp?articleID=1117776054 (accessed November 2000). 2. Michael Stroud, “Blair Witch Casts Strong Spell,” Wired Online, August 2, 1999, http://www.wired.com/news/news/culture/story/21045.html (accessed November 2000). 3. Motion Picture Association, U.S. Entertainment Industry: 2006 Market Statistics (Los Angeles: Motion Picture Association Worldwide Market Research and Analysis, 2006), 19. 4. Adam Finn et al., “Marketing Movies on the Internet: How Does Canada Compare to the U.S.?” Canadian Journal of Communication 25 (2000), 367–76. 5. Chris Gore, The Ultimate Film Festival Survival Guide, 2nd ed. (Hollywood: iFilm Publishing, 2001), 80. 6. Janet Wasko, How Hollywood Works (London: Sage Publications, 2003), 2. 7. Viacom is the parent company of Paramount Pictures; News Corporation heads up Twentieth Century Fox; Time Warner is the parent company of Warner Brothers; General Electric is the parent company of NBC Universal, which runs Universal Pictures; Sony Corporation runs Sony Pictures; and the Walt Disney Corporation owns Walt Disney Pictures. 8. Laura M. Holson, “Is There Life After ‘Star Wars’ for Lucasfilm?” The New York Times, May 1, 2005, Section 3, 1.

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9. Lionsgate, “Lions Gate Entertainment Acquires Leading UK Filmed Entertainment Distributor Redbus Film Distribution Limited,” Lionsgate Films press release, October 18, 2005, http://www.lionsgate.com/investors/pdf/redbus.pdf (accessed March 2, 2006). 10. Alisa Perren, “A Big Fat Indie Success Story? Press Discourses Surrounding the Making and Marketing of a ‘Hollywood’ Movie,” Journal of Film and Video, 56, no. 2 (2004), 20. 11. Yannis Tzioumakis, American Independent Cinema: An Introduction (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2006). 12. Fred Zufryden, “New Film Website Promotion and Box-Office Performance,” Journal of Advertising Research (January–April 2000), 55–64. 13. Janet Wasko, “Show Me the Money: Challenging Hollywood Economics,” In Toward a Political Economy of Culture: Capitalism and Communication in the TwentyFirst Century, ed. Andrew Calabrese and Colin Sparks (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2004), 131–50. 14. King Kong, directed by Peter Jackson, 2005, Universal Pictures, http://www. kingkong.com (accessed October 28, 2006). 15. Fun With Dick and Jane, directed by Dean Parisot, 2005, Sony Pictures Releasing, http://www.sonypictures.com/homevideo/funwithdickandjane/index.html (accessed October 28, 2006). 16. The Guardian, directed by Andrew Davis, 2006, Buena Vista Pictures (Disney), http://theguardian.movies.go.com (accessed October 28, 2006). 17. The Thing About My Folks, directed by Raymond de Felitta, 2005, Picturehouse Entertainment, http://www.myfolksmovie.com (accessed October 28, 2006). 18. Sally Kline, ed., George Lucas: Interviews (Conversations with Filmmakers Series) (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1999). 19. Star Wars: Episode III—Revenge of the Sith, directed by George Lucas, 2005, Lucasfilm and Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation, http://www.starwars.com (accessed October 28, 2006). 20. Lucasfilm, “Hyperspace Frequently Asked Questions,” Star Wars Hyperspace, 2006, http://www.starwars.com/hyperspace/about/faq.html (accessed October 15, 2006). 21. James Sterngold, “The Media Business: Advertising; The Return of the Merchandiser,” The New York Times, January 30, 1997, D1. 22. Ibid. 23. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, directed by Andrew Adamson, 2005, Buena Vista Pictures (Disney), http://disney.go.com/ disneypictures/narnia (accessed October 28, 2006). 24. “Ultimate Fan Contest Finalists,” The Chronicles of Narnia, http://disney.go.com/ disneypictures/narnia/fanclub/fanclub_winners.html (accessed October 28, 2006). 25. Saw II, directed by Darren Lynn Bousman, 2005, Lionsgate Films, http://www. saw2.com (accessed October 28, 2006). 26. Joseph E. Phelps et al., “Viral Marketing or Electronic Word-of-Mouth Advertising: Examining Consumer Responses and Motivations to Pass Along Email,” Journal of Advertising Research 44, no. 4 (2004), 333–48. 27. LOL, directed by Joe Swanberg, 2006, Washington Square Films, http://www. lolthemovie.com (accessed October 28, 2006).

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28. Joe Swanberg, “Working Full Time,” LOL—The Movie—Production Journal, December 6, 2005, http://www.lolthemovie.com/archive/2005_12_01_archive.html (accessed March 24, 2006). 29. Deadroom, Directed by James M. Johnston, David Lowery, Nick Prendergast, and Yen Tan, 2005, Unauthorized Productions and Red Dog Films, http://www. deadroommovie.com (accessed October 28, 2006). 30. The Cassidy Kids, Directed by Jacob Vaughan, 2006, Switchfilm and Burnt Orange Productions, http://switchfilm.com/blog/the_cassidy_kids (accessed October 28, 2006). 31. “LOL,” MySpace profile, http://www.myspace.com/lolthemovie (accessed October 9, 2007). 32. “The Last Romantic,” MySpace profile, http://www.myspace.com/thelastroman ticmovie (accessed October 9, 2007); The Last Romantic, Directed by The Brothers Nee, 2006, August Films and Pop Fiction, http://www.augustfilms.tv/lastromantic/ index.html (accessed October 28, 2006). 33. Joe Swanberg, “It’s Finished (It’s Just Getting Started),” LOL—The Movie — Production Journal, February 23, 2006, http://www.lolthemovie.com/archive/2006_ 02_01_archive.html (accessed March 24, 2006). 34. The Web site itself was unavailable in early 2008, signaling the end of Deadroom’s online promotion. “News,” Deadroom, 2006, http://www.deadroommovie.com (accessed October 28, 2006). 35. The Oh in Ohio, Directed by Billy Kent, 2006, Cyan Pictures, http://www.theohin ohio.com (accessed October 28, 2006). 36. Boynton Beach Club, Directed by Susan Seidelman, 2005, Samuel Goldwyn Films and Roadside Attractions, http://www.boyntonbeachclubthemovie.com (accessed October 28, 2006). 37. Motion Picture Association, U.S. Entertainment Industry: 2006 Market Statistics (Los Angeles: Motion Picture Association Worldwide Market Research and Analysis, 2006), 6. 38. Janet Wasko and Govind Shanadi, “More than Just Rings: Merchandise for Them All,” in The Lord of the Rings: Popular Culture in Global Context, ed. Ernest Mathijs (London and New York: Wallflower Press, 2006), 29. 39. Sue Zeidler, “DVD Sales Fall for First Time,” ABC News.com, January 3, 2008, http://abcnews.go.com/Business/IndustryInfo/wireStory?id=4082841 (accessed January 10, 2008). 40. Peter Jackson, “The Final Production Diary,” The Kong is King.net—The History of King Kong, 2006, http://img-nex.kongisking.net/kong/movies/PPD-00Weeks ToGo_qt6_high.mov (accessed March 24, 2006). 41. Joe Swanberg, “Absolutely Crazy,” LOL—The Movie—Production Journal, March 14, 2006, http://www.lolthemovie.com/archive/2006_03_01_archive.html (accessed March 24, 2006).

chapter 4

Reacting Synergistically: Batman and Time Warner Kimberly A. Owczarski

The first extended look at Warner Bros.’ Batman Begins (Christopher Nolan, 2005) immediately followed the May 2005 season finale of Smallville (2001– 2005), a television drama that centers on the life of young Clark Kent, otherwise known as the alter ego of Superman. This synergistic moment illustrates the power of contemporary media conglomerates in three distinct ways. First, a single media conglomerate was responsible for the production and airing of both the film and the television show. Produced by Warner Bros. Television, Smallville, like Batman Begins, was produced by a subsidiary of Time Warner. The airing network (the WB) was also owned by Time Warner. Second, the two superheroes’ histories have intertwined numerous times in multiple media forms, particularly in comic books because they were both created by DC Comics, another Time Warner subsidiary.1 Earlier in the decade, the two superheroes would have been pitted against each other in a feature film directed by Wolfgang Peterson had separate scripts relaunching each individual franchise not been preferred by Warner Bros. executives. Finally, the event was publicized highly through other arms of the conglomerate, including the magazine Entertainment Weekly, produced by a subsidiary of the company, Time Inc. The news of the Superman/Batman crossover was ushered in through the Entertainment Weekly Web site, often accessible through Time Warner’s Roadrunner high-speed Internet service. As this example demonstrates, the nature of media integration in contemporary Hollywood has grown increasingly complex as synergy takes place in the production and marketing aspects of the industry, as well in

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actual narrative construction. Synergy is a company’s attempt to bring “together groups of information and entertainment media that could be used to cross-promote each other’s products.”2 The key driving force in the pursuit of synergy is the franchise film, a specific branch of the blockbuster than can be exploited in multiple variations across media formats. The franchise film functions as “a two-hour promotion for a multimedia product line, designed with the structure of both the parent company and the diversified media marketplace in mind.”3 The franchise film is meant to be a launching pad for future movies, tie-in video games, and merchandise available at local department stores. The development of media conglomerates since the 1980s has ushered in an era of larger and larger franchises, in an effort to capitalize on a film’s success through (nearly) every arm of the company. In its 1993 Annual Report, Time Warner used the Batman franchise as its example for synergy. Radiating from the iconic Batman symbol used for the 1989 film were examples of the other media formats through which the property could be pushed: Comics, Licensing, Theatrical, Video, Pay TV, U.S. Network, Animation, Syndication, Theme Parks, and Music.4 Nearly each of these formats had a corresponding subsidiary within Time Warner. The Batman franchise thus exemplified Time Warner’s “World-Class Marketing and Distribution” capabilities across multiple media.5 While the Time Warner 1993 Annual Report uses the Batman franchise as its example of synergy, it does not directly state how that is achieved within the multimedia corporation other than to list the (potential) divisions involved in the process. This chapter is a case study of how the Batman franchise initially was used synergistically by Time Warner and how it continues to be a synergistic endeavor. In 1989, the successes of Batman at the box office and across multiple media functioned as a blueprint for synergy for the newly formed Time Warner. By the time Batman Begins was released, the company’s synergistic enterprises were working more in synch than anyone had anticipated in 1989, especially as the film’s promotions expanded into new media technologies. Ultimately, the Batman franchises provide an excellent case study of how the divisions of a conglomerate “react synergistically” to create and promote its key products. THE “AMAZING FUNCTIONS” OF BATMAN Each product only contains one component. The elements react synergistically, in combination. Hair spray won’t do it alone. But let’s say . . . hair spray and perfume and lipstick will be toxic and—untraceable. —Batman to Vicki Vale in Batman As Batman tells photojournalist Vicki Vale, one product is not enough—it is only in combination with other products that their greatest potential can

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be achieved. It is an apt insight about synergy by Batman given his place in Time Warner history. In 1989, a few months before the blockbuster Batman was released, Time Inc. and Warner Communications, Inc. ( WCI) announced the merger of the two companies, a merger that would create the largest multimedia corporation in the world. In the wake of this announcement, journalists and media analysts struggled with the meaning behind the spate of media mergers that occurred in the last half of the 1980s.6 In an article for The Nation in June 1989, Ben H. Bagdikian stressed: Each of these planetary corporations plans to gather under its control every step in the information process, from creation of “the product” to all the various means by which modern technology delivers media messages to the public. “ The product” is news, information, ideas, entertainment and popular culture; the public is the whole world.7

For Bagdikian, this trend was a worrying one particularly in regard to “the product,” for the corporations’ “grand strategy of synergism, increases what already is a drug on the market: commercially safe, generic, all-purpose books, films and TV programs.”8 In Bagdikian’s view, synergy stood as the base strategy of these newly forming and ever-increasing media conglomerates. Using the Batman franchise, Time Warner first put this strategy into action. With its theatrical release in June 1989, Batman became the first film to reach the $100 million mark at the domestic box office in only 10 days. In fact, the film shattered several box office records as it opened. In its first weekend at the box office, Batman broke the record for biggest Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and weekend openings ever.9 And by the end of its theatrical run, Batman emerged as second on the all-time domestic box office gross list, just behind E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (Steven Spielberg, 1982) and just before Return of the Jedi (Richard Marquand, 1983), with a domestic gross of $250 million.10 Batman also was a powerful merchandising vehicle, with over $500 million in retail sales by the end of the year.11 The two tie-in soundtracks performed solidly, and Batman comic book sales increased as a result of the film’s popularity. In reviewing the box office statistics for the films of the summer of 1989, David Ansen of Newsweek referred to Batman’s success as “a merchandising, musical and motion-picture grand slam of unprecedented proportions.”12 Although Time and Warner had not quite merged by the time of its theatrical release, Batman was the conglomerate’s first triumph, integrating synergy into every aspect of the production process. For example, in the preproduction process, producers Peter Guber and Jon Peters were concerned about the film’s eventual merchandising function. The producers wanted the screenplay to reflect more of Batman’s traditional gadgets, presumably to tie-in to merchandise and toys being developed in

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connection with the film. In regard to a scene where Bruce Wayne used a Filofax to stop a bullet, the producers asked for a Bat-gadget to be used instead, claiming that “ The point of a movie called BATMAN is to see BATMAN using a Bat device to be used to save him.” In a scene where Vicki Vale discussed bats with Batman, the producers noted: “Let’s make sure we see the various amazing functions of his cape.” When the Bat-signal was removed from the ending of the film, the producers asked, “[I]s it possible to use it elsewhere?” Finally, the producers were very concerned with the appearance of the Batmobile and responded to a scene where it was unclear what happened to the vehicle: “ We would really like to see it drive out unscathed.”13 Clearly, the producers’ emphasis on Batman’s gadgets was tied to issues of merchandising. Besides seeing to the merchandising aspects to the film, the producers also were involved in the creation of the film’s primary tie-in soundtrack by bringing in pop music star Prince. In addition to being a highly successful recording artist, Prince was also a key Warner’s commodity. He had released several albums through Warner Records, and Warner Bros. had also released his profitable film, Purple Rain (Albert Magnoli, 1984). The film featured a popular soundtrack by Prince — it was number one on the music charts for 24 consecutive weeks — and spawned several music videos.14 The origins of how Prince became involved with Batman are unclear; director Tim Burton was not sure if he was just interested in the project or if studio executives asked him to do it: I’m not sure how this happened. If it was from the producers, or Prince . . . wanted to do music for the film. That was probably my first introduction into the studio world of other things. . . . He was so prolific, and he just had done all of these songs. And a few of them felt like they were really good for the Joker. They were very Joker-esque kind of, kind of songs. So, but it was sort of a separate thing from, I mean, you know, I’m there making the movie, and then they had this whole idea for a concept album or whatever. . . . That was my, you know, first thing, first movie, where, and it was probably kind of the early beginnings for them in terms of marketing and things, you know. Like I had never heard the term franchise before, they never used it.15

What is clear is the synergy of the collaboration, even if Burton was not aware of those intentions.16 Prince’s concept album as well as the single “Batdance” and its music video were released before the film arrived in theaters. The video, described by one journalist as “the aural equivalent of a movie trailer,” featured Prince as a Gemini-type character whose costume reflects Batman on one side and the Joker on the other, both modeled on actual costumes worn by the characters in the film.17 “Batdance” also featured lines of dialogue taken directly from the film. In this regard, the use of the artist Prince, his tie-in

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soundtrack, and the music videos spawned by the album illustrated how WCI could push a product across multiple arms of the company. Another indication of WCI’s ability to push products across its multiple arms was its merchandising division, the Licensing Corp. of America (LCA), which licensed over 300 Batman items to 100 companies with products ranging from toys and clothes to sheets and other domestic products such as Batsoap on a rope.18 Because WCI had an in-company licensing source with LCA, each product sold in the marketplace earned the company between 6 and 10 percent of its wholesale price.19 Producers Guber and Peters decided to hold back many of the toys based on equipment featured in the film (including a utility belt, Batarang, and Batwing) until after the film opened in an attempt to build anticipation for the products. Indeed, merchandisers visited the production in order to view the sets, costumes, and props and also worked closely with production designer Anton Furst to develop toys that reflected the overall look of the film and characters.20 In preproduction meetings for Batman, producer Jon Peters told screenwriter Warren Skaaren that he would use his first draft as a “prototype of how I want things to be on all pictures before we go into production.”21 As the success of Batman reached from the box office to video sales to hundreds of millions of dollars in merchandise sales, it became clear that the film would be a “prototype” for other franchise films to follow, particularly with any Batman sequels. While waiting for the first forthcoming sequel, Time Warner needed to keep Batman at the forefront of popular culture. The company also continued to expand its media outlets, not only to push Batman and other corporate products in new dimensions but also to compete with rival conglomerates such as the Walt Disney Company. Throughout the 1990s, Time Warner engaged in a number of measures to promote its key properties, such as Batman, as well as to continue its status as the world’s largest media conglomerate. A year after the merger was completed, Time Warner as a whole encountered large losses as several divisions underperformed and the financial fallout from the merger was felt. Time Warner’s net losses in 1990 were $227 million, or approximately $13.67 per share.22 In 1991, the company lost $99 million, approximately $9.60 per share.23 In contrast, the smaller conglomerate of Disney earned $824 million in profits for 1990 and $817 million in profits for 1991, the second highest of the diversified service companies for both years.24 Key to Disney’s profits during those two years were synergistic franchises like The Little Mermaid, an animated film with a highly successful soundtrack and merchandising campaign. Clearly, Disney’s multimedia strategies for its key products were working for the company. In order to compete with one aspect of Disney’s dominant performance during this two-year period, Time Warner launched Warner Bros. Studio Stores in four malls in late 1991. Disney had opened over a hundred of its own retail stores over the past four years, and executives at Time Warner

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believed there would be a similar market for their company’s products. Disney’s stores were selling more than double the national average per square foot of retail space and provided an additional venue for synergy.25 Indeed, the Disney stores were the perfect opportunity to merge the studio’s various interests in its theme parks, television offerings, and films into one (consumable) retail space. Time Warner’s foray into the retail business had a similar goal. The first store, which opened in Beverly Hills in September 1991, featured larger-than-life figures of Batman and Superman, as well as a crawling space underneath Bugs Bunny for young children, and offered products ranging from animation cels to t-shirts to home furnishings. Sales at the 4 stores during the holiday season were so robust that the company pushed ahead to create 17 more retail stores within the next year. The opening of the Warner Bros. Studio Stores provided Time Warner with a direct retail space for the selling of products related to their key properties. According to Peter Starrett, Warner Bros. Senior Vice President and Director of Retail at the time, this was the main purpose for launching the stores: “[ T ]here was nothing that placed all the properties under one roof, into one cohesive state. . . . The studio stores bring us one step closer to the customer with the highest quality of Warner Bros. property.”26 In another attempt to compete with Disney, Time Warner also ventured into theme parks. In 1991, Time Warner joined with two other firms to take over the debt-ridden Six Flags Amusement Parks, creating Six Flags Entertainment. According to Robert Pittman, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Six Flags Entertainment, the corporate backing of Time Warner was a step to push the amusement parks in a more profitable direction by using the company’s key assets as promotional tools: “Now that it has an entertainment company behind it, we can reach into our movies, TV shows and characters the way Disney does.”27 In June 1992, the Six Flags Magic Mountain Park in California launched the Batman Stunt Show and Batman Nights: Fireworks & Laser Show. On the two shows’ impact on the parks, Pittman claimed Batman’s presence was a substantial benefit: Bringing Six Flags into the Time Warner family offered us an opportunity to take Batman, one of Time Warner’s premier properties, into an entertaining new sphere never available to us. . . . This is an example of how the brand influence of Time Warner holdings will be working together and helping each other.28

Indeed, Warner Bros. did benefit from this arrangement because the presence of the two shows provided further promotion for the next Batman film, which opened in June 1992. The presence of Batman at the Six Flags parks also helped spur admissions for 1992. In the Annual Report for 1992, Time Warner’s Chairman and

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Chief Executive Officer Gerald Levin composed a letter to shareholders that reiterated how properties like Batman work across the various arms of Time Warner, including Six Flags: Copyright protection makes our mission possible. With it, we are able to take the words and images we produce and sell them over and over, through many different media, in many different markets, for the lifetime of the copyright. Six Flags, for example, the theme-park company in which we own a 50% interest, made increasing use of Time Warner copyrights such as Looney Tunes, Batman, and Sports Illustrated to help achieve 1992’s record attendance.29

In addition to the two shows at the Magic Mountain Park, Six Flags had also initiated a highly successful Batman ride at its Great America theme park in Chicago in May 1992. Advertised as the first “suspended, outside-looping roller coaster,” Batman the Ride provided not only the thrilling experience of the ride itself but also of the property as well. With lines running over an hour and a half before boarding, visitors were enmeshed in the “Gotham City ‘environment’ ” as they waited.30 For a similar roller coaster that opened a year later at AstroWorld in Houston, Texas, George Ladyman, the Design Director of Six Flags, claimed that this environment was part of an immersive experience with the character’s world: “We design a lot differently from a film. . . . A film is purely visual, but here it’s three-dimensional. You can actually walk through ours. You can knock on the penguins.”31 The environment for the AstroWorld roller coaster, Batman: The Escape, was modeled on the 1992 film Batman Returns, and designers for the roller coaster actually visited the film’s sets.32 Indeed, both roller coasters used aspects of the film’s soundtracks in the waiting areas, either from the orchestral scores created by Danny Elfman, pop songs created by Prince, or snippets of dialogue from the films themselves. Thus, Time Warner merged aspects of its film, music, and amusement park capabilities through these Batman rides. In September 1992, a new animated program about Batman premiered on the Fox television network. Produced by Tim Burton, Batman: The Animated Series (1992 –1995) mimicked the dark and foreboding atmosphere of the 1989 and 1992 films.33 The show was initially geared toward older teens and young adults, which informed the approach taken for the animation style as well as the narrative construction. In December 1992, Fox began to premiere episodes of Batman: The Animated Series in prime time because reruns of the show that had aired in that time slot did better in the ratings than previously offered fare. Although the show was aimed at an older audience, Batman: The Animated Series did well with younger audiences, too. In Time Warner’s 1992 Annual Report, the show was highlighted as the top-rated daytime children’s show for ages 2–11 as well as for commanding the highest priced advertisement ever for an animated show aired during the day time.34

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All of these additional venues for Batman helped promote the film’s sequel, Batman Returns, when it was released in theaters in June 1992 and on video in October of the same year. Burton did not imagine the film as a sequel and referred to it as a further episode of the Batman story in interviews about the film. In the foreword to Batman Returns: The Official Movie Book, Burton explained this point clearly: So let me begin by saying that Batman Returns is not really a sequel to Batman. It doesn’t pick up where the first film left off. The sets for Gotham City are completely new. There are lots of new elements in the visuals and storyline that haven’t been seen before. Even Batman’s costume has been revised. The point was to make it all feel fresh and new. It was the only way I could envision the movie.35

Because of his success with the first film, Burton was given much more freedom with the sequel’s production. Executives at Time Warner treated the project as Burton’s personal film, hoping that a hands-off attitude would result in another Batman film that broke box office records. Rather than focus on Bruce Wayne or Batman, who are barely seen in the first 40 minutes of the film, he centered the story on the villainous exploits of the Penguin and Catwoman. Many reviewers remarked on how close these characters were to the outsider characters in previous Burton films and repeatedly used the word “personal” in their reviews to stress that they saw this film as an auteur’s, rather than a studio’s, work.36 Burton chose to include the song “Face to Face” from punk band Siouxie and the Banshees (of which he was a self-described fan) rather than music from a more accessible, mainstream artist, especially one that recorded for one of Warner’s many record labels. His choice not to select a Warner’s recording artist highlighted his refusal to engage in the synergistic wishes of the company. Although representatives from toy companies and other merchandising partners did have access to the Batman Returns set, as they did with the first film, Burton did not particularly welcome this aspect of the business. Indeed, he viewed it as a problem and distraction: [B]eyond that, the other aspects of it, the, you know, the, the merchandising, all that stuff that is now become such commonplace stuff was not a thing that I probably handled well, or dealt well with, or liked. So, the movie is the movie . . . You got a huge job just to make the movie. And, eh, so all of this other stuff is, is necessary to them, the studio and all the people, but for me it’s just more of a problem and distraction. And, eh, you know, it’s hard for me to tell, you know, a toy company what something’s going to look like when I don’t even know myself. You know, you get into that kind of stuff. And, eh, you know, then you keep wondering why you make,

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you know, a movie in like several months and it takes, you know, them the same time to make a T-shirt. You know, there’s a weird juxta . . . it’s a weird time warp, you know, with like how long you have and how long they have and need.37

His refusal to cooperate fully with the needs and desires of the merchandising partners may have helped spur the companies’ backlash against the franchise after Batman Returns opened. Before Burton had even agreed to direct and produce the second film, Time Warner had secured many high-profile merchandising deals for the Batman franchise. Directly after the success of Batman and its associated merchandise in 1989, representatives from Time Warner began to approach potential merchandising partners. Warner Bros. Worldwide Consumer Products, formerly LCA, had signed over a hundred licenses in the United States before the film opened with companies such as Kenner Toys, Ralston Purina (for a Batman-centered cereal), and Sears (for Batman boutiques in some 300 stores). Dan Romanelli, the president of Warner’s Consumer Products Division, believed this to be the logical next step in Batman merchandising: This is probably the strongest alignment of promotional and licensing agreements in history. . . . I think that ’89 was unprecedented, and I think this is going to be bigger. We didn’t have the animated series in 1989 and with that, the retail community and the licensees are very happy with that support.38

Indeed, Time Warner provided an additional forum for pushing Batman Returns products through advertising on the newly created Batman: The Animated Series, which was set to air on the Fox television network in the Fall. With the number of child-oriented licenses and the pending arrival of a new Batman-centered cartoon, Batman Returns was poised to be a film acceptable for young children. Like the first film, Batman Returns was rated PG -13 and many families brought younger children to see it. No doubt, the film’s tie-in toy and merchandising partners such as McDonald’s emphasized it as a film acceptable for smaller children. However, its graphic violence and content (which included electrocutions, a deformed baby, a mutant gang, and Catwoman dressed in fetishistic leather and wielding a whip) hardly seemed appropriate for younger viewers. As parents and parents’ groups complained to Time Warner and merchandising partners, it became clear that Burton had led the film franchise in a direction incompatible with the commercial interests of the company. As a result of the complaints McDonald’s received for its involvement with Batman Returns, the fast-food company changed its merchandising practices significantly, requiring extended looks at films before partnership agreements would even be considered. Toy sales were slow, and

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comic book sales were not positively affected by the film. Rather than driving the revenues of other divisions of Time Warner as the first film had done, Batman Returns became a public relations nightmare. THE “TOYETIC” BATMAN Although Batman Returns was Time Warner’s top film for the year and second in terms of domestic box office grosses for the entire industry, it was not considered a success. Batman Returns grossed $163 million at the domestic box office and propelled Warner Bros. to first place in market share for 1992, but its earnings were less than two-thirds of the first film. After the backlash Batman Returns suffered, Time Warner executives knew that a new direction for Batman was necessary if the franchise was to continue. Their first decision was to keep Burton from doing a third film even though he had been entertaining the thought of staying on for one more film. Instead, a director who had worked faithfully for the studio before, Joel Schumacher, was chosen to lighten up the series.39 Claimed Romanelli: “We knew we had a problem. . . . We knew that people felt the last film was kind of dark. We really turned around the feeling about Batman as a movie franchise, and Joel was key to that strategy.”40 In the film’s preproduction stage, Schumacher met with many potential merchandising partners to emphasize how he was changing the course of the franchise, and he also went to the Toy Fair with the same message.41 As a result of Schumacher’s and the studio’s efforts to convince partners that the film would have a lighter tone, Batman Forever attracted over 200 sponsors from products ranging from fast food to toothpaste. Even McDonald’s came back for the third film, convinced that the film would be more appropriate for younger viewers. Schumacher’s take on Batman worked. Batman Forever was the top grossing film for 1995, earning more than $184 million at the domestic box office. It set a new opening weekend box office record at $52.8 million. It was not just the box office figures, however, that made the film a success. Unlike the previous film, Batman Forever pushed its success across multiple arms of Time Warner. After its opening weekend, the company’s stock rose $2.50 per share to $43.12, a high it had not seen in over a year.42 The soundtrack, featuring songs by Seal and U2, had sold over a million copies by July. Attendance at Six Flags Parks, several of which had received new Batman rides and a few had Batmancentered entertainment shows that year, was up significantly. Warner’s retail stores, which had temporarily changed their name to Batman Headquarters, had doubled their sales from 1994.43 Videos by both Seal and U2 were popular on MTV, further promoting the film. The film itself also featured references to other Time Warner entities—particularly, two key magazines that were part of Time Inc. In Chase Meridian’s apartment, Bruce Wayne thumbs through her Batman-related research materials and finds a “Times” and a “Persons” magazine, each replicating the look of Time and People magazines, respectively.

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Batman Forever thus integrated multiple arms of Time Warner not only in terms of its promotional activities but also within the text itself. Batman Forever was also the first time a Batman film had a Web site. The Web site, however, did not just promote the film; it also promoted other arms of the company. The Web site took three months to complete and was part of a campaign integrating traditional and new media outlets for advertising. The film’s ABC television special, MTV documentary, and posters all featured the Web address, and posters placed in subways and bus stations simply featured the Batman logo with the address.44 The main page was set up to reflect the streets of Gotham, and this hub provided opportunities for users to go to the Gotham Cinema, where trailers of Batman Forever were available; the Gotham Library, which held sneak peaks at several forthcoming Batman comics by DC Comics; Gotham Radio Station, where sound clips from the tie-in songs could be heard; and the Gotham Art Gallery, where photographs from the film could be accessed.45 Although the use of the Internet as a promotional device was new to film studios, Warner Bros. used the Web site for Batman Forever as a new way to target its core audience and promote multiple products related to the Batman franchise. As a company, Time Warner continued to expand into other media for additional venues to push its key products, such as Batman. In August 1995, Time Warner announced that the company would purchase Turner Broadcasting System from mogul Ted Turner. Through this deal, Time Warner would gain cable networks CNN, TNT, TBS, the Cartoon Network, and Turner Classic Movies as well as studios New Line Cinema, Castle Rock Pictures, and Hanna-Barbera Cartoons Inc. A key focus of the merger was to strengthen brands already owned by Time Warner through the additional media outlets provided by Turner Broadcasting. In the 1996 Annual Report for Time Warner, the company states that “Global distribution in traditional and electronic media strengthens and popularizes powerful brands.”46 The next page features four of Time Warner’s and Turner’s driving brands— Batman, Sports Illustrated, CNN, and Looney Tunes—and provides examples of how these brands are carried through multiple components of the company. The brand of Batman, for example, is characterized by TV animation, comics, film, merchandise, theme parks, and soundtracks. In the Warner Bros. Entertainment section of this annual report, the relationship between these arms is spelled out clearly: “Retailing, licensing and theme parks reinforce the power of Warner Bros.’ brands, turning hits into entertainment franchises that become more valuable over time.”47 Given the success of Batman Forever in terms of box office grosses and merchandising dollars, another sequel was inevitable for the Batman franchise. Immediately after the third film hit theaters and broke box office records during the summer of 1995, the fourth film was put on the fast track for a 1997 release, which provided less than two years for the film to be planned, shot, and released. Indeed, theaters were booked for its release before a single

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frame was even shot. Wanting to avoid a public relations debacle like Batman Returns, the fourth film was set up using the highly successful Batman Forever as its blueprint. As with the previous film, Schumacher was charged with lightening up the franchise. According to Schumacher, “[ T ]here was a real desire at the studio to keep it more family-friendly, more kid-friendly. And, a word I had never heard before, more toyetic, which means that what you create makes toys that can sell.”48 Toy manufacturers had a considerable hand in designing the costumes, Batmobile, and Bat-gadgets used in Batman and Robin. Schumacher worked closely with representatives from Kenner, “[R]obbing each other’s ideas” to create stronger sets, props and costume elements for both the film and licensed products, from villain Mr. Freeze’s (Arnold Schwarzenegger) Freezemobile to Robin’s cycle. One result of the[ir] early collaboration is six times the number of action figures with the latest installment than with the previous one.49

Many of these toys were sold through the Warner Bros. Studio stores, which changed their design to reflect a “freeze” from the film’s main villain through icicle-laced décor, life-sized copies of the Mr. Freeze character, and prop ice floes.50 In relation to the release of Batman and Robin, Time Warner enlisted a slew of tie-in partners. Executives at Time Warner secured $125 million worth of promotional partners, from companies such as Frito Lay, Taco Bell, Kellogg’s, and Amoco.51 Frito Lay placed images from the film on several of the company’s leading chip brands as well as on in-store displays, while Taco Bell offered collectible cups and dressed the fast food chain’s restaurants with promotional images on its windows. Kellogg’s featured Batman characters on several cereals, Pop-Tarts, and Eggo’s waffles, which displayed the Bat signal. Michael Gough, the actor who played Alfred, pumped gas at an Amoco gas station in a television commercial, and the gas company featured Batman images on its pumps across the United States. Bob Schneider, Senior Vice President of Worldwide Promotions for Time Warner’s consumer products division, claimed the purpose of these tie-ins was to add additional promotional opportunities for the film; it is a process that “creates a billboard effect, whether you’re driving past a Taco Bell or down a supermarket aisle.”52 Indeed, given the vast number of promotional tie-ins for the film, Schumacher quipped: “I’ve become a total Batman slut.”53 BATMAN AND HIGH-TECH SYNERGY Batman and Robin did not only rely on traditional media sources as promotional devices; like the previous film, it also made extensive use of the Internet. The Web site had many of the same features as the site for Batman

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Forever —audio files from the film’s soundtrack, trailers, photographs of the cast, games, and downloadable posters. However, the online marketing campaign for Batman and Robin expanded beyond the film’s Web site. The compact disc of the soundtrack, which featured artists such as Smashing Pumpkins, R. Kelly, Jewel, and R.E.M., also provided software for Prodigy Internet access. Users who popped the disc into CD-ROM drives on their computers would be brought automatically to the film’s Web site.54 Two of the film’s stars—Arnold Schwarzenegger and George Clooney—chatted live with fans on Prodigy days before the film opened.55 The world premiere of the film was Web cast via E! Online’s site, and featured interviews with the stars as well as live audio and video feeds of the stars’ arrivals.56 While Batman and Robin relied heavily on Internet promotions, the expanding medium offered a few wrinkles to the film’s online strategy. Aint It Cool News, an upstart Web site in Austin, Texas, was fast-developing as one of the most powerful entertainment sites on the Internet. Aint It Cool News provided a forum for user commentaries on preview screenings of studio films. The site’s creator, Harry Knowles, ran a scathing review of Batman and Robin before the film even opened in theaters. According to Knowles, Schumacher derailed the Batman franchise: First, let me say that Joel Schumacher should be shot and killed. I will pay a handsome bounty to the man (or woman) who delivers me the head of this Anti Christ. He has single-handedly destroyed what started out to be a great series of films.57

Chris Pula, head of publicity for Warner Bros. at the time, criticized Knowles’ running of the review, claiming he had not seen the finished print, and his review could affect the film’s overall reception. Knowles responded by putting 52 separate reviews of the film on his site —all negative. Mass media outlets, including People, featured the story about the conflict between Pula and Knowles before the film even opened.58 The negative sentiment about Batman and Robin echoed on this Web site and others led to an underwhelming run at the box office. Although Batman and Robin was the top film for Warner Bros. in 1997, it grossed only $107 million at the domestic box office and was the ninth film for the year overall. The failure of Batman and Robin at the box office extended not just to its grosses but to the company’s overall bottom line. Time Warner’s market share plummeted to fourth, its worst finish among its rival studios since 1982. Ravaged by film critics and fans alike, the film’s weak performance put the Batman film franchise on hiatus for several years. While the film franchise was in hiatus, a number of television versions of Batman emerged. Batman Gotham Knights (1997–1999) premiered shortly after the failure of Batman and Robin as part of The New Batman/Superman

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Adventures block on Time Warner’s network, the WB. Batman Gotham Knights was a continuation of Batman: The Animated Series. Batman Beyond (1999 – 2001), also on the WB, was part of the network’s popular block of Saturday morning cartoons aimed at children and examines the birth of a new Batman after Bruce Wayne has retired. In 2002, a live-action spin-off from the Batman mythos, Birds of Prey (2002 – 2003), debuted on the WB in primetime and followed the exploits of the Huntress, the illegitimate daughter of Batman and Catwoman. Finally, The Batman premiered on the WB in 2004, and as of 2008, it remains on the air on the CW.59 The Batman follows a young Batman as he attempts to establish himself in Gotham City. At one point, executives at Time Warner planned on adapting one of these television versions of Batman —Batman Beyond— into a live-action film. Indeed, in between Batman and Robin in 1997 and Batman Begins in 2005, three high-profile film sequels were instigated but subsequently abandoned as Time Warner executives struggled to find the right approach to restart the film franchise. Ultimately, Christopher Nolan was selected to helm the next Batman film, and his approach to the franchise mimicked his award-winning independent film background, which included Memento (2000), a film told in reverse order. Nolan’s use of an unconventional narrative structure, a realistic aesthetic, and a twist in the third act differentiated Batman Begins from the other Batman films and linked directly with the style he had shown in his previous, independent film work. By refocusing on the start of Batman’s career as a crimefighter, Nolan’s film rebooted the franchise, throwing out a number of the aspects developed in the previous films. Although Warner Bros. entrusted the lucrative franchise to a formerly independent filmmaker, the company hedged its bets on the film’s performance by investing a lot of energy (and dollars) into promoting the film. Rumored to have had a $100 million marketing campaign, nearly as much as the film’s production budget, Batman Begins received a substantial amount of press coverage because of these promotional activities.60 For example, Time Warner sponsored a NASCAR race at the Michigan International Speedway called the “Batman Begins 400” on June 19, 2005, the first time a specific film had ever been the primary tie-in. According to Romanelli, the sponsorship of the event was about linking the speed and excitement of NASCAR to the film: We’re looking forward to pairing the on-screen excitement of Batman Begins to the on-track excitement of NASCAR. . . . A fast car, the BatmobileTM, and a host of high-tech gadgets have always been key to Batman’s success in fighting his way to victory over crime. As NASCAR’s finest drivers take to the track on June 19 for the Batman Begins 400 at Michigan International Speedway, they will utilize all of the high-tech gadgets at their disposal to take their team to victory lane.61

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One of the Batmobiles used for the film worked as the pace car for the event, and Batman Begins merchandise was available for purchase throughout the stadium. In another promotional venue, Batman Begins was adapted into a stunt show at several Six Flag parks. As it opened in early June 2005, the Batman Begins Stunt Show featured special effects, fighting sequences, and a car chase featuring the Batmobile. According to Del Holland, the Vice President and General Manager of the Six Flags Magic Mountain Park, it was the most elaborate stunt show the park had ever produced.62 In addition to these promotional events, Batman Begins also relied on promotional partners such as Dell. Dell products were prominently featured in the film, and the June 2005 catalog for Dell features stills from Batman Begins throughout its 50 pages. In the last few pages of the catalog, Dell products are specifically associated with the film. Under the headline “Awesome movie . . . awesome gear,” the copy foregrounds this relationship: “Look for DellTM products in the summer blockbuster Batman Begins. And now you can make this equipment your own for as little as $6 a month — proof positive that you don’t need to be an orphaned vigilante billionaire to get your hands on some awesome tech.”63 Gear such as the Dell Axim X50 are described in relation to Batman, “[ N ]o utility belt should be without one,” while the Dell Dimension XPS Gen 5 desktop computer “is always ready to take on the bad guys.”64 The catalog also featured the film’s logo and release date several times, further promoting the film. In addition to these promotional outlets, Batman Begins featured a comprehensive Web site. The film’s Web site, like the previous two films in the franchise, linked together several divisions of Time Warner through tie-in products. The comic books and graphic novels that influenced the story and look of Batman Begins were especially highlighted. In fact, three of these stories were later bundled together for the DVD release of the film and included in its packaging.65 Other aspects of the site emphasized the gadgetry used in the film, particularly the reimagined Batmobile, all of which became merchandise available at local stores. The film’s Web site also promoted a mobile game, allowing users the opportunity to download a program and play as Batman on their cell phones. Unlike Batman and Robin, which received a critical drubbing from hardcore fans prior to its release, Internet fan sites heavily promoted Batman Begins as a return to the property’s darker roots based on the materials available on the Web site, the trailers, and in promotional materials. This positive word-of-mouth was also echoed in the critical reviews of the film once it was released. Ultimately, Batman Begins became the ninth highest grossing film of 2005, with $205 million at the domestic box office and another $166 million from the international box office. As the second highest earning film in the franchise, the film’s direction not only signaled that a sequel would follow but also that the Internet would play an even bigger role in the next film’s promotion.

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With The Dark Knight still in production, and not set for release until the summer of 2008, Warner Bros. instigated a viral marketing campaign during the summer of 2007 to promote the film. A few days after the official Warner Bros. Web site for the film launched, Joker cards started appearing in specialty comic shops. The official Warner Bros. Web site featured a campaign poster for Harvey Dent, running for District Attorney, with the tagline “I Believe In Harvey Dent,” while the Joker cards featured the Web site address IBelieveInHarveyDentToo.com. The same poster appeared at the second site, but it was defaced. In investigating the page, users entered their email addresses when prompted and then received an email message that gave the location of one pixel that was to be removed from the Web site. As more users investigated the page, provided their email addresses, and clicked onto their pixels, a new image was revealed. Fans, using sites such as Aint It Cool News, spread the word about the site, which soon displayed a hidden picture of the Joker, the first public image of the character featured in the sequel. The move to this Internet-centered viral campaign for a major franchise is part of the company’s expanding digital strategy. In the late 1990s, Time Warner shifted to a more digital focus for the entire company, culminating in the merger with America On Line, Inc. (AOL). In January 2000, the two companies announced the merger to create AOL Time Warner, and the newly combined company represented the first high-profile junction of old and new media companies. Levin’s address to stockholders in the 1999 Annual Report (released in 2000) stressed that with their combination, AOL and Time Warner together would “achieve . . . what neither company could have achieved on its own: a media-savvy, Internet-intelligent, customer-focused company with multiple revenue streams from branded subscriptions, advertising and commerce, and content.”66 Aligning with the premiere portal and brand on the Internet was thought to give the company the outlet it needed to flourish in the new media environment. Indeed, Levin identified this as the key benefit of the merger: “ This strategic combination with AOL accelerates the digital transformation of Time Warner by giving our creative and content businesses the widest possible canvas.”67 Barry Meyer, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Warner Bros., echoed Levin’s statement in terms of how the Internet could aid film franchises such as Batman: “An expanded Internet platform offers us valuable opportunities for distribution, product promotion and brand extension now and in the future.”68 The merger with AOL has been fraught with setbacks, as both the division and the entire company suffered enormous losses due to accounting scandals, a decrease in spending for advertising on the Internet, and the substantial loss of subscribers to AOL. Indeed, these problems led to AOL being dropped from the company’s name in late 2003, although AOL still remains a division of Time Warner at present. However, AOL has provided an “expanded Internet platform” for the company’s many products. For franchises

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such as Batman, this digital focus has extended the films’ promotional activities specifically into the Internet and other emerging technologies, such as mobile communications. Indeed, as Time Warner continues to expand, so too do the outlets available for promoting key products such as the Batman franchise. With Batman arriving in theaters just a few months after the announcement of the merger of Time Inc. and Warner Communications Inc., the film franchise and the media conglomerate have been intimately linked from the very start. As Time Warner has expanded its multimedia capabilities since 1989, so too have the outlets available to promote the Batman film franchise and its associated products expanded as a result. In recent years, the franchise has adapted to engage in emerging technologies, including DVDs, the Internet, and mobile communications. And as The Dark Knight’s viral marketing campaign attests, Time Warner continues to expand its multimedia promotional activities in new directions. The results of this focus have yet to be seen for The Dark Knight, but if the grosses of Batman Begins are any indication, this focus on generating buzz a year before its release through the use of innovative campaigns on the Internet will most likely result in another profitable outing for the Batman franchise. The Batman franchise was the company’s key franchise during the 1990s, and only after it faltered in 1997 did Time Warner expand its film franchise focus to include other properties. In recent years, Time Warner’s successful franchises have included a new Superman franchise, The Lord of the Rings trilogy (through subsidiary New Line Cinema), the Harry Potter films, The Matrix franchise, and the Ocean’s 11 franchise. Together, these franchises re-established Time Warner as the most formidable film company, as both Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema dominated the film industry. Since the early 1990s, other studios also have geared up their franchise focus in order to compete with Time Warner. However, no company has had as many successful film franchises as Time Warner since 1999, nor the consistent profits these films garner at the box office or in terms of merchandising dollars. Since the merger with AOL in 2000, Time Warner has remained the top entertainment company on the Fortune 500 list, surpassing other conglomerates such as Walt Disney and Viacom in total revenues. Led by its Filmed Entertainment division, Time Warner’s multimedia capabilities enable its key properties to flourish in the competitive marketplace. CONCLUSION By examining Time Warner’s key film franchise, Batman, as both it and the company have developed, its history provides a number of telling details about the current state of the industry. First, it is increasingly clear that discussing the film industry separate from other multimedia industries neglects

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their integrated nature. Not only are these industries housed in the same conglomerate through multiple subsidiaries, but also their promotional aspects are becoming more and more enmeshed throughout the life cycle of the film property. Second, multiple film franchises have become an essential ingredient in the construction of a media company’s slate. Where one key tentpole picture a year may have sufficed during much of the 1990s to ensure a company’s profitability, the competitive nature of the film industry now requires the conglomerates to create several franchises simultaneously in order to be profitable. Time Warner, for example, had two franchise films in 2005 in the top 10 grossing films for the year: Batman Begins and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Mike Newell), which emerged as the industry’s second highest grossing film in domestic theaters with over $275 million. Finally, the influx of independent film talent into franchise films has become an important ingredient in their profitability. Besides Nolan and Batman Begins, talent from independent film has been a key part of every Time Warner franchise, as noted previously. As I discussed at the beginning of this chapter, Ben Bagdikian worried that the conglomerate’s growing use of synergy in 1989 would lead to “commercially safe, generic, all-purpose books, films and TV programs.” By 2005 and the arrival of Batman Begins, it was clear that synergy did work to create “commercially safe” films with a multitude of products available to help ensure profitability. What he could not have predicted in 1989 is the extent to which synergy was rooted into the film franchise’s preproduction, production, and marketing aspects. Nor could he have predicted this turn to independent film talent in heading these franchises. The unconventional nature of Batman Begins demonstrates, however, that these films do not have to be generic. Indeed, as the film market becomes more competitive, particularly with the increase in franchise films produced in the industry, product differentiation has become an essential aspect of the franchise film experience. As Time Warner and the Batman franchise exemplify, the conglomerates and their key products “react synergistically” to the challenges inherent in the developing industry. NOTES 1. Other examples of the crossover between Batman and Superman can be seen in graphic novels such as Batman: Hush by Jeph Loeb, Jim Lee, and Scott Williams; Saturday morning cartoons such as Justice League aired on the Cartoon Network since 2001; and issues of 1940s comic books such as All Star Comics. 2. Stephen Prince, ed., American Cinema of the 1980s: Themes and Variations ( New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2007), 51. 3. Thomas Schatz, “The Return of the Hollywood Studio System,” in Conglomerates and the Media, ed. Patricia Aufderheide (New York: The New Press, 1997), 74. 4. Time Warner, 1993 Annual Report (New York: Time Warner, 1994), 10.

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5. Ibid. 6. News Corporation, incorporated in Australia under Rupert Murdoch, purchased Hollywood film studio Twentieth Century Fox in 1985 and launched the fourth television network, Fox, in 1986. Japanese company Sony Corporation purchased CBS Records in 1987 and Columbia Pictures Entertainment Inc. later in 1989 for a strong base in the production of the cultural software associated with their audio and video hardware technologies. These mergers and acquisitions were large-scale attempts to diversify the entertainment holdings of the parent company. 7. Ben H. Bagdikian, “The Lords of the Global Village,” The Nation, June 12, 1989, 805. 8. Ibid., 815. 9. Joseph McBride, “ ‘Batman’ Swoops to Conquer,” Variety, June 26, 1989, 2. 10. A. D. Murphy, “ ‘Bat’ Has the Speed, ‘E.T.’ the Endurance; Top Pic to Remain So,” Variety, August 9, 1989, 2. 11. Joanne Lipman, “Movie Merchandising Takes Off, Bat-Style,” Wall Street Journal, January 5, 1990, 4. 12. David Ansen, “Boffo Box Office Big Boost to Biz.” Newsweek, July 31, 1989, 61. 13. All quotations in this paragraph from Warner Bros. and The Guber-Peters Company, Inter-Office Memo to Tim Burton, August 30, 1988, Warren Skaarren Collection, Series I, Box 2, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, The University of Texas at Austin. 14. Edna Gundersen, “Prince’s Batting Record: A Big Hit Soundtrack,” USA Today, July 17 1989, D1 in Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed February 21, 2006). 15. Tim Burton, audio commentary, Batman, Batman: The Motion Picture Anthology, DVD. Directed by Burton, 1989. Warner Home Video, 2005. 16. In the October 10, 1988, draft of the screenplay, two of the sequences that ultimately used Prince’s songs (the Flugelheim Museum and parade sequences) simply state “music,” with no indication of what music would be played. The screenwriters themselves were not aware of the collaboration with Prince by this date, which was the first day of principal photography. Sam Hamm and Warren Skaaren, screenplay of Batman, fifth draft, October 10, 1988, Warren Skaarren Collection, Series I, Box 6, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin. 17. Gundersen, “Prince’s New Single: Holy Funk, Batman,” USA Today, June 2, 1989, D1, in Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed February 21, 2006). 18. Business Week, “Holy Bootlegger! What a Lot of Phony Batstuff !” July 17, 1989, 70. 19. John Horn, “Batman Merchandise Flys into Town,” Associated Press, June 13 1989. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 21, 2005). 20. Bill Barol, “Batmania,” Newsweek, June 26, 1989, 73 –74. 21. Warren Skaaren, Studio Notes, September 7, 1988, Warren Skaaren Collection, Series I, Box 2, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, The University of Texas at Austin. 22. Fortune, “ The Service 500,” June 3, 1991, 260 –61. 23. Fortune, “ The Service 500,” June 1, 1992, 174 –75. 24. Fortune, “ The Service 500,” 1991, 260; “ The Service 500,” 1992, 206.

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25. Dave McNary, “ Warner Bros. Opens Studio Stores,” United Press International September 20 1991. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed September 20, 2006). 26. Barbara Hogan, “ Now Playing at Retail,” Billboard, June 13, 1992, 47. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed September 19, 2006). 27. Sonia Murray, “Six Flags to Take Cue from Mickey, Launch Ad Blitz with Batman, Bugs,” Atlanta Journal and Constitution, March 5, 1992, B1. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed September 20, 2006). 28. Quoted in Murray, “Six Flags,” B1. 29. Time Warner, 1992 Annual Report (New York: Time Warner, 1993), 5–6. 30. Ibid., 3. 31. Louis B. Parks, “Batman the Escape,” Houston Chronicle, December 19, 1992, 1. LexisNexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed September 19, 2006). 32. Ibid., 1. 33. The show ran for three years and spawned an animated feature film released in theaters in 1993, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, as well as a direct-to-video title, Batman and Mr. Freeze: SubZero, in 1998. 34. Time Warner, 1992 Annual Report, 36 –37. 35. Quoted in Michael Singer, Batman Returns: The Official Movie Book ( New York: Bantam Books, 1992), 6. 36. For example, Eleanor Ringel’s review for the Atlanta Journal and Constitution calls the film “a personal work,” and Todd McCarthy of Variety argues that “Burton has once again managed to pursue his quirky personal concerns in the context of broadly commercial entertainment.” Eleanor Ringel, “Caped Crusader Returns: Will Fans Go Batty Again?” Rev. of Batman Returns. Atlanta Journal and Constitution, June 14, 1992, N1. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 26, 2005); Todd McCarthy, rev. of Batman Returns, Variety, June 15, 1992. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 26, 2005). 37. Tim Burton, audio commentary, Batman Returns, Batman: The Motion Picture Anthology, DVD. Directed by Burton, 1992. Warner Home Video, 2005. 38. Quoted in Anita M. Busch, “ ‘Batman’ Makeover Lures Back Promo Partners,” Variety, May 1, 1995, 1+. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed May 30, 2005). 39. Schumacher’s previous two films had been for Warner Bros.: Falling Down (1993), starring Michael Douglas; and The Client (1994), an adaptation of the popular John Grisham novel. 40. Quoted in Busch, “ ‘Batman’ Makeover,” 1. 41. Ibid. 42. Paul Farhi, “ Holy 52-Week High, Batman!” Washington Post, June 20, 1995, D2. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 1, 2006). 43. Music and Copyright, “Batman Forever Film Hugely Popular,” July 5, 1995. LexisNexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 1, 2006).

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44. Robert Silverman, “ ‘Batman Forever’ World Wide Web Site to Be Center of National Advertising Campaign,” Interactive Age, May 8, 1995, 1+. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 2, 2006). 45. Dave Jewett, “Batman Forever: Hitch a Ride On Your Computer to Gotham City, Courtesy of the World Wide Web and Warner Bros.,” The Columbian, June 16, 1995, D13. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 2, 2006); Silverman, “ ‘Batman Forever.’ ” 46. Time Warner, 1996 Annual Report ( New York: Time Warner, 1997), 4. 47. Ibid., 8. 48. Joel Schumacher, interview, Shadows of the Bat: The Cinematic Saga of the Dark Knight Part 6: Batman Unbound, Batman: The Motion Picture Anthology, DVD. (Warner Home Video, 2005). 49. Karen Benezra, “Hollywood Wants More Integration,” Brandweek, May 26, 1997, 8. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 22, 2005). 50. Business Week, “ Warner Bros. Studio Stores ‘Chill Out’ in Support of Batman & Robin,” May 16, 1997. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 2, 2006). 51. Jeff Jensen, “ Batman Returns, Armed with $125 Mil Promotion Arsenal,” Advertising Age, May 26, 1997, 3. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 2, 2006). 52. Quoted in Jensen, “Batman Returns,” 3. 53. Quoted in Benezra, “Hollywood Wants More Integration,” 8. 54. Business Wire, “ Holy Internet Access, Batman!” June 5, 1997. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 2, 2006). 55. Business Wire, “ Batman Chats on Prodigy,” June 5, 1997. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 2, 2006). 56. Business Wire, “ E! Online to Produce Exclusive Webcast from the World Movie Premiere of Batman & Robin,” June 6, 1997. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 2, 2006). 57. Harry Knowles, rev. of Batman and Robin, Ain’t It Cool News, June 18, 1997, http://www.aintitcool.com (accessed March 6, 2006). 58. Martyn Palmer, “The Revenge of the Nerd,” The Times, March 16, 2002. LexisNexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed November 22, 2003). 59. Due to the poor performance of the WB and UPN, the two networks were merged together by Time Warner and CBS Corporation in 2006 to form the CW. The CW features a mixture of shows and original content developed for and aired on both corporations’ previous networks. 60. Film Review, “ Essential Summer Preview,” Summer 2005, 64. 61. Quoted in Business Wire, “Warner Bros. Consumer Products and NASCAR Announce ‘Batman Begins 400’ at Michigan International Speedway,” April 27, 2005. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed May 16, 2005; qtd. in “ Warner Bros. Consumer Products). 62. PR Newswire, “Feel the Thrill This Summer,” April 18, 2005. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed May 16, 2005). 63. Dell, advertisement, June 2005, 54. 64. Ibid.

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65. Included in the DVD release of Batman Begins were excerpts from the following comics: Denny O’Neil (writer) and Dick Giordano (artist), “ The Man Who Falls,” 1989; Bill Finger (writer) and Bob Kane (artist), “ The Bat-Man,” 1939; and Jeph Loeb (writer) and Tim Sale (artist), “ The Long Halloween,” 1996. Batman Begins, Deluxe Edition DVD, directed by Christopher Nolan, 2005; Warner Home Video, 2005. 66. Time Warner, 1999 Annual Report ( New York: Time Warner, 2000), 5. 67. Quoted in Business Wire, “America Online and Time Warner Will Merge to Create World’s First Internet-Age Media and Communications Company,” January 10, 2000. Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe [database online], University of Texas, Austin (accessed March 13, 2006). 68. Quoted in Time Warner, 1999 Annual Report, 25.

chapter 5

“You believe in pirates, of course . . .”: Disney’s Commodification and “Closure” of Pirates of the Caribbean Anne H. Petersen

In a 1967 promotional film for the newest additions to Disneyland—Pirates of the Caribbean and New Orleans Square —Walt Disney carefully explains the design of the ride to a young “imagineering” employee. Disney describes the manner in which “all these characters will be life-size, and life-like in their movement” as the pirates discover the town’s rum supplies, dunk the mayor in the well, and observe as women of the pillaged village are auctioned off to the highest bidder.1 As Disney emphasizes, “anything’s possible at Disneyland”— referring not only to the animation of the various models into life-like characters but also to the fact that pirates, mythical and magical in themselves, may be embodied and asserted, in the most Disney-of-ways, as history. Pirates of the Caribbean, for all its imagineering, is “based” on what Disney and others hope the public to take as historical fact. Situated beside New Orleans Square, itself an “historically accurate” model of nineteenthcentury New Orleans, the unstated yet implicit message of Pirates of the Caribbean is clear: The ride is “magical,” but, like many others in the park, it is also based on history. As Disney states in the promotional film, the ride will “take [visitors] back into the days of the past, the pirates, you know, Adapted from Petersen, Anne Helen. “ ‘You believe in pirates, of course . . .’: Disney’s Commodification and ‘Closure’ of Pirates of the Caribbean.” Studies in Popular Culture 29, no. 2 (2007), 63–81. Used with permission.

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when the whole Caribbean area was full of pirates, and they were always sacking things.” Significantly, as Disney speaks, the camera focuses on a closeup of the imagineering representative. Her face is young and innocent, and she eagerly smiles and nods with each word. Here the audience may be interchanged with the young woman—when Disney playfully asserts, “You believe in Pirates, of course,” we nod and reply, “oh yes,” right along with her. This interchange exemplifies what Baudrillard has termed “the Disneyland simulacrum”— specifically, the fact that Disney’s historic re-creation is not only faulty but recreates a history that never truly existed. To examine both the park and the ride as such, we must first acknowledge that the faux history of each Disney ride serves as an open avenue for capitalism. In Disneyland, history and fantasy intertwine to create commodities rooted in society’s psyche. Just as Snow White was initially successful due to the ubiquity of the tale among the common folk, so too is Pirates of the Caribbean immediately palatable for its link to, as Walt so suggestively describes, “the days of the past, the pirates, you know.” Although piracy, mutiny, and rogue sailors may have certainly existed, the manner in which they are displayed in the ride —as swashbuckling caricatures, bungling and gluttonous —is more a function of exposure to other media, not to factual pirate accounts. Whether Robert Louis Stevenson novels or Errol Flynn films, the ride clearly adheres to Baudrillard’s description of the progression of the modern image: “it is the reflection of basic reality, it masks and perverts a basic reality, it masks the absence of a basic reality,” and thus, as in its present form, “it bears no relation to a reality whatever.”2 The Pirates ride, like the rest of Disney, is a fake history. So what? The real question is how modern-day Disney, the uber-corporation, transformed an amusement park ride into the second highest grossing film of 2003, extending that success to the 2006 and 2007 sequels, and successfully commodifying one of the last unsynergized aspects of Disneyland. In folklorian terms, the answer is straightforward: Disney simply “closed” the text. In an interesting twist on McLuhan’s ballyhooed catchphrase, the medium has indeed proved the message: A switch of the medium (from amusement park ride to a fully fleshed-out film) effectively cemented the “message” of Pirates of the Caribbean, closing a text once “open” to myriad interpretations into a singular “closed” rendition. With a static message and a concrete text, Disney could effectively commodify and capitalize upon its narrative, its characters, and its sequels. DISNEY: LAND OF THE CLOSED TEXT Disney’s method of commodification is characterized by its synergistic relish: Each storyline, movie, or character is vertically integrated through the tower of Disney mediums. The Lion King, for example, has a Broadway

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stage adaptation, numerous straight-to-video sequels, an immensely successful soundtrack featuring Elton John, and a healthy DVD sales rate, to say nothing of the products, toys, costumes, and games that boast the Lion King and Disney name. The Disney parks, beginning with Disneyland but now expanded to include Disney World, Tokyo Disneyland Park, Euro Disney, and Hong Kong Disneyland, serve as the capstone of Disney synergy. Hunt and Frankenberg observe, “You have seen the films, are familiar with the cartoon characters, and know that their trials and tribulations are humorous, and will eventually resolve into happy endings. You expect (and know that an omnipresent but unobtrusive management intends) a similar ending from the thrills and spills of your own visit.”3 This certainly holds for the majority of Disneyland attractions: Rides reenact The Song of the South (“Splash Mountain”), Aladdin (“Aladdin’s Oasis”), Pinocchio (“Pinocchio’s Daring Journey”), Alice in Wonderland (“Mad Tea Party”), The Wind in the Willows (“Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride”), and Snow White (“Snow White’s Scary Adventures”), plus many, many more. As Jason Sperb notes, each is a “commodified, homogenized version, if any version, of its now distant . . . relative.”4 Accordingly, these rides simultaneously benefit from and rely on audience foreknowledge of the “plot” of each ride. If each of these films are themselves “Disneyfied” (i.e., Americanized, stream-lined, and lacking in nuance) versions of the original myths, folktales, and fairytales from which they sprung, then the rides represent a third removal from the original source. In this way, altering the medium of representation—from oral tradition to recorded fairytale to Disney cartoon to Disneyland ride —likewise alters the message, not only through technological advances but by “closing” the text. Folklorists consider a closed text as “one that carefully develops details and connections, leaving readers or viewers little chance for active participation and interpretation.”5 Whereas an open text, such as an oral narrative, is characterized by a dynamicism that allows cultural variation and nuance appropriate to time and location, the closed text remains constant. Western oral histories and fairy tales were first recorded in the seventeenth century, when Giovanni Strapola and Charles Perrault first collected their tales, famously followed by Hans Christian Anderson and the Brothers Grimm, amongst others. In recording the narratives, these “editors” affected the first level of textual closure —their versions of Snow White, of Hansel and Gretel, and of Cinderella became the accepted, static norm. Disney further closed the text through its classic screen adaptations. In addition to neutralizing potentially offensive elements and refiguring the plot line to mesh with Disney specifications (the struggle between good and evil; narrative closure with heteronormative coupling), the fact that the cartoons are fleshed out—given a voice, demeanor, and body—further limits potential interpretations of the text. Moral nuance, ambiguity, and personal interpretation are eliminated in favor of a clear, solid, universally palatable product.

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In a closed text, particularly in the Disney universe, there is no need for imagination—the Imagineering team does it for you! The face of the heroine, the look of the forest, the scowl of the evildoer—all created and proliferated to the point of unquestioned cultural acceptance. Put bluntly, Snow White’s face is the same in every country across the world. The Disney amusement ride, however, represents the closure of the original open text. Storylines, character arcs, and emotional development are reduced to an eight-minute tour of loosely interpreted vignettes, animatronic creatures spouting clichéd catchphrases—not from the original text, but from the Disney-appropriated film. A dynamic image eludes commodification— it’s difficult to make a t-shirt of a creature that is interpreted differently by each audience member— but a static one may be readily packaged and purchasable. Dolls, t-shirts, hats, and games, with the same images and taglines, may be sold at the park gift shop or thousands of other outlets around the world. This not only ups Disney’s profits but increases the proliferation of the Disney-generated image, reinforcing its status for generations to come. The ride is three times removed from the original open text, at best a skeletal allusion to a tale that once spoke to genuine societal anxieties. Rides differ very little from park to park—whether at the Magic Kingdom in Florida or Tokyo Disneyland, the faces, gags, and sound effects remain, for the most part, consistent. As the Disney catchphrase persists, “it’s a small world after all,” and the small world of Disney’s cinematic and theme park creation is one where rights and wrongs are universally applicable, where beauty that is “snow white” endures, and love and marriage present themselves as the ultimate (and necessary) solution. Pirates of the Caribbean, however, demands a reexamination of Hunt and Frankenberg’s Disney park thesis. Purportedly sprouted from Walt’s own imagination, Pirates differs from the traditional funnel model of folklorefairytale-film closure. Granted, as previously discussed, Disney subliminally associates the ride with historical events in the colonization-era Caribbean. Instead of European fairy tales, the texts that the ride works to close are general Pirate narratives —taken from or inspired by Robert Louis Stevenson, Davy Jones and his locker, and Errol Flynn movies (from the 1930s and 1940s) that were still very much in the public consciousness at the time of the ride’s opening in 1967. The link, however, was tenuous: Without a clear Disney film or product to serve as referent, Disney was severely limited in its marketing of the ride and the idea that supported it. In 2002, The Disney Corporation attempted to solve a similar problem with another ride —Country Bear Jamboree —by creating a live-action feature to flesh out the attraction. The film, The Country Bears (Hastings, 2002), was a financial failure. Moira McDonald of the Seattle Times elaborates on its downfall: “You might reasonably expect, from the mighty Disney, that the

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big-screen bears might be kind of cutting-edge, with stunningly realistic digital effects. Um, no. It’s guys in bear suits, lumbering around with their big heads and synthetic looking hair, with dubbed voices chiming in from a sound booth.”6 Despite the vocal talents of Haley Joel Osment, Christopher Walken, and a number of stars from the music industry (Bonnie Raitt, Don Henley, and Willie Nelson among others), the animatronic bears of the film are embarrassingly awkward and passé. The film failed to fulfill Disney’s synergistic goals, hampering the effort to further commodify the ride and its characters. Nevertheless, creating a film with an explicit connection to the ride remained the clearest solution to the dearth of Pirates commercial synergy. The idea for a full-length, live-action film was originally pitched in 1992 and languished for over a decade in stages of predevelopment—until Jerry Bruckheimer entered the picture. Producer Jerry Bruckheimer is the closest that Hollywood gets to a magicmaker. He first gained attention as the “Mr. Outside” to producing partner Don Simpson’s “Mr. Inside”—working with directors Tony Scott and Michael Bay, they created a succession of tremendously successful, blow-’emup films, paragons of contemporary masculinity: Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop, Days of Heaven, and Bad Boys. Starting in 1994, Bruckheimer and Simpson began producing films for Touchstone and Hollywood Pictures, both owned and run by Disney. Over the course of the next two years, they shepherded projects as various as The Ref (Demme, 1994, Touchstone Pictures), Crimson Tide (Bay, 1995, Hollywood Pictures), Dangerous Minds (John N. Smith, 1995, Hollywood Pictures), and The Rock (Bay, 1996, Hollywood Pictures). While these films generally garnered negative reviews, they made a tremendous amount of money: As just one example, The Rock, with a production budget of $85 million, grossed $335 million internationally, with $134 million of that domestic. When Simpson unexpectedly passed away in 1996, Bruckheimer continued to produce blockbusters for Touchstone: Con Air (West, 1997), Armageddon (Bay, 1998), Enemy of the State (Scott, 1998), Gone in 60 Seconds (Sena, 2000), Coyote Ugly (McNally, 2000), Remember the Titans (Yakin, 2001), and many others. Bruckheimer’s production success may be attributed to his firm, particular control of his pictures with extreme attention to detail. Instead of interfering on the set, he does most of his work in postproduction, tinkering with score, narrative, and length. He refers to himself as “the audience”—the typical Joe Schmoe “guy with his hand in the popcorn.” The decisions he makes, and thus the films he produces, are meant to cater to those very tastes— movies that are the perfect mix of fun, adventure, humor, entertainment, and emotion, without anything that’s too complex, alienating, or sophisticated. There is very little that is subtle about a Bruckheimer picture: The emotions, narrative turns, and explosions are exaggerated, designed to inflate the films’ profits. The international success of his films (Armageddon, for example,

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grossed $553 million worldwide on a production budget of $140 million) speaks to the international resonance of the Bruckheimer picture: Because the love stories, action, plot lines, and conclusion are all writ large, they are easily translatable. Like a cartoon, a silent film, or a Disney theme ride, they are equally palatable to a middle-aged middle-American and a Japanese teenager. Ultimately, Bruckheimer is the quintessential Disney producer: The vision, style, and success of his productions mesh seamlessly with the Disney business and entertainment philosophy. He “closes” the text; Disney synergizes it; audiences buy it. Pearl Harbor (Bay, 2001) was Bruckheimer’s first hint of a misstep. While the film ended up grossing $449 million internationally, its $140 million production budget was disquieting to Disney. Its original $145 million budget was, at the time, the largest approved prefilming; Bruckheimer and Bay gave up their $4 million salaries (in return for a cut of the profits) to keep the budget down; and Bay quit the project four times over various disputes. Then came Bad Company (Schumacher, 2002), a buddy flick starring Anthony Hopkins and Chris Rock, recouping only $65 million of its $70 million budget. When it came to Pirates of the Caribbean, Disney was, with good reason, wary. With the recent failure of The Country Bears and Bruckheimer’s big budget stumbles, Pirates was a risk— especially because it would require filming on location, in period costume, with massive amounts of computer-generated image (CGI) work in postproduction. But Bruckheimer was locked in a fivefilm production deal with Disney, and regardless of his missteps, he was still the best producer for a big-budget, bombastic job—in the words of Richard Cook, chairman of Walt Disney Studios, Bruckheimer is “our bread and butter,” Disney’s “home run hitter.”7 Bruckheimer handpicked director Gore Verbinski and recruited heartthrobs Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom (fresh off his role as Legolas in The Lord of the Rings) for the picture. According to the producer-commentary included with the Curse of the Black Pearl DVD, Bruckheimer desired a director who could handle what he viewed as the two main themes of the ride: fear and humor. At first glance, the Pirates ride is rather horrific, as grotesquelooking pirates plunder, capture, and eventually burn an entire village. One might assume an underlying fear of rape, torture, and general debauchery. But for the ride —indeed, for Disney in general—any such potential anxieties are completely negated through humor and caricature. The Pirates are dumpy, disfigured, and while ostensibly “dangerous,” they are clearly not a serious threat. As evidenced in past Disney productions, from 101 Dalmations (Geronimi et al., 1966) to The Lion King (Allers and Minkoff, 1992), such villains are prime sources of humor. Verbinski, best known for the Budweiser frog commercials, fear-fest The Ring (2002), and self-declared “family classic” Mousehunt (1997), possessed the genuine, innovative sense of both humor and fear that Bruckheimer viewed as essential to a successful adaptation.

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PIRATING THE PIRATE FILM Ostensibly, Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl indeed offers a “closed” and classical Disney product: Good (the British, Will Turner) triumphs over Evil (the cursed pirates); the heroine (Keira Knightly) is, in current Disney style, both beautiful and adventurous but ends up in the arms of her true love. The film overtly references and pays homage to the ride in a number of places, allowing audience members to easily draw associations between the two—the exact sort of synergy Disney desires. This may be largely attributed to Bruckheimer, whose producing style ensured that the film’s end vision would mesh with the ride and Disney’s underlying intentions for the production. With that said, Bruckheimer may have inadvertently paved the path for the film’s innovation and subversion. Enabling Depp, Verbinksi, and screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio to essentially “pirate” the pirate movie, Bruckheimer set the stage for the filmic coup that is Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. Here one is reminded of the dual definition of the word pirate: a sea-faring historical figure who steals and plunders, of course, but also, in its contemporary usage, one who makes or uses another’s work without authorization. Following Depp’s lead, the director and screenwriters fashioned a film that indeed provides a synergistic compliment to the Disney ride but adds character ambiguity, a troubled story arc, antiheroes, and off-color humor to the traditionally chaste Disney text. The text may be closed, but it is riddled with bullet-holes, with Depp as the lead gunman. THE ROGUE: JOHNNY DEPP AS CAPTAIN JACK SPARROW As every major production requires a bankable star to ensure financial backing, Bruckheimer, still with no more than a general idea of a product, sought and surprisingly recruited Johnny Depp for the role of Captain Jack Sparrow. Best known for his quirky roles and esoteric performances in collaboration with indies and auteurs (Tim Burton, Jim Jarmusch, etc.), Depp might seem the least likely choice for a Disney film. Having settled down with French pop singer Vanessa Paradis, Depp acknowledged his willingness, after years of antagonism, to accept the Hollywood machine and make something “for the kiddies.” Nevertheless, Depp’s image remains irreconcilable with that of Disney. He has played a transvestite, a scissor-handed man, a cocaine-baron, the Earl of Rochester, and Hunter S. Thompson; no doubt: not Disney. But Bruckheimer, with his sense of blockbuster, saw the necessity of a bit of pirate “spice” in the essentially straight story of classic Disney proportions. Additional spice was added by screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio, best known for their work on Aladdin (Clements and Musker, 1992) and Shrek (Adamson and Jenson, 2001). Both films radiate a sense of tongue-in-cheek

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meta-consciousness, acknowledging and reveling in their own self-awareness as cartoons, films, and fairytales. Both works are highly referential: think The Genie’s (Robin William’s) pop-culture references or Shrek’s homage to historical and contemporary fairy tales and films. Elliott and Rossio’s work with Pirates fits this mold, this time slyly poking fun at the very essentialized pirate narratives and Disneyficiation they were enlisted to produce. The casting of Depp constitutes a small coup in and of itself. Granted, 21 Jump Street made him a teen heartthrob in the late 1980s, a status that continues to attract young and middle-aged female fans.8 Yet, his varied history and assorted escapades connote scandal, indecency, and even un-Americanness. A veritable ex-patriot, he has yet to marry his long-term French girlfriend and mother of his two children. His trashing of several hotel rooms was widely covered in the early 1990s press; anyone decently acquainted with pop culture will recall that River Phoenix overdosed at Hollywood’s the Viper Club, owned by Depp. Compounded by his list of esoteric film roles, Depp’s “star” is anything but Disney- and family-friendly. Indeed, Depp’s character, Captain Jack Sparrow, is intended to be an antihero. Lacking in moral conscious, he may no longer be a “bad” pirate (grouped with Barbossa [Geoffrey Rush] and the rest of the cursed bunch), but he is most certainly not a “good” one. The moral, it seems, is a variation on the clichéd theme: You can take the man off of the pirate ship, but you can’t take the pirate out of the man. A Disney hero must clearly come of age, yet, as Depp and Verbinski explain in the DVD commentary, Sparrow (Depp) lacks any sort of character arc: He merely wants a ship, preferably his own, at the beginning, middle, and end of the film. He is unswayed by appeals to emotion, logic, or authority— his goals and character development remain wholly static throughout the film. As such, Sparrow is situated as antihero, thus exempted from the normal guidelines for a Disney hero. The role instead falls to Will Turner (Orlando Bloom), who plays the film’s “straight man.” These roles are reinforced in a scene early in the film, when Captain Jack first encounters Will Turner. Having used Elizabeth as his shield to escape the British army, Jack, still manacled from his previous capture, makes his way to a blacksmith. The role of the virtuous and the unvirtuous are already clearly delineated—Will works hard for a living, suffering in silence while his drunken master takes credit for his work, paying close attention to detail. His dress and demeanor are pristine; a crisp white shirt is coupled with well-groomed hair and beard. Jack Sparrow, on the other hand, is devious: He does not hesitate to put a hot poker to a donkey’s rear in order to rid himself of his chains; his hat, like the rest of his clothing, is soiled and haphazard. This early impression of Will Turner exemplifies traditional Disney characterization—the hero, his background, our willingness to root for him, and his love interest are all neatly set out in the first 15 minutes of the film. Nevertheless, Jack Sparrow severely disrupts the narrative, complicating

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traditional characterization and leading the audience to root for a far more ambiguous sort of hero. When the two first cross the swords, Turner keeps his sword straight and steady, his gaze focused ahead. Sparrow slides his sword up and down Turner’s, playfully declaring that he threatened Miss Swann “only a little.” Turner’s moral vision is black and white —either Sparrow threatened Miss Swann or he didn’t—while Sparrow’s is multivalenced. Sparrow’s take on the morality of his actions, like his level of engagement with Turner’s sword, is liberal. Despite Sparrow’s oily and blackened visage, characteristics that would traditionally establish him as evil, the verbal wordplay that accompanies the action establishes Jack as a far more nuanced character. When Jack asks who makes the dozens of swords that surround the two, Turner earnestly replies, “I do—and I practice with them three times a day!” to which Sparrow replies, “You need to get yourself a girl, mate.” Turner’s traditional act of masculinity—his devotion to his craft and to swordplay—are undercut by Sparrow’s retort. Sparrow’s jab bruises the entire notion of the earnest, devoted, dutiful hero, using it for a laugh and rendering it absurd. Sparrow then postulates that Turner is “incapable of wooing said strumpet,” questioning, “you’re not a eunuch, are you?” The line invariably gets a laugh, and it serves as a turning point in the film: Sparrow has endeared himself to the audience while explicitly questioning the masculinity of his rival. As the duel proceeds, Sparrow and Turner are alternately launched into the air. With one on top, then the other, the nifty stunt serves as a neat metaphor for their positions in the mind of the audience —who’s to be our hero? While Turner gradually begins to accept the piracy of his father and eventually assists in Jack’s ultimate escape from the British, he remains the “straight” hero and moral center of the film. Turner grows less severe in his judgment, more accepting of others, and slowly wins the affection of the girl he loves. With the burden of maturation on Turner, Sparrow is free to subvert conventions, both of Disney and of its appropriated tale of piracy. Disney purportedly exerted a certain amount of creative control over the film, a rumor best exemplified in the oft-quoted story of Eisner requiring Depp to reduce his mouthful of gold teeth to a more sightly two or three after the first day of shooting.9 Yet, several bits manage to elude the proverbial Disney machine. As shaped by Depp, Captain Jack Sparrow keenly resembles a queerly effete pirate with a serious drug history. His eyes are lined with thick, smudged kohl; his face is scarred, pocked, and, if one looks closely, what appears to be the sign of a venereal disease marks his right jaw. His beard is long enough to form two rattail-resembling braids, complemented by a mouth filled with teeth alternating between gold and dead. Beads, gold, chains, bandannas, and a soiled three-cornered hat serve as accessories. Sparrow alternately exudes heterosexual and homosexual appeal: His effeminacy, both in dress and demeanor, reads queerly, yet he continually brags

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of far-flung sexual conquests, with a gaggle of women lining up in Tortuga to berate him for his philandering ways. Several reviewers refer to him as pansexual—he bends notions of gender and sexuality, comfortably spanning the distance between societal definitions. Accordingly, Depp repeatedly credits two influences on his creation of Sparrow: guitarist Keith Richards and cartoon character Pepe Le Pew.10 In other words, he is a composition of a drug-addled, hot pants–wearing, rather debauched rock star and an unsuccessful yet oblivious ladies man, compounded by a tendency toward thievery and duplicitous behavior—once again: not Disney. Amusingly, Depp originally desired to play Sparrow without a nose —a pirate with a mortal fear of pollen, as it were. He pushed for noselessness and an entire mouth of gold teeth; Disney said no; Bruckheimer negotiated a compromise: Depp could play an authentically eccentric, partially gold-mouthed pirate . . . nose intact. Ironically, Depp was free to create such a wildly original character in part because of Disney—as the Disney ride provided no clear precedent for Sparrow, Depp was given what amounted to a blank slate of a character. What’s more, both screenwriters were on set for the bulk of production, rewriting and forming the script as it filmed. As a result, their narrative was undoubtedly influenced by Depp’s ongoing performance of Sparrow, a conclusion reinforced by Will Turner’s imitation of Sparrow’s peculiar disposition halfway through the film. Recalling how the crew of the Black Pearl had mutinied against Sparrow, Mr. Gibbs explains that they “marooned him on an island and left him to die —but not before he’d gone mad with the heat.” Turner responds “Ahhh, so that’s the reason for all the . . .” at which point he begins to pantomime Jack’s leering, off-kilter demeanor. This bit of self-referential humor would be impossible without foreknowledge of Depp’s performance. Regarded in this light, Depp’s “pirating” of the film seems a bit of subversive brilliance, effectively shaping the script and narrative around his character and vision of the film in general. Examining the prerelease trailer for Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, one senses that Disney was feeling no small amount of anxiety concerning Depp’s untraditional performance. Rather than showcasing its star power or Depp’s humor, the trailer focuses on the dark, cursed world of the pirates, filled with special effects, swordfights, and a pounding, chilling score. Even the film’s poster—a sinister-looking skeleton at the helm of a ship—conveys Disney’s marketing angle for the film. In short, play up the scary pirates, play down the crazy actor. However, Pirates was an immense and immediate success, grossing $70 million in its first week of release in July 2003. Perhaps more importantly, Depp’s performance was the talk of the summer, fueled in part by widespread circulation of the anecdote concerning the “inspiration” of Keith Richards. Disney quickly realized that the image on which to capitalize was not that of the cursed Barbossa or the earnest Jack Turner but the leering pansexual pirate. Depp was nominated for an

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Academy Award for his performance, and simultaneous production began on the second and third installments of Pirates of the Caribbean. The film—very much due to Depp’s performance —went beyond Disney’s wildest dreams in its complementation of the Pirates ride. CONCLUSIONS: A CLOSED TRILOGY? By changing the medium of the Pirates narrative, Disney intended to effectively close the available messages to consumers worldwide. What they did not anticipate, however, was how Johnny Depp would pirate the very message they intended to appropriate. Granted, when one thinks of pirates these days, one mostly thinks of Johnny Depp’s visage. The narrative may indeed be closed, yet it had closed in a direction unanticipated by the Disney Corporation and certainly never imagined by Walt himself. However, this was before the release of Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. The poster for the then-forthcoming film featured a skeletal head recognizable as that of Jack Sparrow, complete with a beaded headpiece. The trailer jump cuts between shots of the action and humorous shots of Sparrow; even the film’s tagline announces “Captain Jack is Back.” Clearly, Disney had conceded that Depp’s direction—not its own—was where the trilogy would head. Yet, the magic of an original creation too often evades even the finestcrafted of sequels. In other words, proliferating plot lines spread over a trilogy of CGI madness cannot sustain the subversive, surprisingly un-Disney elements of the first installment. Instead, having switched its marketing campaign in and outside of the parks to focus on Captain Jack, it appears that Disney has thoroughly commodified the pansexual pirate, capitalizing on Depp’s performance and emptying it of its original soul. The bloated sequels evidence the corporation’s ability to co-opt and incorporate all subversive elements of the first film into the Disney machine; they verily overflow with fight scenes, incredible barnacle and octopus-headed villains, eerie witch doctors, shots of Captain Jack running like his britches are on fire, the evils of trade monopoly, bumbling characters from the first movie, a massive shipswallowing sea monster, and an ancient goddess composed, apparently, of crabs. Fittingly, the ride itself closed for a short period for renovations intended to better mirror the narrative of the films, reopening in conjunction with the premiere of Dead Man’s Chest. Walt’s vision of Pirates has been synergized, the text has been closed, and Disney will now continue to commodify and capitalize on the image of the pirate as embodied in Johnny Depp and, to a lesser extent, Orlando Bloom. A scene in the ending moments of Dead Man’s Chest does hint at a bit of moral ambiguity to the otherwise unnuanced narrative. Elizabeth passionately kisses Captain Jack whilst chaining him to the ship, leaving him for dead, and allowing the rest of the crew to escape the monstrous Kracken.11

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In the DVD commentary, screenwriters Elliott and Rossio explain that this moment allows Elizabeth to both slake and drown her lust. She acts on her desire for Jack, telling him “I always knew you were a good man,” approaching him with a fixed look of unfeigned desire. Yet, she knowingly sends him to his death—as she chains him to the ship, she whispers, “[the kracken’s] after you, not us—this is the only way, don’t you see?” The kiss is sustained and passionate, and even after she chains him to the ship, her face remains mere inches from Jack’s, their conversation a continuation of the charged kiss. As the film ends, Elizabeth appears haunted by her decision—and as the publicity for the third film promised that Sparrow will return, audiences were left to contemplate whether the heroine would return to her devoted fiancé or fall for the increasingly appealing Sparrow. While the exploration of Elizabeth’s lust presents a somewhat interesting, problematic twist, Turner’s willingness to forgive foreshadowed the unlikeliness of a romance between Sparrow and Elizabeth. In other words, I hesitate to valorize such plot twists when all signs pointed to traditional coupling at trilogy’s culmination. With a domestic gross of $423 million, Dead Man’s Chest has been acknowledged as the financial savior of the 2006 summer movie season. Yet, as un-Disney as its twisting plot lines appear, it’s simply another case of brilliant Disney marketing—while Elliott and Rossio praised Disney and Bruckheimer for his willingness to end the second installment on such a note of uncertainty, Dead Man’s Chest leaves audiences begging for expected narrative closure, easily purchasable (for a 10 dollar ticket price) in May of 2007, the release date for Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End. With blockbuster audiences fresh off their frustration with the overstuffed Spiderman 3, word of mouth for the equally inflated At World’s End was poor. Anthony Lane neatly sums up critical reception of the film, elaborating on the manner by which the franchise has been reduced from “jollity to wreck.”12 Yet, despite negative press and a dearth of audience buzz, the power of the franchise powered At World’s End to a $960 million international gross, a number slightly less robust than the international numbers for Dead Man’s Chest ($1.066 billion). At World’s End indeed demonstrates that “the theme park is now a ride without a theme,”13 but the ride continues toward its terminus in enormous Disney profits. If anything, its meandering narrative threads allow further commodification—the film resurrects those lost to Davy Jones’ Locker (Captain Barbossa; Captain Jack) and introduces several additional Pirates from “the ends of the world,” all neatly stereotyped racial caricatures that allow for easy reproduction on figurines, Raisin Bran boxes, incense, and dice games. Pirates of the Caribbean is no longer about cinema or subversion—it is about manufacturing a signified for thousands of proliferating products. As the original movie morphed into a franchise, laughs muted to mild amusement, and art became business. Still, audiences arrived in droves.

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The Pirates franchise exemplifies Disney’s recent turn in corporate philosophy. With the 2005 ousting of Michael Eisner, Robert Iger took over as CEO, immediately distinguishing himself from Eisner, his one-time mentor. In the summer of 2006, Iger announced Disney’s revamped entertainment strategy: fewer films, all family-friendly, and each thoroughly vertically integrated with the parks and television holdings. In other words, if it wasn’t merchandisable, it was no longer Disney. This movement speaks to the greater franchise-frenzy that typifies twenty-first-century Hollywood: The summer of 2007 was that of the threequel, packed with third installments of previously profitable narratives: Spider-Man 3 (Raimi, 2007), Shrek the Third (Miller and Hui, 2007), Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, Ocean’s Thirteen (Soderbergh, 2007), Rush Hour 3 (Ratner, 2007), Resident Evil: Extinction (Mulcahy, 2007), and The Bourne Ultimatum (Greengrass, 2007). Interestingly, only The Bourne Ultimatum out-grossed its predecessors, and the dismal business of Rush Hour 3 was, at least in part, attributed to “sequel fatigue.” Yet, the summer of 2008 is nevertheless slated with sequels, most notably to Batman Begins (Nolan, 2005), The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe (Adamson, 2005), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (Spielberg, 1989), The Hulk (Lee, 2003), The Mummy Returns (Sommers, 2001), and The X-Files (Bowman, 1998). Even nonsequels draw on tested, readily recognizable ideas: Iron Man (Favreau, 2008), based on a Marvel comics character, and the Wachowski Brothers’ Speed Racer, from the Japanese anime series. It seems that the only way to play in the high stakes game of blockbuster-producing is to insure your film with static, reliable tie-ins, unrelated to actual ticket sales. In other words, audiences may be unreliable, but their compulsion to buy Happy Meals is not. When it comes to risking hundreds of millions of dollars, it’s not difficult to see why producers opt for the tested, albeit tired, ideas. In essence, we live in a world where mega-corporations have pirated a once-vibrant world of amusement, entertainment, fantasy, and fun, and each narrative —historical, mythical, or otherwise —has already begun to close amidst our capitalist efforts to brand the faces of history. Throughout the twentieth century, Disney stuck to children’s myths and fairy tales, creating the ultimate childrens’ product. In the recent past, having acquired ABC, ESPN, plus innumerable networks, radio stations, news outlets, and print media, Disney has expanded to ’tweens and teens, the sports-hungry, the middle-aged, and the nostalgic.14 The fear, then, is that Disney has set its sights far beyond the world of children’s entertainment. While a child’s ability to imagine, individually conceive, and think beyond the images on a screen are of ultimate importance, Disney’s practice of textual closure has moved past the playground, infiltrating the very grown-up world of politics, global relations, and what it means to be an American. Director Gore Verbinski has repeatedly emphasized that the Pirates ride “is ingrained in our collective

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psyche.”15 The movies will take a similar role for a new generation of Americans, and my hope is that they not only remember Depp’s off-kilter smile or off-color humor but the fact that the combination of these traits—and our willingness to endorse them—indeed pirated the pirate film. NOTES 1. All Walt Disney quotes are taken from an episode of the Disneyland television show titled “From Pirates of the Caribbean to the World of Tomorrow,” which originally aired January 21, 1968. The episode is included in the Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl DVD extras under “Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color.” 2. Jean Baudrillard, Selected Writings, 2nd ed., trans. and ed. Mark Poster (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001), 173. 3. Pauline Hunt and Ronald Frankenberg, “It’s a Small World: Disneyland, the Family and The Multiple Representations of American Childhood,” in Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood: Contemporary Issues in the Sociological Study of Childhood, ed. Allison James and Alan Prout (London: The Falmer Press, 1990), 107. 4. Jason Sperb, “ ‘Take a Frown, Turn It Upside Down’: Splash Mountain, Disney World and the Cultural De-rac[e]-ination of Disney’s Song of the South.” The Journal of Popular Culture 38, no. 5 (2005), 924–38. 5. Kay F. Stone, “Three Transformations of Snow White,” in The Brothers Grimm and the Folktale, ed. J. McGlatherty (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1988), 44, 52–65. 6. Moira McDonald, “Disney’s Low-Tech Country Bears Aims for Tiny Tots,” The Seattle Times, July 26, 2002, http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgibin/texis.cgi/ web/vortex/display?slug=bears26&date=20020726 (accessed December 15, 2006). 7. Laura M. Holson, “Blow It Up and Start All Over Again,” The New York Times, November 13, 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/13/business/media/13bruck heimer.html?_r=1&oref=slogin>1&kw=Queen&LinkType=EverGreen (accessed December 15, 2006). 8. Following Pirates of the Caribbean, Depp was named People magazine’s “Sexiest Man Alive” of 2004. 9. James B. Stewart, Disneywar (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2005), 530. 10. “He came from many directions, old Captain Jack,” says Depp. “The first thing that came to mind was I was trying to figure out what rock stars would have to do with sort of pirates in the sense that it’s like the equivalent of—the pirate of the 18th century seemed to me the rock and roll star of today. And to me the greatest rock n’ roll star of all time, the coolest rock n’ roll star of all time is Keith Richards, hands down. So, yeah, I kind of incorporated the idea of Keith. Not like an imitation of Keith or anything but just that wisdom that he carries, that sort of confidence that he has, that attack that he has. So I got that on one side and on the other side I took a little bit of this cartoon character that I’ve always loved when I was a kid, his name was Pepe Le Pew. Yeah, the skunk, Pepe Le Pew who was the skunk who smelled horrible, but was absolutely convinced that he was the ultimate ladies’ man. You know the guy, he’d fall in love with this cat and the cat quite clearly despised

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him but Pepe Le Pew sort of read it as, ‘Oh she’s just playing hard to get. Oh she’s just shy.’ And then I thought of Jack as this constantly moving organism that would shape himself to whatever situation you were in to see what he would get out of the situation.” Chuck the Movie Guy, “Interview with Johnny Depp,” Comingsoon.net, August 7, 2003, http://www.comingsoon.net/new.php?id=539 (accessed December 17, 2006). 11. I use Tennyson’s spelling of the eponymous sea monster from “The Kracken.” 12. Anthony Lane, “Men at Sea,” review of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End. The New Yorker Online, June 4, 2007, http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/cinema/ 2007/06/04/070604crci_cinema_lane (accessed December 17, 2006). 13. Ibid. 14. Disney either owns or holds partial interest in ABC Family, Lifetime Network, A & E, and E! Entertainment Network. 15. Kenneth Turan, “Pirates of the Caribbean.” The Los Angeles Times, July 9, 2003, http://www.calendarlive.com/movies/reviews/cl-et-turan9jul09,0,3080268. story?coll=clmreview (accessed December 17, 2006).

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chapter 6

The Business of Race in The Lord of the Rings Trilogy Sue J. Kim

The epic fantasy has displaced real contemporary concerns, and audiences are much more interested in Middle Earth than in the world they inhabit. —Robert Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times The Lord of the Rings is racist. —John Yatt, The Guardian Movies of fantasy can be more real than “realistic” movies. For example, it would be a mistake to think of The Lord of the Rings (LOTR) film trilogy as merely an escapist fantasy. On the contrary, the production, content, and distribution of the films exemplify the problems with how many people, particularly in the United States and other “first world” developed nations, think about race today. This skewed but palatable vision of race relations characterizes virtually all Hollywood productions because even slight deviations from such discourses of racial harmony can hurt box office sales. In this chapter, I will discuss how the LOTR films exemplify problems with how we understand race and how the contemporary film industry relies on such distortions.

Adapted from Kim, Sue. “Beyond Black and White: Race and Postmodernism in the Lord of the Rings Films.” Modern Fiction Studies 50, no. 4 (2004), 875–907. © Purdue Research Foundation. Reprinted with permission of the Johns Hopkins University Press.

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Public discourse about race tends to cast it in terms of identity, personal attitudes, and cultural representations rather than economic and political structures. This way of thinking is shared both by people who think racism exists and by those who do not. On the one hand, many of us wish so much that racism was a thing of the past in our enlightened multicultural societies that we believe our own wish, and few places reflect this desire more consistently and obdurately than Hollywood. On the other hand, when issues of race do arise, it is usually in terms of cultural representation or individual attitudes. Neither of these approaches, however, take into account the economic and political histories that constitute the complex realities of race. Liberal multiculturalism, the concept most powerfully informing issues of cultural diversity, gives us a model of discrete racial and cultural groups coexisting harmoniously. Unlike critical multiculturalism, liberal multiculturalism does not account for the difference in power between groups, the differences within groups, and the fluid nature of any human social group. According to the powerful discourse of liberal multiculturalism, which has been accepted by liberals as well as conservatives all over the world, the celebration— or at least “tolerance”— of cultural differences (including dress and appearance, food, speech and other modes of interacting, etc.) has made racism a thing of the past. In other words, the two notions go hand-in-hand: the idea that race is primarily a cultural, discursive, or personal issue and the idea that racism is a thing of the past. But the notion that race is some kind of essential, fixed thing, or that racism is simply the personal failing of a few anachronistic troglodytes, limits our understanding of the complex ways that racialization actually works. In their seminal Racial Formations in the United States, Michael Omi and Howard Winant discuss how race is produced historically, through contending social forces that pervade all aspects of our lives. Like gender and sexuality, the subtle dynamics of racial power suffuse every aspect of our existence, so cultural analyses of race continue to be crucial. But race is also shaped by economic and political forces; Omi and Winant define racism as a process that “creates or reproduces structures of domination based on essentialist categories of race.”1 So, for example, the exploitation and exacerbation of vast differences in wealth within nations and internationally often works in conjunction with race. Our problem is that because we think of race in terms of liberal multiculturalism and its focus on culture and identity rather than political and economic structures, we can fantasize that making images of happy interracial harmony actually produces positive race relations. The dream of liberal multiculturalism characterizes the contemporary film industry (primarily Hollywood, although these discourses also arise in independent films), which sells us this notion of race in places we may least expect it. To fulfill audience’s desires to have racial issues resolved, mainstream films gesture toward challenging issues but ultimately gloss over or even

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suppress the real issues. This suppression is at the heart of the appeal of such films as LOTR, which broke numerous box office records.2 For an industry driven primarily by profit motive, the films offer a wish-fulfillment through their surface of interracial harmony, even as they draw on racist discourses. By examining the semiotics of the films in conjunction with their economic– political contexts, we can better understand why and how limiting ourselves only to the arena of culture or discourse ultimately limits our ability to have meaningful discussions about race. Moreover, we can see how Hollywood uses such watered-down notions of multiculturalism in the content and marketing of its films, while in production and distribution it exploits the same economic and power structures that exacerbate real issues of racial disparity. “MEN OF THE WEST”: COLOR CODING IN LOTR Given that contemporary discourses of race fixate on cultural representation, it is strange that there has been so little discussion about the racial politics of the LOTR films. In terms of racial coding, it is the only contemporary fantasy/sci-fi blockbuster film series as immediately cringe-inducing as the first new Star Wars film, Episode I: The Phantom Menace. The Matrix, as laughably atrocious as Reloaded and Resurrection may have been, at least attempted to be ethnically sensitive and diverse. Each ship’s crew pointedly includes nonwhite members, and Zion is a multiracial city led by a council, one of whom is played by Cornel West, a prominent African American philosopher. The film’s principal heroes include Laurence Fishburne (Morpheus) and Jada Pinkett Smith (Niobe), both African American actors. Harry Potter has a Chinese love interest, and the British public school context of Hogwarts steers clear of anything like the debacle of Jar-Jar or Princess Amidala’s geisha getup. In the LOTR trilogy, however, goodness consistently correlates to whiteness, racially and as color scheme. The good guys are associated with Europe, particularly England and the Scandinavian countries, the West, and the North. Evil is invariably black, savage, Southern (or “Southron”), and Eastern. All racially white actors, whether from New Zealand (where the film was shot), Australia, the United States, Ireland, or England, are assimilable as Middle Earth heroes (although they must adopt British accents), and they display a heterogeneous mix of European (mostly British and Scandinavian) cultural references. The films generally draw their racial and color-coding from the novels, but in the visual medium many aspects appear more striking.3 The “Men of the West” are led by “The White Wizard,” Gandalf, with his white horse, Shadowfax, particularly in defending the racially white people of Rohan and the “White City” of Minas Tirith. Aragorn is a “Ranger from the North” who can speak to horses in not only Elvish but also Old English, and Rohan is of Scandinavian design.4 Eowyn’s lament for Theoden’s son, Theodred,

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is drawn from Old English, and cowriter Philippa Boyens notes that for the Rohirrim they drew on “bits and pieces of Beowulf.”5 The costume designers discuss their intent to make Galadriel the “most white,” “most elegant,” and “most beautiful” of all the characters.6 Hobbit culture and language is drawn from the United Kingdom, and Hobbiton at Mata Mata was designed to convey “homely and familiar” comfort, such as, “Englishness.”7 Conversely, “black” signifies evil, particularly the faceless Black Riders with black hoods and horses. Although Saruman the White, played by Christopher Lee, is one of the chief villains, he proves to be merely “passing”; his castle of black obsidian and black chamber and palantir tip off viewers to his black heart. At the council meeting at Rivendell, Gandalf speaks “the black speech of Mordor”; director Peter Jackson notes that the scene “shows the power of black speech within the elven world of Rivendell . . . the evil force saying those words can conjure up.”8 The various nonhuman minions of Sauron and Saruman exhibit an array of racialized characteristics, although these traits are generally mixed and inconsistent.9 Goblins are blunt-nosed, short, stooping, and slant-eyed. The orcs, who are “elves gone bad,” as explained by Treebeard in the extended version, have brown and red faces.10 The Urukhai are tall, black, and muscular with long, coarse hair that resembles dreadlocks. These Uruks, a racial mongrel of goblins and orcs,11 are shown being “harvested” from mud; thus they are literally “mud people.” Although these monster-villains are generally nameless, animalistic monsters, the one exception is Lurtz, the Uruk captain who is shown emerging from the mud. The filmmakers explain that they invented Lurtz to personify the Uruk-hai and to provide a mobile villain, since both Sauron and Saruman are stationary.12 Lurtz, although entirely covered with prosthetics and make-up, is played by Lawrence Makoare, a Maori of the Ngati Whatua tribe (Makoare), who also plays the Witch King, the Nazgûl captain, in Return of the King.13 Makoare also played “Macenus/Barbarian Leader” in a 1995 episode of Xena: Warrior Princess and “Mr. Kil” in 2002’s Die Another Day.14 Asked why indigenous people always play villains, he replies, “I always play the bad guys . . . it’s a type cast thing. . . . I am not upset about it . . . whether you play the bad guys or good guys, the pay is the same. 5 bucks. heh.” In New Zealand, he continues, “everyone knows me as the bad guy . . . I think I’m the first choice.”15 Makoare also voiced Lurtz, and when Makoare had to leave the production for other engagements, Sala Baker, a New Zealand actor of Samoan descent and a professional stunt-person, took over the Lurtz role. Baker also plays Sauron in the Fellowship prologue and an Uruk at Amon Hen in the Two Towers.16 Disturbingly, with their white face paint (“the White Hand of Saruman”) and coarse black hair, the Uruks strongly resemble Maori warriors. In the New Zealand film Utu, the Maori warrior Te Wheke, played by Anzac Wallace (a former convict, labor organizer, and arbitrator of Maori descent), seeks

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revenge (“utu”) for the betrayals by the British.17 Te Wheke tattoos his face to signify his declaration of war against the Pakeha (white New Zealanders).18 Te Wheke’s trenchant, militant rage is contrasted to his brother Wiremu’s decision to pursue biculturalism. Wiremu is played by Wi Kuki Kaa, who although also ethnically Maori, appears more Westernized and thereby symbolizes a rational, liberal multicultural society. “By the end of the film,” Blythe notes, “Te Wheke . . . has been executed for his transgressions against Maori and Pakeha.”19 In other words, Te Wheke represents the irrational hatred on the part of the savage other. Disturbingly, Makoare as Lurtz shares characteristics of Te Wheke, including brown skin, thick, wiry, black, almost dreadlocked hair, facial tattoos, a hulking physique, and an implacable, primordial desire to destroy (white) people. The Two Towers film, with its extended battle sequences, introduces us to the “Southrons” and “Easterlings.” While the novels inform us that Sauron has struck deals with and/or enslaved these people, in the films they simply appear amassing in Mordor. The Easterlings have kohl-rimmed, almondshaped eyes and dark skin and wear turbans. On the actors’ commentary track, Sean Astin enthuses about the Easterlings’ “South Asian” look.20 Return of the King’s siege of Minas Tirith features the Easterlings as well as the Southrons, who are large, muscular, face-painted, and black, both groups riding atop enormous “oliphaunts” (large elephants). Again, whereas the novels at least hint at the humanity of the Southrons and Easterlings —we get a little insight into their reactions to the “Captains of the West,” and Aragorn has to deal with them as peoples after the war— in the films, they embody abstract evil that disappears when defeated. In a scene cut from the theatrical release (and thought by Sam in the novel), Faramir wonders aloud about the humanity of a fallen Easterling. Jackson argues that this addresses Tolkien’s critics: “People say that he’s racist, people say that he’s pro-war,” but such a scene indicates that Tolkien despised war and questions “why the enemy are supposed to be different from him.”21 But this episode does more to humanize Faramir than the anonymous, dead Easterling, and it is only a brief moment—cut from the theatrical version— in three epic films laden with racialized imagery. Jackson’s comment also reflects the identity-/experiencedbased conception of politics and ideology. Furthermore, Jackson notes that the inspiration for the siege of Helm’s Deep came from the 1964 Michael Caine film Zulu, based on an 1879 event in which 150 British soldiers held a garrison at Rorke’s Drift, South Africa, against 4,000 Zulu warriors. For this, British soldiers received the highest number of Victoria Crosses awarded to a regiment for one action, and Rorke’s Drift has become a tourist attraction to which people still make “pilgrimages.”22 Jackson recalls, “Zulu was always in the back of my mind when I was thinking about Helm’s Deep,” and he discusses drawing on the way Zulu builds tension for the first hour and then “all hell breaks loose.”23

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In Two Towers, tens of thousands of orcs and Uruks amass at Orthanc and then attack the small Rohan band at Helm’s Deep; like beetles or cockroaches they swarm over the landscape, scale the walls, and spill over (and destroy) the battlements. The correlation of orcs, Uruks, and goblins with insects (and Zulus) is not wholly inadvertent; in discussing the design of the prosthetics for the villains, famed Tolkien artist John Howe notes that they should be “insect-like,” like “cockroaches,” with “black, dark, nasty suits of armor.”24 Jackson also refers to other action-adventure films based on fantasies of defeating savage others. In Moria, the cave troll scene in Gloin’s tomb is a homage to Harryhausen, director of such early fantasy films as Sinbad and Jason and the Argonauts, and when the Balrog emerges, Jackson notes that one of his references was Indiana Jones.25 Overall, the racial coding of the films far exceeds the film’s intended message of cross-cultural cooperation, most pointedly conveyed in Legolas and Gimli’s relationship. The filmmakers also invent other episodes to stress this point, such as when a battalion of elves, despite long-standing estrangement, comes to aid the humans at Helm’s Deep. Likewise, although Christine Brooke-Rose argues that Legolas’ and Gimli’s only function in the novels is “to illustrate dwarf and elf characteristics,”26 their friendship is supposed to demonstrate the possibilities for cooperation even between individuals of different cultures and species with long historical animosities, thus moving beyond a deterministic view of those characters and their races. The films also problematize race-consciousness by showing, in Fellowship, Aragorn struggling with his lineage and membership in the human race, preferring the ways (and women) of the elves. In fact, Aragorn himself is a product of a mixture of cultures; as a Dunédain, he lives longer than normal humans, he was raised by the elves, and his children, presumably, will be half elvish. But again, these are just a few notes in an overall symphony of racial coding. The oddest thing about the trilogy is that they invoke contemporary racial discourses without really referring to them, but at the same time the films cannot really escape those racial discourses. The Uruks are big, black, savage, and dreadlocked, their faces tattooed with war paint. The heroes are of “the West” and “the White,” while Mordor is “the Black Land.” These fantastic representations exceed, while never wholly shedding, delineations of current and historical racial discourses. For example, it is curious and bizarre that while most of the Uruks, orcs, and goblins are played by white actors, and while all the actors playing monsters are completely covered by prosthetics and make-up, a Maori actor was cast in the role of Lurtz and the Witch-King and an ethnically Samoan actor in the role of Sauron. Two reasons for this infelicitous casting come to mind. First, as Makoare has noted, he is typecast as “the bad guy,” whether on New Zealand television or Xena: Warrior Princess. Furthermore, Makoare and Baker apparently seem “natural” in these roles because the Uruks, Sauron, and the Witch-King are big, black, savage, and

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evil. These casting and typecasting issues have to do with the issues of the racialized political-economic situation I will discuss later in this chapter; my point here is that the film simply overflows with racial issues that work on two levels. On the surface, the rhetoric of liberal multiculturalism— of many species living together in happy harmony—reassures us; at the same time, the specter of whites besieged by dark hordes speaks to deeper racial anxieties. Both of these levels are key to the films’ appeal. But despite the glaring obviousness of these racial delineations, discussions about race in LOTR and contemporary films in general tend to be confused or avoided altogether. For example, film critics who can intelligently discuss the film’s aesthetics and possible commentaries on war or other topics, find themselves stymied when trying to discuss race (and gender). For example, in the online magazine Slate’s “Year in Movies” discussion by four prominent film critics, the conversation becomes mired down in identities and indeterminacy. The conversation ignites when L.A. Times critic Manohla Dargis, after responding angrily to Village Voice critic J. Hoberman’s suggestion that LOTR was disliked by women because it is “more of a guy thing,” asks, “Do you think that a lot of (American) critics have become reluctant to deal with movies politically for fear of being labeled ‘politically correct’? ”27 New York Times film critic A. O. Scott agrees that while “there is a political dimension to a great many movies,” “trying to establish it too early or evaluate it too dogmatically makes for dull and predictable criticism.” In most cases, he argues, “the political implications of movies are either muddled . . . or opaque, and their connection to the world of actual politics becomes clear only in retrospect.” Politics are indeterminable because each person’s political beliefs are determined not only by “age, taste, gender, sexuality, or anything else,” they are also often marked by “complexity, incoherence, and unpredictability,” as well as “boredom” and “muddle-headedness.” Dargis agrees that her own politics are “a big confusing jumble” and that she does not “look at movies through a specific political lens,” so “I never want to write a review with some sort of (political) checklist in hand.” Wesley Morris, film critic for the Boston Globe, concurs that “a lot of critics do fear dealing with movies’ politics,” either out of the “muddle” of one’s own politics or “some kind of editorial pressure.” And Scott agrees, “politics can be quite slippery and ambiguous—and, as often as not, reflections of the political inclinations and rhetorical skills of the people watching them.” So the answer to the question that Scott poses—“Does Return of the King, with its martial sweep and its clearly demarcated lines of good and evil—racial lines, by the way, albeit drawn between imaginary races—stand as a mirror for our own times?”—remains, ultimately, unanswerable. Similarly, John Yatt in The Guardian identifies both the films and novels as “racist,” then dismisses the issue with a guilty shrug.28 Otherwise, there is little or no conversation about race in the films.

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But we can understand the politics of a film like LOTR in more complex and concrete ways, particularly in the context of the global industry mainstream films have become. The “complexity,” “muddle-headedness,” and “incomprehensibility” of the debate about representation and race may have more to do with its premises than simply each person’s innate confusion. Dargis starts down a productive path at one point, although she shies away from making any definitive statement: Yes, the critic certainly, in part, defines a movie’s politics. But there is a political dimension to even the most ostensibly nonpolitical film, just as there is a political dimension to clothes (Made in China . . . by slave labor!) and food (McDonalds or Slow Food–approved). There is a political dimension to how movie money is raised, what screenwriter and director are chosen, how many and what kind of theaters a film opens in, and it is naive to believe otherwise. Everyone decides what is important to them—how much compromise he or she can stand, and what he or she does with their contradictions.29

While the previous dialogues about fantasy, films, and politics point to the limitations of modern discourses of race, here Dargis suggests possibilities for moving beyond a “checklist” or “litmus test” model of political analyses. What are the structures and processes of power, particularly economically and politically, that shape the experiences and perceptions of different groups of people? As David Golumbia points out in his critique of Star Trek ’s liberal humanist take on race, when race hatred is seen as stemming from primordial, essential “hatred,” there is no consideration of the possible “justifications” of anger, no reflection on the dynamics of one’s own structures, organizations, and processes (e.g., the Federation), nothing but a blissful utopia of a future devoid of racial conflict: Insofar as that rational-logical structure, the Federation, represents the white power structure in place in the U.S. (and the neutralizing and blinding ideology upon which it rests), the show offers us the spectacle of that power structure and of what we might call hegemonic whiteness watching the Watts riots in horror, while relying on its utopian displacements to make those conflicts strange, alien, not part of “us” and significantly not our fault.30

We can see a similar dynamic operating with LOTR. The films function through willful repression. The experience is that our “selves” are okay because the kind of racial strife between the elves and the dwarves is, for us, a relic of the past. We are okay not only because it is “just a movie,” but also because its production, marketing, and distribution is transnational and multicultural; white American actor Viggo Mortensen and New Zealander

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(ethnically Samoan) actor Sala Baker greet one another at The Two Towers premiere with an affectionate head-butt.31 The film was made in New Zealand and intended for a primarily American audience; although global distribution is part and parcel of the industry now, on the DVD commentaries, several times Jackson and the writers address American audiences (e.g., translating Celsius into Fahrenheit). But while the LOTR films were produced by and for multicultural societies putatively dedicated to racial, ethnic, and cultural harmony, the fantasy of cross-cultural cooperation and harmony relies on (while denying) racist discourses and structures that are themselves “real” yet elusive. By obscuring their own premises—the economic, political, social, and psychological processes that rely on, create, and exacerbate racism in our world—the films package and sell liberal multiculturalism to audiences. MAKING THE LORD OF THE RINGS IN A WORLD OF FANTASY Comparing the context of the films’ production to its content and strategies of distribution cast light on the division between the realities and perceptions of race. The films’ production and distribution epitomize the logic of global late capitalism: “transnational” labor forces (both in terms of recruiting skilled workers from anywhere in the world as well as in terms of core nation/First World capital utilizing periphery/non-West labor), global and diversified marketing and merchandising, and an increasing emphasis in developed/First-World countries on information/technology industries and short-term, nonunionized, mobile labor. These processes of financial and political restructuring can be directly related to social changes and issues of cultural diversity. The production process of the LOTR films epitomizes the flexibility and reach of new forms of production in a globalized economy. Although the U.S. companies Miramax and then New Line financed the films, the actual production was relegated to lower-cost New Zealand. Renowned Tolkien artist Alan Lee, whom Jackson recruited along with John Howe to help design the film, speaks of the film as a “huge collaborative process,” involving over 3,000 crew members and over 300 people in the art department who worked for three to four years to create Middle Earth.32 Richard Taylor, the president, supervisor, and spiritual guru of Weta Workshop, discusses how he hired principally young New Zealand artists who did not necessarily have film experience but had a solid background in art.33 Artisans, craftspeople, and artists in New Zealand who could make swords, costumes, sets, masks, and a wide variety of objects—in both traditional and innovative ways — were contracted for this film, working “day and night” for several years.34 Although the films were shot in New Zealand, the cast, crew, and others involved with the production and marketing were international. Specialized

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information- and technology-innovators were brought in from all over the world for this short-term project designed for mass global consumption. In various ways, these workers are information/technology workers, not quite “part-time” but nevertheless temporary, mobile, young, and not unionized. Like most products consumed in the United States, the final product hides the labor that went into producing it. The obscuring of technical wizardry and aesthetic manipulation characterizes not only contemporary fantasy/ sci-fi films but, in various ways, films, texts, and other works of art in the past. But, as claimed repeatedly by Jackson, Taylor, and others, in contrast to the delightfully cheesy Harryhausen movies and even the original Star Wars films, the breakthrough of LOTR is the incredible realism of the fantasy.35 Also hidden is state support and involvement in the production of this high-tech export product. For example, the New Zealand army not only constructed the bridge but also built roads and planted the trees and gardens for Hobbiton at Mata Mata.36 At the same time, the film’s marketing strategy entails recording all this information and selling it as a product. The LOTR franchise broke ground not only in terms of technical filmmaking but also in its innovative, synergistic marketing strategies. “The modern strategies [for marketing] of the big Hollywood companies” entail far more than the film itself; merchandizing and marketing campaigns involve repeat viewings, DVDs (in original formats, extended versions, and extra appendices), free Web publicity, video games, infotainment as advertisements on networks like the Sci Fi channel, magazines, etc.37 As Thompson observes, “A fantasy film, especially as part of a franchise and even more especially as part of a franchise with an existing fan base, can generate enormous income from licensed merchandise and tieins.”38 New Line and AOL, both subsidiaries of mammoth media conglomerate Time Warner, also broke new ground in their savvy manipulation of the internet publicity campaign, “controlling rather than thwarting” piracy for publicity reaching over 65 million people around the world.39 But while the films were made by and for peoples from several countries (primarily New Zealand, the United States, England, and Australia) that constitute an increasingly transnational popular culture in a global economy, New Zealand itself remains marked by the history of colonialism and imperialism in two senses. First, as a former British colony, New Zealanders retain cultural, economic, and political ties to the former Mother Country. Beyond the general influence of British television on Jackson, particularly the work of veterans Bernard Hill (Theoden) and Christopher Lee (Saruman), several other references to former colonial relations appear throughout interviews and the DVD commentaries. One amusing example is Jackson’s proud reference to Australians and New Zealanders as the “crasser members of the Commonwealth.”40 Second, the Maori peoples, Pacific Island immigrants (PI), and the entire country continue to struggle with economic, racial, and

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cultural problems. Examining this history of imperialism, in contrast to and in conjunction with the films, can help us to talk about race and racial issues in more productive terms. New Zealand has traditionally prided itself on its commitment to diversity; as Jane Kelsey puts it, the country “used to claim credit as the first country to give women the vote, as the birthplace of the welfare state, for a harmonious multiracial society and, more recently, for being ‘clean, green and nuclear free.’ ”41 But economic disparities along racial and ethnic lines have in fact increased since New Zealand restructured its economy for the global markets in which LOTR has been so successful. Like many countries that had formerly emphasized industrialization in the decades following WWII, in the 1980s and 1990s, New Zealand shifted from a reliance on manufacturing and state-sponsored services to deregulation, flexible accumulation, and information-, technology-, and service-based industries.42 The “New Zealand experiment,” as it has been dubbed, has been praised by the World Bank and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) as an “international success story.”43 But these economic changes have disproportionately hurt Maori and Pacific Islanders; moreover, the resulting social marginalization of these groups has been cast in terms of racial and cultural differences. The racialized wealth gap contradicts and complicates New Zealand’s narrative —shared by many in other first-world nations — that racism is on the decline. Economic restructuring has directly impacted race relations in New Zealand, as Maori and Pacific Islanders, who provided much of the labor required during the postwar expansion years, have found themselves increasingly cast aside. Many state industries traditionally held by Maori and Pacific Islanders were privatized, including post office, railway, and forestry service.44 Overall, cuts in manufacturing and state-related jobs led to a two-thirds decline in employment between 1985 and 1989, and 80% of those who lost their jobs were Maori.45 Maori unemployment peaked at 27% in 1992, and PI unemployment peaked at over 30% in 1991; by the mid-1990s, Maori unemployment had fallen to 16% and PI to 17%, but these were still higher than the rates for the overall population.46 While one-third of whites in New Zealand are working class, one-half of Maoris and two-thirds of Pacific Islanders are working class.47 In other words, a disproportionate number of Maori and Pacific Islanders are unemployed or working poor. The media in New Zealand—as in the United States—casts social problems resulting from economic disparities in terms of race and culture. For example, Judy McGregor and Joanne TeAwa point out that the news media focuses on “racialised forms of problems or conflict” instead of “deeper social, political or economic causes and backgrounds of these conflicts.”48 Despite the emerging, increasingly disparate class system, the divide between Maoris/ Pacific Islanders and the rest of New Zealanders is seen in terms of a “racial

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problem.”49 Or, paralleling moves by the Slate film critics, structural and systemic problems are cast in terms of identity, culture, and race. Citing William J. Wilson’s When Work Disappears: The World of the New Urban Poor, D. Baker compares the New Zealand underclass to the “dispossessed class of urban blacks and whites” around the world, “individuals or groups with limited skills, education or capital” who are “faced with the possibility of structural unemployment or subsistence-paying jobs.”50 In the Pacific and other places, underdevelopment is the product of advanced capital drawing on precapitalist economies. Uneven economic development has and continues to shape the racial divides and discourses of developing and developed nations. In this context, the typecasting of Makoare and Baker give the lie not only to the dream of multiculturalism and international cosmopolitanism, it also indicates the socioeconomic history that shapes the racialized hierarchy of New Zealand. The films’ “racializations,” drawing on popular racial discourses, mystify race into the abstract (it is there but not), ignoring and denying the actual political realities of racialization and late capitalism while also relying on those very processes. These processes rely on the burial of race — or the privileging of certain conceptions of race and the denial of others. Liberal analyses of race relations are premised on the notion that racial conflict arises from identity/ethnicity/ culture, but “racism and ethnic categorization,” Loomis argues, “are important means of class domination which are given effect through individual behavior, institutional policy and public ideological discourses.”51 Limiting the terms of the debate to identity and discourse does not, ultimately, explain the processes that unevenly distribute resources and divide potential working-class allies by racial animosities, often over a manufactured, unnecessary scarcity of resources. Concomitant to a “culturalist” understanding is the assumption that “racism” either no longer exists or only exists among a few extremist radicals. Purely cultural multiculturalism is easily assimilable into fantasies that draw on a polyglot of cultures, in content and form. For example, in LOTR, the filmmakers note that the funeral of Théodon’s son Theodred (cut from the theatrical version) combines an Old English elegy, sung by Éowyn, with the Maori custom in which the men hand the body to the women.52 Thus, LOTR exemplifies how Hollywood can use liberal multiculturalism as a selling point while also relying on and perpetuating racialized discourses and structural disparities. I want to conclude by discussing how the same limits on considerations of race in Lord of the Rings also apply to a film as stridently “realistic” as Crash. The 2005 film won both accolades (including the Academy Award for Best Picture) and criticism, from film reviews in Slate, the L.A. Times, and the New York Times.53 The film was cowritten and directed by Canadian Paul Haggis, who has discussed the film as a response to his own experience of being carjacked.54 But given the terms with which many Americans think and talk

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about race, a movie like Crash cannot help but fail. Its failure to present a vision of multicultural harmony prevents it from even being a true blockbuster like Lord of the Rings. On another level, those who believe race is an issue but think of it only in terms of culture or identity will have none of those basic assumptions challenged by Crash. In the film, racism is a personal failing that infects everyone and is, for the most part, separate from other issues. That is, although, race is, as one reviewer writes, the “one obsessive issue . . . [that] effects relationships and decisions, shapes and distorts character, and determines social policy,”55 we never really understand why race is an issue. It simply emanates from the primordial racial differences of the various discrete groups. The purpose of the movie for this audience, as the consistently liberal multiculturalist Roger Ebert writes, is that “anyone seeing it is likely to be moved to have a little more sympathy for people not like themselves.”56 All the characters are determined by their race, and redemption—particularly for whites—will come primarily through understanding. As Peter Bradshaw observes, the angry white woman played by Sandra Bullock “is actually in need of a hug. So is everyone else.”57 But despite its earnest intentions, the film exacerbates the belief that race is primarily a personal failing, mostly a product of prejudice and bad feelings rather than larger economic and political structures. The one exception to this treatment of race is the predicament of the policeman played by Matt Dillon. His racism is linked to his anger and frustration that he cannot provide medical care for his ailing father due to the bureaucratic hurdles of his health insurance provider. In the scene, Dillon’s character pleads with the female, African American insurance supervisor, played by Loretta Devine, who can fix his problems with a stroke of her pen. He explains that his father, who had owned a custodial company and paid fair wages to black workers during decades when no one else was, lost everything when the city’s post–civil rights policies began to favor minorityowned businesses. This, the only moment in the film that hints at how political economy actually shapes the terms of race, is actually used to justify racism and criticize affirmative action. Roger Ebert argues that Dillon’s racism toward Devine’s character is “only an excuse for his anger” at the HMO, but, on the contrary, through its obsessive fixation on race as a personal failing, the film casts everything else as a bad by-product of racism. Instead of showing how those structures of power, which often take bureaucratic forms, imprison us all and indeed lead to easy scapegoats, the fi lm reassures us that it is race, and not those structures, that cause our problems. And the film is most problematic when it fantasizes that such a health insurance supervisor would deny coverage on the basis of reverse racism. In the real world, it is more likely that financial and profit pressures would force the hand of an insurance supervisor, regardless of race or gender. So Crash, like LOTR, seeks to assuage fears and liberal guilt, but its terms actually obscure the conditions that create racial inequality and anger.

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In arguing this, my purpose is not to return to the old claim that race (or gender or sexuality) should be subsumed under economics. My point is not that this history of production and economics is the “real story” belying the fantasy; it is just not that simple a bifurcation. But discussion of discourses, semiotics, and attitudes about race without consideration of political, economic, and social structures not only leaves out a large part of the picture, it actually has led to a kind of dead-end in contemporary conversations about race. The Lord of the Rings films, taken on their own terms, are beautiful cultural productions that have brought pleasure to people from all walks of life, and this aspect of the films is real, too. The problem is that our “reality” beyond the films is as fantastical as the films if we believe in the success of liberal multiculturalism, that issues of racial and gendered discrimination, oppression, and exploitation are relics of the past, as mythical as trolls, elves, and wise, good kings. The entirety of the production and distribution of films such as LOTR can actually show a reality more real than the fantasies of happily multicultural societies in which we so want to believe, despite the facts, and which Hollywood is and will continue to be more than happy to sell to us. NOTES 1. Michael Omi and Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 1994), 71. 2. According to the Internet Movie Database, The Return of the King ranked second in all-time worldwide box office and ninth in U.S. sales, Two Towers ranked eighth worldwide and thirteenth in the United States, and Fellowship ranked fifteenth worldwide and twenty-first in the United States. Moreover, each installation of the trilogy broke the previous film’s records for December opening. “Lord of the Rings Breaks Record,” CNNMoney.com (December 18, 2003). Available from: http://money.cnn. com/2003/12/18/news/companies/lotr_opening/ (accessed December 24, 2007). 3. Although the novels share many of these characteristics, their ability to explore symbolism, diplomacy and war, culture, and history in greater depth and subtlety renders their black-and-white coding more ambivalent than in the films. 4. “Audio Commentary,” The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, Special extended DVD, directed by Peter Jackson (2002, New Line Home Entertainment, 2003). 5. “Audio Commentary,” Two Towers. 6. “Designing and Building Middle-earth,” The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Special extended DVD, directed Peter Jackson (2001, New Line Home Entertainment, 2002). 7. “Designing.” 8. “Audio Commentary,” The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Special extended DVD, directed by Peter Jackson (2001, New Line Home Entertainment, 2002). 9. The various goblins, orcs, and Uruk-hai also often speak with working-class cockney accents, suggesting also making the poor king class another race. Similarly,

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the Wild Men of the hills that Saruman sets against Rohan are “disenfranchised human beings” who are rural “primitive, inbred wild men,” and in “Audio,” Two Towers, Jackson notes one could imagine banjos playing. 10. “Audio Commentary,” Fellowship. 11. “Audio Commentary,” Fellowship. 12. “Audio Commentary,” Fellowship. 13. Lawrence Makoare, “Impromptu Chat with Lawrence Makoare —the Actor Behind Lurtz and the Witch King!” (2002) Available from: http://www.theonering.net/ events/logs/030802.html (accessed February 7, 2007). 14. The Internet Movie Database (2004). Available from: http://www.imdb.com (accessed February 6, 2004). 15. Makoare. 16. Sala Baker, “Impromptu Chat with Sala Baker—the Actor Behind Sauron!” (2002). Available from: http://www.theonering.net/events/logs/040802.html (accessed February 7, 2004). 17. Internet Movie Data Base. 18. Martin Blythe, Naming the Other: Images of the Maori in New Zealand Film and Television (Metuchen: Scarecrow, 1994), 240. 19. Blythe, 247. 20. “Audio Commentary: The Cast,” The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, Special extended DVD, directed by Peter Jackson (2002, New Line Home Entertainment, 2003). 21. “Audio Commentary,” Two Towers. 22. “Rorke’s Drift 1879” (2007). Available from: http://www.rorkesdriftvc.com/ index.html (accessed August 29, 2007). 23. “Audio Commentary,” Two Towers; “From Book to Script: Finding the Story,” The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, Special extended DVD, directed by Peter Jackson (2002, New Line Home Entertainment, 2003). 24. “Designing.” 25. “Audio Commentary,” Fellowship. 26. Christine Brooke-Rose, A Rhetoric of the Unreal (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1981), 249. 27. “The Year in Movies: A Cry in the Dark,” Slate Magazine (January 5–9, 2004). Available from: Slate http://slate.msn.com (accessed January 15, 2004). 28. John Yatt, “Wraiths and Race,” The Guardian (December 2, 2002). Available from: http://books.guardian.co.uk (accessed August 20, 2007). 29. Manohla Dargis, “Witness to the Masturbation,” Slate (January 9, 2004). Available from: http://www.slate.com/id/2093274/entry/2093703/ (accessed August 13, 2008). 30. David Golumbia, “Black and White World: Race, Ideology, and Utopia in Triton and Star Trek,” Cultural Critique 32 (Winter 1995–96): 85. 31. “Filming ‘The Two Towers,’ ” The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, Special extended DVD, directed by Peter Jackson (2002, New Line Home Entertainment, 2003). 32. “Designing.” 33. “Designing.” 34. “Designing.”

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35. One of the most fascinating aspects of the films’ design, effects, and production is the commitment, almost completely without irony, to “realism.” Taylor points out that often in fantasy films, actors have to “wink” at the audience to make them accept what is happening, but for them, “It was imperative that Middle Earth was real” (“Designing”). The Weta Workshop literally created the entire universe of the films with an incredible amount of thought, care, labor, and even love in every detail of every prop, costume, and set of the film. Over 45,000 different miniatures, prosthetics, and other items were created by Weta over three to four years. In keeping with the racialization of that world, their philosophy was that every aspect of culture (including dress, dominant colors, architecture, weapons, armor, etc.) of the many “races and cultures” in the books should be identifiable on sight. Each race has a distinctive design of arrow, and over 10,000 arrows were produced for the first film alone. Actual swordsmiths were hired to create real swords for the actors (Viggo Mortensen supposedly kept his by his side constantly). Fifty-eight remarkably detailed, very large miniatures—or “Big-atures,” as Weta dubbed them—were created for the film (including Rivendell, Orthanc, and Lothlorien). For the three films, over 10,000 facial appliances and over 1,800 body suits of foam latex were created; the designers note that they particularly had to create a vast number of facial prosthetics because they would only last one day. Over 1,800 pairs of hobbit feet were created for the four main characters alone. Over 12 kilometers of pipe were sliced into over 12.5 million rings to form hundreds of chain mail garments; in the process, the two people who spent the bulk of over three and half years assembling these garments wore away their fingerprints. At the same time, Jackson notes how interesting it is that while some critics “tore us to pieces” for errors like the “tomato” reference in Fellowship, pointing out that Tolkien revised his novels to cut out New World items like potatoes, few people took issue with the references to tobacco—never mind the elves, talking trees, and balrogs (“Audio Commentary,” Fellowship). 36. “Audio Commentary,” Fellowship; “Designing.” 37. Kristen Thompson, “Fantasy, Franchises, and Frodo Baggins: The Lord of the Rings and Modern Hollywood,” Velvet Light Trap 52 (Fall 2003): 61. 38. Thompson, 58. 39. Thompson, 54 –57. 40. “Audio Commentary,” Fellowship. 41. Jane Kelsey, The New Zealand Experiment: A World Model for Structural Adjustment? 2nd ed. (Auckland: Auckland UP, 1997), 1. See also Kelsey, Rolling Back the State: Privatisation of Power in Aotearoa/New Zealand (Wellington: Bridget Williams, 1993). 42. In New Zealand, as in the United States, employment underwent what has been dubbed “McDonaldization”; work is temporary but faster-paced, with fewer opportunities for development or advancement. Most such jobs have no benefits, security, or union representation, and two-thirds of part-time workers are women. And although these McDonaldized jobs are qualitatively different from those of the artists and technicians who worked on the LOTR films, they are structurally similar: insecure, short-term, and politically unorganized. 43. Kelsey, New Zealand, 1.

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44. Paul Spoonley, “Mahi Awatea? The Racialisation of Work in Aotearoa/New Zealand,” Nga Patai: Racism and Ethnic Relations in Aotearoa/New Zealand, ed. Paul Spoonley et al. (Palmerston North: Dunmore, 1996), 66. 45. Spoonley, 65 – 66. 46. Patrick Ongley, “Immigration, Employment and Ethnic Relations,” Nga Patai: Racism and Ethnic Relations in Aotearoa/New Zealand, ed. Paul Spoonley et al. (Palmerston North: Dunmore, 1996), 23. 47. Terrence Loomis, Pacific Migrant Labour, Class and Racism in New Zealand: Fresh Off the Boat (Aldershot: Avebury, 1990), 67. 48. Judy McGregor and Joanne TeAwa, “Racism and the News Media,” Nga Patai: Racism and Ethnic Relations in Aotearoa/New Zealand, ed. Paul Spoonley et al. Palmerston North: Dunston, 1996), 237–38. Similarly, Loomis notes, “A television journalist speaks authoritatively about tensions between ‘racial communities’ in South Auckland. An Opposition parliamentarian warns of an emerging Polynesian ‘underclass.’ And a Maori activist condemns ‘Pakeha domination’ ” (5). 49. Spoonley, 58–59. 50. Donald G. Baker, Review of Nga Patai: Racism and Ethnic Relations in Aotearoa/ New Zealand, ed. Paul Spoonley et al., Ethnic and Racial Studies 21, no. 4 (July 1998): 795. 51. Loomis, 4. 52. “Audio Commentary,” Two Towers. 53. David Edelstein, “Crash and Fizzle,” Slate (May 5, 2005). Available from: http:// www.slate.com (accessed August 20, 2007); Carina Chocano, “Crash,” L. A. Times (May 6, 2005). Available from: http://www.latimes.com (accessed August 20, 2007); A. O. Scott, “Bigotry as the Outer Side of Inner Angst,” New York Times (May 6, 2005). Available from: http://www.nytimes.com (accessed August 20, 2007). 54. Paul Haggis, “On the Origins of Crash.” Available from: http://www.landmark theatres.com/mn/crash.html (accessed August 25, 2007). 55. Philip French, “Hollywood’s Last Taboo,” The Guardian (August 14, 2005). Available from: http://www.guardian.co.uk (accessed August 20, 2007). 56. Roger Ebert, “Crash,” Chicago Sun-Times (May 5, 2005). Available from: http:// www.rogerebert.suntimes.com (accessed August 20, 2007). 57. Peter Bradshaw, “Crash,” The Guardian (August 12, 2005). Available from: http://www.guardian.co.uk (accessed August 20, 2007).

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chapter 7

Dream Worlds: Film-Game Franchising and Narrative Form Harry Brown

What is the Matrix? Control. The Matrix is a computer-generated dream world built to keep us under control. —The Matrix (1999) FROM ALAMOGORDO TO SAN FRANCISCO On June 11, 1982, Universal Pictures released Steven Spielberg’s E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, a story of friendship between a misfit boy and a benevolent alien stranded on Earth. The film charmed audiences, generating $11 million in its first weekend and more than $350 million in its first year. Ronald Reagan and Princess Diana cried when they saw the film, and the United Nations awarded Spielberg the Peace Medal for his work. Looking back on the film 20 years later, Roger Ebert writes, “This movie made my heart glad. It is filled with innocence, hope, and good cheer. . . . E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial is a movie like The Wizard of Oz, that you can grow up with and grow old with, and it won’t let you down. . . . E.T. is a reminder of what movies are for.”1 In July 1982, Warner Communications, the parent company of Atari, secured the rights to create an E.T. videogame for the Atari 2600 console. The

Parts of this chapter have been reprinted from my article, “Malleable Mythologies: Competing Strategies for Adapting Film Narrative to Video Games in Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings,” in Works and Days 22, nos. 1 and 2 © 2004, edited by Ken McAllister and Ryan Moeller, by permission of David Downing.

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deal promised a happy marriage between Hollywood and the burgeoning videogame industry. At the time, Atari led the games market, and by landing E.T. they acquired the hottest film license since Star Wars. Anticipating massive sales, Atari rushed to complete the game in time for the 1982 holiday season, manufacturing five million game cartridges, about one for every two Atari consoles owned in the United States. The game flopped spectacularly. Warner stock plummeted, and Atari claimed more than $500 million in losses in 1983. In September of that year, Atari buried tons of unsold merchandise in a landfill in Alamogordo, New Mexico, including almost four million E.T. cartridges. Within a year, Warner dismantled and sold Atari. Although employee dissatisfaction, inefficient distribution practices, and increasing competition with home computer games contributed to Atari’s crash, E.T. has come to signify the creative and commercial bankruptcy of the industry in 1983. On June 25, 2005, a long way from Alamogordo, George Lucas welcomed 2,000 guests to the gala opening of the Letterman Digital Arts Center (LDAC) in the Presidio of San Francisco, where Lucasfilm and its special effects and videogame divisions, Industrial Light and Magic (ILM), and LucasArts, had just moved into their new, shared headquarters. Lucas’s guests included California Senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, House Minority leader Nancy Pelosi, and four San Francisco mayors. The city’s most esteemed chefs prepared a buffet of gourmet fried chicken and stuffed vegetables, while Chris Isaak and Bonnie Raitt entertained the crowd. Joan Baez, also in attendance, surveyed the scene and reflected, “There’s something to be said for having a billion bucks.”2 Actually, the Letterman Digital Arts Center only cost $350 million. It covers 23 acres of the Presidio and stands on the site of the former Letterman Army Medical Center, demolished in 2001 to make way for the four main buildings of the LDAC. Located in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, the Lucasfilm campus is open to the public. While the buildings themselves are tightly secured, visitors may stroll, and gawk, and have their picture taken with the bronze statue of Yoda perched on the fountain at the entrance to the LDAC. Lucasfilm boasts that the new facility features “the largest computer network in the entertainment industry, a high-performance system designed to deliver large volumes of data and high-resolution images to artists’ desktops, encouraging interactive collaboration on the creation of synthetic scenes and characters. . . . Distance boundaries have been eliminated, and digital artists can collaborate internally throughout the campus, as well as with creators of entertainment anywhere in the world.”3 While the visual effects designers at ILM and the game designers at LucasArts sometimes collaborated prior to their consolidation, they did so in separate facilities, without the advantages of proximity and a shared database. Now they work in the same virtual

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studio. At an International Game Developers Association (IGDA) meeting in San Francisco in December 2005, Lucasfilm representatives explained, “Developers are now ‘right down the hall’ from each other, developing on the same code base, staffing projects with crew from both divisions, and tackling problems with the best techniques either side has to offer. It’s not just about sharing assets . . . we’re building a unified set of technology to produce both movies and games, and give both companies unique competitive advantages.”4 Lucasfilm’s press release announcing the opening of the LDAC echoes the millennial narrative of the Star Wars films. The triumphant alliance of Lucasfilm filmmakers and game designers heralds a “new vision” for the entertainment industry, in which the “seamless integration of entertainment technologies . . . represents a new way to work . . . [and] recognizes the convergence of movies, videogames, visual effects, animation, and online, and brings Lucasfilm to the forefront of that movement.”5 In more practical terms, the consolidation signals a more deliberate approach to media convergence. In 1982, when Warner bought the E.T. license and commissioned an adaptation for the Atari 2600, the videogame industry followed Hollywood’s lead, waiting for someone to make a blockbuster film and then buying the rights to the film. Lucasfilm now facilitates the simultaneous production films and games. In his keynote address at the 2005 Siggraph digital arts expo in Los Angeles, Lucas explained, “It used to be an assembly-line process: One person would do one thing, then the next person would do the next thing. But now, we’re going to push the envelope and get everybody to work simultaneously on the same thing.” Lucas calls this new production model “the future of entertainment.”6 Beyond Lucasfilm’s corporate proselytizing, what does all this talk about a “new vision” and the “future of entertainment” really mean? How has the relation between the film and videogame industries changed in the two decades between 1982, when the adaptation of E.T. to the Atari 2600 cost Warner a half a billion dollars, and 2005, when George Lucas has reconfigured his $15 billion empire in order to maximize the potential for film–game franchising? This chapter considers the influence of film–game franchising on the way artists create films and videogames, the way audiences consume them, and the way scholars interpret them. HOLLYWOOD AND THE VIDEOGAME INDUSTRY Videogame enthusiasts and media scholars often claim that games will overtake—or have already overtaken—film as the dominant entertainment medium. In a 2003 National Public Radio interview, New York Times Magazine writer Jonathan Dee hailed the ascendance of videogames, predicting, “I can see a future in which when the technology gets a little better . . . I would be hard-pressed to think of a reason why anyone would pay to go see, for

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instance, a new James Bond movie as opposed to playing the new James Bond game.”7 In a 2007 Gamasutra interview, game designer Denis Dyack made the more monumental claim that games are not only more sophisticated and popular than films but also nothing less than “the most advanced form of art thus far in human history,” in their synthesis of text, image, sound, video, and the active participation of the audience into a unified aesthetic experience.8 As film studios and game developers consolidate their interests, however, the traditional rivalry between film and game producers dissolves in corporate synergy, and the fortunes and creative interests of the two industries fall into harmony, as they have at Lucasfilm. Predictions of videogame supremacy like Dee’s and Dyack’s often ignore the fact that games and films share largely in each other’s commercial success. Videogame companies have grown rapidly, but they have not usurped movie studios as much as they have become viable subsidiaries capable of functioning in financial and creative concert not only with film but also with television, publishing, and sports entertainment. Consumers are not conflicted, as Dee imagines, by a choice between the new Bond movie and the new Bond game, but more likely will go see the movie and buy the game, with the sense that their experience of one is enhanced by the other. The future probably will not witness more games and fewer films but rather more games, more films, more games based on films, and more films based on games, with the integrated production and marketing of film–game franchises. In one of the most celebrated ventures in media convergence, Larry and Andy Wachowski, creators of The Matrix trilogy, produced the game Enter the Matrix (2003) simultaneously with the last two films of the trilogy, shooting scenes for the game on the movies’ sets with the movies’ actors, and releasing the game on May 15, 2003, the same day as The Matrix: Reloaded. Likewise, on September 21, 2004, Lucasfilm jointly released of a new DVD box set of the original Star Wars trilogy with Star Wars: Battlefront, a combat game in which players can reenact battles from all six Star Wars films. In 2005, Peter Jackson likewise produced his blockbuster film King Kong (2005) in tandem with a successful King Kong game designed by Michael Ancel and published by Ubisoft. In the last several years, numerous licensed videogame adaptations of major summer and holiday blockbusters were released a few days before or a few days after their respective films, including: all three Star Wars films (1999–2005); all five Harry Potter films (2001–2008); all three Spider-Man films (2002–2007); Hulk (2002); The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002); The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003); The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (2005); Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest (2006); Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (2007); and Transformers (2007). These multimedia franchises have made it more difficult to distinguish the production of films and videogames as separate enterprises.

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The LDAC is the first factory designed specifically to make film–game franchises. In the same press release announcing a “new vision” for the entertainment industry, Lucasfilm offers more specific “facts and figures” describing its technological infrastructure, which includes 10,000 gigabytes of storage, image and sound editing systems, a “render farm” for processing digital images, a media center for format conversion and duplication, a 300seat movie theater, and, most importantly, the largest data network in the industry with fiber optics connecting to every desktop computer to LDAC resources and to each other. In practical terms, images and visual effects created by ILM for the Star Wars films can be immediately appropriated and repurposed by game designers. Steve Sullivan, head of research and development at ILM, explains, “An example would be, ILM is doing a shot for a film, but LucasArts artists can have that exact same shot sitting on their desk, and they can start building a game environment around it.”9 LucasArts’ Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005), a game based closely on the film, marked the first time a Star Wars film shared specific image data with a Star Wars videogame. LucasArts designers have likewise contributed integrally to ILM. “Previsualization,” a form of animated storyboarding developed through the collaboration of ILM and LucasArts, has adapted game design tools to filmmaking. Sullivan describes previsualization as: a tool that directors would use to quickly mock up the ideas of a story and see what’s going to work. It’s really like building up a preview of a movie in a video game world. Instead of using static story boards, you can really just get in and create 3D content and camera moves directly. It’s the best example of the kind of collaboration we’ve got going on. It came from George [Lucas]—it didn’t come from either division. But it requires things that both divisions have expertise in.10

Lucas said at Siggraph, “Cinema is not the art of the image; it’s the art of the moving image.” Previsualization is not simply a faster or flashier way of planning a shot. Rather, it enables filmmakers, for the first time, to edit the interplay of image and motion in the earliest stages of production, to control more deliberately what eventually appears on screen even before shooting begins. Lucas cites Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones as the “first film to be completely shot digitally.”11 While he waits, somewhat frustrated, for Hollywood to catch up, he believes that digitization represents the future of cinema: We’re hoping that at some point the theaters will switch over to digital projection, and the filmmakers will start using the new digital cameras so that we as an industry can advance technically and make everything much easier. Right now, Sony, Panavision, Fujinon and a lot of other companies

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are investing tens of millions of dollars into this idea, and the industry isn’t backing it. . . . At some point, I know it will all happen.”12

He predicts that digitization will “democratize” the industry, enabling amateur filmmakers to shoot with a handheld camera purchased from a local Wal-Mart, edit on a desktop computer, and distribute and publicize their work on the Internet. On a more fundamental level, however, the reduction of cinema to image data means that films and videogames can be created with the same tools, as we already see in ILM’s use of previsualization. If, as Lucas predicts, “it will all happen,” then the relation between the two industries will move beyond licensed adaptations and franchises; they will, as they have in Lucasworld, merge into a single industry. STAR WARS, THE LORD OF THE RINGS, AND TRANSMEDIA STORYTELLING The development of previsualization technology and the franchising of blockbuster films and videogames suggest that the increasing collaboration between the two industries will influence the creation of films and games at every phase, from preproduction to postrelease publicity. The gradual digitization of filmmaking, moreover, will facilitate film–game franchising by giving filmmakers and game designers a common medium and toolset. But what kind of story will be produced by companies like Lucasfilm, equipped to produce films, games, and television shows simultaneously? In his adaptation of E.T. to the Atari 2600, designer Howard Scott Warshaw sought to capture the suspense and sentimentality of the film by creating an adventure game that simulated E.T.’s quest to “phone home.” Players, however, found the game slow and repetitive, with neither the emotional impact of the film, nor the engaging puzzles of earlier Atari adventure games like Adventure (1980) and Raiders of the Lost Ark (1982). Recent critics routinely cite Atari’s E.T. as the worst game ever made, attributing its aesthetic and commercial failure to Atari’s rush to ship the game before Christmas, but the game reveals a deeper theoretical uncertainty among game designers at the time about strategies for the adaptation of a story from one medium to another. As the first great failed attempt to convert a blockbuster film to a videogame, E.T. proved that a film’s popularity alone could not buoy a bad game. In the two decades following Atari’s bust, highly improved technology has, as we have seen, enabled designers to make their games look more cinematic. More importantly, filmmakers and game designers have learned from earlier failures and developed subtler and more calculated strategies for spinning stories across multiple media. In Convergence Culture (2006), Henry Jenkins describes The Matrix franchise as an “entertainment for the age of media convergence, integrating multiple texts to create a narrative so large that

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it cannot be contained within a single medium.” Jenkins observes that the Wachowskis “plant clues [in the films] that won’t make sense until we play the computer game. They draw on the back story revealed through a series of animated shorts, which need to be downloaded off the Web or watched off a separate DVD.” Jenkins calls this emergent narrative structure “transmedia storytelling”: In the ideal form . . . each medium does what it does best—so that a story might be introduced in a film, expanded through television, novels, and comics; its world might be explored through gameplay or experienced as an amusement park attraction. Each franchise entry needs to be self-contained so you don’t need to have seen the film to enjoy the game, and vice versa. Any given product is a point of entry into the franchise as a whole.

According to Jenkins, collaborative authorship and the process of “worldmaking” define these new narrative franchises. He quotes an experienced screenwriter, who says, “When I first started, you would pitch a story because without a story, you didn’t really have a film. Later, once sequels started to take off, you pitched a character because a good character could support multiple stories. And now, you pitch a world because a world can support multiple characters and multiple stories across multiple media.”13 Two television commercials, one produced by LucasArts to promote the game Star Wars: Bounty Hunter (2002), and the other produced by Electronic Arts (EA) to promote their adaptation of Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, provide sketches of two competing strategies for transmedia storytelling. LucasArts’ advertisement, released during the 2002 holiday shopping season, opens with an animated close-up of a snorkel poking from the surface of a swampy, extraterrestrial pool. As nervous breathing hisses from the tube, a gauntleted fist grips the snorkel and plugs the airway with a thumb. A gasping, bug-eyed alien springs to the surface to find that the obstructing thumb belongs to Jango Fett, the most ruthless bounty hunter in the galaxy. Jango seizes his quivering prey and in his gruff, mercenary’s voice, jokes, “Did you miss me?” The commercial represents another example of the collaboration between Lucasfilm special effects engineers and LucasArts game designers that Lucas hopes to maximize at the LDAC. Although created at ILM, we don’t find this scene in any of the Star Wars films. The game’s appeal, in fact, derives from its clear departure from the 2002 film Episode II: Attack of the Clones, in which Jango, the game’s hero, is a significant but nonetheless supporting character, who in the end is summarily beheaded by a Jedi light saber. The game narrative itself follows this strategy of departure from the film narrative, representing an interactive prequel to Attack of the Clones in its story of a secret bargain between Jango and the Sith Lord Count Dooku to create the clone army already in existence at the outset of the film.

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EA’s advertisement, released during the 2003 holiday season, represents a different strategy. As the commercial opens with the New Line Cinema and Wingnut Films logos set to the haunting soundtrack of The Lord of the Rings films, we expect to see yet another plug for the last film in Peter Jackson’s trilogy. In fact, as we watch the Nazgûl glide above Minas Tirith, the giant Oliphaunt thunder across the Pelennor Fields, and the stalwart fellowship of Gimli, Legolas, Aragorn, and Gandalf in pitched battles with armies of orcs, we see that we are not wrong; these are indeed tantalizing scenes from the upcoming film. But then something strange happens: The filmed scenes transform fluidly and subtly into the photorealistic digital animations for EA’s new game. In contrast to the Bounty Hunter commercial, the spot simultaneously advertises the movie and the game, which derives marketability from its nearly perfect mimicry of Jackson’s film. Like LucasArts’ game, EA’s The Return of the King correlates this advertising strategy with an interactive narrative strategy, which offers players the chance to participate in scenes involving environments, characters, and battle sequences reproduced from those seen in the film. The commercial concludes with the invitation, “Be the hero! Live the movie!” The two advertisements manifest fundamentally different narrative and marketing strategies. Bounty Hunter offers consumers something new, something unavailable in theaters, while The Return of the King offers consumers something familiar, a chance to interact with something they have seen or soon will see in theaters. At the 2004 Game Developers Convention, veteran game designer Warren Spector urged fellow designers to use film narrative as a way to “draw in the casual gamer, who’s used to having a story told to him in other entertainment mediums, particularly movies.”14 This strategy underlies game companies’ exorbitant spending on film licenses, which represents the acquisition of a guaranteed audience and the probable success of the game among the same crowds who pack the cineplexes. While both strategies have proven commercially successful, LucasArts’ creation of game narratives that extrapolate rather than mimic the film narratives more freely explores the possibilities of transmedia storytelling that intrigue Jenkins. EA’s mimetic approach in both The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002) and The Return of the King yields, on the other hand, missions that replicate action sequences from the films. In the first mission of The Two Towers, the player is Isildur in the midst of the ancient battle that first claimed the Ring of Power from a 17-foot, mail-clad Sauron. In the second mission the player becomes Aragorn defending the wounded Frodo from the Nazgûl on Weathertop Hill. Both scenes come from the first film of the trilogy, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. In the succeeding missions, adapted from The Two Towers, the player may choose to continue as Aragorn, Gimli, or Legolas, but, with the exception of a minor variance in the bonus missions, the choice of character has no bearing on the unfolding

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of the game narrative. As in the television commercial, animations and music in both The Two Towers and The Return of the King flow seamlessly into and out of sequences from the films, which are spliced into the game narrative. The game world has been designed directly from film sets, and actors from the film have been employed for animations and voiceovers, creating an overall play experience, as the advertisement indeed claims, in which one seems to “live the movie.” In many adaptations of the Star Wars films since the release of Episode I: The Phantom Menace in 1999, LucasArts has adopted an elaborative approach, in which multiple games, such as Jedi Starfighter (2002), Clone Wars (2002), and Bounty Hunter do not mimic the film narrative but rather follow independent narratives branching from the movie plots. Although familiar movie characters, in some cases, reappear in the LucasArts games, the games’ animations, soundtracks, settings, and narratives are original. In contrast to the mimetic The Lord of the Rings games, the game narratives situate themselves outside the established chronology of the Star Wars films, becoming, in effect, interactive prequels and sequels to the films.15 In a 2006 interview, LucasArts Project Lead Chris Williams said: We’re not in a space right now where we just want to be cranking out movie games. To the extent that we did that with the Episode III game, we’re kind of done with that. We want to be telling new stories, new experiences, and really taking advantage of the interactive medium. And not just rehashing or serving up a film experience in a sort of interactive way. We’re not sitting here right now waiting for ILM to come to us with some big film project so we can just crank out a movie game of it. The goal is use these tools, techniques, and knowledge to make a really exciting, innovative, next-gen product.16

At the same time, Star Wars games reinterpret scenes from the films in ways that are recognizable to the established Star Wars audience but are, nonetheless, new. In Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (2003), a roleplaying game set four millennia before events depicted in the films, the player character liberates a comrade from slavery by winning a swoop bike race, a sequence that recalls The Phantom Menace, in which the young Anakin Skywalker must win his own emancipation in a pod race. In the same game, the central plot twist reveals that the player character, plagued by amnesia through more than half the game, finally discovers that he is a powerful Sith Lord thought to be dead and now psychologically reprogrammed by the Jedi Council to do good. The revelatory animation echoes Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980), in which Luke Skywalker, undergoing Jedi training with Yoda, beheads an apparition of Darth Vader only to discover his own face behind Vader’s mask. Finally, the closing animation of Knights of the Old Republic, in which an evil, celestial-sized superweapon is spectacularly destroyed

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and a battle-weary but joyous crowd celebrates the motley band of heroes, recalls the familiar ending of Episode IV: A New Hope (1977), in which the Death Star is annihilated, and Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Chewbacca, and the faithful droids are given medals before a happy assembly of rebels. LucasArts has also adopted this strategy in its “Jedi Knight” series: Dark Forces (1995), Jedi Knight (1997), Jedi Outcast (2002), and Jedi Academy (2003). Each of these games represents a narrative sequel of the original Star Wars trilogy in which central characters from the films, such as Luke Skywalker, Boba Fett, and Lando Calrissian, recede to supporting characters, and new characters, unseen in the films, take center stage. Republic Commando (2005), likewise, is set during the Clone Wars of Episodes II and III, but abandons the perspective of the elite Jedi heroes in favor of that of the faceless grunts, who appear in the films only as laser fodder. In a March 2004 interview,17 Peter Morawiec spoke to Game Developer magazine about adapting genre fiction and film narratives to game design: As the videogame market matures, I believe it’s natural for the story-driven games to be crafted within established narrative genres. With the age of today’s average gamer pegged at something like 29, the audience welcomes greater thematic variety, as well as deeper and more mature storylines. I believe that people will instinctively want to play the same types of genres they like to watch or read. (12)

Morawiec describes his own game designs as interactive narratives that move forward: no matter how badly the player does, allowing even a total newbie to fumble his or her way through an entire storyline, without repeating missions or getting stuck. In a passive medium such as a movie, whenever the hero hits a low point mid-film, the story doesn’t restart; rather, the hero recovers or finds another way to go on. (12)

In terms of the interrelated strategies of designing and marketing film–game franchises, Morawiec’s proposed script-imperative game narratives coax a player-character along a relatively linear narrative path, limiting the “hybrid active-passive experience” in favor of replicating the traditional narrative structures of film. LucasArts has instead increased the potential of the player to participate actively within the mythic film–game universe, while sacrificing, perhaps, a measure of identification among the built-in film audiences. For those who do not come to the games by way of a primary interest in the films, LucasArts’ strategy explores the evolving possibilities of transmedia storytelling by giving the consumer, as Jenkins suggests, multiple points of entry into the franchise. While EA has created a game narrative more tailored to the massive audience of the Lord of the Rings films, a sort

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of interactive advertisement for the films, LucasArts has developed a true experiment in world-making that allows game companies to adapt multiple game titles from a single film and allows the player to participate more actively within an expanding film–game universe. EA has abandoned its mimetic approach in Everything or Nothing, a game that has gained critical favor as the first Bond game to offer a narrative independent of the Bond films. EA’s elaboration of the Bond franchise compared to its replication of The Lord of the Rings suggests that their strategy with The Two Towers and The Return of the King has been determined, at least in part, by the existing mythology first created by Tolkien’s novels. Because The Lord of the Rings games are third-tier adaptations—games based on films based on novels—and the Star Wars games are second-tier adaptations—games based on films—their respective designers have been bound by two different sets of rules. In a sense, Tolkien’s novels have been canonized as a kind of immutable sacred text, and fans of the novels undoubtedly represent an established audience for the films who must, on some level, be acknowledged. As Peter Jackson has often spoken of his faithful intentions toward Tolkien and Tolkien’s devotees, EA has similarly deferred to Jackson’s films in order to avoid the risk of alienating the audiences who purchase the games based on their love for the films or the books. Neil Young, who oversees EA’s Lord of the Rings franchise, explains, “I wanted to adapt Peter’s work for our medium in the same way that he has adapted Tolkien’s work for his.”18 One could not imagine Tolkien’s The Return of the King ending with Frodo and Sam impaled on the ramparts of the Black Gate and Sauron’s forces annihilating Gandalf and Aragorn and spreading eternal darkness over the World of Men. In The Lord of the Rings games, bound to some extent by the fixed narratives of Tolkien’s novels and Jackson’s films, such evil endings mean that the player has failed and must try again. Star Wars, on the other hand, is a more malleable mythology, and fans of Lucas’ films, who sustain a cottage industry of derivative serial novels and fan fiction, seem more receptive to manipulations of their canon. In Knights of the Old Republic, for instance, the player may choose to reject the good counsel of the Jedi, slaughter loyal friends, and claim the galaxy in the name of Dark Side. The player, in a sense, may choose to fail according to the ethical standards established by the films and yet succeed in the game. The Two Towers and The Return of the King offer the player no such choice. LucasArts seems to have evaded criticism by Star Wars purists by disengaging from the film narratives, by letting the movies stand as they are and creating instead alternate stories partially unbound by the expectations of their established audience. Nonetheless, in their varying experiments in bringing interactivity to Middle Earth and that long-ago, far, far away galaxy, EA and LucasArts have begun to create and to test these new modes of storytelling that have become possible in the wake of media convergence.

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MEDIA CONVERGENCE AND MEDIA CRITICISM In April 2008, LucasArts released Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, its first major “next-gen product” available for Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and Nintendo Wii. The game realizes both the technical and the narrative aspirations of Lucasfilm. Like Bounty Hunter and Knights of the Old Republic, the game narrative extends beyond the films and introduces new characters. Set 7 years after the events depicted in Revenge of the Sith and more than 10 years prior to the events depicted in A New Hope, The Force Unleashed casts the player as Darth Vader’s powerful apprentice, a figure who does not appear in the films. The game dramatizes the “dark times” in which the Jedi Knights are hunted to extinction and Darth Vader is fully transformed into a “Dark Lord of the Sith,” events only vaguely represented in the films. With a new game engine jointly developed by LucasArts and ILM, The Force Unleashed represents the latest fruit of the collaboration fostered at the LDAC. In his production diary, Project Lead W. Haden Blackman writes, “The groups within [ LDAC ] are separated by discipline, but nothing happens in isolation. . . . [ T ]he animation group bleeds into the design team, which is a stone’s throw away from the cinematics team, who takes their work and directs the characters and settings to perform the cutscene animation that propels the story.”19 With the considerable financial and technological resources of the film industry brought to bear on interactive entertainment, videogames such as The Force Unleashed will look more cinematic, as Blackman promises. With game design tools brought to bear on moviemaking, films will look faster and more kinetic. But, from a critical standpoint, will these games and films be better? Just as media convergence has transformed they way artists create films and games, both in the tools they use and in the stories they tell, it has also influenced the way critics and scholars evaluate and interpret films and games. Adopting film theory as a means of interpreting games, media scholars propose that what we see in film establishes precedents for what we see in games, in terms of both thematic content and visual perspective. Film critic Graham Leggat writes, “just about everything video games know about visual language and narrative was learned from the movies . . . from camera angles to cuts and dissolves, from the deployment of original music to mise-enscène.”20 Game scholar Mark J. P. Wolf likewise claims, “Theoretically, many of the same issues are present in video games and film: spectator positioning and suture, point of view, sound and image relations, semiotics, and other theories dealing with images of representation. . . . It is perhaps due to the desire to measure up to the standard of visual realism set by film and television that the video game evolved as it has.”21 Videogame evolution parallels cinematic evolution, for instance, in the construction of virtual spaces. Wolf

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compares the single, static frames of early games like Taito’s Space Invaders (1978) and Atari’s Missile Command (1980) to the early films of Lumière and Méliès, which maintain a static point of view and make no use of editing to link different locations. Scrolling games like Activision’s Pitfall! (1982) and Nintendo’s Super Mario Bros. (1985) correspond to the early development of panning and tracking. Early adventure games like Atari’s Adventure and E.T. simulate cutting and continuity editing through the use of distinct but contiguous game spaces. Finally, Wolf argues, the immersive three-dimensional environments of current games replicate the “space represented in classical Hollywood film . . . viewed from multiple angles and viewpoints.”22 At the same time, the potential for the player to act within these virtual environments makes game spaces essentially different from film spaces. Wolf explains, “Whereas the cinema offered a window and positioned the spectator within the world it depicted, the video game goes further, allowing the spectator to explore that world and take an active role in its events.”23 Our success in a game depends largely on our knowledge of the game space, and game narrative often unfolds in spatial terms, as we discover new stories in different areas of the game world. Unlike films, most games offer a map, a symbolic representation of the virtual environment that aids our navigation. In this sense, game space is twofold, containing a diegetic world as well as a metadiegetic schematization of that world. Perhaps most important, game spaces must offer the potential for free exploration and so must appear navigable and continuous. Alexander Galloway explains this essential difference between cinematic vision and “gamic vision”: Gamic vision requires fully rendered, actionable space. Traditional filmmaking almost never requires the construction of full spaces. Set designers and carpenters build only the portion of the set that will appear within the frame. Because a direct has complete control over what does appear within the frame, this task is easy to accomplish. The camera positions are known in advance. Once the film is complete, no new camera positions will ever be included. . . . By contrast, game design explicitly requires the construction of a complete space in advance that is then exhaustively explorable. . . . The camera position in many games is not restricted. The player is the one who controls the camera position, by looking, by moving, by scrolling, and so on.24

Peter Molyneux, creator of Black and White and Fable, calls the player “the best camera man because he knows what he wants to see,” but the challenge, he says, “is to allow people the flexibility to choose their own camera angles,” while maintaining visual and narrative coherence in the game.25 This notion of a “camera” and the ability to control it forms a crucial part of the visual language of videogames and, on a technical level, enables the

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synthesis of films and games envisioned by Lucasfilm. The first-person perspective that has become conventional in current games, following models like id Software’s Wolfenstein 3D (1992) and Cyan’s Myst (1993), has its origin in the “subjective shot” utilized in film. Galloway describes the subjective shot as “a rather extreme first person point-of-view shot, where the camera pans and tracks as if it were mounted on the neck of a character. . . . The viewer sees exactly what the character sees, as if the camera ‘eye’ were the same as the character ‘I.’ ”26 In films as in games, the subjective shot is marked by visual or sound effects that simulate the physical or psychological experience of the character: blurred or tinted vision to indicate injury, a binocular or magnified view to indicate peering through a lens or a scope, or panting and heaving to indicate fatigue. Citing familiar scenes from the films The Terminator (1984), Predator (1987), and The Silence of the Lambs (1991), Galloway notes that films most often use this specialized shot to represent “a sense of alienation, detachment, otherness, or fear . . . the vision of criminals, monsters, or killer machines.” Games, on the other hand, more commonly use the subjective shot not to represent marginalized consciousness but rather to “achieve an intuitive sense of affective motion,” to simulate being and acting within a virtual world. The subjective shot has become a keystone of game design in a variety of genres, including first-person shooters, role-playing games, and driving games. In fact, Galloway concludes, the subjective point of view “is so omnipresent and so central to the grammar [of videogames] . . . that it essentially becomes coterminous with it.”27 While games, according to Leggat, Wolf, and Galloway, are the progeny of cinema, in terms of both content and visual language, the aesthetics of game design have also begun to exert an influence on filmmaking as film becomes more digitized. Ridley Scott, who produced a series of live-action online short films in 2004 promoting the release of Atari’s DRIV3R, finds greater creative potential in games. Scott told the New York Times, “The idea that a world, the characters that inhabit it, and the stories those characters share can evolve with the audience’s participation and, perhaps, exist in a perpetual universe is indeed very exciting to me.”28 Leggat compares the fight choreography in the Matrix and Kill Bill films to the wild moves performed in fighting games, and Galloway calls attention to the “bullet time” sequence in The Matrix, where time slows and Neo impossibly dodges a hail of gunfire, as “a brief moment of gamic cinema, a brief moment where the aesthetic of gaming moves in and takes over the film.”29 The interactive nature of game narrative that intrigues Scott has also prompted more independent filmmakers to reconsider the ways a story can be told on film. Tom Tykwer’s film Run Lola Run (1999), for instance, portrays a young woman trying to aid her desperate boyfriend as he rushes to repay a debt to a crime boss. Even with its chic rapid-fire editing and

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animation sequences, Run Lola Run looks like a standard caper film until Lola, surprisingly, is shot dead about 20 minutes into the action. Rather than accept this outcome, however, she simply opens her eyes and says, “No,” transporting herself back in time as if restarting the game, which she replays twice throughout the film until she achieves the desired ending. Run Lola Run reveals that interactivity has begun to destabilize the way filmmakers view their craft, even at the fundamental level of narrative structure. Tykwer’s film in not nonlinear but multilinear, like a game that a player can complete or fail to complete in any number of ways. For some critics, however, media convergence, particularly this increasingly visible influence of videogames on cinema, signals an aesthetic and intellectual corruption. In a survey of films about the Second World War, film critic David Thomson calls Michael Bay’s Pearl Harbor (2001), “not just a colossal bore, but a defamation of popular history that leaves you in despair of the cinema.”30 Thomson believes that videogames have obscured filmmakers’ and audiences’ understanding of the complexity of history and the reality of violence. He writes: It’s what you get when the kids in the audience and the kids in charge have spent two decades playing video combat games. . . . Virtually every set-up [in Pearl Harbor] puts the camera in the best position not just to see the explosion but to be it. The essential Bay shot is the POV from the bomb that falls on the Arizona; it has all the gravitational zest, and the denial of damage or tragedy, that’s built into the trigger-jerking spasms of video games.31

For Thomson, gamic vision in films does not signify the exciting potential of media convergence but rather reduces cinematic art and marks a shallow fascination with the hyperactive images of violent action rather than a critical exploration of the causes or consequences of such action. Although fans of Star Wars and The Matrix might accuse Thomson of being old-fashioned, Thomson rightly observes that films, when they try to copy games, often look silly. Even as The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay (2004) proves that good games can be made from bad films, and EA’s The Godfather: The Game (2006) proves that good games can be made from good films, Hollywood has not yet discovered a way to make a good film from a good game. Early attempts to do so have been ridiculous or merely forgettable, including Super Mario Bros. (1993), Street Fighter (1994), and Mortal Kombat (1995). Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001), rendered entirely in CGI, lost more than $120 million and bankrupted Square Pictures. Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001), Resident Evil (2002), and Silent Hill (2006), have done well at the box office but utterly disappointed film critics with their glossy violence, inane dialogue, and shallow characterization. In other words, they seem too game-like.

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Jenkins compares current videogames, with all their flaws, to the cinema of the early twentieth century, an art form still in a stage of rapid technical development and radical experimentation, still awaiting coherent theories and critical approaches, and still lacking a tradition or a canon. Videogames, Jenkins believes, have almost unbounded commercial and artistic potential, but they need time to grow up.32 Leggat similarly describes the relation between games and film as Oedipal: “cinema’s scrappy stepchild, the game world is . . . constantly competing with an idealized, phantasmic father for the love and attention of the mass market, yet never truly believing that it enjoys or deserves it.”33 The most spectacular failures in film–game franchising, from Atari’s E.T. to Square’s Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, occur when filmmakers attempt to replicate the grammar of videogames in films or game designers attempt to replicate the grammar of films. In a review of Jackson’s The Return of the King, film critic Anthony Lane writes, “As I watched the film, an eager victim of its boundless will to astound, I found my loyal memories to the book beginning to fade. It may be time to halt the endless comparisons between page and screen, and to confess that the two are very different beasts.”34 As the fusion of the film and game industries continues and transmedia franchises emerge, designers of film-based games must similarly acknowledge that games and films, despite their convergence, are also two very different beasts. Though some may try to make games that play like films, or movies that play like games, we find that the narrative forms governing one genre do not quite fit the other. Like the Matrix itself, transmedia narrative is a new sort of beast born in the age of convergence, an expansive and perpetually expanding simulated dream world constructed not so much to control as to entertain. In choosing the blue pill, however, we submit to both. NOTES 1. Roger Ebert, “E.T. the Extraterrestrial,” rogerebert.com, March 22, 2002, http:// rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20020322/REVIEWS/ 203220304/1023. 2. Dan Levy, “Lucas’ Presidio premiere,” San Francisco Chronicle, June 26, 2005, http:// www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/06/26/BAGTQDF4RU1.DTL. 3. Lucasfilm, Ltd., “Letterman Digital Arts Center: A New Vision for the Digital Arts,” June 24, 2005, http://www.lucasfilm.com/press/presidiopreview/index.html?page=2. 4. Eric-Jon Rössel Waugh, “Worlds Are Colliding!: The Convergence of Film and Games,” Gamasutra, December 12, 2005, http://www.gamasutra.com/features/2005 1212/waugh_01.shtml. 5. Lucasfilm, Ltd., “Letterman Digital Arts Center.” 6. George Lucas, “Future of Entertainment,” Hollywood Reporter, September 13, 2005, http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_con tent_id=1001096310.

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7. WNYC Radio, “Joystick Nation,” On the Media, December 19, 2003, http://www. onthemedia.org/yore/transcripts/transcripts_121903_joystick.html. 8. Bryan Ochalla, “Are Games Art? (Here We Go Again . . . ),” Gamasutra, March 16, 2007, http://gamasutra.com/features/20070316/ochalla_01.shtml. 9. “The New Force at Lucasfilm,” BusinessWeek, March 27, 2006, http://www.busi nessweek.com/innovate/content/mar2006/id20060327_719255.htm. 10. “The New Force at Lucasfilm.” 11. Lucas, “Future of Entertainment.” 12. Lucas, “Future of Entertainment.” 13. Henry Jenkins, Convergence Culture (New York: New York University Press, 2006), 94–96, 114. 14. Tom McNamara, “GDC 2004: Warren Spector Talks Game Narrative,” IGN. com, March 26, 2004, http://pc.ign.com/articles/502/502382p1.html. 15. LucasArts, however, adopted a mimetic strategy in Star Wars: Battlefront (2004), Battlefront II (2005), and Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005). Like The Two Towers, Revenge of the Sith incorporated scenes from the film in the game. 16. “The New Force at Lucasfilm.” 17. Jamil Modelina, “Hard-Boiled Developer: Luxoflux’s Peter Morawiec on Bringing Classic Story Genres to Life,” Game Developer, March 2004. 18. Jenkins, Convergence Culture, 107. 19. W. Haden Blackman, “Collaborative Connections: Teamwork Unleashed,” May 1, 2007, http://www.lucasarts.com/games/theforceunleashed/#/diary/. 20. Graham Leggat, “Chip Off the Old Block,” Film Comment 40 (2004): 29. 21. Mark J. P. Wolf, “Inventing Space: Toward a Taxonomy of On- and Off-Screen Space in Video Games,” Film Quarterly 51, no. 1 (1997): 11–12. 22. Wolf, “Inventing Space,” 20. 23. Wolf, “Inventing Space,” 22. 24. Alexander Galloway, Gaming: Essays on Algorithmic Culture (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006), 63–64. 25. MIT Program in Comparative and Media Studies, Computer and Video Games Come of Age, “The Future of Games,” http://web.mit.edu/cms/games/future.html. 26. Galloway, Gaming, 40. 27. Galloway, Gaming, 56, 59, 63. 28. Laura M. Holson, “Out of Hollywood, Rising Fascination with Video Games,” New York Times, April 10, 2004, http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/10/technology/ 10GAME/html. 29. Galloway, Gaming, 67. 30. David Thomson, “Zap happy: World War II revisited,” Sight & Sound 11, no. 7 (2001): 35. 31. Thomson, “Zap happy,” 35. 32. Henry Jenkins, “Games, the New Lively Art,” in Handbook of Computer Game Studies, ed. Jeffrey Goldstein and Joost Raessens (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005), 175–92. 33. Leggat, “Chip Off the Old Block,” 29. 34. Anthony Lane, “Creating Monsters,” The New Yorker, May 24, 2004, 97.

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chapter 8

Co-Opting “Independence”: Hollywood’s Marketing Label Mary P. Erickson

Four of the five films competing for Best Picture at the 2006 Academy Awards were unique in that a good portion of each film’s financing derived from nonstudio investment sources. For example, Minneapolis-based River Road Productions partnered in the production of Brokeback Mountain (Ang Lee, 2005), requesting international distribution rights in exchange for its investment. This $14 million film premiered at film festivals in Venice, Telluride, and Toronto before heading into theaters in the United States and internationally. This investment secured a substantial return for the film’s producers and distributors, which also included Universal Studios’ division, Focus Features; Brokeback Mountain garnered a respectable $83 million at the domestic box office.1 In addition, the film received several awards, including three Oscars, four Golden Globes, and two Independent Spirit awards. Brokeback Mountain was joined in the race for Best Picture by Good Night, and Good Luck (George Clooney, 2005); Capote (Bennett Miller, 2005); Crash (Paul Haggis, 2004); and Munich (Steven Spielberg, 2005). Much of the publicity leading up to the awards ceremony focused on these films’ production financing because most of them were “substantially produced outside the studio system.”2 Each of the films, with the exception of Crash, was also substantially produced inside the studio system: United Artists (a division of MGM at the time of the film’s production) produced Capote, Warner Independent Pictures (a division of Warner Brothers) produced Good Night, and DreamWorks and Universal Pictures produced Munich. Article after article in the press touted these films (with the exception of Munich) as “independent,” their reliance on

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nonstudio financing an anomaly for films leading the Oscar race. But this “independence,” and the corollary primacy of nonstudio financing, is misleading because it does not account for the infrastructure that accompanies the film’s studio-based financing. As Hollywood producer Avi Lerner declares: No one can disagree that when you’ve got Crash having this kind of success, it’s good for independent film. That’s a true independent film. I consider Lionsgate [Crash’s distributor] a real independent company. But Brokeback Mountain? No way. It was released by a studio with all the machinery and money and people of a major studio—the same people who released Munich. The same people who released King Kong. No, Brokeback Mountain was not an independent film. An independent film is a movie that was really made by independent people, independent producers, not by Focus. The producer of Brokeback Mountain was James Schamus, the head of a specialty studio.3

Specialty divisions such as Focus Features increasingly rely on the concept of “independent” to describe and promote their films, as these films tend not to resemble studio blockbusters in style, plot, or character. But Focus Features still, as Lerner asserts, offers the distribution infrastructure of its parent studio, giving its films more support in publicity and promotion. This becomes particularly problematic for independent filmmakers who do not have investment relationships with specialty divisions. These people are thus forced to compete for the same audiences through the same press outlets and the same distribution and exhibition channels without similar resources. The flood of so-called “independent” films that have originated at studio divisions saturates the marketplace, which in turn shapes the public’s expectations of what independent film looks like as well as the perception of diversity of filmmakers and film content available in theaters and on home video. Independent filmmaking occupies a spot in American cinema as the obvious alternative to mainstream Hollywood fare, but audience preferences that seem to shift away from blockbusters lately have troubled studios who rely on hundreds of millions of box office dollars for every film. The development of new distribution windows such as the Internet has allowed independent filmmakers to gain more direct access to audiences. With declining box office revenues and audiences turning toward newer technology to watch films, Hollywood has found itself in a troublesome financial spot.4 While studios continue to focus on producing tried-and-true formulaic films (witness the release of several sequels in 2007, from Spider-Man 3 [Sam Raimi, 2007] to Shrek the Third [Chris Miller and Raman Hui, 2007] to Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End [Gore Verbinski, 2007]), they have also ventured more actively into genres, subject matter or aesthetics not traditionally found in Hollywood films. Because these studios, operating as specialty divisions such as Focus Features, can utilize the production and distribution infrastructure

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of a major studio (in this case, Universal Studios), marketing efforts are much more coordinated, encompassing, and forceful than the marketing efforts of a singular filmmaker or even smaller-scale distribution company that operates outside of the studio system. Hollywood carefully crafts film marketing, spending extravagantly to achieve its marketing goals. Major studios spend approximately $34.5 million on prints and advertising (P&A), or a full third of a film’s budget, while specialty divisions of major studios spend an average of $17.8 million on P&A per film (although this number is more variable based on the wide range of “independent” film budgets).5 Even with smaller budgets, such as Brokeback Mountain’s $14 million, investors expect returns to make their contributions worthwhile, and thus, specialty divisions focus on the most attractive angles to ensure high levels of box office and home video revenue.6 We can witness various instances, particularly lately, of specialty divisions marketing films by using the concept of independence as the primary selling point. Therefore, the question becomes this: How do specialty divisions exploit the concept of independence in film publicity? By examining the marketing campaigns of films such as Little Miss Sunshine (Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, 2006), Sideways (Alexander Payne, 2004), Garden State (Zach Braff, 2004), and Good Night, and Good Luck (George Clooney, 2005), we can find similarities in the usage of “independent” as a marketing label. This has significant implications for independent filmmakers who are not affiliated with major studios, as their primary methods of marketing are co-opted by Hollywood. As we shall see later, these filmmakers must then develop new methods of marketing to reach audiences. THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN INDEPENDENT AND “INDEPENDENT” A definition of independent film is difficult to pinpoint because it can hinge on aesthetics, subject matter, budget, actors, director, or any number of other factors. The label of independent film typically connotes certain aesthetics or social themes, or what Holmlund calls “a distinctive visual look, an unusual narrative pattern, a self-reflexive style.”7 Many scholarly accounts of independent film reflect on past eras, documenting the industry’s history as eras distinct from the independent film era of today. Greg Merritt writes a thorough biography of independent film, beginning with the early days of cinema, and Peter Biskind formulates his history around the rise of Miramax and the Sundance Film Festival.8 Others try to understand independent film through an examination of what are often considered the “founding fathers” of the contemporary canon, including, among other films, Stranger Than Paradise (Jim Jarmusch, 1984); sex, lies and videotape (Steven Soderbergh, 1989); Reservoir Dogs (Quentin Tarantino, 1992); and Clerks (Kevin Smith, 1994).9

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Many accounts speculate on the present-day status of independent film but surprisingly often fail to expand beyond superficial musings on the blurring lines between Hollywood and independent studios. Independent films are typically made outside the Hollywood studio system and are often products of creative devotion, a luxury not afforded within the confines of a tightly managed studio production. The lines quickly start to blur when we try to pin down a definition because high-profile actors may star in nonstudio films, $50,000 and $15 million film budgets are classified together, and art house cinemas may screen Woody Allen’s latest alongside a local filmmaker’s production. Even applying the limitation of making films outside the Hollywood studio system is problematic; is it fair to say that George Lucas’ Star Wars prequels were independent? They were, after all, made outside the standard Hollywood studio system, produced instead by Lucasfilm; however, the trilogy’s budget stood at roughly $350 million, hardly the scale of budget associated with independent films. The central problem lies with ownership. Hollywood is generally divided into six major film studios: Warner Brothers, Disney, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures, Universal Pictures, and 20th Century Fox; these studios control an estimated 94 percent of the domestic box office gross.10 Each of these is part of a globally diversified media conglomerate that operates myriad business divisions (Time Warner, for example, owns Warner Brothers, its main film studio, in addition to a cable television system, multiple cable television channels, and Internet service provider America Online; it also publishes approximately 130 magazines and employs roughly 96,000 people worldwide).11 Each of these major studios owns at least one “specialty” studio arm, such as Miramax (Disney), Warner Independent Pictures (Warner Brothers), and the newly formed Paramount Vantage to accompany Paramount Classics (Paramount Pictures); these specialty studios handle both production and distribution of nonmainstream films. Hollywood studios have managed their specialty, “independent” divisions for many years now, most of them having been started or acquired in the mid-1990s. Others have more recently evolved to represent the changing independent film landscape. New Line Cinema, a specialty division acquired by Turner Broadcasting in 1994 (acquired by Time Warner two years later), had its own specialty division, Fine Line. In 2003, Fine Line folded into the streamlined Warner Independent Pictures, in order to “provide an outlet where artists can express their vision, where ideas and controversies can be aired, where new talent can grow, where new styles and techniques can develop, where the conventional wisdom of tomorrow can first take shape.”12 In a sense, one could say that Warner Independent is providing the educational ground through which to develop strategies for thinking about independent film within its own structures; it defines who those artists are, what ideas are aired, and how new styles develop, all within the objective of profit-making. After all, Warner

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Independent is designed to “fill a niche in what is otherwise a fully integrated, broad-based global entertainment company.”13 It is significant that Warner Independent executives see the studio as fitting into a global and undoubtedly mainstream company, rather than as an alternative to it. This is contrary to the very definition of an “independent” company. The fact that many of these specialty divisions are called “independent” proves problematic when we acknowledge their corporate parentage. Alisa Perren argues that My Big Fat Greek Wedding (Joel Zwick, 2002) was misrepresented in its publicity and promotion as an independent film. Actors Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson took the film’s concept (based on a stage version) to HBO, enlisting the Time Warner–owned cable channel’s financial support in exchange for distribution rights (foreign, cable, and video).14 Wellconnected Hollywood individuals, in this case, helped clear obstacles that the film might have otherwise faced in securing distribution, and distribution guarantees a certain level of expenditures to promote the film; after all, the distribution company wants to recoup its investment. With Hanks, Wilson, HBO, and others backing the production of Wedding and guaranteeing its distribution, therefore, Perren does not classify the film as independent. It becomes obvious that major studios use “independent” as a label or brand for, as King writes, “association with ‘quality’, arty, edgy or ‘cool’/ alternative features is good for the image,” particularly for those “individual executives with pretensions to something more than noisy blockbuster productions and [those] branches of large corporations often subject to criticism for their business practices and much of their not-so-creative output.”15 But corporations use the label of “independent” to legitimize themselves by emphasizing their dedication to the art of filmmaking, and often the link between specialty division and parent company is less than obvious. While we know that Warner Brothers own Warner Independent Pictures, it may be less apparent that Universal owns Focus Features. Focus Features can more easily represent itself as a truly independent film company, not a subsidiary of a major corporation, simply because of a difference in name. Tzioumakis has offered one of the most thorough and unflinching examinations of the intersection and interconnection between independent and mainstream film. He observes the push and pull of production and distribution practices that independents use, mainstreams co-opt, and independents then eschew for new practices. Tzioumakis tackles the conundrum of defining independent film by stating that the term is in fact “a discourse that expands and contracts when socially authorized institutions (filmmakers, industry practitioners, trade publications, academics, film critics, and so on) contribute to its definition at different periods in the history of American cinema.”16 Tzioumakis strips away the weight of “independent” as a definitional term by noting how it becomes situated in language and marketing in order to serve power relations.

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This linkage between power and the use of independent as a term is essential for understanding how it is used for marketing purposes in film today. Tzioumakis notes that the film industry trade publication Variety declares “indie” as a descriptor to have “lost much of its rugged appeal.”17 However, it is still used because it does carry weight. As non-Hollywood filmmakers continue to carve out spots for themselves in production, distribution, and exhibition practices, they continue to draw audiences over which Hollywood would rather take hold. Films such as The Blair Witch Project and The Passion of the Christ startled the major studios with their box office earnings of $140 million and $370 million, respectively. The innovative and groundbreaking distribution practices associated with these films, such as Blair Witch’s online presence and The Passion’s outreach to religious communities, signal that audiences are drawn to films that challenge popular notions of filmmaking and film distribution. Film distribution is, according to Wasser, the central location for maintaining power—it is in this stage of the filmmaking process that a film moves from the filmmaker or studio to the audience.18 Distributors retain allocative control, or the allocation of resources. It is here that marketing dollars are spent and decisions are made as to who sees the film and who does not. Drawing a line between independent and nonindependent film is difficult when we conceive of “independent” as a discourse of power, as it does not lend itself to clear distinctions that apply to every single case. We can say, though, that “independent” as a label is being used in the cases being discussed here because media conglomerate subsidiaries aim to secure audiences wherever they exist. Hollywood has relied on blockbuster films to bring in astronomical revenues in ever-increasing numbers of theaters. While some films have been successful (Spider-Man 3, for example, opened on 4,252 screens to garner $151.2 million in the United States alone in May 2007),19 many other blockbuster films have not. King Kong (Peter Jackson, 2005), Universal Studios’ remake of the 1933 film, was expected to tackle Titanic’s (James Cameron, 1997) ranking on the all-time top box office revenue chart; instead, it stalled at a paltry Number 51, just after Mrs. Doubtfire (Chris Columbus, 1993).20 Studio executives have tried to pin blame on any number of factors, including “DVDs, video games, iPods, cellular phones, HBO, crying babies, $10 tickets, Chinese pirates, big screen plasma TVs, an aging demographic, liberal bias, video-on-demand, annoying pre-feature commercials and the Bush administration’s energy policy.”21 No matter the reason, the fact remains that theatrical releases are stagnating.22 One factor that remains constant about the Hollywood movie marketing strategy is that “if you only get one demographic into the theater, you can only achieve a certain level of success.”23 Therefore, there is a continual effort to maximize revenue streams by expanding the types of films produced and distributed by Hollywood studios so that no matter the audience preference, Hollywood supplies it.

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This is not a new phenomenon, as we can witness various periods in cinema’s history when “independent” has been co-opted by major studios and filmmakers. Howard Hughes with Hell’s Angels (1930) and David O. Selznick with Gone With the Wind (1939) both used the concept of independence to differentiate their films from the “sausage factory” films of Hollywood.24 Studios turned to art house fare in the 1960s, not only co-opting “independent” as a label, but also controlling the distribution of foreign films. Often laden with sexual themes generally forbidden by the American industry’s Production Code (the precursor to the modern ratings system), these films were “attracting customers and the majors wanted a part of the business.”25 Then, beginning in the mid-1990s, the mainstream American film industry started to institutionalize “independent” as a marketing label by overtaking those studios that were truly independent of the mainstream system and that posed the greatest threat to Hollywood dominance over alternative film supply. It wasn’t long before “independent” came to signify formulaic elements that could be predictably located and exploited for marketing purposes; the resulting climate of film publicity is likely forcing changes in truly independent film distribution. FILM MARKETING STRATEGIES Despite its centrality in the film distribution process, film marketing is not often covered in film literature. Yet, it is vitally important to understand because it is the most direct and overt method through which major studios try to wield control. As mentioned earlier, distributors plan to add 30 percent or more to the film’s overall budget for P&A expenses, and thus, the marketing campaign is carefully mapped out. In her study of marketing campaigns for films such as Four Weddings and a Funeral (Mike Newell, 1994), GoldenEye (Martin Campbell, 1995), and Welcome to the Dollhouse (Todd Solondz, 1995), Tiiu Lukk writes that a film’s marketing potential impacts the very production of a film.26 Often, major studios use content models to mitigate risk of investment, utilizing previously successful genres, star actors, and sequels, or what Justin Wyatt terms “high concept” factors, to ensure box office success, and those elements that are untested or have been unsuccessful in the past are less likely to appear onscreen.27 Typically associated with blockbusters, high concept factors can now be revised and extended to “independent” films. The marketing strategy for a Hollywood film is carefully constructed because “each film in theatrical release is a new product that needs to be explained, positioned, and promoted to consumers on its way to that short and fragile shelf life.”28 This strategy is a multifaceted operation, with paid advertising in print, television, radio, and other media; publicity by way of critics’ reviews and feature stories; promotional events; merchandising and cross-promotions; and various other tactics. In marketing smaller-budgeted,

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“independent” films, studios emphasize certain tactics over others. Publicity and advertising are likely the most oft-used tactics. A Miramax studio executive claims, “If you say a film is great enough times and can back it up with some footage, the press will begin to believe it,” which can have a significant impact on audience choice.29 Marich notes that studios often use familiar elements like stars or genre for film marketing hooks because each film is its own unique product. Rather than starting from scratch every time, marketers position films in relation to those tried-and-true products that have been released in the past. Independent films represent an interesting case study in film marketing strategy because they often do not contain those familiar elements like major studio releases do. But independent films do contain their own sorts of familiar elements that are used to position a given film in relation to other successful films. These elements work in tandem to foreground the film’s very independence; some of these elements include the film’s Web site, publicity strategies to frame the film as independent (for example, a newcomer in the starring role or a novice director), and festival appearances. MARKETING “INDEPENDENCE” The films examined in this study were selected from a list of all films, excluding foreign films, distributed to U.S. theaters by the six major studios’ top independent divisions from 2004 to 2006.30 These film divisions are those that self-identify as “independent” studios; for example, Fox Searchlight calls itself “Hollywood’s premiere indie movie studio,” while Miramax Films declares itself to be “return[ing] to its roots as a top provider of quality independent and modestly budgeted films from outstanding filmmakers.”31 Various elements of films’ marketing campaigns were examined, including: framing of actors, directors, and storylines in the media; the films’ release strategy, with particular attention to festival and theatrical platform release; and attention to certain coveted awards. Focusing on a few select films, including Little Miss Sunshine, Garden State, Sideways, and Good Night, and Good Luck, highlights how each of these elements is manipulated for marketing purposes; these films are some of the more visible “independent” films of the past few years because they have received more marketing attention. As Globe and Mail film reviewer Johanna Schneller tells us, the logic goes that “nominations [for high-profile awards] make money” because theatrical and ancillary (home video and DVD) sales rise when a film is in the running for top awards.32 When a film can promise a nomination (and preferably multiple nominations), the distributor will pour money into its marketing: “[It costs] tens of millions to send out screeners to the 6,000 academy members, place ‘For Your Consideration’ ads in the trades, and fly the casts around the chat-show circuit.”33 Those films that

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cannot promise much in the way of additional revenue that spurt from nominations do not receive extra marketing efforts. Little Miss Sunshine, Garden State, Sideways, and Good Night, and Good Luck have all presumably received a good dose of marketing dollars and therefore present valuable case studies in analyzing how specialty divisions market films using elements such as specific types of actors and directors, quirky or thoughtful storylines, festival and theatrical platform releases, and certain coveted awards. Storylines Films classified as “independent” tend to feature unconventional stories that operate outside the mainstream fare. Stories become offbeat, quirky, and artsy, positioned to alert the audience that the film might not contain the typical Hollywood cinematic experience. The films are also often labeled as quaint, charming, or endearing, as though they are the sweet but overly eccentric aunts of whom families are somewhat embarrassed. These key phrases are synonymous with independent films because they signal refreshing stories and interesting characters that defy cookie-cutter replication. Garden State follows the story of a young man who returns home to attend his mother’s funeral after a long estrangement from his family. The film is consistently described in terms of its off-kilter storyline: it is a “quirkywith-a-capital-Q romantic comedy” with an “undeniably charming script.”34 Sideways, in which a pair of friends travel the southern Californian wine country in celebration of one of the friend’s impending marriage, is labeled in the press as an “offbeat gem,” its characters’ friendship filled with “quirky complexity.”35 In Little Miss Sunshine, a family takes a road trip to a child beauty pageant, tackling subjects such as homosexuality, suicide, and drug use, along with family dysfunction. A “silly yet endearing story,” Little Miss Sunshine is filled with “studied wackiness” and is classified as a “quirky family road picture.”36 “Independent” films may also explore edgy or alternative subject matter, as was the case with Good Night, and Good Luck, which is a retelling of journalist Edward R. Murrow’s confrontations with Senator Joseph McCarthy in the early days of television. Some critics have observed a shift to more authenticity and honesty in storytelling, although many confess that this storytelling runs contrary to the average moviegoer’s preference.37 New York Times critic A. O. Scott predicts that “most of the discussion of [Good Night, and Good Luck] will turn on its content—on the history it investigates and on its present-day resonance,” as it is a timely critique of modern-day journalism framed within a moment of historical crisis of the McCarthy era.38 “The delivery isn’t as important as the message,” writes Steve Persall of the St. Petersburg Times. “Maybe that’s Clooney’s agenda: to make us consider the meat rather than the sizzle.”39

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Directors An oft-used strategy of marketing “independent” films is to highlight the novice director, an aspiring filmmaker looking to make his or her mark in the world of cinema. According to Tiiu Lukk, “These are people that bring a certain rawness and newness to their storytelling style, because they’re not polished, slick Hollywood film or TV commercial directors.”40 The case of Zach Braff aptly illustrates this tactic. Braff, who has starred in the NBC sitcom Scrubs since 2001, leapt onto the independent film scene in 2004 with Garden State. In interviews, Braff was depicted as the amateur whose success came about from sheer luck and a dash of persistence. “I feel like I’ve won the independent film lottery,” he mused.41 It was a Cinderella story of sorts hammered home through promotional angles that made Braff accessible to audiences as the average Joe who made good. He traveled across the country on a publicity tour, during which he held question-and-answer sessions after film screenings.42 He also wrote a blog on the Garden State Web site, a personal diary of sorts, in which he related random details of his life (e.g., “I had this twisted nightmare once where I was dating a really bitchy Clydesdale who played drums in a wedding band.”) that helped audiences get to know Braff as an average citizen.43 “With this blog,” he said, “I thought ‘I’m just going to talk to my audience like I would with a friend.’ ”44 Readers of his blog were enamored with his down-to-earth style, which served to further legitimize Braff as an independent filmmaker who has not lost sight of his roots. “They say, ‘I don’t believe you’re writing this, it’s crazy you’re writing this, you seem too real, this must be your assistant.’ ” One gets the impression from Braff ’s interviews that he hardly believed it either; he is “endearingly wide-eyed about his current status.”45 The directorship duo, Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, cut their teeth on Little Miss Sunshine. Their previous experience resided with directing music videos for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, REM, Smashing Pumpkins, and others. In much of the publicity around the film, the novice status of these directors contributes to the film’s freshness and integrity. As producer Marc Turtletaub attested, “Thankfully, we had John and Val who are two directors who have no background, hadn’t made a feature-length film, and they said ‘No, this is what we want to make’ and they stuck with that.”46 These “babes in the woods” with “virgin exposure” to Hollywood made for a steep learning curve, but their efforts were rewarded with positive feedback from critics. “What’s even more amazing is that this is the first feature from husband-andwife directors,” exclaims Christie Lemire of MSNBC. “They’ve come up with no stereotypes, no self-consciously quirky indie-movie clichés.”47 Having only directed one other film, George Clooney, director of Good Night, and Good Luck, could have been positioned as a novice director. However, his acting reputation precludes the marketing campaign from focusing

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on his inexperience in a similar way to Zach Braff or Little Miss Sunshine’s directors. Rather, the subject matter of his film compels film reviewers and feature writers to frame him as operating outside the studio system, the mark of an independent filmmaker. “You’ve got to stick with your convictions,” he says in an interview. “Do what you want to do and hope that it strikes a chord.”48 Because he has taken risks, one film critic labeled him as the “indieSpielberg,” his commitment to Good Night, and Good Luck so strong that “he famously accepted only $1 for producing, directing and writing.”49

Actors Actors are probably the most visible and recognizable marketing element of a film. Unknown or unpopular actors are considered to be a handicap to a film’s success, but they are in fact becoming more integral to the legitimacy of independent films. They are logistically essential to most independent films simply because budgets cannot afford expensive stars. But they are essential as well because they are exploited as a shrewd marketing angle. The stars in Little Miss Sunshine and Sideways in particular, while generally known, are not A-list actors able to command high salaries for their participation in projects. Indeed, those most recognized for acting ability are unlikely to be among the most well-paid actors in Hollywood.50 Rather, these stars take risky roles and explore the craft of acting with dignity and style. Because “independent” films are typically character-driven, the actors portraying those characters make or break a film; therefore, publicity around a film’s actors highlight their excellence. Little Miss Sunshine boasts an ensemble cast, and the contribution of each actor relays a stellar performance in understated dysfunction, indicative of their overall acting ability. It is rare,” notes Los Angeles Times critic Mary McNamara about Greg Kinnear, who plays the father in the film, “to read a bad or even lukewarm review of Kinnear’s work.”51 Toni Collette receives similar accolades, both for her role in Sunshine and in her other films. “Her body of work has earned her widespread respect within Hollywood, where she is considered among the most talented of her generation.”52 Alan Arkin garnered the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in 2007 for his performance of the film’s heroin-addicted grandfather, after quietly promoting the film through “a gentle campaign fashioned around what Mr. Arkin is willing to do: talk-show appearances, a few interviews and a special evening sponsored by the Film Society of Lincoln Center.”53 Sideways similarly boasted an ensemble cast that each contributed to the overall acting performance of the film. Thomas Haden Church was perhaps best known for his television roles in Wings (1990–1997) and Ned and Stacey (1995–1997) before he took the role of Jack in Sideways. Virginia Madsen had

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also been primarily a television actor before joining the cast of Sideways as Maya. These two actors eventually competed for 2005 Academy Awards, which signaled to audiences that their acting, along with that of costar Paul Giamatti were appropriately billed as “great anchoring performances” by critics.54 Good Night, and Good Luck starred a range of actors as well, although David Strathairn’s portrayal of Edward R. Murrow drove the film, eventually securing a Best Actor nomination at the Academy Awards in 2006. But the film’s promotion focused less on the strength of its actors and more on its subject matter. However, because this film was based on actual events, the marketing campaign included individuals who worked alongside the reallife Murrow. For example, Hugh Downs, the retired journalist, attended question-and-answer sessions that accompanied film promotional events.55 Release Strategy The film’s marketing strategy is carefully planned around its release schedule. Because an “independent” film often has low-profile actors, a novice director, and a quirky storyline, it is often perceived as a risky project that must be carefully monitored in its distribution and exhibition. To cushion this risk, distributors first screen these kinds of films at film festivals to test the film with critics then move them into a platform theatrical release to test with audiences. The film festival is an arena of discovery. Ideally, any film, regardless of financial or professional connection (or lack thereof ), might be sold to a distributor here; it is this Cinderella story that turned The Blair Witch Project into an overnight success. Many festivals, however, are more known for their “independent” films, rather than their independent ones, as the film festival circuit has become one component of a major studio’s planned marketing strategy. Sony Pictures Classics decided that “the best way to create a profile for [their independent feature Welcome to the Dollhouse] would be through a series of film festivals leading up to a summer release for the film.”56 This is an inexpensive way to garner publicity and critical acclaim: “One of the benefits of festival exposure is that films get reviewed by the media,” upon which word-of-mouth (or buzz) develops.57 Garden State screened at seven different festivals, including a premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in 2004 before its theatrical release. It continued to screen at festivals, moving to the international festival circuit as Fox Searchlight and Miramax prepared to release the film overseas. Sideways screened at four festivals, including Toronto and New York, before its domestic theatrical release in 2004, and also expanded to a broad range of international festivals to precede its foreign theatrical release. Good Night, and Good Luck opened at the Venice and New York Film Festivals prior to its release in theaters; the film traveled to more festivals after this release.

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Little Miss Sunshine also premiered at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival; Fox Searchlight acquired distribution rights to the film for $10.5 million. While the film did not have a financial relationship with Fox Searchlight prior to distribution, it did rely on other studio financing for its production. Focus Features had initially funded the film’s production before pulling out before the film was finished. Because Little Miss Sunshine did not arrive at Sundance with a major production and distribution company in hand, its adoption by Fox Searchlight has been classified as “the classic Sundance Cinderella story,” wherein a small, “independent” film drew attention and dollars.58 Fox Searchlight then structured an international festival release strategy to preface the film’s international distribution, touring the film at festivals such as Locarno, Helsinki, Tokyo, and Manila. To complement festival exposure and to build upon critical acclaim, distributors then release their films in a platform strategy, which “involves opening a film in one theater or a few theaters in key target cities, with the intention of building word-of-mouth, then widening the run to other cities, usually in phases.”59 Fox Searchlight built similar release schedules for Sideways in 2004 and for Little Miss Sunshine in 2006, allowing “word-ofmouth to build, rather than this big blitzkrieg ad campaign where you feel like you’re being sold on something . . . [Fox Searchlight] allowed people to discover the movie rather than have them feel like they have to be talked into it.”60 The film started on 7 screens in July 2006, peaking at 1,602 screens two months later before finally leaving theaters in March 2007 with a $59.9 million box office gross.61 Garden State started on 9 screens, building to 813 screens in five weeks.62 Sideways opened on 4 screens and peaked at 1,786 screens four months later.63 To put these numbers in perspective, the average Hollywood blockbuster opens on thousands of screens in the United States and worldwide. King Kong opened on 3,576 screens, while Spider-Man 3 opened on 4,252 American screens with simultaneous theatrical openings around the world.64 So while “independent” films still do not compete at the level of blockbuster opening, they are increasingly becoming major players in the exhibition market. Coveted Awards The Independent Spirit Awards are presented by Film Independent, a Los Angeles–based nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting independent film and filmmakers. The event “has made a name for itself as the premier awards event for the independent film community,” celebrating a “uniqueness of vision”; “original, provocative subject matter”; “economy of means (with particular attention paid to total production cost and individual compensation)”; and “percentage of financing from independent sources.”65 Receiving an Independent Spirit award solidifies the label of “independent” for many

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of Hollywood’s so-called independent films. This award is not, after all, the mainstream Academy Awards or Golden Globes. Rather, it is a banner that marketers can attach to the film’s poster, alongside its festival mentions, to validate the film’s supposed independence. Even press coverage of the event itself confirms the status of this award; the awards ceremony is “always offbeat” with a “let-it-all-hang-out tone.”66 With rising budgets seeping into the independent film industry, some films’ eligibility for the award is called into question. But the award judges may overlook certain shortcomings, including having a too-large budget. Sideways, whose budget came in at $17.5 million, exceeded the awards cap of $15 million but was accepted anyway and ended up receiving the most nominations for 2005, eventually winning six awards.67 The awards ceremony compensates for this budget bloat by instituting an award for Best Film Under $500,000; it has also raised the budget cap to $20 million. Now, it seems, there are two types of films that can receive Independent Spirit Awards: Hollywood’s “independents” and true independents. For the truly independents, perhaps this award means something. For Hollywood’s specialty studio divisions, four Independent Spirit Awards in 2007 for Little Miss Sunshine, one award and three nominations in 2006 for Good Night, and Good Luck, and one award and one nomination for Garden State in 2005 mean that these have achieved the spirit of independence, despite the fact that the films are not independent at all. The theatrical and subsequent home video performances of some of these films were further bolstered by Academy Award nominations and wins. In 2005, Sideways won an Oscar for Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay, and was nominated for an additional four Oscars. Good Night, and Good Luck was nominated for six awards in 2006, and Little Miss Sunshine took home two Oscars (Best Supporting Actor and Best Writing, Original Screenplay), having received four total nominations. AN UNRELIABLE FORMULA Hollywood specialty studios try very hard to construct the perfect independent film. They have tried to figure out an equation that labels films as “independent.” Unknown or underappreciated (but nonetheless stellar) actors work with young, fresh directors in quirky, offbeat films that hit all the major film festivals to build word-of-mouth. This all precedes their limited platform releases and the eventual winning of coveted Independent Spirit Awards, which leads to a respectable performance at the box office and on home video. Hollywood has instituted many of these elements to assemble an infrastructure that can be used to dominate film distribution to all audience niches. Film festivals such as Sundance, Toronto, and Cannes have become all but

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unreachable for amateur filmmakers hoping to break into the film industry. Instead, they are used as one of several stops within the release strategy of a major studio’s “independent” film. Even theater chains are becoming part of that Hollywood “independent” infrastructure. AMC Theatres, the country’s second-largest theater chain, has designated a certain number of its theaters to its AMC Select program, going by the tagline, “Special Films for Select Tastes.”68 This program “showcase[s] independent films in theaters in markets where art house viewers are believed to reside.”69 Is the formula so entrenched that every film released by studio specialty divisions can be guaranteed box office success? Certainly Little Miss Sunshine and the other films examined here attest to the reliability of this formula. But we can also locate many instances of films that have failed, despite Hollywood’s best efforts. For example, Sony Pictures Classics distributed The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada from first-time director and seasoned actor Tommy Lee Jones. It started in various festivals such as Cannes and Toronto, garnered four Independent Spirit Award nominations, and opened on 33 screens. It only expanded, however, to 356 screens in four weeks before the studio acknowledged that audiences did not agree with the film’s publicity. The film’s box office gross stalled at $5 million.70 Thumbsucker (Mike Mills, 2005) faced an uphill challenge from the start, as producers and distributors alike refused to sign on to the film because, as director Mike Mills recalls, they felt that “it’s unmarketable, it’s unmarketable, it’s unmarketable.”71 Some “independent” films are rather too independent, as Mills discovered with his film. Despite signing on Tilda Swinton and Keanu Reeves to star in the film, Sony Pictures Classics (its eventual distributor) gave the film limited marketing attention; it tried to follow “independent” film marketing protocol by premiering the film at Sundance in 2005, followed by screenings at the festivals in Berlin and Toronto the same year. Thumbsucker was even nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best First Feature. But Thumbsucker’s platform release, starting with nine screens, only expanded to 330 screens before the studio realized that the film was bombing. The film’s dual coming-of-age stories (the story of the main character, Justin, and the story of his parents) “seems to be what scared the marketing people.” Mills protested the tactics used for his film, which eventually spelled its demise of garnering only $1.3 million in a ten-week run. “The marketing thing pissed me off . . . In [the U.S.], it’s just lumped into this quirky independent box.”72 Hollywood studio executives tend to think that they have captive audiences whose preferences are easily mapped. As Miller et al. write, “Marketing executives have already decided that an audience exists for a film with the right combination of high playability, clear positioning and abundant marketability.”73 The prevalence of Hollywood specialty studio divisions signals Hollywood’s confidence that it must simply massage audience tastes to

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match company objectives, with less attention to the integrity and quality of the filmmaker or the film. INDEPENDENT TRAILBLAZERS As we have seen, the film marketplace is clogged with “independent” films that are produced and distributed by the specialty divisions of major studios. These types of films define what should be typically associated with the concept of independence. Film publicity, and the corresponding infrastructure through which to communicate it, is saturated with certain buzzwords, symbols, and themes befitting independent films. It starts to matter less if the film is actually produced and distributed outside the six major studios that dominate 94 percent of the domestic box office. So where does this leave filmmakers who do operate completely outside of the studio system? If the studios effectively decide what films are shown at most theaters in the country, what outlets do independent filmmakers have? How can they differentiate their films from the studio-supported “independent” ones percolating in every corner of the film industry, given that the media generally frames them all to be of the same ilk? Independent film has existed alongside, in opposition to, and because of major studio productions since the very beginning of cinema. Independent filmmakers have long been driven to alter their production, distribution, and exhibition practices in order to stand out, only for Hollywood to co-opt them after the success of these practices has been proven. For example, the economic imperative of filming with consumer-grade digital cameras has translated into digital camerawork in major productions, as seen in films such as Click (Frank Coraci, 2006), distributed by Sony Pictures, and Miami Vice (Michael Mann, 2006), distributed by Universal Pictures. Consequently, this once economic and aesthetic necessity has mainstreamed to the point that it no longer is a mark of an independent film. The use of Web sites and social networking sites to reach film audiences has produced a glut of carefully crafted and highly purposeful online corporate marketing synergies. Because of Hollywood’s constant co-opting of independent techniques, however, independent filmmakers are forced to continue developing new techniques, infrastructures, and tactics, pushing the boundaries, in this case, of traditional film marketing and distribution. The case of Four Eyed Monsters (Susan Buice and Arin Crumley, 2005) exemplifies the willingness of independent filmmakers to pursue innovative modes of marketing and distribution in order to connect with audiences. The film, which follows the relationship of two shy individuals who communicate by never directly speaking to each other, has located its audiences primarily, like most independent films these days, through online word-of-mouth. After an appearance at the 2006 Slamdance Film Festival

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(which happens concurrently in Park City, Utah, with Sundance), Buice and Crumley’s hopes of securing a distributor did not pan out. Therefore, they began to develop their own marketing and distribution plan that was not contingent on studio (or even independent distribution company) support. The duo began broadcasting via their film’s Web site episodic video podcasts that were effectively extensions of the film itself. These mini-films were paired with music by unsigned musicians and offered via MySpace in order to initiate cross-promotion, whereby music fans would discover the film and vice versa; they have been downloaded over 500,000 times via YouTube, MySpace, and iTunes.74 Soon, the directors decided to premiere the 71-minute Four Eyed Monsters on the video-sharing site, YouTube, becoming the first full-length feature to do so. Their next step involved identifying clusters of interested audiences in different geographic locations in order to arrange screenings likely to be attended by at least 150 people. Buice and Crumley screened their film in over 100 cities around the United States after having received requests from over 5,000 people. With their attention now turned toward creating more minifilm podcasts and coordinating a DVD release of Four Eyed Monsters, the pair cannot promise that they themselves will arrange screenings. They do, however, encourage audiences to host screenings. They have relinquished control over possible financial gain from these kinds of screenings, merely suggesting: “We recommend screenings be free,” the film’s Web site proposes, “but if money is charged, we ask that half be sent to us via pay pal. And educational institutions that normally pay films a screening fee can just send us a check for the going rate they normally pay to other films.”75 Some of these screenings are arranged through Brave New Theaters, which bills itself as “the world’s first people-powered movie distributor.”76 This free service facilitates networks between filmmakers and venues (both traditional theaters and nontraditional venues such as churches or universities) in order to arrange screenings that “uh, wreak a little havoc on the corporate media.” “Everybody wins!” exclaims the Web site. “Except the Hollywood studios.”77 Buice and Crumley have now aligned with Spout, a film recommendation community Web site, in another mutually beneficial partnership. For every person who signs up with Spout.com by way of Four Eyed Monsters’ recommendation, Spout will donate one dollar to recoup Buice and Crumley’s $100,000 film production costs (Spout earns most of its revenue from online DVD sales). The filmmakers have earned over $46,000 as of October 2007. Although this return is only a portion of the filmmakers’ financial outlay, it presents an alternative model of financial recouping that is not contingent on a studio distribution deal. Filmmakers are often paid an advance upon signing a distribution deal, which may or may not entirely cover production costs, and they often do not receive any additional money from box office grosses or ancillary sales. Furthermore, film rights are signed over to the

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distributor, therefore rendering filmmakers unable to earn any more money on the film if the film fails from distributor inattention or mishandling.78 Buice and Crumley’s model of self-distribution allows them to retain financial control over the film while affording them the option to try different promotional tactics. Now other filmmakers are following Buice and Crumley’s model of film marketing and distribution. Independent filmmaker Francis Stokes released his film Harold Buttleman, Daredevil Stuntman (2002) on YouTube in August 2007; he, too, attracted the attention of Spout, which “wants to help filmmakers who are pioneering online distribution.”79 The Web site is contributing one dollar to Stokes’ production expenses for each member signed up on Spout.com through Stokes’ recommendation (Stokes had secured nearly $2,500 as of October 2007). These strategies are in sharp contrast to the operations of any corporately owned film distributor, which does not relinquish such control over distribution and exhibition. Films made outside the studio system count on communities of support, often achieved by handing over control to audiences and trusting them with it. Since its inception, independent film has relied on communities of support that gather for the love of cinema, rather than corporately distributed “independent” film that actively seeks and builds communities through the financial heft of marketing dollars. The truly independent film communities might develop as a result of festival buzz or as a collection of supporters finding and responding to a film on YouTube or Spout. Independent filmmakers’ style of promotion relies on self-selected communities who stumble across or purposefully seek out a given film such as Four Eyed Monsters, rather than having a film shoved at them from every conceivable angle. While these films may not garner anywhere near similar levels of box office grosses as Hollywood releases, filmmakers such as Buice and Crumley are more interested in circumventing the strictures of the traditional distribution track, thereby paving the way for filmmakers to self-distribute without going broke. Another independent filmmaker, Lance Weiler, established a sustainable model of theatrical self-distribution for his film Head Trauma that hinged on paid speaking engagements, advertising sponsors, and 50/50 door split with small theaters on his film’s national tour. He notes that the current distribution system is broken, which puts filmmaking “at a very interesting crossroads. When something is damaged it provides new opportunities.”80 Despite Hollywood’s best efforts to control the film industry by coding their own films as “independent” in marketing campaigns, independent filmmakers continue to push the boundaries of what audiences identify as independent. With each new marketing or distribution tactic, they remove gatekeeper control out of Hollywood studios’ hands, at least momentarily, so that audiences have more agency over the kinds of films they would like to see, and filmmakers have more agency over the fates of their films. “Through

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all these media,” comment Buice and Crumley, “we’re having sort of a conversation with our audience. We’re becoming friends with people we’ve never met.”81 These personal relationships are key for independent filmmakers, as the filmmakers typically do not have the financial wherewithal to compete with “independent” film marketing materials flooding out of Hollywood. In fact, some consider their lack of marketing to be the crucial component: If these films are hyped, they may be doomed. One of the joys of stumbling upon a charming or sophisticated or funny low-budget . . . film is just that, stumbling upon it, whether given to you on DVD by a friend or the filmmaker himself or walking into one of them unknowingly at a film festival . . . I’d think they need to come at the average viewer like a pleasant surprise, with as little forethought or anticipation as possible.82

While the preceding quote refers directly to “mumblecore” films (films that have been deemed part of a new independent film movement that revels in low production qualities and casual filmmaking), film journalist Anthony Kaufman’s sentiments can be extended to much of independent cinema today.

CONCLUSION Hollywood studios use specialty film divisions to produce and distribute “independent” films in order to maximize revenue streams by offering films to every audience niche. No matter the preference, Hollywood should supply it. Independent filmmakers have long posed a threat to Hollywood’s methods of conducting business by presenting innovative and often equally effective modes of filmmaking, and as independent filmmakers discover more techniques that facilitate the production, distribution, and exhibition of their films, Hollywood strives to retain its control by coding its films as “independent.” Major studios release films under specialty labels that self-identify as “independent” (witness Warner Independent Pictures) and follow strict marketing campaigns that foreground a given film’s “independent” qualities. These elements are intended to connect a given film with previously released independent films; they include fresh or amateur directors, quality acting, quirky or endearing storylines, a release strategy that includes the festival circuit and platform releasing, and coveted awards. While this chapter uncovers how Hollywood studios use these elements for narrative feature films, it should be noted that another area ripe for further development is how studios market documentaries, which are films traditionally under the helm of independent filmmakers. As documentaries perform increasingly well at the box office, Hollywood studios will surely more explicitly craft marketing campaigns to code these films in certain ways. Are these campaigns similar to those of “independent” films, or do they contain elements unique to the genre?

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We must also consider how Hollywood studios will respond to new marketing and distribution techniques such as those utilized by Susan Buice and Arin Crumley for Four Eyed Monsters. These filmmakers eschew financial gain by offering their film free-of-charge on YouTube and allowing people to screen the film in whatever venue possible —all in return for the knowledge that their film is finding its audience. Hollywood will likely refuse to relinquish control over marketing and distribution and will likely still try to co-opt these techniques somehow, monetizing them for financial gain. Hollywood studios may more actively seek out practitioners of alternative film distribution before these models prove successful or are popularly adopted, offering opportunities to work with studios to develop distribution options that continue to favor a studio’s interests over those of the filmmakers. However, a studio promise of profits may still not overcome the lure of retaining rights to one’s own creative work and the chance to intimately connect with audiences. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This chapter was completed with the assistance of a grant from the University of Oregon Canadian Studies Committee, which enabled me to present a version of this chapter at the 2007 Union for Democratic Communications conference in Vancouver, Canada. NOTES 1. Internet Movie Database, “Box Office/Business for Brokeback Mountain,” IMDb. com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0388795/business (accessed September 30, 2007). 2. David Carr, “As Independents Lead Oscars, Credits at Issue,” International Herald Tribune, February 2, 2006, 10. 3. Avi Lerner, as told to Nicole Porte, “Reality Check: Lerner: ‘Indie’ Means Risk,” Variety, May 15–21, 2006, 16. 4. The Motion Picture Association of America reports that theatrical admissions declined from $1.64 billion in 2002 to $1.40 billion in 2005, with only a small increase in 2006 to $1.45 billion. Motion Picture Association, U.S. Entertainment Industry: 2006 Market Statistics (Los Angeles: Motion Picture Association Worldwide Market Research and Analysis, 2006), 6. 5. Motion Picture Association of America, U.S. Entertainment Industry, 15–16. 6. A lawsuit filed against Brokeback Mountain’s production company, Focus Features, by one of the film’s actors cited a $30 million P&A price tag for the film, more than double its production budget. Randy Quaid claimed that he accepted a very small fee for his role in the film in order to allow the production to devote its budget toward the film. Quaid’s complaint arose when the film began to achieve box office success, earning $160 million by the time Quaid filed the lawsuit. Sharon Waxman, “Lawsuit over ‘Brokeback Mountain’ Reveals Unease over Pay for ‘Arthouse’ Films,” New York Times, March 29, 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/29/movies/ 29quaid.html (accessed January 9, 2008).

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7. Chris Holmlund, “Introduction: From the Margins to the Mainstream,” in Contemporary American Independent Film: From the Margins to the Mainstream, ed. Chris Holmlund and Justin Wyatt (London and New York: Routledge, 2005), 2. 8. Greg Merritt, Celluloid Mavericks: A History of American Independent Film, (New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2000); Peter Biskind, Down and Dirty Pictures: Miramax, Sundance, and the Rise of Independent Film (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2004). 9. Geoff King, American Independent Cinema (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2005); Emmanuel Levy, Cinema of Outsiders: The Rise of American Independent Film (New York: New York University Press, 1999); John Pierson, Spike, Mike, Slackers & Dykes: A Guided Tour Across a Decade of Independent American Cinema (London: Faber, 1996). 10. “SIC 78—Motion Pictures,” Market Share Reporter, 2005 (Detroit, MI: Gale Research, 2005). 11. Time Warner, “Fact Sheet,” Time Warner: About Us, http://www.timewarner. com/corp/aboutus/fact_sheet.html (accessed October 8, 2007). 12. Warner Independent Pictures, “About Warner Independent Pictures,” Warner Independent Pictures Web site, http://wip.warnerbros.com (accessed June 11, 2006). 13. Warner Independent Pictures, “About Warner.” 14. Alisa Perren, “A Big Fat Indie Success Story? Press Discourses Surrounding the Making and Marketing of a ‘Hollywood’ Movie,” Journal of Film and Video 56, no. 2 (2004), 18–31. 15. King, American Independent Cinema, 46. 16. Yannis Tzioumakis, American Independent Cinema: An Introduction (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2006), 11. 17. Tzioumakis, American Independent Cinema, 282. 18. Frederick Wasser, Veni, Vidi, Video: The Hollywood Empire and the VCR (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2001). 19. “ ‘Spider-Man 3’ Smashes Box Office Records,” MSNBC.com, May 7, 2007, http:// www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18522923/ (accessed October 3, 2007). 20. Internet Movie Database, “All-Time USA Box Office,” IMDb.com, http://www. imdb.com/boxoffice/alltimegross (accessed June 10, 2006). 21. William Booth, “Box Office Blahs: Blame It on (Fill in the Blank); Reasons for Slump Are Cinematic in Scope,” The Washington Post, December 30, 2005. 22. Box office revenue spiked in 2002, hitting $9.52 billion. It has since fluctuated slightly, resting at $9.49 billion for 2006. Motion Picture Association, U.S. Entertainment Industry, 4. 23. Tiiu Lukk, Movie Marketing: Opening a Picture and Giving it Legs (Los Angeles: Silman-James Press, 1997), 47. 24. Tzioumakis, American Independent Cinema, 12. 25. Tino Balio, “Brigitte Bardot and Hollywood’s Takeover of the US Art Film Market in the 1960s,” in Trading Culture: Global Traffic and Local Cultures in Film and Television (Eastleigh, UK: John Libbey), 192. 26. Lukk, Movie Marketing. 27. D. F. Prindle, Risky Business: The Political Economy of Hollywood (Boulder: Westview, 1993); Justin Wyatt, High Concept: Movies and Marketing in Hollywood (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994). 28. Robert Marich, Marketing to Moviegoers: A Handbook of Strategies Used by Major Studios and Independents (Burlington, MA: Focal Press, 2005), xii.

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29. Marich, Marketing to Moviegoers, 249. 30. Lists of distributed films were obtained from each studio’s entry on Internet Movie Database (imdb.com). 31. Fox Searchlight Pictures, “The Studio: About Fox Searchlight Pictures,” Fox Searchlight Pictures Web site, http://content.foxsearchlight.com/studio/node/218 (accessed October 4, 2007); “2006 Annual Report,” The Walt Disney Company, http:// corporate.disney.go.com/investors/annual_reports/WDC-AR-2006.pdf (accessed October 4, 2007), 21. 32. Johanna Schneller, “Smart Money was on Indies,” The Globe and Mail, February 3, 2006, R4. 33. Schneller, “Smart Money was on Indies,” R4. 34. Stephen Garrett, “Critic’s Diary, Part 1: Zach Braff ’s Impressive Trip to the ‘Garden State’; Mixed Reactions to ‘Chrystal,’ ‘Primer,’ and More,” Indiewire.com, January 18, 2004, http://www.indiewire.com/onthescene/onthescene_040118crit. html (accessed June 10, 2006). 35. Lloyd Sachs, “Madsen uncorks vintage performance with new kind of full-bodied role,” The Chicago Sun-Times, January 9, 2005; Eleanor Ringel Gillespie, “Wine-Country Trip Uncorks Friendship’s Quirky Complexity,” The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, November 5, 2004. 36. Ty Burr, “ ‘Sunshine’ Warms with Dark Laughs,” The Boston Globe, August 4, 2006, D1; Mary McNamara, “Sneaks/The List; Little Miss Sunshine; Putting Dysfunction to the Road Test,” The Los Angeles Times, May 7, 2006, E35. 37. Daniel B. Wood and Gloria Goodale, “Moviegoers to Hollywood: ‘Make it Real,’ ” Christian Science Monitor, February 1, 2006, 1. 38. A. O. Scott, “News in Black, White and Shades of Gray,” The New York Times, September 23, 2005, E1. 39. Steve Persall, “A Good Day for the Good Guys,” St. Petersburg Times, November 3, 2005, 11W. 40. Lukk, Movie Marketing, 114. 41. Patrick Barkham, “ ‘I’ve Won the Indie Film Lottery’: Zach Braff has Graduated from Star of Scrubs to Writer and Director of His Own Hit Film,” The Guardian, November 12, 2004. 42. Brian Brooks, “ ‘Garden State’ Sows a Bountiful Box Office Debut,” Indiewire.com, August 4, 2004, http://www.indiewire.com/biz/biz_040804boxoffice.html (accessed June 10, 2006). 43. Zach Braff, “Stir Crazy in French Canada,” Zach Braff ’s Garden State Blog, May 24, 2005, http://www2.foxsearchlight.com/gardenstate/blog/index.html (accessed June 11,2006). 44. Barkham, “I’ve Won the Indie Film Lottery.” 45. Barkham, “I’ve Won the Indie Film Lottery.” 46. Sharon Waxman, “A Small Film Nearly Left for Dead Has Its Day in the Sundance Rays,” The New York Times, January 23, 2006, E1; Jim Schembri, “The Little Film That Could,” The Age (Melbourne), October 13, 2006, 2. 47. Christie Lemire, “ ‘Little Miss Sunshine’ is an Indie Treat,” MSNBC.com, http:// www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14013775/ (accessed October 5, 2007).

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48. Ann Thompson, “Clooney’s Good Luck; Actor Picks Up Six Golden Globe Noms,” The Toronto Sun, December 31, 2005, 56. 49. Schneller, “Smart Money was on Indies,” R4. 50. Forbes reports that of the top 20 best-paid actors and actresses in 2005, only four have ever received Academy Awards. Lacey Rose, “The World’s Best-Paid Actors and Actresses,” Forbes.com, February 23, 2006, http://www.forbes.com/2006/02/23/ best-paid-actors_cx_lr_0223actors.html (accessed January 10, 2008). 51. Mary McNamara, “The Life of Hollywood; Behind the Smile; The Good Looks Aren’t Why Greg Kinnear Gets a Wide Variety of Roles,” The Los Angeles Times, July 17, 2006, E1. 52. Sharon Waxman, “Lovely When Necessary, But Vulnerable Always,” The New York Times, May 7, 2006, Section 2A, 3. 53. Margy Rochlin, “Dry as Ever, Shrugging at Hollywood,” The New York Times, January 7, 2007, Section 2A, 7. 54. M. E. Russell, “Slipping ‘Sideways’ Toward an Oscar,” The Oregonian, January 29, 2005. 55. John Clark, “To Promote Unusual Films, Try Uncommon Marketing,” The New York Times, January 16, 2006, C5. 56. Lukk, Movie Marketing, 118. 57. Lukk, Movie Marketing, 120. 58. Waxman, “A Small Film,” E1. 59. Lukk, Movie Marketing, 2. 60. Schembri, “The Little Film That Could,” 2. 61. Internet Movie Database, “Box Office/Business for Little Miss Sunshine,” IMDb. com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0449059/business (accessed October 5, 2007). 62. Internet Movie Database, “Business Data for Garden State,” IMDb.com, http:// www.imdb.com/title/tt0333766/business (accessed June 11, 2006). 63. Internet Movie Database, “Business Data for Sideways,” IMDb.com, http://www. imdb.com/title/tt0375063/business (accessed June 11, 2006). 64. Internet Movie Database, “Business Data for King Kong,” IMDb.com, http:// www.imdb.com/title/tt0360717/business (accessed June 11, 2006). 65. Film Independent, “Independent Spirit Awards,” Film Independent Web site, http://www.filmindependent.org/index.php/independent_spirit_awards (accessed June 12, 2006); Film Independent, “FAQs,” Film Independent Web site, http://www. filmindependent.org/index.php/independent_spirit_awards/submit_your_film (accessed October 5, 2007). 66. Will Keck and Donna Freydkin, “Oh, What an Expletive Deleted Night; That’s the Spirit Awards,” USA Today, March 6, 2006; Richard Rushfield, “It All Depends What You Mean By ‘Independent,’ ” The New York Times, January 23, 2005. 67. Richard Rushfield, “It All Depends What You Mean By ‘Independent,’ ” The New York Times, January 23, 2005. 68. AMC Theatres, “AMC Select,” 2007, http://www.amctheatres.com/amctheatres/ user-controller/select (accessed October 5, 2007). 69. Lorenza Munoz, “AMC to Exhibit Specialty Films,” The Los Angeles Times, May 2, 2006.

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70. Internet Movie Database, “Business Data for The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada.” IMDb.com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0419294/business (accessed June 11, 2006). 71. Pascale Wyse, “G2: Culture: ‘This Film is Unmarketable’: Mike Mills Signed Up Keanu Reeves, Tilda Swinton and Vince Vaughn for his First Feature. And Still No One Wanted to Fund It,” The Guardian, October 25, 2005, 21. 72. Wyse, “G2: Culture,” 21. 73. Toby Miller et al., Global Hollywood (London: BFI Publishing, 2001), 157. 74. Eugene Hernandez, “DIY Distribution: Coming Soon Via the Filmmakers . . . ‘Four Eyed Monsters’ and ‘Head Trauma,’ ” indieWIRE Insider, August 16, 2006, http://www.indiewire.com/biz/2006/08/diy_distributio_1.html (accessed October 8, 2007). 75. Susan Buice and Arin Crumley, “Four Eyed Monsters—Request the Film and Join Our Mailing List,” Four Eyed Monsters Web site, http://foureyedmonsters.com/ request_film/ (accessed October 6, 2007). 76. Brave New Theaters Web site, http://bravenewtheaters.com/ (accessed October 6, 2007). 77. “What Filmmakers Can Do with Brave New Theaters,” Brave New Theaters Web site, http://bravenewtheaters.com/filmmakers (accessed October 6, 2007). 78. John W. Cones notes that independent film producers are often highly disadvantaged in the structuring of distribution deals due to misleading or unclear contractual terms and creative accounting procedures. John W. Cones, The Feature Film Distribution Deal: A Critical Analysis of the Single Most Important Film Industry Agreement (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1997), 3–5. 79. “Francis Stokes,” Spout Web site, 2007, http://www.spout.com/francisstokes (accessed October 6, 2007). 80. Lance Weiler, “DIY Workbook Project and a Best Buy Promotion,” Indie Features (ex Indie Features 06), November 9, 2006, http://indiefeatures06.blogspot.com/2006/ 11/diy-workbook-project-best-buy.html (accessed January 10, 2008). 81. Barbara Gibson, “ ‘Four Eyed Monsters’: From Podcasts to Theaters,” Apple Hot News, 2007, http://www.apple.com/hotnews/articles/2006/09/foureyedmonsters/ (accessed October 6, 2007). 82. Anthony Kaufman, “Why Mumblecore Shouldn’t Be Hyped,” Anthony Kaufman’s blog, August 22, 2007, http://blogs.indiewire.com/anthony/archives/014434.html (accessed January 9, 2008).

chapter 9

Entertainment in the Margins of the American Film Industry: “Orion Pictures Presents a Filmhaus Production of a David Mamet Film” Yannis Tzioumakis

This chapter examines the business of entertainment in the vibrant independent sector of the American film industry. Since the early 1980s, this formerly marginal sector of American cinema has been responsible for the production of a large number of aesthetically and politically challenging films that have found considerable commercial exposure, to the extent that several critics have talked of an “independent movement” within Hollywood cinema.1 By the end of the 1980s, this movement had become a sizeable force in American cinema as the incredible commercial success of sex, lies, and videotape (Soderbergh, 1989), the popularization of Sundance Film Festival, and the rise of Miramax as the quintessential distribution company of independent fare brought low-budget films by (mostly) young filmmakers and made away from the majors much closer to a mainstream audience. Since then, the label “independent” has been claimed by a large number of films, filmmakers, producers, production companies, and distribution companies as it was seen to connote “a particular brand of quality that was perceived as absent from the considerably more refined (and expensive) but impersonal mainstream Hollywood productions.”2 As a result, it became increasingly difficult to define what an independent film is, while even major productions have been keen to play up the “independent card,” such as The Aviator (Scorsese, 2005) which, according to its producer, was “the biggest

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independent movie ever made, unless you count Lord of the Rings.”3 Not surprisingly then, the business of entertainment in the independent sector became a blurry subject, especially when the majors created subsidiaries (“the Classics divisions”) firstly to make profit from non-American art house films but later with the explicit purpose of claiming a piece of the American independent film market. With companies such as United Artists Classics, Sony Pictures Classics, and Fox Searchlight distributing and (later) financing famous independent films such as Lianna (Sayles, 1983), Safe (Haynes, 1995), and Boys Don’t Cry (Peirce, 1999), respectively, it became incredibly difficult to argue that these companies are not part of the institutional apparatus of American independent cinema, despite the fact that their corporate parents are conglomerates with massive financial power and the companies against which independent cinema often defines itself.4 Even though these developments have been shaping the independent sector in recent years, especially post-1989, they were nevertheless anticipated to a great extent by the practices and conduct of business of Orion Pictures, a motion picture company that went into business in the late 1970s. As I’ve argued elsewhere, Orion is an exceptional case in the American film industry.5 Originally an independent production company attached to a major studio (Warner), Orion quickly left the major and entered the film distribution business, becoming an independent production and distribution company that financed productions in-house while also purchasing distribution rights of films from other independent production companies. This means that Orion plied its trade across the independent spectrum (financing, commissioning, purchasing distribution rights, and distributing) as this had been emerging in the 1980s, while it was also one of the first companies to form a classics division, Orion Classics, in 1983. For that reason it makes an excellent case study to understand the direction(s) the business of filmmaking took within the context of contemporary American independent cinema. The main focal point will be the production history of House of Games (Mamet, 1987), one of the low-budget films Orion financed and distributed but that was produced by Filmhaus Productions, the production company of respected independent producer Michael Hausman (with producing credits in Silkwood [Nichols, 1983] and The People vs Larry Flint [Forman, 1996]). What makes House of Games an interesting example is that the film was made by a first-time director and was also characterized by a distinctive aesthetic, in line with what audiences have come to anticipate from an “indie” film. As our discussion will demonstrate, the distinct aesthetic effects the film conveyed, which were the product of an unusual narrative construction and use of visual style, must be firstly attributed to the fact that the film was conceived, developed, produced, and distributed away from the majors, which would never allow a film such as House of Game to become the film it became. On the other hand, Orion could. Specifically, the company’s practice

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of preselling the rights for its films to raise production finance so that Orion would not put its own money in line and the company’s legendary reputation for being “always open to the offbeat or ‘serious’ idea” and “sensitive to filmmakers” created an institutional arrangement that allowed a first-time film director, such as Mamet, unprecedented freedom to make his film according to his own very specific aesthetic vision.6 Following this arrangement, Mamet and Filmhaus organized the production of the film in a way that differs substantially from the dominant mode of production that has characterized mainstream American cinema from its early days and has remained generally unaltered post-1960, despite several changes in the industry.7 As a sort of preface, I cite Mamet’s statement on his experience as the director of House of Games: “what a joy to be on a project that was not a collaboration,” a comment that can be read as a direct criticism of the hierarchy entailed in the detailed division of labor that characterizes the mode of production of mainstream “classical” films. Instead, Mamet and Filmhaus utilized a somewhat less hierarchical model, one that has a long standing tradition in independent filmmaking since John Cassavetes revolutionized the sector in the late 1950s and that continues to our times. Before examining the institutional configuration that the phrase “Orion Pictures Presents a Filmhaus Production of a David Mamet Film” signifies, a brief discussion of what independent filmmaking actually is and how it evolved alongside mainstream cinema is in need. INDEPENDENT FILMMAKING AND AMERICAN CINEMA Independent film production has always coexisted alongside studio production in American cinema and has taken many forms and functions. For instance, during the studio years (mid-1920s to late 1940s) the label independent could be attached to prestige-level pictures made by producers such as Samuel Goldwyn, Walt Disney, and David O. Selznick who used United Artists (and later other companies) to release films they made through their respective production companies. Among these independent films one could find films such as Wuthering Heights (Wyler, 1939) and The Best Years of Our Lives (Wyler, 1946), films widely considered mainstream Hollywood productions under the studio system, which nevertheless were produced by Samuel Goldwyn through his independent company and distributed by United Artists and RKO, respectively. The same label, however, could also be attached to low-budget pictures (such as the singing cowboy western Rainbow Over Texas [F. McDonald, 1946]) produced and distributed by Poverty Row studios such as Republic Pictures or Edgar G. Ulmer’s famed B noir Detour (1945) produced and released by Producers Releasing Corporation and destined for the low part of

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double bills in the 1930s and 1940s. The label independent could also be attached to ultra-low-budget films that targeted the various ethnic populations in America, which were produced, distributed, and exhibited mainly outside the California-based film industry. Oscar Micheux’s films such as Within Our Gates (1920) and Body and Soul (1925), which were made completely outside Hollywood and targeted black audiences, are characteristic examples of this type of independent cinema.8 During the 1940s and 1950s, however, a cluster of sociocultural factors including demographic shifts (especially the wave of suburbanization), the rise of consumer culture, and the consolidation of television as the primary entertainment medium had been gradually shaping an American society with an increasing number of leisure options. With theater attendance declining constantly since 1947 (despite the studios’ attempts to emphasize the cinema experience through the introduction of widescreen technologies in the early 1950s), it was clear that cinema-going became a secondary activity in postwar America.9 All these factors led to an industrial and economic restructuring in the American film industry, the main manifestation of which can be seen in the dissolution of the studio system, the concentration of the majors on the production of fewer but more expensive films, and on the strict control of the distribution sector. These changes in the industry changed the format of independent filmmaking. Since the 1950s, prestige-level, top--rank independent production became increasingly “dependent” to the majors as they adopted this type of production after the dissolution of the studio system and were happy to concentrate on financing and distributing while letting other, smaller corporate entities deal with the production process. Films such as The Defiant Ones (Kramer, 1958) and Spartacus (Kubrick, 1960) were financed and distributed by majors (United Artists and Universal, respectively) but were produced by companies owned by Stanley Kramer and Kirk Douglas, respectively. Equally, low-end independent filmmaking continued to exist in the somewhat different form of exploitation filmmaking that companies such as AIP, Dimension, New World Pictures, and filmmakers such as William Castle and Roger Corman practiced from the 1950s onwards. Furthermore, hubs of independent filmmaking activity continued to exist outside California, such as the New American Cinema Group that was based in New York and emphasized an anti-Hollywood approach to film production and distribution. John Cassavetes, an extremely influential independent filmmaker, started his career as part of the group but quickly distanced himself from filmmakers such as John Mekas, Edward Bland, and Lionel Rogosin who were pulled toward the noncommercial avant-garde cinema. Some of these trends continued largely unaltered to our times. For instance, one could argue that Titanic (1997), a film that epitomizes mainstream Hollywood production at its most excessive, is an independent film

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because it was produced by James Cameron’s Lightstorm Entertainment and financed and distributed by Fox and Paramount, much like Spartacus in the 1960s.10 And the same can be suggested for low-budget exploitation filmmaking, which found new avenues of financing with the advent of new distribution and exhibition technologies (video, cable, Pay TV, satellite and, recently, DVD and the Internet), which have made certain film genres (horror, pornographic, martial arts films) very cheap to make and with guaranteed distribution in the video and cable market. The advent of new distribution outlets, however, became beneficial for another format of independent filmmaking, which lay a much stronger claim to the label independent than the other formats. The introduction of all those distribution technologies signaled the creation of new exhibition outlets, all of which needed sufficient product to operate cost-effectively. At a time when the majors were distributing just over 100 films a year on average, it was clear that demand for films would be staggering. Exploiting their existing film libraries (licensing their old films for exhibition in the cable and video markets) was one of the main measures the majors took, but the demand was mainly for new product. This became particularly evident in the mid-1980s when the home video market showed a tremendous growth (from 1,850,000 VCR sets in 78,000,000 households [2.4% penetration] in 1980, the number reached 32,000,000 in 87,400,000 households [37.2% penetration] in 1986, on the way to 67.6% penetration three years later). With pay cable subscriptions exceeding slightly the numbers of VCRs in 1986 (32,500,000 subscriptions), it was clear that any film producer stood a good chance to have their film released in one or more of the nontheatrical markets, often regardless of the film’s quality and regardless of whether the film received theatrical distribution.11 With the majors increasingly focusing on the production of a handful of blockbusters per year, it was left to independent production to come up with the rest of the product required to sustain the majors’ immense distribution pipelines, cater for the various tastes of different audiences, and generally support the film market in this time of expansion. The mid-1980s, in particular, witnessed a substantial rise in independent film production that provided the necessary diversity of product that the majors were in no position to supply. With ample production finance available primarily via the preselling of home video (and in most cases, cable) rights to numerous new distributors, which were established to exploit specifically these highly unusual circumstances (Vestron, Vidmark, Full Moon, etc. in the video area; HBO, Showtime in cable), independent film production became responsible for a huge variety of films.12 This diverse production fed the majors’ distribution apparatus but also catered for distinct niche markets such as the art-house market or different minority markets. The good market conditions for independent filmmaking reached a major threshold in 1989. That year and largely due to the hype surrounding Steven

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Soderbergh’s sex, lies, and videotape, as well as other participating films such as True Love (Savoka) and Heathers (Lehmann), the until-then little-known U.S. Film Festival became headlining news. With the Sundance Film Institute also achieving public visibility and with companies such as New Line Cinema and Miramax scoring incredible box office figures with small, idiosyncratic films such as House Party (Hudlin, 1990) and sex, lies, and videotape, independent cinema stopped being associated entirely with low-budget, esoteric films for the art-house market. It suddenly became commercial and therefore an attractive proposition for all kinds of industry practitioners and, of course, for the majors. The company that exploited these new conditions better than anyone was Miramax. Although Miramax existed since the late 1970s as a distribution company of mostly foreign art films, the success of sex, lies, and videotape, which Miramax distributed theatrically, put the company firmly on the map. For a short period of time the company operated primarily through purchases of distribution rights of films from the increasing number of festivals that showcased the new American independent films. Since the mid-1990s, though, Miramax adopted the “Orion model” and proceeded in the finance of films that other independent companies would produce. In this manner Miramax was able to cultivate relationships with successful filmmakers such as Anthony Minghella, Quentin Tarantino, and Kevin Smith. However, unlike Orion, which maintained its corporate autonomy throughout its history, Miramax accepted a conglomerate takeover by Disney in 1993, becoming then one of the “major independents . . . hybrid production and distribution companies that were allowed a large degree of creative autonomy after they were taken over by a conglomerate parent.”13 With Disney’s backing Miramax dominated the market while independent production flourished under two more “systems.” The first was under the auspices of independent distributors, the number of which—not surprisingly— multiplied after 1989. The vast majority of these distributors (such as Cinecom and October) were not in the business of finance and production and therefore operated strictly through purchasing distribution rights of completed films (much like the way Miramax operated before the takeover by Disney). The second system was under the aegis of the classics divisions. Originally, the classics were subsidiaries established by the majors to distribute nonAmerican films in the United States as certain European art films such as Truffaut’s La Dernier Metro ( The Last Metro) and Beineix’s Diva made rentals of $1.9 million and $2 million in 1980 and 1981, respectively, demonstrating clearly the potential for profit in that market.14 Soon, however, the classics started buying the distribution rights of American independent films and, in effect, competing against Miramax and the independent distributors for product. By the mid-1990s, the competition had reached such levels that soon the classics divisions (with the backup of

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their parent companies) followed Miramax’s example and started financing films that were “independent in spirit,” something that independent distributors were in no position of doing because no independent, with the possible exception of Lions Gate, had a financial base wide enough to finance productions that cost up to $15 million like Fox Searchlight could without even having to ask for permission from 20th Century-Fox, its parent company.15 By the end of the 1990s and early 2000s there was so much “indie” product in the market that the label started losing its appeal. As Variety reported, “after a decade of inflated expectations met with erratic B.O. returns ‘indie’ has lost much of its rugged appeal. It’s become shorthand for movies that are small in concept, weren’t produced with the bottom line in mind and were released by companies that are going out of business.”16 But even if the label started losing its cache, and other appellations such as “niche” or “specialty” started being used instead, the existence of an exceptionally large number of exhibition platforms (including television channels that exclusively screen independent films such as the IFC Channel and the Sundance Channel) that are in constant need of product ensured that independent films were still business as usual. Despite being made in the late 1980s and before the watershed year of 1989, the production background of House of Games demonstrates a number of characteristics that anticipated the direction independent cinema took. Specifically, the film was produced by an independent company, Filmhaus, after the company secured financing (approximately $5–6 million) by an independent distributor, Orion Pictures.17 Orion raised the financing through the preselling of the distribution rights of the film (domestic cable and Pay TV, foreign theatrical, foreign video), in effect securing exhibition for a film with a first-time director, no stars, and no other selling point. To explain why this was not a fluke but part of the business practices of the most successful independent company of the 1980s, we need now to turn our attention to Orion Pictures. THE ORION PICTURES FACTOR Orion Pictures belongs to a particular group of distribution companies that competed with the established powers for much of the 1980s.18 Along with Cannon, the De Laurentis Entertainment Group, and Miramax, Orion Pictures entered the film business as a production company at a time when demand for feature films had been increasing due to the proliferation of distribution outlets, especially cable and video. The company was formed in 1978 by a group of ex–United Artists executives headed by Arthur Krim and Robert Benjamin who disagreed with the policies imposed by Transamerica, United Artists’ parent company. Almost immediately, Orion established a distribution deal with Warner who set up a $90 million financing arrangement

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for the newly formed company.19 The deal saw Orion becoming Warner’s (and Hollywood’s) first “satellite” film production company in the same way that Warner’s music division had a number of satellite labels (Warner/ Reprise, Atlantic, Elektra, and Asylum) under its orbit; labels that were autonomous in terms of management and creative decisions but that had to use Warner’s distribution apparatus to put their product in the market. Although the arrangement between Warner and Orion, with its substantial financing and its seemingly favorable terms, gave the five executives an excellent opportunity to re-enter the film business at a time when the average negative cost for a film was still relatively low, it nevertheless proved to be problematic for both partners. Questions of authority and control over Orion’s projects were raised even within the first six months of the partnership.20 Marketing and distribution, in particular, became a moot point in the two companies’ conduct of business as Warner had the ultimate say in such matters. Thus Orion-produced films with some box office potential did not manage to find an audience partly because of the way they were handled upon their release by the major, such as A Little Romance (G. R. Hill, 1979), a love story that featured Laurence Olivier and, especially, The Great Santini (L. J Carlino, 1979), a gritty drama with Robert Duvall that was released on three different occasions with modified marketing campaigns. Furthermore, Warner’s foreign distribution offices were empowered to veto the release of Orion’s films if they thought that they would not perform well in specific markets, which could deprive Orion of potential profits.21 Finally, and perhaps more importantly, Orion was not in a position to deliver Warner the stratospheric profits that the expensive, effects-laden, action/ adventure-oriented films were bringing to the other majors. With Orion’s line of credit set at $90 million, it was obvious that the company could not afford to make such films. As a matter of fact, Orion had to pass on Raiders of the Lost Ark (Spielberg, 1981) due to its high cost and the principal players’ demands from the film’s gross.22 As a result, the deal between the two companies lasted only four years (1978–1981). During the period, Orion produced 23 films for the major with only 2 box office hits, 10 (Edwards, 1979) and Arthur (Gordon, 1981).23 After the termination of the contract in 1981, Orion made the decision to venture into the distribution business by taking over Filmways, an independent distributor that had emerged through a merger between American International Pictures and Filmways in 1978. With a distribution apparatus in place and a library of more than 800 titles from Filmways that could be exploited in the video and cable markets, Orion proceeded to make a number of deals to raise production and marketing funds. Strictly adhering to a philosophy of minimum economic risks,24 the company started preselling the ancillary distribution rights of its upcoming films to a number of parties. These deals included an agreement with RCA/Columbia for foreign theatrical and

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video rights; with HBO for cable and pay-TV rights; with Vestron for home video rights; and agreements with foreign distributors, some of which were willing to buy the whole Orion roster of films (in the area of 8 to 12 films per year). With the receipts from theatrical distribution in the U.S. market and the funds from preselling the rights of its films in all other ancillary markets, Orion accumulated substantial capital to self-finance films for theater and television exhibition and therefore start competing directly with the majors. By early 1985 the company was in a position to finance and distribute at least one picture per month and, in the words of Eric Pleskow, the company’s president and CEO, “to be as voluminous a supplier of motion pictures to the world as any other company.”25 Arguably, the most important deal Orion made during the first half of the 1980s was with HBO. The spectacularly successful pay cable channel had already become one of Orion’s main stockholders when the latter went public, acquiring 8.5 percent of the company and providing the main financial pillar of Orion throughout the period from 1982 to 1985, which saw a series of deals between the two companies, bringing substantial capital to Orion.26 The partnership was further extended in February 1985 when HBO and Orion signed new deals according to which the former acquired the nonexclusive pay cable rights for the next 14 Orion films as well as the domestic home video rights to 40 films from Orion’s (ex-AIP, ex-Filmways) library. According to Variety, only the 1985 deals with HBO brought Orion funds within the region of $50–$75 million, bringing up the level of total revenue that the company generated from its partnership with HBO (since 1982) in excess of $150 million.27 As a result Orion was able to self-finance a record 17 pictures scheduled for release in 1986, including Mamet’s debut feature.28 Very early, Orion Pictures established a reputation for making “quality films,”29 for being “a sanctuary for creative filmmakers,”30 and for “nourishing chancy, low-budget properties.”31 If one takes a look at the Orion library of titles, one will find critically acclaimed films by Woody Allen (all his films from Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy [1982] to Shadows and Fogs [1992]), as well as Milos Forman’s Amadeus (1983), Francis Ford Coppola’s Cotton Club (1984), Alan Parker’s Mississippi Burning (1988), and Jonathan Demme’s Something Wild (1986) and The Silence of the Lambs (1991). One would also find Paul Verhoeven’s first American feature, Robocop (1987), Oliver Stone’s Platoon (1986) and Kevin Costner’s Oscar-ridden Dances with Wolves (1990). In 1987, Orion Pictures demonstrated a remarkable achievement for an independent company by capturing the largest share in the American film market.32 Three of its 1986 films, Platoon, Hannah and Her Sisters, and Hoosiers, received 18 Academy Award nominations collectively and shared 6 Oscars. Platoon’s domestic gross surpassed the $100 million benchmark, and the company invested bigger sums in its 1987–1988 releases. Furthermore, it established a new distribution arm for the American home video

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market (Orion Home Entertainment) and ventured in the television market with the very successful series Cagney and Lacey. Additionally, Orion Classics, a semiautonomous division Orion had set up in 1984 to distribute mostly nonU.S. films, had two big hits in Claude Berri’s Jean de Florette (1986) and Manon des Sources (1986), which together grossed $10 million in the U.S. box office. Orion, however, did not manage to repeat the success of 1987. Excessive spending (by the company’s standards) and a series of flops culminating in the extremely poor $459,000 gross of The House on Carroll Street (Yates, 1988) brought Orion back to a normal 4.2 percent in 1989 and 5.6 percent of the American film market share in 1990. The financial success of the 1990 western Dances with Wolves raised Orion’s stake to 8.5 percent in 1991.33 However, even though Orion Pictures managed to repeat the success of Costner’s film in 1991 with The Silence of the Lambs, a film that also scooped all five major Oscars in March 1992, it finally went bankrupt in November 1991. Its library of titles was subsequently bought by Kirk Kerkorian, already owner of the M-G-M and United Artists film libraries. This brief account of the history of Orion Pictures reveals certain interesting issues regarding the industrial/economic background of House of Games. The first important parameter is that the film was financed by a company that was considered to be friendly toward creative filmmakers and consequently thought to exercise minimum control over the creation process or, at least, less control compared to the traditional majors. As Mike Medavoy, Orion’s head of worldwide production, stated, Mamet’s “body of work as a playwright—Sexual Perversity in Chicago, American Buffalo and Glengarry Glen Ross —was reason enough for us to give him a shot at directing.”34 Secondly, it is clear that the film was produced during the most successful period of Orion’s history (1986–1987), a fact that potentially reinforced the degree of freedom Mamet enjoyed during the production of the film. Finally, through the distribution deals with HBO, RCA/Columbia, and various foreign distributors, Orion not only managed to provide the full budget for the film with zero financial risk for themselves but also to secure exhibition both in the United States and abroad for a feature with no established director or marketable stars. With global distribution and exhibition secure and with a financer–distributor not in the business of “interfering with the [production] process” the filmmaker was in a position to make the film according to his—very specific—vision and hence avoid potential compromises in creative decisions.35 Unlike filmmakers such as Jim Jarmusch, Joel and Ethan Coen, or Gus Van Sant, who retained creative control of their first movies through independent financing and sometimes self-distribution,36 Mamet managed to achieve this rare feat (for a $5 million production) within the independent structure of “Orion Pictures presents a Filmhaus production of a David Mamet film.”

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FIRST-TIME FILM DIRECTOR Prior to House of Games, Mamet had already achieved fame in Hollywood with two star vehicle scripts for big studios. The first was an adaptation of the James M. Cain novel The Postman Always Rings Twice (1934) for the Lorimar/M-G-M production of Bob Rafelson’s same-titled film (1981) with Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange. The second script was also an adaptation, this time of Barry Reed’s novel The Verdict, for the Fox production of Sidney Lumet’s The Verdict (1982) with Paul Newman. Mamet was nominated for an Oscar for his work on the second script in the 1982–1983 Academy Awards. The critical and commercial success of these films and of a string of “off-Broadway” and foreign productions of some of his plays,37 which culminated in the presentation of the Pulitzer Prize for Best American Play to Glengarry Glen Ross in 1984, provided Mamet with substantial clout, which he subsequently used for achieving his objective, to make the transition from playwright and screenwriter to film director. In 1985, Mamet began to work on two scripts. One was an assignment for Paramount, The Untouchables (De Palma, 1987), loosely based on the successful television series of the same title. The second was a screenplay based on a short story written by himself and Jonathan Katz under the working title The Tell, which later became House of Games. His decision to direct the latter himself stemmed in many ways from a wish to retain the copyright of his written work in the medium of cinema. Accustomed to authorship rights in the terrain of theater, where he enjoyed a much greater fame, and as his screenwriting reputation was growing stronger, Mamet became more sensitive to the issue of defense of his intellectual property in his cinema career. In particular, the fate of Sexual Perversity in Chicago (1974), the first adaptation of one of his early plays, which hit the screens as About Last Night . . . (Zwick, 1986) and had very little to do with the themes and the spirit of his original play, provided the spark in Mamet’s desire to make the leap behind the camera.38 As Mamet put it in one of his essays: I have never been much good as a team player or employee, and it was difficult for me to adjust to a situation where “because I say so” was insufficient explanation. When you write for the stage, you retain the copyright. The work is yours and no one can change a word without your permission. When you write for the screen you are a laborer hired to turn out a product, and that product can be altered at the whim of those who employ you. (original italics)39

As his work on the script for The Untouchables continued and in the wake of creative differences with Art Linson and Brian De Palma (the screenwriter had submitted four drafts of the screenplay, but the producer and director of

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the film wanted further changes),40 Mamet’s interest in directing House of Games led him to reject packages that gave him the screenwriter’s credit but stipulated the appointment of an already established filmmaker to direct the film. These proposals mainly originated from big studios and included the complementary terms of a big-budget production and the signing of stars for the two central roles of Margaret and Mike.41 The studios’ reluctance to finance an expensive production headed by an individual who was driven by his wish to maintain control of his work as a writer can be mainly understood as a refusal to grant a first-time writer–director the final cut of the film, a condition that was nonnegotiable for Mamet. Mamet’s persistence in this issue, which, apart from his views about copyright, can be explained by the major role language plays in his plays and screenplays, essentially left him with one option, to finance and produce the film independently. This option generally entails certain fundamental characteristics that shape the production of a film in very specific ways, especially during the mid-1980s when independent production had started flourishing but had yet to reach the frenzy of the late 1980s and early 1990s. These characteristics include: low budget, unknown actors, financial insecurity, and often, no guaranteed distribution. Those features, however, are counterbalanced by the considerably higher degree of freedom a filmmaker enjoys as opposed to studio-controlled film production. It is not surprising then that Mamet chose to go independent because in his opinion “good moviemaking require[d] not conspicuous expenditure but disciplined imagination.”42 Mamet’s decision to reject studio packages and embrace independent filmmaking to maintain control of his written material paved the way for other playwright–screenwriters who also made the leap to directing. A year after Mamet, Sam Shepard’s first feature as a writer–director, the rural drama Far North (1988), was also produced independently (a collaboration between Circle JS Productions and Nelson Entertainment—the latter an independent production company specializing in horror films that had decided to branch out to prestige drama) and distributed by Alive Films, a short-lived distributor of the 1980s. Shepard chose a similar arrangement for his second (and for the time being last) directorial effort, the western Silent Tongue (1994), which was produced as a collaborative project by three independent companies (Mire, Belbo Films, and the French Canal+) and distributed by Trimark Pictures, a company in the mold of Orion that went out of business in 2000 and whose library of titles is now controlled by the largest contemporary independent production and distribution company in U.S. cinema, Lions Gate Entertainment. Equally, Neil La Bute, the only American playwright besides Mamet with a significant filmmaking career, had his first film, the controversial drama In the Company of Men (1997), produced independently (by Canadian-based Alliance Atlantis) and distributed by Sony Pictures Classics, the classics division

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that has traditionally enjoyed the largest degree of autonomy from its parent company, Sony Pictures.43 More generally, for writer–directors who wanted to retain creative control over their films, independent filmmaking was the only option, and Mamet’s deal with Orion and Filmhaus became a formula that was copied in the future. A FILMHAUS PRODUCTION OF A DAVID MAMET FILM The independent producer whom Mamet approached with the script for House of Games was Michael Hausman. Until 1986, and via his company Filmhaus, Hausman had been associated with a variety of films spanning from key independently financed and released features such as Alambrista! (Young, 1977) and Heartland (Pearce, 1980) to independently produced but studio-financed and distributed films such as Mikey and Nicky (May, 1976) and Places in the Heart (Benton, 1984). Hausman’s credits, furthermore, extended to other areas of film production such as production manager in The Heartbreak Kid (May, 1972) and as second unit or assistant director in films such as Rich Kids (Young, 1979), Hair (Forman, 1979), Silkwood (Nichols, 1984), and Desert Bloom (Corr, 1986). Hausman’s experience in the film production business and his knowledge of the craft of filmmaking were instrumental in Mamet’s attempt as a firsttime director. As Mamet himself has documented in one of his essays, Hausman was the driving force behind the organization of the film’s production. Strictly adhering to the axiom “all mistakes are made in preproduction,”44 the producer ensured the smooth operation of the film’s production by planning carefully the stage of principal cinematography and by developing a close working relationship with the director.45 Hausman also received another credit in the film as a second assistant director, helping Mamet with the technical aspect of the film, an aspect to which Mamet admitted complete ignorance prior to shooting House of Games.46 Furthermore, Hausman secured financing and distribution by making a deal with Orion Pictures who advanced the money by preselling the film’s rights to a cable distributor (Home BoxOffice) and to foreign theatrical distributors on an individual basis.47 Although the role of Michael Hausman was fundamental in these areas of the production of House of Games, further evidence suggests that the film’s mode of production was not a clear instance of the package-unit system that typified Hollywood cinema since the 1950s. According to this system of film production: A producer organised a film project: he or she secured financing and combined the necessary laborers (whose roles had been previously defined by

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the standardised production structure and subdivision of work categories) and the means of production (the narrative property, the equipment and the physical sites of production).48

Even though Hausman’s work in securing financing and arranging the means of production generally conforms to this definition of the package, there are certain elements—specific to the production—that indicate transgressions from this definition. This is especially at the level of the division of labor and the role of the director in the overall organization of the production. Before discussing the exact nature of those transgressions and the ways they have shaped the production of the film, we need to examine the properties of the House of Games package. The main ingredients of the package, gathered by Hausman, included the director, his script, the organization of production by Filmhaus (which also supplied the lower echelon workers for the film), and the complete financing of the project by Orion. However, within this structure, there was a second “mini-package” put together by Mamet that included the more creative aspects of the production such as the actors, the music composer, the set designer, and the costume designer, all previous collaborators on his work in the theater.49 This type of arrangement has not been a rare phenomenon in low-budget productions, as the director is normally bestowed with the power to select the principal players provided that he or she remains within the allocated budget. Furthermore, there has been a long-standing tradition in independent (and often studio) filmmaking where a director has worked with the same players in film after film. From John Cassavetes who employed actors Gena Rowland, Peter Falk, Seymour Cassel, and Ben Gazzara; editor Tom Cornwell; cinematographer Al Ruban; and composer Bo Harwood in a series of films he wrote and directed to more recent independent filmmakers such as Kevin Smith who used actors Ben Affleck, Jason Lee, and Jason Mewes; composer David Pirner; production designer Robert Holtzman; and editor–producer Scott Mosier in the majority of his films, the independent sector is full of examples of filmmakers who work consistently with a small and trusted circle of friends and collaborators. What makes House of Games interesting in this respect, however, was that the majority of Mamet’s key collaborators had very little or, in many cases, no experience whatsoever in filmmaking prior to House of Games, despite years of experience in theater production, particularly in producing Mamet’s plays since the 1970s. Specifically, the music composer, the production designer, and the costume designer of the film had never worked in cinema before Mamet’s first film. Also, actors such as W. H. Macy, Mike Nussbaum, and J. T. Walsh had previously appeared only in a handful of film productions, whilst other actors in key parts such as Ricky Jay (the man from Vegas) and Steve Goldstein (Billy Hahn) made their cinema debut in House of Games.

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Additionally, and following traditions in American theater (and in independent cinema), some of the players took on more than one role in the production of the film, such as Scott Zigler and Patricia Wolff who are credited as actors and production assistants, Ricky Jay who is credited as actor and consultant in confidence games, and, of course, Michael Hausman, who is credited as producer and second assistant director. This second mini-package functioned as an ensemble, an intricately linked group of creative units whose contribution to the production and aesthetics of the film is far greater than the sum of individual contributions. This suggests that the division of labor during the production of the film did not follow the strict hierarchy that has traditionally characterized the mode of production of mainstream Hollywood films. The transgression in the division of labor from the dominant model does not imply that there was no pecking order in the production process or that Mamet, as the film’s director, did not have the final say in such questions as frame composition or editing. Rather, it demonstrates that the creative aspect of the film’s production was, more forcefully than is usual, shaped by the dynamics of a group of players whose long-time collaboration on stage under Mamet’s tutelage influenced both the nature of the division of labor in the upper ranks of the film’s production and eventually the aesthetics of the film. In transferring distinct practices from stage to film production and assimilating these to traditions of independent filmmaking, Mamet demonstrated that, unlike Hollywood mainstream cinema, which is considerably more resistant to “foreign” influences, independent cinema is a mode of filmmaking that is open to influences from other media and modes of productions (such as theater and the working methods of theater companies). In this respect, Mamet’s success in assimilating his theater-originating methods of work to independent cinema’s tradition of filmmakers working with a small circle of friends and collaborators in film after film paved the way for the introduction of further outside influences that made American independent cinema even richer in terms of the directions it could follow. A characteristic example here is Kevin Smith, who burst into the independent scene only a few years after Mamet and introduced an equally distinct mode of filmmaking. As noted earlier, Smith also worked with a small circle of friends and collaborators who have participated in most of his films. In this case, such a system of production has provided the filmmaker with the freedom to create a distinct filmic universe that exists across all his films and that is realized through relentless cross-referencing of characters, narrative events, and “in-jokes” from all his films. This practice reached a remarkable extent in 2004 with his film Jay and Silent Bob Strikes Back, which contained so many references to his previous films that lack of prior knowledge of Clerks (1994), Mallrats (1996), Chasing Amy (1997), and Dogma (1999) can render Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back incomprehensible. With other independent

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filmmakers importing new ideas and practices (Smith’s inspiration for such a universe was the medium of comic books), one can only expect that American independent cinema will continue to be a locus of innovative trends that expand the language of cinema. THE “MAMET AESTHETIC” House of Games tells the story of Dr. Margaret Ford (Lindsay Crouse), a clinical psychologist who, in her attempt to help one of her patients, becomes involved in a series of adventures with a gang of con artists led by Mike (Joe Mantegna). Although Margaret believes that she has been allowed access to the planning and execution of one of the gang’s elaborate tricks to fleece an unsuspected businessman, she finally comes to understand that it was she who had been the “mark” of the con all along. The film ends with Margaret’s violent reaction to the realization that she had been “played” by the con artists and her recognition of a surprising truth about herself. This narrative premise functioned as a vehicle for the articulation of a number of distinct themes, which characterized Mamet’s previous work as a playwright and which include: the destiny of the lumpen proletariat in corporate America, the education of the innocent, the dynamics of the teacher–student relationship, the meaning of everyday transactions, and the truth behind deceptive appearances.50 More importantly, however, this narrative premise was mainly realized through the use of a specific set of stylistic choices whose particular combinations signaled the beginning of a distinct aesthetic view that came to permeate all future Mamet films. This view can be seen as a product of an amalgamation of theoretical concepts and ideas that stem from Mamet’s readings of the Aristotelian concept of narrative unity, the Eisensteinian theory of montage, the Stanislavskian notion of physical acting, and the assimilation of the last to particular patterns of speech delivery by Mamet’s actors. These were developed by Mamet and a group of theater actors and practitioners, many of whom are present in the credits of House of Games. More specifically, Mamet’s distinct aesthetic view relies upon a use of film style that sits uneasily with the notion of classicism in American cinema. This is because, although narrative construction in Mamet’s films follows for the most part the basic principles of classical narrative (causal coherence, continuity, and character motivation), it often departs from those principles and follows a logic of its own. These departures are mainly manifest in several clear breaks from the rules of social and/or cultural verisimilitude, which immediately provide the story with a high degree of implausibility compared to a classical narrative. Equally, the film style employed to support such a narrative generally adheres to the rules of continuity and transparency, though, on several occasions, it also breaks those rules and consequently evokes a

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strong sense of constructedness and/or artificiality. These effects are mainly conveyed through the frequent absence of realist conventions in parts of the film’s mise-en-scène, including frame composition, camera movement, and editing. For this reason, although the film style is at the service of the narrative, it also comments on the narrative and breaks the spectator’s engagement with the story in ways that a classical style would never do. This paradoxical (for an American film) relation between narrative and style has its roots in Mamet’s view of realism as a discourse that should seek to “express” rather than to “convince.”51 For Mamet, style should be used to serve the aesthetic integrity of the film, which is not necessarily constructed according to externally imposed standards of realism and verisimilitude.52 What Mamet seems to object to here is the use of a film style that does not “respect” the central idea of the film as it is put forward by the written text, which, of course, explains the filmmaker’s stern opposition to any changes made to his scripts. As Joe Mantegna stated in an interview: “He [Mamet] has painstakingly, specifically created his dialogue to get whatever impact he expects to get out of it. . . . 99 times out of 100 I’ve done everything he’s written as written.”53 More importantly, however, Mamet’s objection stands as a powerful critique of a stylistically determined mode of film practice such as the mainstream classical Hollywood cinema. Given the fact that the classical Hollywood cinema favors a specific use of film style that serves a particularly constructed narrative and a mode of production that has traditionally treated the screenplay as work-in-progress and excluded the screenwriter from the stages of film production and postproduction, it is obvious that Mamet’s approach to filmmaking stands firmly outside such a mode of film practice. This is the reason why Mamet’s style strikes critics as artificial and unnatural, despite the fact that it is organically connected to narratives that are often contrived and implausible. Mamet’s distinct approach to filmmaking and his refusal to comply with pillars of classical filmmaking in House of Games (but also in his later films such as Homicide [1991], Oleanna [1994], The Spanish Prisoner [1997], The Winslow Boy [1998], and State and Main [2000]) locate him firmly at the core of the independent sector of American cinema, at a time when independent cinema was gathering momentum before the “watershed” year of 1989. It is important then to acknowledge his contribution during the “lean” years of American independent cinema and to place the distinct formal and aesthetic propositions his films made alongside ones made by other important parental figures of “indie” filmmaking, such as John Sayles, Jim Jarmusch, Wayne Wang, Spike Lee, Victor Nunez, and Gus Van Sant. Furthermore Mamet’s focus on narratives about grifters and confidence tricks reinvigorated a type of film that had been popularized in the 1970s and early 1980s with The Sting (G. R. Hill, 1973) and The Sting II (Kagan,

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1983). Following Mamet’s House of Games, a number of similar films were made, almost all paying homage to Mamet and almost all by independent companies.54 These include: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988) distributed by Orion; The Grifters (Frears, 1990) distributed by Cineplex ODEON; Traveller (J. N. Green, 1997) distributed by October Films; Mamet’s second con artist film The Spanish Prisoner (Sony Pictures Classics); Where the Money Is (Kanievska, 2000) distributed by USA Films; Confidence (Foley, 2003) distributed by Lions Gate Films; and Criminal (Jacobs, 2004) distributed by Warner Independent Pictures. A brief discussion of a scene from House of Games will demonstrate Mamet’s distinct aesthetic vision, highlight the film’s almost anticlassical aesthetics, and illustrate its status as a con artist film. A HOUSE FULL OF GAMES OR “THAT’S WHAT YOU THOUGHT YOU SAW” After a patient of hers threatens to commit suicide because he can’t pay a large gambling debt and therefore the gangster (Mike) whom he owns the money to would sooner or later kill him, Dr. Margaret Ford breaks the codes of her profession and goes herself to the debt holder to convince him to leave her patient alone. As it turns out, Mike (the gangster) is not as tough as Billy had implied and is willing to forget Billy’s debt, provided that Margaret would help him beat one of his opponents in a card game in-progress. What Margaret has to do is pretend that she is Mike’s girlfriend and look for a specific signifier in his opponent’s behavior during the game, a “tell,” as Mike puts it, that would signal whether his opponent is bluffing or not. Margaret accepts Mike’s offer and joins him in the back room where some serious money is at stake in a game of poker.55 During the previous scene, however, the spectator finds out that Billy’s debt to Mike is a mere $800, a piece of information that Margaret, rather implausibly, misses. This consequently implies that there are other latent reasons for Margaret’s direct involvement with Mike and his company, reasons that have to do with her compulsive, and therefore not clearly motivated, character. While the spectator has formed the expectation that Margaret, the proficient psychologist, will catch the tell and be instrumental to Mike’s objective to beat his opponent from Vegas and consequently achieve her own goal (protect her client), editing and narration play a number of tricks to the spectator. In the early parts of the scene the man from Vegas is strictly framed either between Mike and Margaret who occupy the two sides of the frame or in the corner of individual frames, “surrounded” by the other card players. Such stylistic choices and the way the compositions are edited suggest that the man from Vegas is “trapped,” and there is no way that he can come out as the winner of the game.

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In latter parts of the scene, however, editing and narration seem to suggest a different outcome for the game. This time the man from Vegas takes a central position in the frame, and it is Mike and Margaret who are isolated from the group and play “against” them. The compositional isolation of Mike and Margaret from the other players juxtaposed with the central position of the man from Vegas (who is now the character spatially “supported” by the other present characters) shifts the balance to his favor and prepares the spectator, who is still expecting that Margaret will help Mike win the hand, for a narrative surprise. When the man from Vegas wins the hand, the first subsequent shot is of Mike and Margaret shocked from the defeat. Slowly, Mike leans backwards and ends up off screen leaving Margaret alone in the frame, totally isolated from the rest of the card players. The relation of this shot to the previous group of shots seems to suggest that Margaret is responsible for their defeat, a piece of narrative information that stands at odds with what the spectator has previously witnessed, namely, Margaret following Mike’s instructions and catching his opponent’s tell. Finally, two subsequent shots of two card players who are peripheral to the story seem to create an idea that ends up informing the rest of the film. Even though the narrative value of both these minor characters is too insignificant to suggest that those two shots connote a particular idea,56 the equal duration of the shots (2.5 seconds each) and, especially, the highly stylized nature of the compositions (both shots were filmed with wideangle lenses that distort the distance between camera and object; both shots were photographed from unusual camera angles while also there is a lack of background diegetic sound at that point), along with the break they introduce to the pattern of the scene, provide them with an added value for the spectator’s understanding of the real meaning of the scene. The two shots come to reinforce the idea of a set up, of a constructed reality that Margaret is shortly to discover and the spectator is invited to discover at that exact moment. In light of discovering the true meaning of this scene as a set up to con Margaret out of her money and not as a trap to trick the man from Vegas (as both the main character and the spectator originally thought), one can begin to understand Mamet’s use of style in House of Games as a means to visually support an idea, namely, that the development of the narrative does not occur through the actions of a psychologically motivated protagonist who wishes to achieve a goal. In other words, film style is used to negate the unfolding of a “classical” narrative and to imply the existence of a second, more powerful, and up to that point, latent narrative agent whose goals, at the last instance, frame the actions of the main protagonist. This narrative agent is eventually concretely personified in the characters of the con men (and in particular the character of Mike) but only in the final scenes of the film.

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Furthermore, throughout the poker game sequence the rules of cultural verisimilitude are broken repeatedly demonstrating further the very specific logic Mamet’s story follows. Even if the spectator does not have any knowledge or experience of card-playing, he/she should be in a position to question the plausibility of several events that take place in the scene. Thus, the fact that Mike nods to Margaret that he is holding three aces (after spending considerable time explaining to her what a tell is) is the first clue that this is not a “real” game. Later on, Mike reveals his cards without covering the bet (if accepted, the check should have been written in advance and placed in the pot). After threatening Mike and Margaret with a pistol, the man from Vegas puts the weapon down on the table (running of course the danger of having the pistol taken by any one of the other players). In the midst of all this, Joey watches calmly the whole incident from a distance and is not ordered to move to a place where he can be visible to the man from Vegas. All the above actions clearly deny any sense of verisimilitude in the scene. Mamet also makes a number of other stylistic choices that succeed in discarding the armor of an externally imposed realism from the film. The most obvious one is the staging of confidential information “within earshot of characters who don’t hear them.”57 For instance, Mike tells Margaret to keep looking for his opponents tell while sitting opposite him at the poker table; Margaret tells Mike that she caught the tell while standing only a few feet away from the man from Vegas; and so forth. Rosenbaum has rightly argued that Mamet uses conventions of theater space, which, unlike the usual conventions of filmic space, allow such staging of conversations. The poker game sequence is a blueprint for understanding the rest of the film as the events depicted in this scene are replicated in a much more elaborate way throughout the rest of the film. Thus, in this scene, Margaret agrees to play Mike’s girlfriend to help him fleece the man from Vegas and discovers that she was the actual mark of the con. In the rest of the fi lm, Margaret agrees to play Mike’s wife to help him con a businessman only to discover that she was the mark of the con once again, only this time Margaret does not realize it until after handing them over $250,000 of her savings. House of Games did not prove the commercial success Orion, Filmhaus, and David Mamet might have hoped. The film grossed $2,585,639 at the U.S. box office, which means that it did not manage to recoup its negative costs. The failure of the film could partly be explained by the distributor’s decision to center the advertising campaign for the film on Mamet’s transition from a writer to a filmmaker, while also highlighting the film’s generic status as a tense noir thriller. Opting for such an approach the distributor directly targeted audiences familiar with Mamet’s theatre and literary background rather than dedicated cine-philes who patronize art cinemas and watch lowbudget indie films. For instance, in the film’s trailer there is no reference to Mamet’s Oscar nomination for The Verdict or his association with The Postman Always Rings Twice, both commercially successful films.58

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Despite its commercial failure, however, House of Games did its job in introducing Mamet the filmmaker in American cinema, and in the following years, the once full-time playwright and screenwriter made the transition to a full-time filmmaker with nine feature films in 20 years, the vast majority of them low-budget independent productions (Mamet still writes plays but at a much slower pace than in the 1970s and 1980s). Furthermore, the film’s independent status, primarily exemplified by the financer/distributor’s “hands-off ” approach to creative decisions during the production process and its ability to guarantee complete financing and global distribution and exhibition for the film allowed Mamet to transport his distinct dramatic approach from theater to the medium of cinema and therefore maintain his idiosyncratic “voice,” which had made him one of the most important contemporary American playwrights, in a different medium. In terms of production practices, this creative freedom manifested mainly in the way the division of labor was arranged at the top echelon of the production crew. This is where a number of creative players were allowed a much more significant input in the production process, to the extent that the term collaborative business (a term that normally—and ironically—designates a strictly hierarchical and detailed division of labor in Hollywood cinema) was put into question. For that reason, the film’s mode of production can be seen as different from the production mode that, according to Bordwell, Staiger, and Thompson, has exemplified historically mainstream classical American cinema. CONCLUSION In many ways, the production history of House of Games points toward the name of the game in the post-1989 years when major independent distributors such as Miramax and New Line Cinema, the classics divisions, and larger independent distributors such as Lions Gate have followed Orion’s steps and have institutionalized American independent cinema. From the independent “movement” in the early 1980s, which consisted of a small group of films per year, American independent cinema has now become a relatively distinct category of filmmaking both in the global entertainment industry and in public discourse.59 With the existing distribution companies branching out into financing independent productions alongside the more traditional buying of distribution rights of completed films, Orion’s impact is evident. This is even more so when companies such as Miramax and New Line recently invested in multimillion dollar productions such as Shakespeare in Love (Madden, 1998—$24 million budget), Confessions of A Dangerous Mind (Clooney, 2000—$35 million budget); and The Four Feathers ($80 million budget) all three for Miramax, and The Lord of the Rings trilogy (Jackson, 2002–2004) for New Line Cinema, in the same way that Orion gambled with the expensive revisionist western Dances with Wolves in 1990.60

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The institutionalization of American independent cinema has succeeded in making a particular brand of filmmaking marketable at a global level and in effect helped a very large number of personal, idiosyncratic, and offbeat films receive theatrical distribution and often find an audience. And as Orion allowed a filmmaker such as David Mamet to make films with a very particular anticlassical aesthetic that goes against fundamental Hollywood rules, other independent distributors took chances with films that pushed the envelope in terms of aesthetics and representations often getting into uncharted territory. Thus, Miramax allowed filmmakers such as Kevin Smith to make films such as Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001), which has so many references to other Smith films that it might prove incomprehensible to audiences with no prior knowledge of Smith’s previous films. After seeing it at Sundance, independent distributor Artisan (now part of Lions Gate) purchased the rights to The Blair Witch Project (Myrick and Sánchez 1999), a horror-home moviein-the-woods shot with a digital camera that had little chances of a commercial theatrical release; the film, a spectacular success, proved well worth the risk. And Focus Features, Universal’s classics division, financed and distributed Ang Lee’s controversial Brokeback Mountain (2005), a modern-day western featuring gay cowboys, a taboo subject in the genre as defined by the films of the majors. Whether major independents, independents, or classics divisions, in the financing, production, and/or distribution business, these companies have managed to create an institutional apparatus that differs from the one that characterizes mainstream Hollywood cinema. Despite the differences, though, this apparatus has existed in a symbiotic relationship with the majors, making for a well-oiled entertainment machine that covers all audience tastes and preferences. NOTES 1. Geoff King, American Independent Cinema (London: I. B. Tauris, 2005), 71; Emanuel Levy, Cinema of Outsiders: The Rise of American Independent Film (New York: New York University Press, 1999), 46; Peter Biskind, Down and Dirty Pictures: Miramax, Sundance and the Rise of Independent Film (London: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2005), 17. 2. Yannis Tzioumakis, American Independent Cinema (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2006), 13. 3. Gabriel Synder, “ ‘Aviator’ Ready For Take-Off: Scorsese, DiCaprio Reteam for Pricey Hughes Biopic,” Variety, June 9, 2005, 9. 4. Levy, Cinema of Outsiders, 3. 5. Yannis Tzioumakis, “Major Status—Independent Spirit: The History of Orion Pictures (1978–1992),” The New Review of Film and Television Studies 2, no. 1 (2004): 88.

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6. Patrick McGilligan, “Breaking Away Mogul Style,” American Film 5, no. 8 (1980): 29. 7. David Bordwell, Janet Staiger, and Kristin Thompson, The Classical Hollywood Cinema: Film Style and Mode of Production to 1960 (London: McGraw-Hill, 1985), 360. 8. Tzioumakis, American Independent Cinema, 10. 9. Tino Balio, “Introduction to Part I: Responding to Network Television,” in Hollywood in the Age of Television, ed. Tino Balio (London: Unwin Hyman, 1990), 7. 10. Tzioumakis, American Independent Cinema, 5. 11. Tzioumakis, American Independent Cinema, 223. 12. Jim Hillier, The New Hollywood (New York: Continuum, 1994), 22; Tino Balio, “Introduction to Part II: Responding to New Television Technologies,” in Hollywood in the Age of Television, ed. Tino Balio (London: Unwin Hyman, 1990), 281. 13. Justin Wyatt, “The Formation of the ‘major independent’: Miramax, New Line and the New Hollywood,” in Contemporary Hollywood Cinema, ed. Steve Neale and Murray Smith (London: Routledge, 1998), 86–87. 14. Stephen, Klain, “Prods over-value US art mart: Classics eye upfront stakes as terms stiffen,” Variety, May 4, 1983, 532. 15. Claude Brodesser, “Fox: A Brighter Searchlight,” Variety, April 7, 2003, 55. 16. Dana Harris, “H’wood Renews Niche Pitch: Studios Add Fresh Spin as They Rev Up ‘Art’ Divisions,” Variety, April 7, 2003, 1, 54. 17. The only source that estimates the size of the film’s budget is Cinebooks Motion Picture Guide Review (a database of reviews available in Microsoft’s Cinemania CDROM, 1996 and 1997). 18. The brief account of Orion is based on a more extended piece I wrote on the history of the company, titled “Major Status—Independent Spirit: The History of Orion Pictures (1978–1992).” See Tzioumakis, “Major Status,” 87–135. 19. Anne Thompson, “Rise and Shine: Mike Medavoy Interviewed by Anne Thompson,” Film Comment 23, no. 3 (1987): 56. 20. Mike Medavoy with Josh Young, You’re Only As good As Your Next One: 100 Great Films, 100 Good Films, and 100 for Which I Should Be Shot (New York: Pocket Books, 2002), 103. 21. Erik Pleskow (President and Chief Executive Officer of Orion Pictures [1978– 1990] and chairman of Orion Pictures [1990–1992]), interview with the author, June 24, 2005, Weston, Connecticut. 22. Mike Medavoy (Head of Worldwide Production, Orion Pictures [1978–1990]), interview with the author, June 15, 2004, Los Angeles, California. 23. Besides the two Dudley Moore vehicles, which recorded $37 and $42 million in terms of film rentals, respectively, Orion delivered 6 moderate hits (including Excalibur [Boorman, 1981]), while the company saw 15 films that lost money at the American box office. See S. Hanson, “Orion: Looking to the Stars,” Stills, February 1985, 25. 24. Balio, “Introduction to Part II,” 278. 25. “HBO & Orion Still Going Steady As Paycabler Picks Up 14 Films; Homevideo in $50–75 mil Deal,” Variety, February 27, 1985, 44. 26. “HBO & Orion Still Going Steady,” 44.

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27. “HBO & Orion Still Going Steady,” 44. 28. Thompson, “Rise and Shine,” 60. 29. Hillier, The New Hollywood, 14. 30. Clarence Brown, “Down the Drain with the Ninja Turtles: Hollywood’s Last Creative Sanctuary Has Fallen to the Vultures,” The Guardian, February 6, 1992, 29. 31. McGilligan, “Breaking Away,” 31. 32. Richard Maltby with Ian Craven, Hollywood Cinema: An Introduction (Oxford: Blackwell, 1995), 481. 33. Hillier, The New Hollywood, 21. 34. Medavoy, You’re Only As good As Your Next One, 169. 35. McGilligan, “Breaking Away,” 29. 36. John Pierson, Spike Mike Slackers and Dykes: A Guided Tour Across a Decade of American Independent Cinema (New York: Hyperion/Miramax Books, 1995), 339 – 40. 37. Those hits included Glengarry Glen Ross (1983) at the National Theatre in London and at the Golden Theater in New York (1984), The Frog Prince (1985) at the Ensemble Studio in New York, and Edmond (1984) at the Royal Court Theatre in London. See Leslie Kane, “Chronology,” in David Mamet: A Casebook, ed. Leslie Kane (Garland Publishing: New York, 1992), xxxiii–xxxv. 38. As one critic poignantly noted, “the film, a loose adaptation of Mamet’s circular, fragmentary and acerbic play of the 1970s sexuality, smooths the rough edges into a linear 1980s narrative of capitalist redemption, in which a disaffected young Chicagoan finds affluence and romance through suffering repentence [sic] and entrepreneurial hard work. Indeed, the transfiguration of Mamet’s play is so drastic as to call into question the notion of adaptation itself.” Varun Begley, “On Adaptation: David Mamet and Hollywood,” Essays in Theatre 16, no. 2 (1998): 166–67. 39. David Mamet, A Whore’s Profession: Notes and Essays (London: Faber and Faber, 1994), 162. 40. David Mamet, Some Freaks (London: Faber and Faber, 1990), 136. 41. Roger Ebert, “House of Games,” Chicago Suntimes, October 16, 1987, http://rogere bert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19871016/REVIEWS/7101 60301/1023 (accessed February 13, 2008). 42. David Mamet, Jafsie and John Henry: Essays on Hollywood, Bad Boys and Six Hours of Perfect Poker (London: Faber and Faber, 2000), 98. 43. According to Variety, Sony Pictures Classics is one classics division the heads of which have employment contracts with their parent company that “give them autonomy over business decisions.” Christopher Grove, “Crouching Indie,” Variety, May 14, 2001, 35. 44. Mamet, Some Freaks, 125. 45. Mamet, Some Freaks, 127–28. 46. Mamet, Some Freaks, 119. 47. Since there is no available public documentation of the deal in question, this conclusion has been inferred by cross-referencing three main sources: Hillier, The New Hollywood, 21; Balio, “Introduction to Part II,” 278; and Thompson, “Rise and Shine,” 58–59. 48. Bordwell et al., The Classical Hollywood Cinema, 331. 49. Mamet, Some Freaks, 140.

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50. Besides his plays, these themes can be found in the five volumes of collected essays Mamet has published: Writing in Restaurants (London: Penguin Books, 1987); Some Freaks (1990); The Cabin: Reminiscence and Diversions (New York: Vintage Books, 1993); Make-Believe Town: Essays and Remembrances (London: Faber and Faber, 1996); Jafsie and John Henry (2000). These themes can be also seen in a number of interviews Mamet has given, some of which could be found in Leslie Kane, ed., David Mamet in Conversation (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2001). 51. Mamet, Some Freaks, 64. 52. Mamet, A Whore’s Profession, 202. 53. Leslie Kane, “Mantegna Acting Mamet,” American Theatre 8, no. 6 (1991): 23. 54. The one exception is Matchstick Men (2004), which was directed by Ridley Scott and was financed and distributed by Warner. 55. The phrase “That’s what you thought you saw” is uttered in the diegesis by Joey when he explains to Margaret that the fact that she saw him slipping $20 in an envelope does not mean that he actually did it. 56. Throughout the sequence these two characters are heard only when clichéd phrases are uttered (such as “I’m going south” and “cards of the players, three good players”) a fact that further decreases their importance in the scene. As I mentioned previously, however, they are important in terms of their placement within the frames. 57. Jonathan Rosenbaum, “House of Games Capsule,” The Chicago Reader, http:// onfilm.chicagoreader.com/movies/capsules/10149_HOUSE_OF_GAMES (accessed February 13, 2008). 58. Yannis Tzioumakis, “Marketing David Mamet: Institutionally Assigned Authorship and Contemporary American Cinema,” The Velvet Light Trap 57 (2006): 62– 63. 59. Tzioumakis, American Independent Cinema, 270. 60. Biskind, Down and Dirty Pictures, 330, 450, 464.

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chapter 10

Piercing Steven Soderbergh’s Bubble R. Colin Tait

In 2004, a major controversy erupted in Hollywood after filmmaker Steven Soderbergh signed a six-picture deal with billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban’s HDNet films. The project involved Soderbergh making low-budget movies exclusively with high-definition (HD) technology that would enjoy simultaneous release in theaters on DVD and were available to download via the Internet, thus entirely eliminating the exhibition window for a film’s theatrical release. This gesture not only leveled a flurry of criticism at the filmmaker as well as Cuban, but their enterprise ultimately met with mixed results, barely making a dent at the box office and hardly registering in Soderbergh’s canon. The controversy surrounding Bubble (2006) raises several questions. The first of these relates to why studios and exhibitors were so violently opposed to a shift in exhibition paradigms and went as far as to rally Hollywood executives and prominent filmmakers (such as M. Night Shyamalan) to denounce Cuban and Soderbergh’s enterprise. Furthermore, is it possible that the film’s slow roll-out over several film festivals, in addition to the negative publicity it garnered along the way, largely influenced the way that the experiment was received and largely factored into its commercial reception? Finally, despite the film’s status as a “failed experiment,” it is nevertheless crucial that we situate Bubble as a properly historical document and examine the film’s resonance not only to contemporary film culture but to the future industrial trends it anticipates and likely embodies. At the 2004 Toronto International Film Festival, the unlikely trio of billionaire Mark Cuban, his business partner Todd Wagner, and filmmaker Seven Soderbergh held a press conference to announce their new enterprise

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together. That there was another announcement at North America’s leading business festival—where more films are bought and sold than any other— was not surprising, but the content of the announcement was. It sent reverberations of fear and uncertainty through the industry for the next several years. Cuban and Wagner had signed Steven Soderbergh to a long-term deal in order to secure his services for the launch of several related enterprises: the Landmark theater chain, recently acquired by Cuban; the HDNet television channel; and Magnolia pictures. Soderbergh’s Bubble would effectively brand the venture, bringing his high-profile status to the mixture of independently financed HD filmmaking (as opposed to studio projects such as Michael Mann’s Miami Vice or Brian Singer’s Superman Returns, both shot in HD and both costing $135 million and $270 million, respectively) along with an appropriately smaller scale of artistic ambition and distribution model.1 The three figures shared the belief that the contemporary industry structure was broken beyond repair by excessive overhead costs, piracy, and consumer demand for instantaneous content, particularly on the lower-end and independent side of the distribution equation. Day-and-date release, then, offering the consumer the ultimate choice of venue, was their unique solution to this problem. What they could not have predicted was the overwhelming and virulent resistance to their scheme —the uniformity of objection related to the absolute collapse of the exhibition window—as Bubble would be released simultaneously in Cuban’s theaters, be made available on DVD through his nascent video exhibition arm Magnolia Pictures, and also available for download in the coming days by way of the Internet. The idea created a firestorm of industry resistance before the project was even underway and mostly from the exhibition side of the equation. M. Night Shyamalan helped inspire a negative buzz for Bubble, first denouncing the film at the 2005 Director’s Guild of America Feature Director’s night dinner and raising the stakes even higher when he followed up these comments as the invited speaker for the 2006 ShowWest convention for exhibitors. Here, Shyamalan defended the studios and exhibitors’ position, stating: We have these business guys coming in, many of whom haven’t been part of the industry, saying, “This is how it’s gonna be.” And then you had a few (directors’) voices in support of the experiment. And I went “whoa, whoa, whoa—this is sacred to me. I’m not gonna let the theatrical experience just go away like this.” I made it clear that night that we’re all losing faith and that we don’t have to stand by and let this art form be rolled over.2

Shyamalan’s stance was obviously echoed by the American exhibitors, who presumably had the most to lose with any shift in distribution patterns. As exhibition revenue relies almost solely on filling seats for high-profile blockbusters and selling consumers popcorn, this was obviously the most resistant

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faction that day-and-date release offended.3 In response, the larger exhibition chains such as Regal Entertainment Group, AMC Theatres, Loews Cineplex, and Cinemark USA boycotted 2929 and Magnolia products (also owned by Cuban and Wagner) adopting a “zero-tolerance” stance on Cuban and Wagner’s releases.4 On the studio side, other executives lined up to denounce the idea, including those who had worked with Soderbergh at Warner Brothers. Throughout the movie industry, CEOs and filmmakers criticized Soderbergh and his backers by wholly objecting to their new scheme. At the heart of the issue was the fact that the movie, along with the industrial formulation that it represented, had the potential to disrupt the business model that had been operating for years, in effect undermining the entrenched system. The studios, slow to accept any deviation from the industry norms—as exemplified from their slow acceptance of sound technology in the days of early cinema through to today’s new technological rollouts, which include video game consoles such as Microsoft’s X-Box 360 and Sony’s Playstation 3, not to mention the effect of viewership lost to iPod technologies and bittorrent software—retrenched themselves and brought the full force of their media and industry control to bear on the trio. In other words, it may be that the industry resistance played itself out through its ancillary industries, particularly in the media outlets owned by the larger studios, which essentially created the consensus view of Soderbergh’s, Cuban’s, and Wagner’s enterprise before anyone had even seen the film. Though the connections between Cuban, the rogue billionaire and flamboyant owner of the Dallas Mavericks who established his fortunes during the high-tech boom of the 1990s, and Steven Soderbergh, the man who became independent cinema’s de facto poster boy, were not initially clear; the two figures shared similar outsider statuses, affording them to be innovators, while at the same time becoming fixtures on the contemporary business and film scenes, respectively. Cuban and Wagner surely fit the criteria of Shyamalan’s description of “business guys.” Though Cuban’s entrepreneurship extended to many different avenues—sports teams among other enterprises—it wasn’t until he created the TV station HDNet and bought the boutique Landmark theater chain that he entertained the idea of making movies through his production house, 2929 Pictures then HDNet films. At that point Cuban and Wagner had secured a vertically integrated exhibition and distribution wing for themselves, whose ability to broadcast in the HD format required a great deal of area bandwidth but, more importantly, demanded that a certain amount of guaranteed content was available for broadcast at a given time. With the advent of extremely high-quality home entertainment equipment, including 5.1 Surround Sound and widescreen home theater technology, the industry was slow to answer the demand for high-resolution products—best exemplified by the all-out format war between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray technologies—and there

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was a huge opportunity to be seized by someone who could recognize the new shifts in the system, particularly when it came to content provision via the Internet. At the time, however, their problem was that aside from sports programming, there was not a great deal of original material that was available for broadcast in the HD format. They would simply have to create it in order to be successful. This is precisely what Cuban and Wagner were attempting, while at the same time seeking to associate themselves with like-minded artistic figures such as Soderbergh, Hal Hartley, and, eventually, Brian De Palma instead of strictly “independent” artists. The venture, therefore, would attempt to bring industry-wide acceptance of low-key filmmaking by leading directors, while at the same time bringing high exposure to the creative possibilities of the HD medium. One of the great advantages that HD affords a potential filmmaker and ultimately the exhibitor is the ability to reduce the costs of manufacturing 35 mm prints in addition to streamlining the filmmaking process. According to independent producer James Schamus, the profitability of any independent film is entirely dependent on how well a producer is able to sidestep the ancillary costs of a film’s release. The brunt of these costs come from the elusively titled print and advertising (P&A), which Schamus describes as “cover[ing] anything from the design and printing of posters . . . the striking and shipment of release prints, the cost of print, radio and TV advertising, the care and feeding of stars and other talent as they travel promoting the film, and the various other costs.”5 In our present environment, a film’s P&A is known to effectively double the budget of most mainstream releases, making even a typical Hollywood product extremely difficult to recoup its costs. For a film such as Spider Man 3, whose final production budget was $258 million, the film must ultimately make approximately $600 million if the film is to even come close to breaking even.6 Wagner has cited figures that negative costs and P&A have jumped up to 85 percent and 110 percent, respectively, making the prospect of moviemaking an extremely risky venture even in the optimal of circumstances.7 For the purposes of independent or digital filmmakers then, reduction of the initial investment costs provides a decided advantage in the marketplace, affording the production team to effectively sidestep most of the obstacles to a film’s profitability and allowing a direct conduit to immediately recoup their costs with day-and-date release. In the case of Bubble, the film’s initial roll-out over festivals cost next to nothing to advertise, save for Soderbergh’s various appearances with the work, and avoided the cost of having to manufacture a master print, as most festival theaters are now equipped to show digital works. The film’s instantaneous release and exhibition not only allowed the film to travel but reduced the expense of having to spend unnecessary funds on advertising. Using Cuban, Wagner, and Soderbergh’s model, a film is able to effectively avoid one-half of the overall cost of filmmaking and exhibiting, making it an extremely

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streamlined and cost-efficient means of production, particularly for independent and digital filmmaking. Cuban and Wagner’s solution to the earlier problems—lack of content and printing costs—was simply to set themselves up as producers and become directly responsible for creating their own products, while at the same time affording artists absolute freedom to express themselves with the costefficient, high-quality recording and distribution technologies. Soderbergh was a natural choice, if only because he was known as the premier filmmaker for doing things on the cheap and consistently under budget—something that obviously appealed to two businessmen in their first foray into the emerging business of HD digital filmmaking. At the same time, Soderbergh was extremely interested in altering the industry model, particularly as it related to smaller, more esoteric films such as his recent digital projects Full Frontal (2002), K-Street (2004), and his other collaboration with George Clooney on the HBO series Unscripted (2005). What the television, pay-per-view, DVD, and Internet content provision afforded was the opportunity for smaller audiences to find his films outside of the theaters, as the larger chains rarely carried these more “artistic” works to begin with. What was at stake, therefore, was the opportunity for digital and predominantly HD works to find audiences through emerging new venues, echoing the new emphasis on content and programming rather than films in and of themselves. The key factor missing from the arguments against the enterprise was that the films that Soderbergh, Cuban, and Wagner championed were precisely the films that were generally left out of the distribution part of the equation, so the exhibitors and studios’ resistance was largely disproportionate when considering Bubble’s scale. The intense animosity toward Soderbergh and his backers was grossly overstated, particularly when considering the fact that the scale of his film—a $1.4 million on-location set with no stars—was a far cry from the Hollywood blockbuster. In today’s figures, $1.4 million is a paltry sum for a feature film of any standard but even more so when considering Soderbergh’s pedigree, which includes a 2001 Academy Award win for Best Director. For Soderbergh, it was important that the work emerge from two particular factors: It needed to be both site and medium specific. Soderbergh had found his experiences working with nonactors James Carville and Mary Matalin in K-Street invigorating and was looking to find an excuse to combine these elements.8 Bubble’s setting, a doll-factory in Ohio, served as the synthesis of all of these artistic choices, and the filmmaker cast his leads from the town in order to reinforce the verisimilitude of the film. Finally, Soderbergh knew that the HD format was the perfect medium for this kind of industrial and artistic experiment, stating, “I was interested in this because I knew that creatively [. . .] this was the only way to get a film like ‘Bubble’ made, period.”9 At the same time, the film represented a continuation of the run-and-gun

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style that had characterized the filmmaker’s evolution since his debut film Sex, Lies, and Videotape. After initially becoming the poster boy for the independent film moment with his explosive debut, Soderbergh’s career went through several phases that were a direct result of the way his films were initially received and also the way in which Soderbergh wanted to make his films. This created the reputation of the filmmaker being a cold technician rather than an engaged “auteur” personality, which eventually factored into the critical reception of most of his films from his debut onward. Sex, Lies, and Videotape seemed to capture the zeitgeist of post-Reagan America, along with the new tone of Generation-X brand angst; after the film’s high prominence at both the Sundance and Cannes Film Festivals, it seemed that the filmmaker would be able to write his own ticket. However, when he won the Palme D’ Or at Cannes he stated that it “was all downhill” from there and ended up forgetting the award under his seat. Beginning with Kafka in 1991 and leading to the universally panned Schizopolis in 1996, Soderbergh made a series of films that diverged widely from the model that critics and industry would likely have set out for him. After the critical and commercial failures of his post–Sex, Lies, and Videotape period—beginning with the box-office failure of Kafka (1991) through to the release of Schizopolis (1996)—Soderbergh re-entered the mainstream and displayed remarkable business acumen from that point forward, beginning with Out of Sight in 1997. Central to his success was not only his profitable partnership with A-List star George Clooney and their production company Section Eight Pictures but also his incredible ability to deliver high-quality product at a budget that was far below the cost of other filmmakers. At a time when most films as banal as Brett Ratner’s Rush Hour 3 (2007) cost in excess of $140 million, Soderbergh was still capable of making movies for less than $50 million. Full Frontal (2002), for instance, only cost Harvey Weinstein’s Miramax $1 million, despite the fact that it featured A-list actors such as Julia Roberts and Brad Pitt. To put this figure in context, this is often what a script or even a development deal would cost in contemporary Hollywood figures. Soderbergh’s technical savvy made him a rarity in Hollywood and had made him a virtual vertically integrated industry in and of himself, producing, writing, directing, editing, and manning his own cameras as cinematographer. When he beat himself for the Best Director Academy Award— for Traffic rather than Erin Brockovich—he further solidified his reputation within the Hollywood community by also becoming an actor’s director, a fact that both Julia Roberts’ Best Actress win as well as Benecio del Toro’s Best Supporting Actor win attested to. With Traffic, despite the fact that the film was easily the most visually stunning of the year, Soderbergh invalidated himself from competition in the best cinematographer award, due to his desire to add the credit “Directed and Photographed by Steven Soderbergh,” as the writer’s union would not allow this title to supersede writer Steven Gaghan’s own. Eventually he went with the pseudonym Peter Andrews to

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display his displeasure with the union, a practice that he continues to this day.10 With 2002’s release of Ocean’s 11, the filmmaker afforded himself the possibility to become a self-financing entity, as exhibited by the fact that he (as well as the actors on the film) made more money from the film’s phenomenal success than with anything that they had made previous to Ocean’s. This is also true of partner George Clooney, who bought his mansion in Italy’s exclusive and expensive Lake Como with his portion of Ocean’s’ profits. The success of Ocean’s set the course of Soderbergh’s career for the next several years as it not only afforded him the ability to take risks in his filmmaking practices (as exhibited by his collaboration with James Cameron in Solaris, 2002) but also allowed him to help out friends he admired within the industry, including Christopher Nolan, Todd Haynes, and Richard Linklater, in addition to financing George Clooney’s directorial efforts in Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002) and Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) as their executive producer. Thus, Soderbergh provided himself with the rare opportunity to exist as both an insider and an outsider—outside the critical and academic community while at the same time standing at the center of the industry as the Vice President of the Director’s Guild of America. Though many of Soderbergh’s films were often perceived by critics as “interesting failures” as well as being “cold” and “impenetrable” to audiences, the director was a rarity in Hollywood, a figure who allowed himself to work in every possible genre in stylistically innovative ways, while at the same time providing himself with a stable financial model to fund these pet projects through his efforts with Clooney. Interestingly, this nonmainstream fare has most often served as prime fodder for critics who have seemingly relegated Soderbergh’s experimental (and independent) work as too intellectual. The best example of this negative critical reception includes the response to Soderbergh’s Schizopolis, Full Frontal, Solaris, and, most recently, The Good German. Because he never behaved in the manner that critics would have him make films, Soderbergh has often been accused of being out of step with his audiences, despite the fact that his films stand up and certainly reward extra viewings. In all cases, the filmmaker has been accused of attempting to talk down to his audience with these experiments or, in the case of the lighter Full Frontal, telling a joke that only he and his friends enjoyed. On the other hand, the more artistic films that Soderbergh executive produced during this period, ranging from Pleasant ville (Gary Ross, 1998); Far From Heaven (Todd Haynes, 2002); Good Night, and Good Luck; and Syriana (Steven Gaghan, 2005) to Michael Clayton (Tony Gilroy, 2007), have all been extremely well-regarded by critics even though they paradoxically exhibit stylistic traits that can all be traced back to the director’s influence. Soderbergh has always implemented new technologies into the Hollywood filmmaking process, as demonstrated by his Dogme-inspired film Full Frontal, his hybridized docu-drama K-Street for HBO, and his important cinematographic innovations with tinting film stocks beginning with The

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Underneath (1995), in addition to his inclusion of different mediums (including full-frame video on screen) into the mainstream. Indeed, many of today’s aesthetic and technical hallmarks—including the handheld cinema verité cinematography, and bleached films stocks found in Spike Lee’s Clockers (1995) and even Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan (1998)—can be at least in part attributed to the influence of Soderbergh’s revolutionary technical, cinematographic, and stylistic contributions. Finally, as an executive producer with as many producing credits to his name as he does for direction, Soderbergh was acutely aware that the industry model was in need of repair, if not a complete overhaul. Ultimately what Cuban and Wagner received in collaboration was a third interested partner who was immersed in the culture and who was also seen as enough of a Hollywood outsider to be able to pull it off, and who was a director whose efforts always came in under schedule and under budget. Soderbergh was respected enough within the industry to act as a lightning rod for other interested directors to participate, as evidenced by Brian De Palma’s eventual signing with HDNet for 2007s Redacted, shot in Iraq, in addition to filmmakers such as David Lynch and Francis Ford Coppola adopting HD and digital formats with Inland Empire (2006) and Youth Without Youth (2007), respectively, though not for HDNet films. Though the studios were loath to admit it at the time, from the vantage point of 2004, the industry was facing a huge crisis, not only of leadership but due to the old studio model losing billions of dollars to piracy, bootlegging, and illegal downloading of its films. According to Steven Daly, Internet piracy, including peer-to-peer file sharing via platforms such as bittorrent software, cost the studios at least $7 billion in 2005.11 From 2003 to 2005, studios were presented with three consecutive years of declining box-office totals, descending by 3.4 percent for 2003, 0.4 percent for 2004, and 8.9 percent for 2005 for a total of 12.7 percent for the three-year period.12 These figures are particularly vivid when put in relation to the huge takes of the previous years, particularly those ushered in by Spider Man (Sam Raimi, 2002), which grossed $821,708,551 worldwide.13 Though the movie industry was hemorrhaging dollars in excess of those of the music conglomerates (in the billions), nevertheless, there was ample cause to find, or at least to propose, alternatives to the Hollywood model of production and distribution. What seems to be at the heart of the piracy issue, as proven by the success of iTunes amongst other new music distribution and technological shifts in the industry, is ultimately the question of instant access and availability—an issue that Cuban, Wagner, and Soderbergh’s proposal sought to remedy. Their rationale was that if people wanted to watch the film at home, in theaters or vice versa, it didn’t matter to them, provided that people ended up watching the film, period. Soderbergh commented, “I wanted them to sell the DVD in the lobby of the theatres,” which they actually did in Cuban’s Landmark Theater chain.14

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The main problem was that the current industry model relies heavily on the sale of DVDs and the films acting as advertisements to draw people in. Adam Liepzig reports that the major studios derive most of their profits not from the theatrical release of a film but ultimately from consumers’ adding it to their DVD collections. Since few movies earn that much [200 million at the box-office], the studios have increasingly relied on the home-video market, where the equation is much more in their favour, to help recover losses and to make a profit. For example, a DVD costs about $2 to manufacture and $2 to market. It is then sold wholesale to retailers at $16 a unit, amounting to a $12 profit. Since manufacturers’ suggested retail prices are usually $20 to $30 a DVD (typically discounted by 20 percent), a DVD can return tens of millions of dollars in profit to the studio.15

Unlike the production of the film, which currently runs in the hundreds of millions of dollars range, DVDs are relatively inexpensive to manufacture ($2) and can be sold for $20 plus upon their release. Exhibitors and theater owners are also in need of products, which in Hollywood are ultimately interchangeable but at the same time are still extremely necessary for putting people in seats. Producer James Schamus describes this phenomenon quite succinctly when he explains exhibitors, ironically, don’t make their make their money from exhibition but by selling moviegoers heavily marked-up popcorn and pop before the shows.16 With this in mind, we can see why the exhibitors had some pronounced reservations to the idea. On the other hand, we can also see the prevalent attitude on the consumer end against what can be seen as double-, triple-, and quadruple-dipping on the part of the movie industry. Resistance to this industry-wide practice can be seen as motivating the more illegal end of Internet piracy, perhaps justified by pirates as a rebellious gesture against the industry’s constant reselling of its catalog to the same consumers, particularly with the release and re-release of special editions on DVD. A prime example of this phenomenon can be found in the constant opening and closing of the prestigious “Disney Vault,” whose scarcity spurs consumers into buying and rebuying movies that they have bought several times over in order to own the latest digitally remastered version.17 We might, therefore, possibly see a move by consumers toward ownership, or at least possession, but we should also measure the fact that that they may not necessarily be willing to pay repeatedly for the same experience, especially if they have seen the film in the theaters first then paid several times over to own the DVD. Day-and-date release partially solves this consumer quandary, nipping the idea of instantaneous access in the bud, while at the same time providing a series of formats for the consumer to “own” the experience— something that appeals to the collector as well as the casual viewer.

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The idea of digital projection, as found in Cuban’s Landmark Cinema chain, has only recently met with some malleability from the exhibitor community as well. A case in point occurred in 2002, when George Lucas attempted to retrofit theaters with digital projectors in order that his Star Wars (particularly Attack of the Clones, 2002) films could be shown in their proper HD format rather than be transferred to film and projected via a 35 mm print. As he had done earlier, with the advent of THX sound, Lucas actually offered to pay for the theaters’ purchasing digital projectors in order to ensure that his films could be seen in what he viewed as the most appropriate manner. Then as now, any suggestion of change to the contemporary industrial models was met with a great deal of resistance, despite the fact that in the long run, HD digital projection eventually became a reality for many theater chains, though, admittedly, this is still the exception and not the rule.18 At the same time, the movie industry of the past 30 years has been refashioned to the point where a film is only one stop in Hollywood’s recovery of profits. The movie, as viewed in theaters, more often than not only serves as a larger advertisement for the ancillary products the home conglomerate can shill. Star Wars is the ultimate example of the shifts within the industry, as the films spawned hundreds of micro-industries in their wake, ranging from lunch boxes to action figures to books to a lucrative video game industry, all inspired by the series.19 The average cost of today’s Hollywood blockbuster exceeds $150 million and poses huge problems for studios, who now rely almost solely on the ancillary industries (such as soundtracks and spin-offs) and foreign box-office figures to recover their investment in a film. In this vein, we should recall that according to Laura M. Holson, foreign advertising figures have become staggering, to the point where Sony Pictures reportedly spent upwards of $70 million (roughly 70 times Bubble’s entire budget) to promote The Da Vinci Code (Ron Howard, 2006) in Europe alone.20 When taken in relation to a film’s total cost we can see that the P&A effectively doubles a studio’s initial outlay of capital to the point where a film must make approximately twice its weight in rentals if a film is to turn a profit. At this point in history, this often means that a Hollywood Blockbuster must make at least half a billion dollars before it starts to make money. This is where DVD sales enter the equation, as the system has shifted inevitably to the foreign box office and to DVD to recover their investments. The relative success or failure of a DVD, like the film itself, can be easily measured by sophisticated computer tracking systems, such as the one employed by Wal-Mart, the world’s largest DVD merchant, which accounts for 50 percent of the entire DVD market. DVD sales can be tracked and further copies manufactured by individual title, making the profit margins even more effective by way of the instantaneous systematic assessment of supply and demand. It seems necessary to iterate that the window of a DVDs success or failure already operates on such razor-thin margins of profit.21

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The issue of release windows from exhibition to DVD sales, then, is an extremely volatile one, ultimately complicating the issue even further when adding the overall effect of piracy to the equation. This is just as true for filmmakers and may help to explain M. Night Shyamalan’s resistance to the idea, as he has stated that The Sixth Sense DVD paid for the whole cost of his house.22 Since the initial run of a film will likely anticipate the manufacture and sale of its DVD equivalent, any shrinking window will not only diminish the effectiveness of this strategy but likely ease the ultimate demand for the DVD sale. The additional market of the HD TV industry further problematizes the issue as consumers are now capable of watching similar quality fare in their homes through video-on-demand technologies, which potentially bypass the theater and the video store and go directly to the consumer’s home. Finally, the rise in illegal movie downloading via the Internet, where the same peer-to-peer file sharing technologies that devastated the music business could potentially divert further profits from Hollywood, causes another problem because newly bootlegged Hollywood films are often available by a film’s first weekend release in high quality forms on the Internet, which can be easily viewed on domestic home theater systems. In the minds of Soderbergh, Cuban, and Wagner, then, the system was already broken. Their partial solution to this problem was the day-and-date release strategy that Bubble would be the first to exploit. By releasing Bubble in theaters and on DVD and making it available (and cost-effective) over the Internet, they effectively solved the problem by giving the consumer instant access to the product that they wanted to watch. In their mind, the question of choice and format—in other words, the idea that consumers want to watch films the way that they want to, whether on home video, via their computers, or in the theaters—lies at the heart of the illegal activity of movie downloading. In the music industry, iTunes has at least provided a stopgap measure (and industry alternative) to illegal file sharing, as it provides a venue for the instantaneous access to newly released content and has diverted some illegal traffic to ensure the recovery of profits. The day-and-date release strategy, at the very least, can be seen as a viable alternative to the ultimate loss that a newly released blockbuster film will likely face in the longer term. Thus, Cuban and Wagner’s plan ultimately helps to stem the diversionary tide of profits by allowing the consumer their respective choice of format and by providing the immediate access that consumers crave. Predictably, the idea met with a great deal of resistance throughout the industry. We can look at the reception of Bubble in two waves because it was largely received in the popular press in two corresponding phases. These phases roughly responded to the manner in which the idea of the film was received in the year anticipating its release, followed by generally warm reviews of the film upon its theatrical run. In articles that responded to the idea of the film, these sources were further split, on the one hand representing industry

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retrenchment against the idea and generally denouncing the idea in the popular press. On the other hand, articles in favor of the idea also provided a great deal of ancillary information about how the current industry model operated, using Soderbergh’s film as a launching pad to discuss what the day-and-date release meant or could mean to the industry. The New York Times’ Manohla Dargis was among the first mainstream critic to comment on the film’s potential in a feature piece in 2005. The timing of this article coincided with the Bubble’s release throughout the festival season and features the director speaking on the behalf of the new enterprise.23 In a contemporary article written from the film’s debut at the earlier Toronto International Film Festival, Christopher Borrelli wonders if the film’s mandate, to show ordinary people in their environments, is relayed with any sense of condescension; he eventually comes to the opposite conclusion.24 Both pieces concentrate on the filmmaking process—the 18-day shoot, the use of nonactors, and the implementation of HD technologies to the industry model—and additionally to Bubble’s low-key aesthetic. While the film received admiration and intrigue on the one side of the equation, on the other hand, industry sources began denouncing the project before it even began. This includes the reportage of industry-wide resistance to the HD format, as reflected in Scott Kirsner’s piece on the infiltration of digital cinematography in mainstream Hollywood fare, in addition to his initial interview with M. Night Shymalan, which brought the industrial debate into the mainstream.25 Adam Liepzig uses Bubble and the industry model that it could potentially disrupt to discuss the larger issue of the DVD market. When the film was finally released on 32 screens on January 27, 2006, it was generally quite well-regarded by critics, who found it an extremely engaging return to form for the filmmaker, with Entertainment Weekly’s Owen Glieberman calling it “devious and fascinating,” Roger Ebert calling it “hypnotic,” and Lou Lemenick characterizing it as a “deadpan commentary on the emptiness of middle-American life,” which Soderbergh managed “to pull off . . . without condescending to the characters.”26 Ironically enough, and despite the industry’s resistance, Bubble was one of Soderbergh’s best-reviewed films in years and did not face the same tone of negative criticism that accompanied some of his other, more esoteric works. Most critics agreed that the film was a return to form for the director, with Ebert calling it “brilliant.” Many reviewers seemed swayed by the film’s potential to change the industry model, with many centering on the “experimental” nature of its low-key aesthetic. In this regard, The Boston Globe’s reviewer Ty Burr calls the film an “experiment worth seeing,” while Dargis’ review calls the film a “wilfully perverse excursion into experimentation.”27 Critics on the negative side seem to have really hated the film, with comments such as “staggeringly clueless” and “[b]oring as [s]h*t.”28 The most intelligent negativity came from Marjorie Baumgarten, who remarked that the film would more likely

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be remembered for “its method of manufacture and release than for any inherent qualities of its own.”29 Despite the overall critical consensus that the film was a good one, the film’s release was tempered by its lack of access to screens overall, and it played for under a month in Cuban’s Landmark chain until February. Regardless of the profit-sharing incentives that Cuban and Wagner offered to theaters willing to carry the film, the overall resistance on the exhibition side doomed the film to a poor box-office total and virtual invisibility in the video stores. Its lackluster box-office performance seemingly buoyed National Theatre Owner’s President John Fithian’s victory over Cuban, and he was able to conclude that the exhibition window should not shrink accordingly. Here, he was able to restate his earlier opinion, calling the film a “radical” and misguided “experiment.”30 At the same time, even Fithian agreed that the film eventually “caused studios and exhibitors to sit down and talk with the creative community about this issue,” and that it “got us all together.”31 Cuban, on the other hand, reported that Bubble exceeded even his modest expectations, and the higher profile that the film garnered as a result of the related controversy resulted in it grossing “approximately $5 million in total returns, including box office, DVD pre-orders and ‘other revenues’ (presumably meaning pay-per-view receipts), which approximated a viewership of 500,000 people.”32 This would seem to indicate that the “radical” and “misguided” experiment served its purpose by overperforming in its new venues (DVD, theater, and pay-per-view) by expanding the exhibition venues horizontally, by way of Internet and cable delivery systems. HDNet films released other films between 2005 and 2007, including Hal Hartley’s Fay Grim (2006), Broken English (Zoe Cassavettes, 2007), and Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (Alex Gibney, 2005). Ironically, among these works it was the documentary that was the most profitable, and the exhibitors that showed the film were offered back-end revenue in order to show it, as Cuban “kept writing them cheques.”33 With the release of Brian De Palma’s high-profile Iraq drama, Redacted, it seemed as though the enterprise— including the overall controversy that the trio courted—was on the cusp of success. However, despite the overall positive reviews of the film, the HDNet experiment may have reached the end of its course. Though Cuban and Wagner are experimenting further with the industry model, possibly making Redacted available in what they call “Ultra HD Video-on-Demand,” they moved the filmmaking end of their business from HDNet to 2929 Productions ultimately ending their role as producers.34 Their rationale was that “three years on to the project, they no longer saw the need to convince people to produce in HD.” Furthermore, “[n]ow that people have accepted that digital technology can create wonderful artistic works, it is now but one more choice available to the independent artist choosing to work in film.”35 It is unclear whether this will mean a contractual renegotiation between Cuban, Wagner,

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and Soderbergh, though it is rumored that his upcoming film on Spalding Gray, Life, Interrupted, will still be produced through HDNet films. Regardless, since Bubble’s release and the industry’s resistance to it, the structure is already in the process of changing, particularly when it comes to online and video-on-demand delivery. The overall effect can already be seen in WalMart and Amazon.com’s competition to provide high-speed delivery of movies online, in addition to the recent announcement that iTunes will now make Disney films available for download on its Quicktime player. In this sense, aside from the controversy that surrounded it, we should see Bubble as a properly historical document, perhaps going as far as to distinguish the film as the zero-moment of the coming digital era and the moment that the industry realized it had to change in order to ensure its long-term survival. NOTES 1. Miami Vice, http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=miamivice.htm; Superman Returns, http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=superman06.htm. 2. Shyamalan, qtd. in Gregg Goldstein, “Shyamalan: Day and Date Life or Death to Me,” The Hollywood Reporter, October 28, 2005, http://www.hollywoodreporter. com/hr/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001391595. 3. Schamus, James, “To the Rear of the Back End: The Economics of Independent Cinema,” in Contemporary Hollywood Cinema, ed. Steve Neale and Murray Smith. New York: Routledge, 1998: 91–105. 4. Goldstein 2005. 5. Schamus 1998: 93. 6. Spider Man 3, http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=spiderman3.htm. 7. Hernandez, Eugene, “TRIBECA ’06: In a Time of Change for the Movie Business, Talking About Emerging Distribution Platforms,” Indiewire, April 27, 2006, http://www.indiewire.com/ots/2006/05/tribeca_06_in_a.htmlHernandez 2006. 8. Soderbergh, Steven, “Director’s Commentary,” Bubble. Magnolia Pictures, 2006. 9. Soderbergh, qtd. in Hernandez 2006. 10. This was not Soderbergh’s first run-in with the writer’s union, as he changed his writer’s credit to “Sam Lowry”—a name inspired by the bureaucracy of the system in Terry Gilliam’s Brazil (1985)—to reflect his dissatisfaction with the union for his writing credit for The Underneath (1995). Since then, Soderbergh has begun to use the name Mary Ann Bernard for his own work as an editor from Solaris (2002) onward. 11. Daly, Steven, “Pirates of the Multiplex,” Vanity Fair, March 2007. 12. “Yearly Box-Office,” http://www.boxofficemojo.com/yearly. 13. Spider Man, http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=spiderman.htm. 14. Soderbergh, “Director’s Commentary.” 15. Liepzig, Adam, “How to Sell a Movie (or Fail) in Four Hours,” The New York Times, November 13, 2005. 16. Schamus 1998.

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17. The present author has bought at least four separate versions of the original Star Wars trilogy: two versions on VHS and two on DVD. 18. Burr, Ty, “Celluloid Zero,” Entertainment Weekly, April 15, 2002. 19. For the historical overview of this issue, see Jon Lewis, “Following the Money in America’s Sunniest Company Town: Some Notes on the Political Economy of the Hollywood Blockbuster,” and Thomas Schatz, “The New Hollywood,” in Movie Blockbusters, ed. Julian Stringer. London: Routledge, 2003. 20. Holson, Laura M., “More Than Ever, Hollywood Studios are Relying on the Foreign Box Office,” The New York Times, August 7, 2006. 21. See Liepzig’s description of a weekend total for the DVD market of a film; Liepzig 2005. 22. Goldstein 2005. 23. Dargis, Manohla, “Director Zigs From Stars to Nonactors,” The New York Times, September 22, 2005. 24. Borrelli, Christopher, “Main Street U.S.A.: Filmmakers see the Midwest through many lenses,” The Toledo Blade, October 16, 2005. 25. Kirsner, Scott, “Digital Cinematography,” The Hollywood Reporter, July 13, 2006, http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_ id=1002688109; Kirsner, Scott, “Director M. Night Shyamalan on New Technologies, Filmmaking, and the Theatrical Window,” http://cinematech.blogspot.com/2006/07/ director-m-night-shyamalan-on-new.html. 26. Glieberman, Owen, “Review: Bubble,” Entertainment Weekly, January 25, 2006; Ebert, Roger, “Review: Bubble,” The Chicago Sun-Times, January 27, 2006; Lumenick, Lou, The New York Post, 2006. http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/10005849bubble/?beg=19&int=20&page=2. 27. Burr, Ty, “Review: Bubble,” The Boston Globe, January 27, 2007; Dargis, Manohla, “Review: Bubble,” The New York Times, January 27, 2006. 28. Atani, Jay, “Bubble Movie Review,” Filmcritic.com, January 2006. http://www. filmcritic.com/misc/emporium.nsf/reviews/Bubble; Douglas, Edward, “Review: Bubble,” http://www.comingsoon.net/news/reviewsnews.php?id=12875. 29. Baumgarten, Marjorie, “Review: Bubble,” The Austin Chronicle, January 27, 2006. 30. Hollywood Reporter.com, “Studio Briefing,” January 31, 2006, http://imdb.com/ title/tt0454792/news. 31. Hollywood Reporter.com, “Studio Briefing,” January 30, 2006, http://imdb.com/ title/tt0454792/news. 32. Hollywood Reporter.com, “Studio Briefing,” January 31, 2006, http://imdb.com/ title/tt0454792/news. 33. Thompson, Anne, “Soderbergh, Outsiders Challenge Studio Model,” The HollywoodReporter.com, http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr/columns/risky_busi ness_display.jsp?vnu_content_id_htm. 34. “Brian de Palma’s Redacted to Hit TV via Ultra HD Video on Demand,” Variety, August 10, 2007. 35. Hernandez, Eugene, “Cuban and Wagner Change Course at HDNet Films as ‘Redacted’ Stirs Venice, Telluride and Now, Toronto,” IndieWire, September 6, 2007.

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chapter 11

Celebrity Juice, Not From Concentrate: Perez Hilton, Gossip Blogs, and the New Star Production Anne H. Petersen

In early May of 2006, Tom Cruise grinned wildly at the reader from the cover of Entertainment Weekly. Only instead of promoting Mission Impossible 3, Cruise’s million-dollar smile was paired with a questioning caption: “Is Tom Cruise Really Worth $100,000,000?” For a star whose box office track record has established him as one of the few remaining sure-fires in an industry with increasing resemblance to a Las Vegas craps table, the gravity of such a headline is immense. Arguably the most iconic actor of the last 20 years, considerable damage must have been inflicted in order for anyone, let alone a national magazine, to question the drawing power of the cinematic colossus that is Cruise. Many will argue that Cruise shot himself squarely in the foot with a year of Scientology speechifying, couch-jumping, his public condemnation of psychiatry, and the micromanagement of fiancée Katie Holmes, and they are correct: Cruise’s actions were a clear departure from his once immenselyprivate personal life. But what truly brought Cruise’s actions into the limelight, what scrutinized them, parodied them, and facilitated their massive proliferation, is an institution even older than Hollywood: celebrity gossip. Us Weekly, People, and Entertainment Tonight, of course. Even more significant to the deterioration of Cruise’s image, however, is the advent of the Internet Adapted from Petersen, Anne Helen. “Celebrity Juice, Not From Concentrate”: Perez Hilton, Gossip Blogs, and The New Star Production. Jump Cut 49 (2007). http:// www.ejumpcut.org/currentissue/PerezHilton/index.html. Used with permission.

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gossip blog. With easy accessibility and immediacy, gossip blogs have set up shop in the massive mechanism that is the Hollywood star system. By combining snarky commentary with links to the actual video, clips, and recollections of Cruise’s recent television appearances, gossip bloggers have been credited with causing Cruise’s star to begin its fall, M:I:III to perform below expectations, and Entertainment Weekly to question his worth on the marquee. The greatest evidence of Cruise’s descent came in an August 22, 2006, article in the Wall Street Journal, where Paramount CEO Sumner Redstone publicly severed the studio’s ties with Cruise, explaining “his recent conduct has not been acceptable to Paramount.”1 As evidenced by the case of Cruise, a blogger may use posts to significantly influence box office pulls and simultaneously dent, inflate, and damage a star image. The most notorious of these bloggers is Perez Hilton (real name Mario Lavandeira) whose blog currently boasts more than a million hits a day. Along with fellow gossip bloggers at The Defamer, Lainey Gossip, The Superficial, Jossip, and Pink Is the New Blog, Perez and his blog function as the newest component in the business of entertainment, integrating the established mechanism of gossip with the new, immediate accessibility of the Internet. Hilton and his blog may be situated within Richard Dyer’s landmark meditation on stars, with particular focus on the blogger’s novel role in the “production” of stars. As Paul McDonald notes in The Star System, much of the work on stars in the last two decades has focused on stars as a “phenomenon of consumption,” rather than one of production, effectively “los[ing] sight of where stars come from.”2 While McDonald primarily concerns himself with star production on the part of the studio, the blogger occupies a unique position in the entertainment industry, functioning as both producer and consumer of the star image, providing a rich site for analysis. I focus specifically on Hilton, in part because his blog is the most read, most publicized, and most thoroughly pervaded by the blogger’s own personality. As such, it exemplifies the union of traditional gossip columnists and new media technologies. But even more interestingly, Hilton, as an openly gay “queen” with an unabashed affection for all things camp, complicates these phenomena of production and consumption. Whether by comparing an unflattering photo of a celebrity to a celebrated drag queen or launching incessant campaigns to “out” a star, Hilton’s position in the queer community cannot be discounted. The gossip blogger may be traced in relation to five key aspects of star production—economics, manipulation, fashion, magic/ talent, and the nature of the medium, with attention to the extent to which each element of production is (or is not) influenced by Hilton’s queer identity. Ultimately, the gossip blogger’s use of new media may be situated as a stripping of the mediated mechanisms of the entertainment business. New media technology makes such mechanisms visible, and gossip bloggers utilize this visibility to influence consumption. Bloggers illuminate the star system, and

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in so doing, alter our expectations and understanding of stars and their importance in contemporary society. One of Dyer’s major assertions focuses on the fact that society, as opposed to the success or failure of a film, truly makes or breaks a star. How we “feel” about stars—whether they are likable, admirable, down-to-earth, worthy of devotion, glamorous, and so forth—determines whether or not we attend their movies. With this in mind, as Internet gossip continues to proliferate, how does it influence, much more than printed media, our perception and subsequent consumption of stars? How are Internet gossip sites any different than the gossip columns of Classic Hollywood? The answer is in front of my eyes as I type this sentence on my laptop: Blogs represent a recent yet significant component of new media, a term loosely defined as the current cultural shift resulting from the ubiquity of and reliance on computers, digitalization, and the Internet. Blogs first garnered attention as a means of rapid-fire discourse surrounding the 2004 presidential campaign. At the time, their ability to swiftly post material, engender debate, and garner a readership that was at once loyal and diverse served as a remarkable point of interest. Blogs emerged as a new way to stimulate discourse, disseminate opinion, and reach out to the technologydependent audience. The gossip blog serves the same function, focusing on the “new” business of entertainment: smut and glamour. As tickets sales and television viewership continue to drop, the industry has amped up promotion of its most reliable commodity, namely, celebrities. Whether it’s shots of Britney’s crotch or Angelina’s babies, the buying and selling of celebrity information—pictures, video, gossip, interviews, exclusives—serves as a solid foundation for the market. Stars are a near inexhaustible resource: While one may fall, another will certainly rise in her place. Indeed, the dynamicism of celebrity culture is what keeps us hooked—someone’s always falling in or out of society’s graces. We want the dirty details and the sparkling gowns, the mugshots, the sex tapes, and the latest proof of Jennifer Aniston’s nose job. The gossip blog trades on this very desire: Even though Perez’s catchphrase announces his blog as “Hollywood’s most hated website,” he’s actually providing the exact sort of sustained feed necessary to generate and maintain societal interest. Hollywood may dislike his speculative and snarky ways, but Perez keeps attention focused exactly where the industry wants it most: on the product. Gossip blogs, PerezHilton.com in particular, follow the same general format. A picture is posted; the picture is accompanied by a comment, story, or a link to a more detailed article. The picture itself is the focal point of the post, but the text influences the manner in which the picture is received. The text and photo, received in tandem, thus become part of the star’s “image.” I use the word not in its traditional sense—as a visual representation of a thing— but in Dyer’s conception of the image, which he summarizes as “a complex

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configuration of visual, verbal, and aural signs. . . . it is manifest not only in films but in all kinds of media texts.”3 Bloggers concentrate not on only the image itself but also on the means of its production. While the public has long been knowledgeable of the strings of production—Joan Crawford’s persona and name were chosen through a Photoplay contest; Rita Hayworth’s cosmetic transformation was highly publicized, to name just a few—the difference is that those strings were meant to be seen. Like any other part of a star’s public image, they were constructed and willfully disseminated by the studio. Yet, bloggers, even more than the gossip columnists who came before them, have broken through those walls, effectively exposing the “phenomena” of production. Here, for the purpose of better understanding its contemporary importance, star production is explored through four of Dyer’s categories: economics, fashion, magic/talent, and the nature of the medium. ECONOMICS Stars are essential to the business of Hollywood: More than any other cinematic variable, they may be used to predict or ensure the success of a film. And yet, as Dyer explains, “even in Hollywood’s heyday, stars did not absolutely guarantee the success of a film. Stars move in and out of favour, and even at the height of their popularity may make a film that nobody much goes to see. . . . for this reason stars were a very problematic necessity from an economic point of view.”4 In other words, stars represent the ultimate in Hollywood paradoxes: A studio needs them, but they cannot “insure” them with good roles or promising parts. The studio must rely on their specific appeal in a specific societal moment. As society is historically as moody as a 13-year-old girl, this makes for mercurial rises and falls. For most of the twentieth century, the task of recording (and influencing) a particular star’s fortunes (and appraised economic value) fell to print media, specifically the form of the gossip column. Celebrity gossip is as old as Hollywood itself—for decades Louella Parsons, Hedda Hopper, and dozens of others served to arbitrate and disseminate all the star “news” that was fit to print. But with newspapers and magazines, the reader had to wait for a weekly update on the dynamic star lifestyle. The wait was cut with the introduction of celebrity “news,” especially Entertainment Tonight and E!, a network devoted exclusively to celebrity culture and entertainment. The majority of E!’s programming schedule is filled with repeat broadcasts of True Hollywood Story, 50 Biggest Fashion Mistakes, and similar productions, and while these shows undoubtedly contribute to a star’s image and subsequent economic value, once produced, they remain static—unable to match their content with that of the ever-fluctuating star. E!’s daily gossip show Talk Soup does provide dynamic, up-to-date accounts of a star society. But the show is more of a forum for other gossip guests, not a gossip-getter

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itself. “Talking gossip heads,” including Perez and other gossip bloggers, now regularly appear to dish on specific stars or subjects. What’s more, a onetime broadcast requires the viewer to be present at a certain time, in a fixed location. But the Internet, with the mobilization enabled by wireless technology and PDA devices, is accessible at all times, in nearly all places. Because Hilton posts continuously throughout the day, the consumer can check in several times, charting the progress of a celebrity event; the sheer volume of posts allows for a more minute examination of rises and falls. In this way, Hilton’s blog proves reflexive: it serves not only as a detector of public disfavor but a catalyst for it as well. Farming gossip from a variety of sources, Hilton disseminates this “news” to an audience of millions, thus amplifying public awareness. Even if a star was not previously in public disfavor, the fact that Perez reports that she is effectively morphs rumor into reality, working to bolster or break the economic value of a star. Hilton’s treatment of “TomKat” (gossip’s moniker for Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes) exemplifies this relationship between blogging and the star’s economic value. In a post from June 1, 2005, just weeks after the first public appearance of the couple in Rome, Hilton highlights a suggestive gossip bit. Quoting the National Enquirer’s story of Cruise gifting Holmes with a “hightech GPS phone” that could “track her whereabouts, minute by minute,” Hilton follows with his own commentary: “That story is just so ridiculously sublime, who cares if it’s true!” Here, Hilton’s afterthought is significant— while he acknowledges that the gossip may be far-fetched, his perpetuation of such a story subtly influences the reader to believe that regardless of its veracity, such behavior may be believably attributed to the stars in question. Put differently, even a story acknowledged as fake may influence a star’s image, simply by associating that star with a certain type of behavior. Such stories also set a precedent: From June 1st on, Hilton posted dozens of quips concerning Cruise’s purported micromanagement and “control-freak” antics with fiancée Holmes. Each story made the next more believable, leading to Hilton’s speculation that Holmes was paid by Cruise to bear his child in synchronization with the premiere of Mission: Impossible III. Once again, it matters little whether or not Cruise actually paid Holmes. What matters is that the item was so heavily circulated by Hilton and other bloggers that it has appreciably deteriorated Cruise’s star.5 Granted, print gossip was publishing the same bits of gossip, but pressure from advertisers and libel laws generally hold them more responsible for the factualness of their gossip. What’s more, the frequency with which Hilton blogged these bits substantially intensified their effect and influence —as discussed later, the categorization function of the blog allows the reader to click on a link labeled “TomKat” and read Hilton’s critical posts in succession, further intensifying the negative sentiment and suspicion of Cruise.

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Mission: Impossible 3 opened with a disappointing $48 million in domestic box office —a stellar number for most films but well below the opening weekends of both Mission Impossible 2 (Woo, 2000) and War of the Worlds (Spielberg 2005), a statistic that lead CBS “blogophile” Melissa McNamara to title her May 10 article “Did Bloggers Doom M:i:III?” McNamara cites Hilton’s call for a boycott of the film as a potential explanation for its underwhelming performance, quoting his May 5th post proclaiming, “If you believe that good should triumph over evil . . . if you believe in the power of the people, democracy, free speech, and popping pills. . . . Then join the campaign!”6 Clearly a blogger with Hilton’s readership may potentially alter public perception of a star. With the release of M:i:III, the evidence leads us to believe that he may likewise possess the power, even more than print gossip, to influence the economic value of a star. Perez’s ability to economically affect a star thus established, the question remains: Why would he choose to do so? Perez effectively launched a campaign against Cruise and his movie, but to suggest he did so arbitrarily is to neglect one of the juiciest rumors in Hollywood: namely, that Cruise is an intensely closeted homosexual. Perez promotes/demotes a star based on their skill of production: For him, one practice particularly denotes an inattention to the current attitude of star consumers and that is a refusal to come out of the closet. For Perez, denying one’s homosexuality reinforces what he views as the “myth” of gayness as box office poison—stars who view homosexuality as a potentially negative component to their star images are woefully ignorant of burgeoning societal acceptance on all fronts.7 Furthermore, and perhaps even more economically importantly, such thinking neglects the homosexual community as star consumers. Many homosexuals, especially self-identifying queens such as Perez, have embraced the “fabulousness” of Hollywood glamour as part of their external culture. As homosexuals statistically enjoy relatively large sums of expendable income, they should be acknowledged and appreciated as a significant segment of star consumers.8 In other words, for Perez, neglecting or insulting such a key segment of the consuming public constitutes poor image production values and merits exposure and ridicule through his blog. FAGALICIOUS: PEREZ AND OUTING Perez self-identifies as an “outing” homosexual. While the first waves of massive outing resulted from deaths by AIDS in the 1990s, many homosexuals, following the lead of Michael Musto and Michaelangelo Signorile, came to regard outing as a moral obligation to the gay community. As Richard Mohr explains in Gay Ideas, “to accept the closet is to have absorbed society’s view of gays, to accept insult so that one avoids harm.”9 Perez wholeheartedly espouses this ideology, inspiring both criticism and praise.10 As Mohr

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elaborates, “to break such a community-defining convention is to appear to be a traitor to the community. But what appears as treason to some can actually be social reform, as exemplified by civil disobedience, in which, when one breaks a current convention, one hopes thereby to establish a morally improved community.”11 While Perez does not use the exact rhetoric, he, like many others, believes that there is no “right” to any closet, especially the celebrity closet.12 Perez hints at the homosexuality of a number of celebrities—Cruise, John Travolta, Clay Aiken, Jodie Foster, Queen Latifah, among others. His disdain for these celebrities hinges on what he perceives as their refusal to emerge from their very obvious closets. He disseminates this criticism through a number of channels, from the boycott of M:i:III to calling his readers to send flowers (and providing a link to do so through ftd.com) to both closeted and open homosexuals on National Coming Out Day. Starting in September 2005, Perez embarked on a full-fledged campaign to out former N’Sync’er Lance Bass. He focused on slips in Bass’s production of a straight image—for example, Hilton coined the term “man-sharing” to explain the fact that Bass and friend Reichen Lehmkuhl, an openly gay reality star, were consistently photographed wearing each other’s clothing. Perez was not only criticizing Bass’ refusal to come out but his faulty image production. Hilton’s efforts culminated in the July 26th, 2006, cover of People Magazine, with a picture of Bass and the announcement “I’M GAY.” Members of Bass’s family had read bits on his purported homosexuality in blogs such as Perez’s, leading the actor to at last publicly proclaim his sexuality. Perez defended his actions, explaining, “I know there is some controversy about outing people, but I also believe the only way we’re gonna have change is with visibility. . . . if I have to drag some people screaming out of the closet, then I will. I think that lots of celebrities have an archaic fear that being gay will hurt their career but look at Rosie. Look at Ellen.”13 Indeed, coming out has served as an immense boost to Bass’s formerly stagnant career—supporting Hilton’s underlying assertion that coming out isn’t just a moral obligation, it’s an aspect of economic production.14 In 2001, Cruise filed suit against Chad Taylor, aka Kyle Bradford, over an interview with international magazine Acustar in which the former porn star claimed to have engaged in a homosexual affair with Cruise. The Complaint of Defamation, available in full at The Smoking Gun, claims: Bradford’s defamatory remarks are of the kind calculated to cause Cruise harm in his profession and his ability to earn [. . .] Losing the respect and enthusiasm of a substantial segment of the movie-going public would cause Cruise very substantial sums. While the plaintiff believes in the right of others to follow their own sexual preference, vast numbers of public throughout the world do not share that view and believing that he had a

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homosexual affair and did so during his marriage, they will be less inclined to patronize Cruise’s films.15

In other words, Cruise believes that public insinuation of homosexual activities will damage his star image and, in the process, his economic value. Perez’s criticism of Cruise is thus double-sided: If Cruise is indeed gay, he is not only shirking his personal responsibility to the homosexual community but perpetuating what Hilton views as an antiquated equation of homosexuality with economic depreciation. Cruise has produced and profited from an unambiguously heterosexual star image. As an actively outing gay man, Perez subverts Cruise’s meticulous production, calling attention to the manner in which Cruise has constructed himself, focusing on his overly public relationship with Holmes. Through posts and gossip proliferation, Perez supplants Cruise’s star image with one of his own: as a closeted homosexual whose efforts at production are so poor, so out of touch with society, that bloggers could pull them apart and expose them to the consuming public. In essence, Cruise misjudged his consumers—his conspicuous heterosexual displays only bolstered Hilton’s claims. Perez claims, “being gay is not a death sentence in show business. We need to get out of that mind frame. It’s 2006, people!”16 And in 2006, while being gay may no longer economically kill a star, being the target of Perez’s production-exposing blog very well may. MANIPULATION Dyer positions manipulation as the second component of the phenomenon of star production. In his conception, “out of this emphasis on manufacture, there develops an account of the star system as ‘pure’ manipulation. That is, both stardom and particular star are seen as owing their existence solely to the machinery of their production.”17 Hilton and the gossip blogger function as star manipulators themselves but likewise put pressure on the idea that Hollywood can manipulate an image to please the public. Gossip bloggers are simultaneously engaged in and critical of the system—pointing to its holes as they stitch themselves into the fabric. Perez’s choice of “cousin”/namesake, Paris Hilton, exemplifies this paradoxical practice.18 Interestingly, the underpinning of “Perez” and his blog is the empty promise of a star—and not just any star, but Paris Hilton, who has built her celebrity on being nothing but herself and doing nothing but existing. Paris Hilton is what Daniel Boorstin defines as a “pseudo event”; or, as Dyer summarizes, a star who “appear[s] to be meaningful but [is] in fact empty of meaning. Thus a star is well-known for her/his well-knownness, and not for any specific quality.” Perez, like Paris, is a signifier of celebrity. People talk to him, give him clothes, and feature him in articles not because of any talent

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of his own but for becoming well-known through his association with stars. In similar fashion, Perez has manipulated his image through his blog to be that of the quintessential “schwag-seeking” star-lover. These are their public “personalities,” but as Boorstin points out, “stars do not have a strong character, but a definable, publicizable personality: a figure which can become a nationally-advertised trademark.”19 Both Paris and Perez perform as “nationally-advertised” trademarks: They trade public appearances for cash, make outlandish statements to generate press, and sell their image, whether on t-shirts or lunchboxes, to the highest bidder. The persona, Web site, graphics, catchphrases, and content of Perez Hilton and perezhilton.com are all legally trademarked. Such immaculate control over a rather outlandish image speaks to an additional facet of Perez’s public persona: his “camp” sensibility. As Susan Sontag notes in her seminal essay, “indeed the essence of Camp is its love of the unnatural: of artifice and exaggeration.”20 Reading through Perez’s posts, his love of and revelry in “the spirit of extravagance,” “corny flamboyant femaleness/exaggerated he-man-ness,” and “things-being-what-they’renot”— all hallmarks of camp—is overwhelming.21 Perez commits the bulk of the blog to the lives of high-profile celebrities, but he also consistently celebrates campy idols: “Chyna,” an androgynous professional female wrestler; British glamour model “Jordan,” known for her flamboyant personal life and multiple breast enhancements; plus others as various as singer Ricky Martin and fashion maven Karl Lagerfield. But these pseudo-stars represent only the most exaggerated of Perez’s camp tastes; indeed, these men and women are so fantastically camp that it’s difficult for those unacquainted with camp to appreciate such posts. In contrast, Perez’s attention to Paris Hilton exemplifies a subtler form of camp taste that permeates the blog, based more on a love of surfaces and “instant character” that constructs what Sontag refers to as “a mode of enjoyment, of appreciation—not judgment.”22 Paris may very well be “empty of meaning”—she has manipulated her image to be that of a jet-setting, spoiled, ditzy fashionista, nothing but surface and image, as one-dimensional as the photos that appear on the screen in front of us. Producing such a tightly controlled image, devoid of nuance or complication, is a feat worthy of celebration. Perez lauds Paris’s immaculate self-construction, but the manner in which he does so—with an underlying sense of camp —effectively undercuts the seriousness with which Paris takes herself. For camping, at its heart, is innately duplicitous: There is a “straight,” public sense of a thing, contrasted with a “private, zany experience.”23 Put differently, there is the way that the star means her image to be perceived and the very different way that camp receives it. Reveling in this disparity between intended and received meaning, camp makes the means of manipulation obvious to the point of enjoyment. With his blog, Perez has free license

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to camp writ large —blogging to an audience of millions; he lets others in on what has long been a members-only form of humor. Perez characterized his early career by lambasting Paris on a regular basis—in a post from November 5, 2005, Perez proclaims “Paris’ new book allows YOU the opportunity to confess your deepest, darkest, dirtiest secrets to the bitch that’s . . . outskanked you and whom we all aspire to be!” But in the last year and a half, Paris and Perez have become “friends”: Perez has posted dozens of photos documenting his attendance at various events hosted or attended by Paris. Here, the celebrity blogger is interpolated into the world of the pseudo-event. While the photos undoubtedly assist in manipulating Perez’s own star image as gossip authority, the fact that the photos are sweaty, somewhat unattractive, ordinary, and even boring affects the star of both Hiltons in a different way. By posing for and posting these photos, Perez reifies the pseudo-event of both Paris and himself; at the same time, he calls attention to the fact that Paris has normal, boring house parties like anyone else —exposing the cracks in her image as impeccably styled socialite. Such exposure was made possible by new media. The fact that Perez could attend a party by himself, shoot dozens of pictures on his digital camera, and post those photos the next morning attests to the immediacy of the blogger. Usually, gossip mongers are forced to wait for paparazzi photos to accompany their columns, which are published weekly or daily. Perez transcends the traditional model by going to the celebrity herself, documenting the night, posting it on his blog, and making it an event. Lev Manovich emphasizes, “with new media, a new area has emerged. As ‘professional technology’ becomes accessible to amateurs, new media professionals create new standards, formats, and design expectations to maintain their status.”24 Amateur photographer and Web designer Perez takes blurry photos on his digital camera. He posts them to his blog using a preset template. Yet, these, and other photos posted to the “Personally Perez” section of the site, have worked to close the gap between “professional” blog sites—Gawker is a good example of a slick, professional site—and “amateur” sites such as Hilton’s. If Perez is getting the first-hand scoop, he maintains his status, regardless of amateur standards. Or, better yet, Perez’s style —first-hand star-loving, low production standards, camp humor—becomes the new standard. FASHION Celebrity fashion has always generated gossip, and Internet gossip takes no less of an interest. While fashion may appear the purest, most superficial form of manipulation, as I. C. Jarvie points out, “one function a star serves is to fix a type of beauty, to help a physical type identify itself.”25 In this way, “types of beauty” are made to “define attractiveness.”26 Dyer likewise asserts

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that a change in fashion is a change in social meaning—when a star dyes her hair from blonde to red, for example, it constitutes a change in the social meaning of her star. If, as previously asserted, stars rise and fall because of the ability of their individual social meanings to resonate within society, then a change in fashion can prove disastrous or fortuitous. The gossip blog does more than display the fashion of the star—through the innate functions of the blog, it subtly calls attention to fashion as a means of production. Perez Hilton is by no means the blogging authority on fashion. For sites devoted to celebrity fashion, see The Sartorialist or Manolo’s Shoe Blog. With that said, Perez, like all those interested in celebrity gossip, cannot escape commentary, criticism, and promotion of fashion. The dependence of Internet gossip on visual imagery makes it a constant topic: With each picture, one is immediately drawn to comment on appearance—clothes, face, hair, shoes, skin tone, hands—and use it as a starting point for interpreting the meaning or significance of the photo. Perez’s camp sensibilities naturally translate to an attention to fashion and surface. As Dyer explains in his essay “It’s Being So Camp As Gets Us Going,” camp “is a way of prising the form of something away from its content, of reveling in the style while dismissing the content as trivial.”27 Focusing on these elements of style, Perez has his clear favorites and, of course, his subjects of consistent ridicule. What distinguishes Hilton’s treatment of fashion from print media lies in two key components to the blog: categorization and reader response. Blogs often build sorting and categorizing options into their design. Perez’s categorizing method is rather straight-forward: Each photo receives several tags, one for each star pictured, plus additional tags if it falls into a Perez–pre-established category, including “Gay Gay Gay,” “Fashion Smashion,” “Fun ’n’ Fluff,” and “SIGHtings.” As evidenced by the titles, in sorting a picture into an established category, Perez establishes the meaning of the photo—for example, a photo of Jake Gyllenhaal and a male friend working out, once filed under “Gay Gay Gay,” takes on new significance. The same holds true for Perez’s labeling of fashion: Placing a photo in “Fashion Smashion,” as opposed to “Fashion & Beauty,” automatically tips off the reader as to the intended meaning. Print media uses a similar technique to distinguish between the front pages (filled with celebs wearing beautiful dresses) and the back pages (“What Were They Thinking,” fashion designer critique of fashion mistakes, etc.). The blog one-ups the fashion mag with its ability to catalog all “Fashion Smashion” posts, from one week to one year ago, in one easily clickable location. Manovich calls attention to the manner in which New Media creates “predefined menus” (Perez’s database of photos, sorted into categories) prepped for user-selection, a process that allows “end users [to] feel that they are not just consumers but ‘authors’ creating a new media object or experience.”28 When a reader uses the “StarSeeker” pull-down menu to select a category, he is creating his own experience of the blog, viewing

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it in a completely different form, order, and context than it was originally displayed. This power of authorship over one’s own gossip experience takes on particular meaning when applied to fashion. Scrolling through the “Fashion Smashion” section, posts that initially appeared in no relation to each other coexist on the same page. Jennifer Lopez appears smartly dressed and styled in a post titled “THIS is why Jennifer Lopez is a style icon” followed by a picture of Kirsten Dunst, hair and dress haphazard, stumbling down the street. The contrast changes the meaning of the original post—Lopez’s fashion sense and classiness are heightened, while Dunst’s are lessened. In this way, Perez assists in establishing stars as superlatives—an idea key to Dyer’s conception of the star. Perez’s sorting allows the reader to insinuate Lopez as the “most stylish,” while Dunst becomes the “most bag-ladyish.” The star thus “dissolves into the superlative, [is] indistinguishable from it, they become superlative.”29 Hilton pressures notions of fashion by inviting readers to comment on or decide whether an outfit, dye job, or new look is attractive. On May 8, Hilton posted a picture of Jessica Simpson presenting at the 2006 ALMA Awards, which honor Hispanics in Hollywood. Hilton challenged his readers to examine Simpson’s curly auburn bob, tightly fitted orange dress, and deeply bronzed skin, and debate “Jessica Simpson’s New Look: Love it or Leave it? YOU Decide!” Over 300 reader comments follow, including “She looks like an oompa loompa,” and “Does anyone else ever notice that in some pictures she looks like an old ass Texan grandma?” As the comments proceed, they transcend mere fashion commentary, declaring, “She is trying way too hard these days to be something she not,” “She and her sister symbolize everything that is wrong with our culture,” and “kinda racist to go in black face (or in this case ‘brown face’) to the ALMA awards, no?” Here, we see a change in fashion denote a change in social meaning: As opposed to her former All-American, blonde-haired, innocent image, this picture encapsulates the change in Simpson’s star and social meaning following her divorce from Nick Lachay. From reader responses, we gather that she appears as an absurd and fake chameleon, racially insensitive, and an embodiment of “all that’s wrong with our country.” While many visitors to Hilton’s site do not participate in or read comments, such commentary nevertheless documents greater societal reactions.30 Unlike letter sections in print gossip, these responses are immediate, uncensored, and interactive—they feed on one another, constructing an overarching sentiment toward the star and his/her fashion choice. In this way, they constitute a veritable goldmine of public opinion, a way to monitor how society feels about a particular star at a particular moment. As celebrities are dependent on visual imagery to maintain their presence in society, fashion will most likely always be a determining factor in their popularity. Gossip bloggers represent a heightened awareness of fashion—not

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only through their ability to post large numbers of images but also through the particular characteristics of the blog that pronounce and reify the social meaning of each fashion choice and, by direct association, the star who wears it. MAGIC AND TALENT Public sense of a star’s “magic and talent” likewise influences production and consumption. Dyer explains that “a very common view . . . though not intellectually very respectable, is that stars are stars because they are exceptional, gifted, wonderful.”31 If we accept this idea, then we must determine at what an actor is exceptional or gifted—according to Dyer, the skill is “not ‘acting’ in the classic sense, as numerable examples show. Skill then at being a certain sort of person or image.”32 Hilton and his blog showcase magic and talent in becoming “a certain sort of image” in two ways, functioning as pure fan and as critical observer. There is no doubt that Hilton is a fan. It seems a requisite for blogging with such frequency and passion. When dealing with his favorite stars (Paris, Madonna, Janet Jackson, Britney Spears, and Angelina Jolie), Hilton is not shy in expressing adoration. The words “brazilliant,” “hot,” and “this is why we love” convey affection and admiration. For Perez, such admiration is often explicitly linked to a smart self-marketing move on the part of the star. On April 16th, following the birth of Gwyneth Paltrow’s son Moses, Perez posted the following: Do the laws of supply and demand apply to the paparazzi? Gwyneth Paltrow hopes so! The new mom to Moses was glowing as she carefully unveiled her new baby boy to the world, in front of A LOT of paparazzi, which means that no one particular shot will be worth more than the other. In fact, all of them will be worth probably the same and the market will be saturated with that shot. Knowing Paltrow, she will probably not keep new baby Moses in hiding, hoping that by doing the same repetitive tasks with the baby each day—maybe even wearing the same clothes—the paparazzi will see no monetary incentive to follow her around every day. Yay for economics! Enjoy your mommy time Gwyneth.

With this post, Perez lays bare the economics of the paparazzi and Paltrow’s savvy manipulation of them. With her baby’s photo so readily available, the market will close for new pictures, allowing Paltrow and her family privacy from the paparazzi. In a similar vein, following the much-anticipated birth of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s daughter Shiloh Nouvel, Perez posted, “She’s such a smart cookie! On the same day The Baby was born, Santa Angelina had her lawyers snatch up the domain name ShilohNouvelJolie-Pitt.com. Crafty!” (May 31st). His praise for Jolie is not based on any acting skill but

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on her knowledge and control of the media. Control over media extends to control over one’s own image; the tighter hold a celebrity possesses of his/ her own image, the more authentically magic and talented he/she appears. One may readily discern who does or does not have “magic and talent” in Perez’s eyes through observation of his posting styles. In his opinion, there are two categories of stars: those who deserve to be famous and those who do not. His posts concerning “real” stars focus on lifestyles: their ability to present themselves as a particular “type” through commodity consumption. In these posts, the woman is presented as “spectacle”—her clothes, her children, her dining habits are deconstructed and analyzed, all because she is interesting enough (talented enough) to garner such attention. Put differently, she deserves the attention of the media, Perez, and his readership, for she has produced her image so skillfully as to appear seamless, believable, real. Conversely, celebrities who do not deserve attention are ridiculed for their attempts at spectacle. Their displays of conspicuous consumption—as defined by Dyer, “the way by which the wealthy display that they are wealthy;” the very backbone of the star lifestyle—are criticized instead of celebrated.33 Perez calls attention to stars that continue to posture as famous long after the capital of their talent has been exhausted—favorite examples include Jennifer Love Hewitt, Tori Spelling, and former boy band members. Unlike the caricatures of celebrity in which Perez revels, these stars land somewhere between the truly magical and the truly camp; they are neither a pure construction nor pure talent but a sad mess in between. In the language of camp, they’re simply not “bad” enough to be good. THE NATURE OF THE MEDIUM Dyer stresses the manner in which “the close-up reveals the unmediated personality of the individual, and this belief in the ‘capturing’ and the ‘unique’ ‘person’ of a performer is probably central to the star phenomena.”34 The close-up, a key element to narrative cinema, should create what Bela Balazs terms a “silent monologue,” forming a connection between the star and the viewer. The “medium” of Dyer and Balazs’s discussion is film, but the same principle may be readily applied to the Internet blog. The medium in question is both the celebrity photo and the blog; their collective nature performs a specific function in connecting or alienating the viewer from the star. In his essay “The Face of Garbo,” Roland Barthes draws attention to the power of the close-up. Barthes asserts that, “Garbo still belongs to that moment in cinema when capturing the human face still plunged audiences into the deepest ecstasy, when one literally lost oneself in a human image as one would in a philter, when the face represented a kind of absolute state of the flesh, which could be neither reached nor renounced.”35 He concludes that, “the face of Garbo reconciles two iconographic ages, it assures the passage

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from awe to charm,” situating Audrey Hepburn and her “unique specification of the face, which has nothing of the essence left in it” as the face of charm. As such, “Garbo’s singularity was of the order of the concept, that of Audrey Hepburn is of the order of the substance. The face of Garbo is an Idea, that of Hepburn an Event.”36 Barthes was writing in the late ’50s, but this idea of cultural significance connected to the close-up still applies. With New Media, we have moved to yet another iconographic age: from awe to charm to disbelief. If the face of Garbo is an Idea, and Hepburn’s face is an Event, then the face of Jessica Simpson, of Angelina Jolie, of Paris Hilton is a Question. Is the photo real? Have wrinkles been airbrushed; have the lips had collagen injections? Has the picture been manipulated to represent an idea or event that does not, in fact, exist? Whose image has been recycled to form that of the new celebrity? In short, Photoshop and digital technology have forever altered the meaning of the close-up and the celebrity photograph in general, working to endlessly question the signs of star production. As a thoroughly postmodern facet of new media, Photoshop allows for perpetual reselection: If a celebrity doesn’t like her lips, they may be airbrushed to resemble another set, one more compatible with her desired image. In this way, “rather than assembling more media recordings of reality, culture is now busy reworking, recombining, and analyzing already accumulated media material.”37 To put it in Manovich’s terms, a star is thus the “author” of the “object” of her image; as she composites her image from pieces that she did not create, “the creative energy of the author goes into the selection and sequencing of elements rather than into original design.”38 Production of star image in postmodern times dictates a process of selection, attempting to reproduce the awe and charm of earlier un(digitally)mediated stars. The resulting image is an attempted semblance to the ideas of awe and charisma made iconic in the faces of both Garbo and Hepburn. Hilton and his fellow gossip bloggers call attention to the mediation that occurs in the postmodern, Photoshop-dependent era. In other words, gossip bloggers attempt to answer the question posed by the images of contemporary stars, repeatedly addressing issues of manipulation. Wielding his own rudimentary knowledge of Photoshop, Perez uses the “paint” function to point to specific questions of production. In this way, Perez denies stars the chance to author themselves by drawing attention to their attempts. With a picture of Victoria Beckham posted March 7, 2006, Hilton declares, “Victoria Beckham would be so pretty . . . if she hadn’t had so many damn procedures.” In the accompanying photo, four hand “painted” arrows point to Beckham’s nose, cheeks, brow, and breasts. This photo, along with dozens of others posted under the category “Knifestyles,” make visible the question of the mediated image, simultaneously providing an answer. Perez, like many other gossip bloggers, follows Beckham very closely, and with good reason: Like Paris, she is composed only wholly of surfaces, a

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true pseudo-event. She first came to fame as a member of The Spice Girls, a group composed of five women, each of whom took on a singular personality characteristic to be emphasized through their dress, attitude, and general image. The group was extravagant, enormously successful, and wholly dependent on surface-level stereotype: pure camp. Beckham, formerly Victoria Adams, was labeled “Posh Spice,” a look she manifested in the form of short black dresses, heavy eyeliner, and disinterested stares in public appearances, a somewhat blunt evocation of classic Hollywood sophistication. Beckham’s current look is a selection of past “posh” looks, revamped in order to disassociate herself from the connotations of her old image, that is, fake, cheap glamour. Beckham is attempting to “author” herself. After several failed albums, Beckham’s former avenue to stardom is essentially blocked. The only way for her to still be a star is to continue appearing in public as a star. In other words, she “shows up” places where one is certain to be photographed, such as Ivy in London, Koi in Los Angeles, or at Fashion Week in Paris, in outfi ts that solidify her selected posh image. The contents of Beckham’s category on Hilton’s Web site are variations on this self-same theme: Posh dines out with fashionable husband; Posh goes skiing in all leather; Posh tries on shoes with Katie Holmes at Barney’s. Regarded collectively, they illuminate Beckham’s attempt at image production. Beckham, along with stylish, soccer-star husband, David Beckham, has successfully acquired the visual accouterments and commodities of a posh lifestyle. To sustain her star, Victoria Beckham need only sustain her established image, even if this process necessitates plastic surgery and a suspected eating disorder. If the reader selects the Victoria Beckham category, Perez’s photoshopped post of Beckham’s surgeries appears between numerous others, exclamations of “Feed me!” scrawled beside bony arms and Beckham’s somewhat emaciated face. When regarded as such, Hilton’s posts serve as an amplification and critique of Beckham’s process of image selection. Dyer and Balazs believe that the close-up possesses the ability to connect star to viewer by portraying the uniqueness of the individual. In a world dominated by new media, uniqueness is impossible, even irrelevant—stars succeed in connecting to the individual through their ability to best select pre-established traits, poses, ideas, and images to form a composite of a likable star. The manner in which they do so is heavily reliant on new technology— plastic surgery and Botox, of course, but also new media technologies such as Photoshop, official Web sites, and the proliferation of their image on sites such as Hilton’s. While Hilton and others undeniably take part in the perpetuation of this cycle, republishing photos and reifying images, they likewise draw immediate attention to the cracks in their carefully crafted image. This process represents the new nature of the medium, with skill of construction (and resultant believability) functioning as the key determining factors of a star’s popularity.

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CONCLUSIONS Through his blog, Perez has initiated a new way to perceive stars, using a sort of absolute value scale to evaluate the signs of production. To obtain Perez’s attention and endorsement, a star must be completely surface level—glaring signs of production, pure camp, bad enough to be good—or so skilled at production as to erase such signs entirely. The million-plus readers of his blog have, perhaps obliviously, begun to co-opt this method of judgment. What does this tell us about the state of the star system, the gossip it inspires, and the society that consumes it? To address this question, one must only return to the example of Cruise, a major star for the last 20 years. In 1983, there was something distinctive in the way that Tom Cruise appeared in All the Right Moves (Chapman)—the film opens with shots of his dreary mill town home, shifting to a sleeping Cruise, who awakes with an endearing bleariness, his eyes still sparkling from dreams. Throughout the film, Cruise is earnest, impassioned, and cocky—his set, square jaw; his self-assured flirtation with girlfriend, Lea Redmond; the affected swagger of the 5′6″ man. This film, juxtaposed with Risky Business (Brickman, 1983), released just months apart, is what first made Cruise a star: He appears equally authentic as a home-alone son, taking over the mansion and the scrappy cornerback, desperate for a way to escape the steel legacy of his family. His image, meticulously constructed by top publicist Pat Kingsley, served as the common denominator of the films that solidified Cruise’s star—Top Gun (Scott, 1986), The Color of Money (Scorsese, 1986), Born on the Fourth of July (Stone, 1989). In short, his image was so unified, so believable, that the signs of this construction were invisible.39 In 2002, David Thomson wrote that for Cruise to maintain his star, he would have to “remake himself at every turn—and there may not be enough good people to trust. He is very professional—but is there now a profession?”40 Thomson returns us to an essential realization: While I would not go so far to assert that the profession is completely dead, it’s clear that the star system will never be the same, and the emergence of New Media, gossip blogs included, is the reason. Cruise was often likened to another broad shouldered lady’s man by the name of Clark Gable, and for a time, he seemed ready to join the colossal stars of the past—Gable, Grant, Garbo, Hepburn—as one who could play both the everyday and the extraordinary. He was simultaneously likable—you could be pals, if he moved into the rambler next door—but, at the same time, on a completely different level, untouchable, godlike, a Top Gun, worthy of devotion and admiration. A large part of that which established the above stars was a conflation of star image and star role—the fact that Cary Grant married his fifth wife at age 76 only reinforced his image as the ultimate likable cad; you looked at a picture of

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him, watched a film of his, heard gossip about him, and it all fed back to a single united image, so immensely attractive in its harmonized message. What has changed, then, and where Cruise has run into trouble, is that in the age of New Media, there are no colossal stars, nor will there ever be. No one is larger than life—rather, they are manipulated simulacrums of life. With New Media, there are simply too many aspects of the image, too many roads leading to a permanently decentralized Rome. I am in no way asserting that the images of Gable, Garbo, or Grant were not, at their heart, constructions—the public was more accepting then; there were fewer discourses surrounding the star, which allowed the viewer to forgo skepticism, finding herself willing to believe. The problem, then, is that we are no longer willing to believe anything—we have been disillusioned and made skeptical by so much technology, so much manipulation, that perhaps the only film that we are willing to believe is that of a plane flying into the World Trade Center. And even then, there’s a cult of doubting conspiracy theorists. Tom Cruise has fallen from the limelight because he attempted to make the shift from twentieth- and twenty-first-century star, trading his rare appearances and relative secrecy for overexposure and outspokenness.41 Before our current age of digitalization, Cruise’s infamous couch-jumping would have been documented and disseminated but, after a few months, perhaps forgotten, fading from public consciousness. New Media, however, allows that tape to be circulated and viewed again and again, its audio track morphed into a dance remix. The legends of the early stars of cinema were in large part attributed to the novelty of the medium, and we have become wearied, disaffected, and unimpressed by mere film projection. We clamor for the next level, demanding immediate access to photos, film, music, and gossip. We are addicted to the likes of Perez Hilton because he feeds us exactly what we want: He makes visible the signs of production, telling us where to direct our consumption. Our inability to be awed, our reluctance to believe—this is what has changed the star system. As a film scholar, I suppose I thrive on my own ability to make visible the signs of production, to draw attention to why we like stars. In this way, I am not so different from Perez—I write scholarly papers, he posts snarky posts—but we both concentrate on and call attention to the machinery of Hollywood. At the same time, I’m saddened by my own assertion that we will never again believe enough in anything to hold it up for true adoration. But Perez and I grew up in the ’80s, when Cruise, Madonna, and Michael Jackson were indeed larger than life—they were still something to believe in, especially as children. So long as our generation is a part of Hollywood—both as scholars and gossips, viewers and fans—then a modicum of fascination and adoration will remain. I do wonder, however, what will occur when my own children, the babies of New Media, are born into a world that is rapidly

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becoming digitalized and, as such, turning into an immense image of itself, an overwhelming Question—what will remain for them to believe in, and who will think it important, as both Perez and I so obviously do, to tell them the answers? NOTES 1. “Paramount: Cruise is Risky Business.” CNNMoney.com. 23 August 2006. http:// money.cnn.com/2006/08/22/news/newsmakers/cruise_paramount/index.htm?cnnyes (accessed 10 October 2006). 2. Paul McDonald, The Star System (London: Wallflower, 2000), 2. 3. Richard Dyer, Stars (London: BFI, 1998), 35. 4. Dyer, Stars, 11. 5. At the time of writing, Mission: Impossible 3, with a domestic gross of $133 million (compared with a budget of $150 million+) clearly performed far below expectations. 6. Melissa McNamara, “Did Bloggers Doom M-I-iii?” CBS News Online. 10 May 2006. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/05/09/blogophile/main1600758.shtml (accessed 16 May 2006). 7. Bear in mind, this is more of a suggestive hopeful vision than reality: While Perez asserts that star consumers have become accepting of homosexuality, in reality, coming out would in all probability significantly decrease Cruise’s earning power. 8. According to a survey conducted by the Simmons Market Research Bureau, gays represent the ultimate “DINK” market—Double Income, No Kids. The annual value of the gay and lesbian market exceeds $514 billion; the average household income for gay men was $52,624, 41 percent above the national average. 9. Richard Mohr, Gay Ideas: Outing and Other Controversies (Boston: Beacon Press, 1992), 31. 10. In a post from July 14th, 2006, in response to criticism from the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation for speculating about sexuality, Perez writes, “We don’t have the support of our people, and we love it! If we’re hated, that means we’re doing something right. . . . We don’t need your support, bitches. Michael Musto has been outing people for years, and he is our hero!” 11. Mohr, Gay Ideas, 28. 12. As he proclaims in a broadcast of Ring My Bell, posted on perezhilton.com on October 18th, 2006, “if you’re a celebrity or a politician, you’re fair game.” 13. “Did Gossip Blogger Out Lance Bass?” MSNBC.com. 27 July 2006. http://www. msnbc.msn.com/id/14065223/from/ET/ (accessed 15 October 2006). 14. Bass is currently developing a reality show for UPN; in October of 2006, Bass and Reichen were presented with the Human Rights Campaign Visibility Award. 15. “Tom Cruise v. Chad Slater aka Kyle Bradford.” Thesmokingun.com. 2 May 2001. http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/chadslater1.html (accessed 15 October 2006). 16. “Did Gossip Blogger Out Lance Bass?”; While Perez remains firm in his stance that coming out as a homosexual will not damage one’s career, I must agree with Cruise: His star image is predicated on such an intense sense of masculinity that

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coming out as a homosexual would undoubtedly deharmonize his constructed image. Granted, Perez seems to be arguing that his attempts at hiding his homosexuality— his relationship with Cruise in particular—have already enacted such a deharmoniza tion. . . . so why not come out? 17. Dyer, Stars, 13. 18. In a recently televised Queer Edge interview, Perez explains the genesis of his name as such: While club-hopping on New Year’s Eve in Miami, as they left each club, the promoter would exclaim “Oh don’t leave—Paris Hilton is coming later.” According to Hilton, after the third or fourth club, he realized that Paris Hilton definitely wasn’t coming—they were simply using the promise of her name to convince people to stay and buy more drinks. He turned to his friends and announced, “Puhlease, Paris Hilton is not showing up, but Perez Hilton might!” Watch the interview in its entirety at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOOcM6lEu7c&search=perez %20hilton; Dyer, Stars, 13. 19. Daniel Boorstin, The Image (London: Widenfeld and Nicolson, 1962), 162. 20. Susan Sontag, Against Interpretation, (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1968), 275. 21. Sontag, Against Interpretation, 279–83. 22. Sontag, Against Interpretation, 286, 290. 23. Sontag, Against Interpretation, 281. 24. Lev Manovich, The Language of New Media (Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2001), 120. 25. I. C. Jarvie, Towards a Sociology of the Cinema (London: Routledge, 1970), 14. 26. Ibid. 27. Richard Dyer, The Culture of Queers (New York: Routledge, 2002), 43. 28. Manovich, The Language, 125. 29. Dyer, Stars, 43. 30. Reader-response also provides a forum for the debate over Perez’s outing. Following an August 6th post in which Perez asserts the homosexuality of Clay Aiken, “Nancy” responds: “Once again, Perez. . . . It is not your right nor is it your responsibility to out someone—and to even ask people to do the dirty work for you. What is up with that? It is nothing short of vicious.” “Katie” expands this thought further, writing, “Just because you are a flamboyantly and openly gay person and that works for you, doesn’t mean that it will work for everyone. Your work and much of your image, or ‘gimmick’ per say, is based on being gay. This is not true for Clay Aiken. He found fame through American Idol. A majority of American Idol’s viewers are religious middle Americans. Furthermore, America is not yet a country where most of it’s general population can look at an entertainer purley for talent and not judge them based on their personal lives.” 31. Dyer, Stars, 16. 32. Dyer, Stars, 17. 33. Dyer, Stars, 38. 34. Dyer, Stars, 15. 35. Roland Barthes, Mythologies (Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1970), 56. 36. Barthes, Mythologies, 57. 37. Manovich, The Language, 131.

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38. Manovich, The Language, 130. 39. For more on Kingsley and her skill at managing Cruise’s image, see Anne Thompson, “Pitt vs. Cruise: A Tale of Two Publicists,” The Hollywood Reporter, 5 June 2005. 40. David Thomson, The New Biographical Dictionary of Film (New York: Alfred A Knopf, 2002), 193. 41. As Anne Thompson makes clear, this overexposure and outspokenness can be traced to Cruise’s choice of publicist. After firing Pat Kingsley in March of 2004, he hired his sister, Lee Anne DeVette, also a Scientologist. DeVette served as Cruise’s publicist until November 2005, at which point Cruise replaced her with veteran publicist Paul Bloch. Although DeVette’s official reason for leaving was to spend more time with various philanthropies, the move is widely regarded as part of Cruise’s strategy to rehabilitate his image.

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chapter 12

Big Bucks and Fake Tears: Celebrity Journalism’s Hyperreality Zachary Snider

How else to represent this new world than through post-modernist flatness? The post-modernist motto is: You can’t beat trash culture, so join it. —Todd Gitlin CAREER FORMATION IN THE HYPERREALITY MATRIX At the impressionable age of 20, I was hired by the Manhattan branch of what, for purposes of this chapter, I’ll call Stars Today, which, for decades, has been America’s beloved daily syndicated entertainment news show. For the past nine years I have served as an associate producer for Stars Today in New York City, Los Angeles, and London, where I worked the press lines for awards shows, film premieres, benefits, and other events and where I animatedly asked stock (but apparently necessary) questions to countless celebrities, including “Who are you wearing?!” and “What are you doing next!?” With boom mics and NTSC tapes flying at my head, the rest of my workdays were spent at film press junkets in private luxury hotel rooms; jam-packed press conferences; in-studio confessional interviews; behind-thescenes of various film shoots; exclusive album recordings; Broadway play rehearsals and backstages; personal viewings of celebrity homes; among innumerable other celeb-infested events. As a nonthreatening (and uncommonly innocent-looking, which always opens more doors in this industry) young blond male (still) under 30, I became a very trusted entertainment

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television Boy Wonder, at the demanding side of the executive and coordinating producers and high-profile PR agents with whom I had established professional relationships, on both sides of the Atlantic. The purpose of this chapter is a proposal, or a pleading, perhaps, for viewers to heighten their sense of awareness, of perception and interpretation, of what news—both (supposed) hard and soft news—presents to them. With visual media serving as humanity’s best and allegedly most-trusted friend in the twenty-first century, particularly for the Millennial generation, many regular television viewers do not initially realize that nearly every news segment transmitted via satellite is editorialized for competitive and capitalistic gain and that actual “reality,” or “hyper-reality,” as Baudrillard refers to the mass media’s format of “projected reality,” can never be actual reality at all. Even as someone who has been a manipulator of media for his entire professional life thus far, I, too, like any other television viewer, inevitably fall prey to the hyperrealistic ideas unconsciously absorbed by my oft-media-dictated and -affected psyche. Prior to being hired by Stars Today, I had conducted celebrity interviews and written feature stories for my university newspaper, as well as having spent a year on the editorial staff of a renowned Manhattan theater magazine, for whom I interviewed and wrote articles about “stars” of the stage, screen, and television. As a ravenous young adult, barely into college I knew I wanted to hang out with celebrities for a living because I had spent my childhood and adolescence seeing all of their films, buying their CDs and cassette tapes, and video-recording their TV shows. This American popular culture obsession is certainly not uncommon. I can only imagine how affected my celebinfected mind would have fared as a teenager in the twenty-first century, since, from Facebook to Flavor of Love, the Millennial generation’s philosophical intuitions of every aspect of their lives seem to be shaped solely by celebrity culture. In college, when my peers were happily doing keg stands and shot-gunning Keystone, I was in a tuxedo at the Tonys, a Ferragamo jacket at the MTV Video Awards, or illegally sipping Veuve Clicquot at a Julia Roberts tribute gala. My entire adult life thus far has consisted of conditioning my formerly sheltered suburban mind to understand the plights and puppeteered dichotomies of the “celebrity brain,” per se, as well as to explore precisely why audiences want what they want. Later, while pursuing my Ph.D. in London, I developed career multiple personality disorder: Mornings I lectured to creative writing, media theory, and literature classes about Foucault’s, Baudrillard’s, Lyotard’s, and Derrida’s concepts on reality (or the lack thereof ), and nightly I would interview current celebrities such as Sienna Miller, all the while pretending to care with whom Jude Law was committing infidelities. Thus, I can completely relate to

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Baudrillard’s characterization of himself: “What I am, I don’t know. I am the simulacrum of myself.”1 I knew I needed to collapse and sprawl across Roland Barthes’s postmodernist couch and hear about the lack of reason in reality, after having to tell my classes, “Sorry, I’ve not finished marking your term papers about ‘Death of the Author’. Um. At the last minute I had to go interview Queen Latifah in Prague.” THE TELEVISION PRODUCER AND HIS OTHER Now, I’ve got at least three different versions of a career Other, one a postmodernist–psychoanalytic theory scholar, another a Hollywood television producer, the third a guilty, a naughty mix of the two. In regards to this formulation of an Other, Toffoletti states: Baudrillard’s displacement of a psychoanalytic model of subject constitution proves immensely significant for forging alternative understandings of subjectivity in contemporary life. In a context where the real gives way to the hyperreal, Baudrillard seeks to put an end to dialectics, to a value system by which identity is forged through differentiation from the Other.2

With this in mind, I myself, after having been submersed in the entertainment industry but having also been inducted into academia, am also an example of Baudrillard’s forged identity of his Other explanation. My version of reality became an entirely skewed version of actual reality, where celebrities seemed to be genuine peers and colleagues in my life, both for work and play. It is our show’s job to pretend for the rest of America that our visual, editorially edited images of celebrities are realistic representations of these televised public figures so that our viewers can forge personal, upfront “relationships” with the celebrities they follow faithfully. Hollywood, and the small celebrity-oriented world within Manhattan, is a sort of plastic Disneyland for those of us who work in television. For comparison’s sake of this ultimate hyperreality, which is not far-off from Hollywood: “It was the controversial French philosopher Jean Baudrillard who pointed out that the true role of Disneyland was not to provide a childlike escape from the reality of life, but to persuade us that the utter fantasy of modern American life is in fact real.”3 As television producers, we are the pushers—the persuaders—of what Baudrillard refers to as this “utter fantasy of American life,” bringing viewers a sort of fantastical Hollywood-as-the-adult-Disneyland slide show of images. We create a fantasy world for our viewers but ironically, if not hypocritically, do our best to make you believe that your fantasy is reality.

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WHAT YOU REALLY WANT TO KNOW ABOUT . . . Soon after the turn of the millennium, I worked on a piece for the Michael Jackson Radio City Music Hall tribute, where we produced footage of Jackson and Elizabeth Taylor emerging from a towncar in the middle of midtown with thousands of fans nearby cheering them on. When, in actual reality, a rather mortified midtown crowd had gone disturbingly quiet (which never happens), as though two extra-terrestrials had landed in the center of New York City. Our joyous, cheer-crazy footage hid the actual, realistic moment, which would have appeared like a misplaced scene from Close Encounters of the Third Kind. When a mega–pop star released a CD, while producing/fantasizing our warped television reality, we got soundbites from her about how she protected her virginity and stayed away from drinking or drug use. Later, in actual reality, I watched the pop princess, with hands rubbing all over a boyfriend’s clothed private parts, accept drugs and alcohol and partake in her party favors, with her dancers. Our moralistic, promotional segment was the antithesis of the orgy that went on downstairs at a now-defunct club. During another segment, we aired soundbites of a teen heartthrob walking the red carpet into an awards ceremony, proclaiming he was looking for a special lady, while earlier that day I had watched his notoriously overprotective manager grab the star’s rear and kiss him backstage. This was followed by some other homoerotic canoodling backstage during rehearsals, but of course none of this footage was aired, which I’m sure was appreciated by the celebrity and his drooling female fan following. For an entire week in London, we followed around another major star as she promoted her new book. Our footage showed her reading the entire story to a group of inner-city British schoolchildren, all of them captivated by her prose. When, in “actual reality,” more than half of the children had sprawled out on the carpet, napping, whispering loudly to each other, and bored to tears. Later, our crew captured her walking the red carpet into an awards show; we did not air the footage of her skipping the entire show, opting to instead slip out the backstage door into her towncar, after having thanked her fans and announcing how excited she was for the show. But I am not writing a gossip column here. Rather, this is our job. We get paid for this. It is our duty to ignore and erase “actual reality” for the expectation of our fans and the reputation of our celebrity clients. Stated again: We create your fantasy as your desired reality. Every day is comprised of a series of meticulous, manipulative steps to create what Baudrillard refers to as hyperreality, in order to seduce the American public to feature prominently into our Nielson ratings—especially during Sweeps Week, when the most ultradramatic, overhyped stories conveniently emerge, which is also the time of the year when celebrities are most

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promotional of themselves because they know their audiences want to know all their dirty little secrets. Entertainment television producers must have a hybrid, paradoxical version of reality and lead this hybrid life in order to play the middleman between celebrity life and our audience’s actual real lives. ENTERTAINMENT VS. INFORMATION: AMERICAN CULTURE IS POP CULTURE While, for example, I can understand why Daniel Radcliffe and his young Harry Potter costars will never feel like “regular” people due to never getting the chance to develop or even know their true selves; and, for example, I can empathize with Tom Cruise for crazily jumping on Oprah’s couch and subsequently being conveniently “let go” from his Paramount contract; and, for example, I can even relate to Bjork’s desire to wear an entire feathered swan to the 2001 Oscar ceremony . . . I still question relentlessly why the American public wants what it wants in terms of celebrity culture. Similar to anything else that is captured on camera, entertainment news is (obviously) not real. As soon as a correspondent, celebrities, or any montage of footage is filmed with expensive camera equipment and distributed via mass satellite feed to the American public, a representation of “real” Hollywood is catered buffet-style for tabloid-obsessed America. Defensor analyzes Baudrillard’s oft-studied and taught “Procession of Simulacra” in regards to this idea: All reality, he claims, can be concerted into signs which are empty. If you have worked in a public relations office, an advertisement company, or a political campaign stable, you can have some idea of what he is saying. The image is all. That’s how the sale is made. That’s how the votes come in. And the alienation of signs from reality becomes even greater as the draft text goes to the editors who do not worry about the reality, but are concerned about “what will the audience say?”4

Regardless of your abhorrence or appreciation for popular culture, it is obvious by reading any online service’s “Most Viewed News Stories” (i.e., Yahoo! News, Google News, MSN) that celebrity-oriented headlines top America’s information priorities, even that over politics and election coverage, Iraq war updates, or health and safety issues. Even today’s hard news programs and footage are criticized for placing importance on providing entertainment rather than information. Much of the in-depth hard news coverage is now filmed and produced like Jerry Bruckheimer Hollywood blockbusters, no matter if it’s about international wartime affairs or a local children’s spelling bee. This suggests that, today, perhaps all news is entertainment news. Lerner states of the millennial generation’s

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relationship with hard news: “21% of Americans younger than 30 consider comedy shows—comedy shows!—a primary source of political news.”5 This borderline sensationalistic style of news reporting in the twenty-first century has now placed entertainment values over the provision of information; network competition has become so fierce that it seems every aspect of news reporting has become for capitalistic gain. For the American public, the desire for subjective entertainment has now superseded that of the desire for objective information. Lerner also comments about this parasitic relationship between visual consumer expectation and network financial gain: We live in an age when cameras are ubiquitous and access to what had once been off-limits is virtually universal—operating rooms, police cars, the boudoirs of the rich and famous. Increasingly, events unfold in real time, and thanks to reality TV and the proliferation of media, the public sphere is larger than it ever has been before. At the same time, television docudramas and movies that are “based on a true story” encourage us to believe that we can view the world from on high, like omniscient narrators. But nothing’s really changed. The idea that we “know” the “real” people behind the celebrity remains an illusion no matter how often our overexposed movie stars visit Jay Leno’s couch or how many embarrassing admissions they make on “Larry King Live.”6

Every local pre-primetime five o’clock news often covers and presents epiclike news stories with Oscar-worthy cinematography about anything and everything, borderlining sensationalism and yellow journalism—but this method of combo-entertainment-information presentation has become expected by American audiences. Thus, since most news in the twenty-first century is often overdramatized, it would make sense that Hollywood-oriented program content is the most popular. Lawson proposes that today’s news production style and content is executed more like fictional works than concise, nonbiased, ethical reporting: The obvious temptation is to blame journalism, and it’s certainly true that these blockbuster news stories are partly shaped by the fact that today’s journalists (in print and television) have much more space and much less fear of legal censure than did their predecessors. But I think the news increasingly feels like a novel or screenplay because so many people now live like figures in fiction, defining themselves as “characters” within what artistic criticism calls a “structured narrative.”7

There must be some truth to Lawson’s fiction styled interpretation of today’s news production; otherwise, television “stars” (who are actually supposed to be nonbiased or nonpartisan reporters) such as Katie Couric or Anderson Cooper wouldn’t have such a prolific fan base. Couric, formerly

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with well-adored Matt Lauer on The Today Show —another form of “entertainment news”—became America’s Sweetheart, whose life was trailed by her audience of faithful followers who wanted to know every soap operatic detail about her husband, children, network reputation, and so forth. Likewise, if Cooper didn’t have his gray-haired, Indiana Jones-like stud character personae, bravely trudging through jungles and Middle Eastern battle fields, his reputation of a journalistic yet heroic, modern-day Gulliver or Gilgamesh wouldn’t have been cemented by his adoring viewership.

PARASITES AND THE LOSS OF MEANING The majority of the audience for a television news program such as Stars Today immediately interprets information, camera footage, and headlines as authentic, forgetting that all meaning of celebrity culture has been manipulated by us as television producers, writers, and directors, thus putting our own often ethically questionable editorial spin on whatever allegedly newsworthy information we are reporting to you. As far as meaning is concerned for audience consumption, shows such as Stars Today disguise soap-operatic tabloid information, complete with characters who have newsy lingo and language, prompting viewers to consider that they need to know the celebritysupported and endorsed facts we provide. The meaning of this editorialized information is plastically altered for its famished, avaricious audience of persons who long to be closer to real celebrities, the majority of whom are never presented in a real or unbiased manner. When any celebrity is filmed, photographed, or scribed about, it is impossible for these representations to be real, yet their faithful fan followings often fail to realize this. Toffolletti analyzes this concept as per Baudrillard’s take on television itself: For Baudrillard all the media of information and communication neutralize meaning, and involve the audience in a flat, one-dimensional media experience, which he defines in terms of a passive absorption of images or resistance to meaning, rather than an active processing or production of meaning.8

This suggests that, according to Baudrillard, the audience is to blame for their hungry consumption of these editorial images and their inability to decipher the real from the unreal, the meaningful and the meaningless, the true and the false. In opposition, it is easy to simply blame “the media”—particularly entertainment news shows such as Stars Today and gossip magazines such as Us Weekly —for spoon-feeding the American public this coveted footage and the reporting of their beloved celebrities. And admittedly, we, as entertainment informants, are at fault, at least partially.

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We’re to blame, perhaps even more so than our audiences’ willingness to believe our footage, all of which is, of course, advertised as honest reporting with journalistic integrity. Thus, if the relationship between entertainment television production and its audience is equally at fault for satisfying each other’s desires (the audience’s entertainment and informative wants; television’s monetary needs), wouldn’t celebrities, who are the coveted program content of these shows, be at fault, as well? Without newsworthy celebrities (i.e., popular or controversial or trendy), shows such as Stars Today would have no relationship with their audience to begin with. In regards to where blame should be placed, Defensor states, without withholding his opinion, “The tragedy is that these do not only happen in advertising or PR agencies, but also in the editorial and news offices of some print and electronic media who have lost their identities in this image and money jungle.”9 This parasitic tri-prong relationship between American consumerist culture feeding off of whatever celebrities give them, in terms of products (both handheld and artistic), body image, moral and ethical ideal systems, and all areas of trends (domesticity, fashion, travel and leisure, etc.), has partially alluded my psychology, because, since I have been of American voting age, all of celebrity culture, for me, has been work. EVERYONE LIKES TO BLAME “THE MEDIA” Of all the contentious social issue topics my writing seminar classes dissect, whenever we get to the week on Body Image, every last student explains that his/her own psychologically constructed body image is compounded from unrealistic media simulacra. When teaching theory and critical thinking to undergrads, popular culture examples always seem to be the most digestible. Whenever I ask my students how they choose whom to compare themselves in terms of media-dictated body image, the room falls silent. They palpably do not understand where their often unattainable self-perceptions and aspirations of media-dictated body image derive from. Coulter recalls Baudrillard’s object vs. subject separation of this rather quixotic self-perception: For Baudrillard, consumer society is object-focused and, as such, always disappoints. The object, however, does play a dramatic role. It designates the real world and its absence. Objects are uncanny: “There is always something in the object which the subject cannot comprehend,” says Baudrillard. The more objects we accumulate, the more obstacles we place between ourselves and relating. The object is a source of extreme paradox for consumer culture. By focusing on the object, rather than the subject, Baudrillard posits the object as a fully fledged actor in consumer society.10

For television, and perhaps all of visual media, the collection or accumulation of rapid-fire images is substituted for the accumulation of materialistic

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or physical objects. Visual, quite often editorially altered images, are far easier two-dimensional “objects” for viewers to consume than materialistic goods, so the media is able to force syndicated point-of-sale transactions via this parade of images at a much faster and more affective rate and at a larger volume. While my students (and most Americans who have embraced or accepted any overruling facets of popular culture) all blame “the media,” as is now overly common to do in the academic classroom, no one wants to admit that his or her own perception of him/herself has consciously or unconsciously evolved from images of various celebrities and models, all of which are represented in the form of unattainable but popular entertainment conglomerate-decided effigies. The media always seems to be at fault, but many of my students do not entirely know who and why they are blaming. Seaton states of this innate insecurity and general unknowingness of today’s university crowd: But there is also another, less obvious, source of attraction to the notion that “there is nothing outside the text.” Today Americans—and, perhaps, young people in particular—are concerned about identity and seem often to be searching for some sort of definite and secure identity . . . Advertising tells us that everything we eat or wear, any game we play and, naturally, anything we buy, is a sign that tells other people something about ourselves.11

The media sells ideas and lifestyles more than it does physical products, most of which are executed by celebrity culture, both directly and indirectly. These images and lifestyles are implemented into mainstream popular culture directly by conglomerate-dictated trends, while viewers’ psyches are affected indirectly by the posh lifestyle trends they view, and often attempt to emulate, compliments of filmed celebrity culture. The media is both a delight and a demon to the Millennial generation, but they’re understandably and forgivably unaware of who precisely is delighting and demonizing them. In response to my question about how they derive their own personal body image construction, my students unfalteringly ask, “What do you mean?” To which my immediate, easy answer is this: One evening during the Mission: Impossible 3 premiere, I stood on the red carpet outside of the Odeon Cinema in the middle of London’s Leicester Square. My cameramen and sound guys towered over my 5'7, 140-pound frame as I faced off with Tom Cruise, who, like a plastic Ken doll alien, had just landed from outer space to answer questions about his wardrobe tonight and his stunts in the film. I erected my shoulders as high as they’d go, realizing that I was speaking to a world-famous human being who, most likely, no longer actually knows the difference between the real and the unreal. And then, mortifyingly, I found myself neurotically having the following internal monologue: Tom Cruise is my height! He’s a shorty! Although he’s a bit bulkier and muscley, our body frames are essentially the same type. I bet we even have the same

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waist size! We’ve both got big glittery smiles, sparkly eyes and full heads of hair. Tom Cruise is an international sex symbol! Ergo —if Tom Cruise is wanted, desired and lusted after by the majority of the planet, then—WOW!—I MUST be okay, too!

At which point, while staring Tom Cruise in the face, I wanted to instead slap myself across the face, having realized that even though my entire professional life had consisted of serving the American public celebrity fantasy information—plasticized compilations of forged simulacra in the form of 20-second television promos—I too had fallen prey to my own company’s salesmanship of entertainment-driven self-degradation and questioning of self-worth. My microphone went limp at my side. After confessing this neurotic self-comparison to my students, they understand my question, and their responses are typically delivered in comprehensibly narcissistic categories, narcissistic in the realm of mirrored self-acceptance. The thin, peroxided girls want to emulate Charlize Theron and Cameron Diaz; the black and Latina females find acceptance from footage of J-Lo and Rihanna; the naturally curvier young women say they appreciate publicly proud celebs such as Kate Winslet and Scarlett Johansson. Most of my male students compare themselves to David Beckham or other popular athletes; hip-hop stars, the skin color of whom seems blessedly irrelevant to these Millennial students nowadays; indie and/or Emo bands such as Panic at the Disco! or The Killers; or, for the beer-guzzling frat dudes, any of today’s Frat Pack film stars, including Vince Vaughn and Luke and Owen Wilson. There is an image archetype for everyone as we near the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century. For example, most recently, the fall television season of 2007 introduced a geek club of characters for nerd viewers to relate to and women to find cute, such as the protagonists of Reaper, The IT Crowd, and Chuck, among others. These trends are conglomerately decided for competitive purposes, not simply by chance, which is unfortunately what the majority of the boob tube–consuming public assumes. CONFORMING TO YOUR OWN PERSONAL HOLLYWOOD ARCHETYPE Nowadays, this omnipresent, unidentifiable but blamed force called “the media” presents trends for its public to consume, thereby identifying and cementing its public’s self-worth. Ten, maybe even five years ago, celebrities such as potato-shaped Jack Black; schlubby, shaggy-headed Will Ferrell; or blatantly average Taylor Hicks would absolutely not be featured in prominent publications’ lists such as “America’s Best Bachelors” alongside chiseled Brad Pitt, Hollywood classical George Clooney, or athlete-stud

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Matthew McConaughey. Note: the aforedescribed qualities of these wellknown celebrities are not my personal, editorial physical descriptions, per se, but rather, the socially connotated reputations of their appearances. The public’s consumption of these images of overweight, out-of-shape celebrities who are now apparently considered “sexy” in the twenty-first century is perhaps acceptable nowadays because much of America is overweight and out-of-shape. The majority of this country does not synonymously resemble Brad Pitt and Charlize Theron, so the American public is much more comfortable being told that celebrities such as Jack Black and Mo’Nique are desirable. This means that if a man resembles Jack Black, then he is sexy and desirable enough to be a celebrity . . . ! I am not attempting to define beauty here but, rather, suggesting that television viewers narcissistically (but understandably) want confirmation or self-acceptance that they too are desirable and celebrity-worthy, like these superstar Hollywood images they watch daily. The parasitic relationship of these images—what “the media” force-feeds us and what we will consciously or unconsciously accept—is now more about deflated self-worth than about the power or presence of being a celebrity. In regards to this force-feeding of ideas and images, Baudrillard cites four steps in the progression of an image into simulacra: 1. 2. 3. 4.

The image reflects a basic reality. It masks and perverts a basic reality. It masks the absence of a basic reality. It bears no relation to any reality whatsoever.

Furthermore, Baudrillard notes the existence of simulation as something of a step toward simulacra. Simulation is an imitation of the real that often becomes confused for it. He also posits that we exist in a state of hyperreality, where little distinguishes the real and the imaginary. This is perhaps most readily apparent in television.12 This concept is impossible, as simulation, or an imitation of the real, can never actually happen in “the media” because there is no reality. The fantasy life, personalities, and images constructed around celebrity culture in entertainment television is this very state of Baudrillard’s hyperreality. Thus, no accurate simulation, not even an imitation of the real, can be successfully molded by television. In the twenty-first century, many (but not all) famous people who are considered “celebrities” are more Everymen or Everywomen—or Everylosers or Everynerds or Everygirl-next-doors—rather than the glittery, glamorous 1950s-esque celebrity personas. Much of the American public nowadays wants their celebrities to reflect an imitation of “reality” that is identifiable and relatable to them. In many cases, viewers prefer mirror image–type

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celebrity archetypes and images of themselves, so that, in our age of obsessive reality television fandom, the viewers themselves feel like celebrities, thanks to the casting of celebrity types.

WHITE POWER The majority of the stories we ran were increasingly considered edgy for our mega media conglomerate parent company, predominantly because before the emergence of these “big and beautiful” women, many of them non-Caucasian ladies, the majority of its channels and subsidiaries featured absolutely no facet of nonwhite culture. It wasn’t until just a couple of years ago when our executive producers decided it may be beneficial to our viewership if we had “persons of color” as correspondents, in order to hook in new millennial audiences. In years previous, even when doing man-on-the-street interviews (i.e., when a segment producer socially/casually assaults passersby with a microphone and questions, as his camera crew films each assault), we were blatantly informed to not ask “ugly,” overweight, or “alternative-looking” people, and especially, persons of color. The audience of Stars Today, along with most other mainstream American entertainment news programs, is not in New York or Los Angeles. We cater to the Neilson rating demographics of middle-aged, middle-class, Middle American–suburban, mostly female, mostly archetypal “housewife” viewers, the vast majority of whom are Caucasian. Seaton humorously paraphrases Sontag’s take on the dominance of “white culture”: The late Susan Sontag was once willing, like many other advanced thinkers, to think of cancer as a text revealing that one was guilt-ridden, uptight, repressed—in a word, bourgeois. It was with this notion in mind that she once declared that “the white race is the cancer of human history.”13

With specialty cable channels including BET, LOGO, Oxygen, and Spike now catering to very microscopic audiences, our twenty-first century production strategy has had to adopt a more multicultural marketing strategy and representation. Although this seems like a logical and welcome change in the television industry, many top executives believe that steering away from the aforementioned demographic is a ghettoization, or even a dumbingdown, of our program content. In a sense, well-watched and -rated entertainment news television programs serve as the mediators between celebrities and their worshipping audiences. We’re the dysfunctional middle child of Hollywood, stuck in the center, trying to make everyone happy. And if we can profit from both celebrities and their audiences, all the better.

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DEATH OF THE TELEVISED TEXT/ IT’S ALL ABOUT YOU Roland Barthes’s 1977 “The Death of the Author” critical commentary of the literary and publishing communities is, strangely, as applicable for Hollywood and the television community. Although the high-brow, elitist, and respected literary community is, by reputation, in opposition with the lowbrow, commercialist, and amoral television world, the audiences of these two sparring communities are often one-in-the-same and share a great deal of common characteristics. Because both the literary elite and Hollywood mass culture must cater to their audiences with very similar methods of pleasured satisfaction, Barthes’s proclamation that the audience has been given importance over the text itself seems wholly appropriate for entertainment news. Now that technology and media rule popular culture over the printed word, even entertainment news programs such as Stars Today are considered texts, suggesting that the sole purpose of such programs is to please their viewers but to also not simultaneously anger their celebrity clients. It’s tough making everyone happy. In “The Death of the Author,” Barthes wrote: Once the Author is removed, the claim to decipher a text becomes quite futile. To give a text an Author is to impose a limit on that text, to furnish it with a final signified, to close the writing. Such a conception suits criticism very well, the latter then allotting itself the important task of discovering the Author (or its hypostases: society, history, psyche, liberty) beneath the work: when the Author has been found, the text is “explained”—victory to the critic. Hence there is no surprise in the fact that, historically, the reign of the Author has also been that of Critic . . . In the multiplicity of writing, everything is to be disentangled, nothing deciphered.14

When audiences watch and interpret entertainment news shows, everyone is a critic. The very program content of a 30-minute entertainment news episode is a collection of often overdramatically represented promotional segments in which very little happens. This segment collection of celebrity gossip and soft news/feature stories is produced strictly to entice viewers to stay on the same channel for 30 minutes preprimetime so that said entertainment news show may secure these viewers for ratings. Entertainment news television does not capitalize on its viewership by providing its target viewer with a fantasy. Rather, we create fantasy—or hyperreality, as Baudrillard calls the “realistic” fantastical—presented to you, our faithful viewer, as the projected reality we’re convinced that you have special ordered. With market research, competitive Neilson ratings proof, and mega-media conglomerate-decided trends, we’re actually manipulating each of our television-viewing audience members as a marionette, simultaneously telling you what you want to watch yet hypocritically convincing

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you that we’re catering to your entertainment consumption needs and requests. Coinciding with Barthes’s “The Death of the Author,” this similar “Death of the Viewer” concept for American television audiences prompts viewers to not only embrace the clichéd idea of “don’t believe everything you see on television” but, more so, to realize that, in the twenty-first century, it is viewers who should embrace the power of free and original thought rather than accepting everything that we television producers passiveaggressively force-feed them. Without much of American television viewership making and pioneering this realization, the validity and reliability of the influence of “The Media” will continue to morph into a distrusted, inauthentic, hyperreality rather than a necessary, trusted source of information and entertainment. NOTES 1. Steven Poole, “Obituary: Jean Baudrillard: French philosopher and sociologist who explored the changing nature of reality in the media age,” The Guardian (Guardian Obituary Pages), March 8, 2007, ProQuest, http://www.library.manhattan.edu:2062/ pqdweb?did1229149761&Fmt3&clientId10762&RQT309&VNamePQD. 2. Kim Toffoletti, “Media Implosion: Posthuman Bodies at the Interface: [1],” Hecate, 29, 2003, ProQuest, http://www.library.manhattan.edu:2062/pqdweb?did 592467571&Fmt3&clientId10762&RQT309&VNamePQD. 3. New Media Age, “Hollywood writers’ strike is a symptom of a wider change,” December 13, 2007, ProQuest, http://www.library.manhattan.edu:2062/pqdweb? did1399578861&Fmt3&clientId10762&RQT309&VNamePQD. 4. Benjamin G. Defensor, “One Man’s Meat,” BusinessWorld, January 15, 2007, ProQuest, http://www.library.manhattan.edu:2062/pqdweb?did1194655301&Fmt3& clientId10762&RQT309&VNamePQD. 5. Preston Lerner, “ ‘Based on a True Story’; An absolutely 100 percent factual account of Hollywood’s gradual devaluation of reality—depending, of course, on how you define the words ‘true,’ ‘factual,’ and ‘reality’,” Los Angeles Times (Los Angeles Times Magazine), September 11, 2005, ProQuest, http://www.library.manhattan. edu:2062/pqdweb?did894472081&Fmt3&clientId10762&RQT309&VNamePQD. 6. Lerner, “Based on a True Story.” 7. Mark Lawson, “Comment and Debate: Front-page thrillers: The Hyper-reality of fiction techniques has transformed the way we consume the news,” The Guardian ( The Guardian Comment and Debate Pages), December 7, 2007, ProQuest, http://www. library.manhattan.edu:2062/pqdweb?did1394631951&Fmt3&clientId10762&RQT3 09&VNamePQD. 8. Toffoletti, “Media Implosion.” 9. Defensor, “One Man’s Meat.” 10. B. Gerry Coulter, “Passwords,” The Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology (Book reviews/Comptes rendus), February 2005, 42, ProQuest, http://www.library. manhattan.edu:2062/pqdweb?did815510401&Fmt3&clientId10762&RQT309&VN amePQD.

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11. James Seaton, “The Word is Out,” The Weekly Standard, February 25, 2008, ProQuest, http://www.library.manhattan.edu:2062/pqdweb?did1435702601&Fmt3&cli entId10762&RQT309&VNamePQD. 12. Christopher Wright, “Welcome to the Jungle of the Real: Simulation, Commoditization, and Survival,” The Journal of American Culture, June 2006, 29, ProQuest, http://www.library.manhattan.edu:2062/pqdweb?did1047821271&Fmt4&clientId1 0762&RQT309&VNamePQD. 13. Seaton, “The Word is Out.” 14. Roland Barthes, “The Death of the Author,” Image, Music, Text, 1977, North Carolina State University, http://social.chass.ncsu.edu/wyrick/debclass/whatis.htm.

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About the Editor and Contributors

EDITOR

Robert C. Sickels is Associate Professor of American Film and Popular Culture at Whitman College. He has made several short films that have played nationally at festivals around the country. In addition to publishing numerous journal articles and book chapters, he is also the author of American Popular Culture Through History: The 1940s (Greenwood, 2004) and American Film in the Digital Age (Praeger, 2009).

CONTRIBUTORS

Harry Brown is an Assistant Professor of English at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana. His essays on American literature and digital games have appeared in the Journal of American and Comparative Cultures, Works and Days, Paradoxa, as well as several collections. His book, Injun Joe’s Ghost, was published in 2004. Mary P. Erickson is a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Journalism and Communication at the University of Oregon. She worked as a publicist for a Seattle film arts organization and with several independent filmmakers. She coedited a book with Janet Wasko titled Cross-Border Cultural Production: Economic Runaway or Globalization?

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About the Editor and Contributors

Jeffrey Hirschberg is an Assistant Professor and Coordinator of the Television Arts program at Buffalo State College. He is a member of the WGA, a professional screenwriter, and is currently writing a book on Heroes & Villains in American Film for Michael Wiese Productions (ThreeAct.com). Sue J. Kim is an Assistant Professor of English at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where she teaches cultural studies and literary theory. Her essays have appeared in Modern Fiction Studies, the Journal of Asian American Studies, and Narrative. Ramon Lobato is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Melbourne and a sessional lecturer at RMIT University. His current research examines the relationship between film distribution and globalization, and his work has appeared in Camera Obscura, Media International Australia, Limina, Continuum, and Studies in Australasian Cinema. Kimberly A. Owczarski is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Texas at Austin in the Department of Radio -Television-Film. She is currently finishing her dissertation on the relationship between the Batman film franchise and Time Warner. She has published articles in Cine Action, Journal of Film and Video, and Spectator. Anne H. Petersen is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Radio-TelevisionFilm at the University of Texas–Austin, where she focuses on the intersections of celebrity culture and New Media. She currently serves as coeditor of the online journal FlowTV, available at www.flowtv.org. Zachary Snider, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor at New York University and other Manhattan universities, specializing in courses in creative writing, journalism, and postmodernism. He also works professionally as a television and print journalist and writes fiction novels and nonfiction publications. R. Colin Tait teaches Asian Cinema and Contemporary Film Authorship at The University of British Columbia. His current research interests include contemporary Hollywood, politics, film genre, and Fredric Jameson. He is currently coauthoring a monograph on The Cinema of Steven Soderbergh with Andrew deWaard. Yannis Tzioumakis is a Lecturer in Media and Communication Studies at the University of Liverpool. He has published widely on American cinema. His book American Independent Cinema: An Introduction was published in 2006. He is currently coediting “American Indies,” a book series dedicated to independent cinema, and contributing to a volume on Mamet’s The Spanish Prisoner.

Index

About Last Night . . . , 163 Access, piracy as, 29 –32 Actors, 139 – 40 Adee, Peter, 8, 9 –10 Adult industry, and piracy, 23– 24 Aint It Cool News, 67 Aladdin, 83–84 All the Right Moves, 211 AMC Theatres, 143, 181 America On Line (AOL), 70, 101 Amoco, 66 Amusement rides, 61, 77–78, 80, 82, 89 –90. See also Theme parks AOL (America On Line), 70, 101 Arkin, Alan, 139 Armageddon, 81–82 Artisan, 174 Asia, piracy in, 16, 22– 23, 29, 30 –31 Asphalt Jungle, The, 18 Assimilation, in movies, 6 Atari, 111–12, 113, 116, 123 Audience, 10 –11, 220 – 21 Authorship, piracy as, 25– 28 Aviator, The, 153–54 Awards, 141– 42

Bad Company, 82 Bagdikian, Ben H., 57, 72 Baker, D., 104 Baker, Sala, 96, 98–99, 100 –101, 104 Balazs, Bela, 208, 210 Barthes, Roland, 26, 27, 208–9, 229, 230 Bass, Lance, 201 “Batdance” (Prince), 58–59 Batman: The Animated Series, 61, 63 Batman: The Escape, 61 Batman, The (television program), 68 Batman and Robin, 65– 67 Batman Begins, 55, 68– 69, 72 Batman Beyond, 68 Batman Forever, 64 – 66 Batman franchise, 55–72; amazing functions of, 56– 64; high-tech synergy and, 66–71; Six Flags parks and, 60 – 61; synergy and media integration, 55–56; “toyetic” Batman, 64 – 66. See also Time Warner Batman Gotham Knights, 67– 68 Batman (movie), 57–59, 63, 71 Batman Returns: The Official Movie Book (Burton), 62 Batman Returns (movie), 61, 62– 64, 66

236 Batman the Ride, 61 Batmobile, 68– 69 Baudrillard, Jean, 218–19, 220, 221, 223, 224, 227 Baumgarten, Marjorie, 190 –91 Bay, Michael, 81, 82, 125 Beckham, Victoria, 209 –10 Berri, Claude, 162 Bettig, Ronald, 28, 29 Birds of Prey, 68 Black, Jack, 226, 227 Blackman, W. Haden, 122 Blair Witch Project, The: box office earnings and distribution, 134; film festival release and distribution, 140, 174; as Web phenomenon, 37, 38, 47, 50 Blogs, gossip. See Gossip blogs Bloom, Orlando, 82, 84, 87 Boorstin, Daniel, 202, 203 Borrelli, Christopher, 190 Boyens, Philippa, 96 Boynton Beach Club, 49 Bradford, Kyle, 201– 2 Bradshaw, Peter, 105 Braff, Zach, 138 Brave New Theaters, 145 Brokeback Mountain, 129 –30, 131, 174 Brooke-Rose, Christine, 98 Bruce Almighty, 2–3 Bruckheimer, Jerry, 81–82, 83, 88 Bubble, 179, 180 –81, 182, 183–84, 189 –91, 192 Buena Vista Pictures, 43– 44. See also Walt Disney Pictures Buice, Susan, 51, 144 – 46, 147, 148 Burr, Ty, 190 Burton, Tim, 58, 61, 62– 63 Cable and Satellite Broadcasting Association of Asia, 16 Cable market, 157 Camp, 203– 4, 205 Capote, 129 –30 Carell, Steve, 2–3 Cassavetes, John, 156, 166 Cassidy Kids, The, 48 CBS Corporation, 6–7 Celebrities, homosexuality of, 200 – 202

Index Celebrity gossip, 198–99. See also Gossip blogs Celebrity journalism, 217–30; audience expectations, 220 – 21; blaming the media, 224 – 26; career formation in, 217–19; conforming to personal Hollywood archetype, 226– 28; death of televised text, 229 –30; diversity and, 228; entertainment versus information, 221– 23; parasites and the loss of meaning, 223– 24; television producer and his Other, 219 China, piracy in, 22– 23 Chronicles of Narnia, The, 46 Chronicles of Riddick, The, 125 Church, Thomas Haden, 139 Cinemark USA, 181 Classics divisions, 158–59 Click, 144 Clockers, 186 Clooney, George, 137, 138–39, 183, 184, 185 Cockroach capitalism, 23 Collette, Toni, 139 Consent Decree (1940), 4 –5 Convergence Culture (Jenkins), 116–17 Cooper, Anderson, 222, 223 Copyright, 17– 20, 22, 24, 26– 27, 61. See also Piracy Copyrighting Culture (Bettig), 28 Copyrights and Copywrongs (Vaidhyanathan), 24 Copyright Term Extension Act (1998), 18 Costs: marketing, 8; piracy, 186; prints and advertising, 182, 188; production, 1, 182 Country Bear Jamboree ride, 80 –81 Country Bears, The (movie), 80 –81, 82 Couric, Katie, 222– 23 Crash, 104 –5, 129 –30 Creative Commons, 25 Cruise, Tom, 195–96, 199 – 200, 201– 2, 211–12, 221, 225– 26 Crumley, Arin, 51, 144 – 46, 147, 148 Cuban, Mark, 179 –80, 181–83, 186, 188, 189, 191–92 Cultural Control and Globalization in Asia (Pang), 29 Cyan Pictures, 49

Index Daly, Steven, 186 Dances with Wolves, 162, 173 Dargis, Manohla, 99, 100, 190 Dark Forces, 120 Dark Knight, The, 70, 71 Da Vinci Code, The, 188 Day-and-date release strategy, 179, 180, 189 Dayton, Jonathan, 138 Deadroom, 48, 49 “Death of the Author, The” (Barthes), 229, 230 Dee, Jonathan, 113–14 Defensor, Benjamin G., 221, 224 Dell, 69 De Palma, Brian, 182, 186, 191 Depp, Johnny, 82, 83, 84, 85–87, 90 Digitization, 115–16, 188 Directors, 138–39 Disney, Walt, 77–78. See also Walt Disney Company; Walt Disney Pictures “Disney Vault,” 187 Diversity, and celebrity journalism, 228 Downs, Hugh, 140 Dunst, Kirsten, 206 DVD market, 187, 188–89, 190 DVD technology, and piracy, 23 Dyack, Denis, 114 Dyer, Richard, 197–98, 202, 204 –5, 207, 208, 210 EA (Electronic Arts), 117, 118, 120 – 21 Ebert, Roger, 93, 105, 111, 190 E! cable channel, 198–99 Economics, and star production, 198– 202 Eisner, Michael, 85, 89 Electronic Arts (EA), 117, 118, 120 – 21 Elliott, Ted, 83–84, 88 Empire of Mind, The (Strangelove), 24 – 25 Empire of Their Own, An (Gabler), 4 England, copyright history, 17, 19 Enron, 191 Entertainment news television. See Celebrity journalism Entertainment versus information, 221– 23 Entertainment Weekly, 55 Enter the Matrix, 111 E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (movie), 111

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E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (videogame), 111–12, 113, 116, 123 Evan Almighty, 2–3 Everything or Nothing, 121 “Face of Garbo, The” (Barthes), 208–9 Fair use provisions, 18 Family Business, 3– 4 Faris, Valerie, 138 Far North, 164 Fashion, and star production, 204 –7 Fast and Furious, The, 10 Film festivals, 140 – 41, 142– 43 Filmhaus Productions, 154, 159, 165– 66 Filmways, 160 Fine Line, 132 Finn, Adam, 38, 40, 42, 44, 47 Fithian, John, 191 Florsheim, Bobby, 2 Focus Features, 130, 133, 141, 174. See also Universal Pictures Foucault, Michel, 26, 30 Four Eyed Monsters, 51, 144 – 46, 147, 148 Four Quadrants, 7–8 Fox Searchlight, 39, 136, 140, 141, 159. See also Twentieth Century Fox Fox (television network), 18, 61, 63 Franchise films, 56, 89. See also Batman franchise; Star Wars franchise Free Culture (Lessig), 25 Free enterprise, piracy as, 22– 24 Free speech, piracy as, 24 – 25 Frito Lay, 66 Full Frontal, 183, 184, 185 Fun With Dick and Jane, 43, 44 Gabler, Neal, 4, 5, 6 Galloway, Alexander, 123, 124 Garbo, Greta, 208–9 Garden State: awards, 142; director, 138; marketing, 136–37; release strategy, 140, 141; storyline, 137 Gay Ideas (Mohr), 200 – 201 Giamatti, Paul, 140 Glengarry Glen Ross, 162, 163 Global Hollywood (Miller et al.), 28– 29 Godfather: The Game, 125 Golumbia, David, 100 Gone with the Wind, 135

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Index

Good Night, and Good Luck: actors, 140; awards, 142; director, 138–39; executive producer, 185; financing and production, 129–30; marketing, 136–37; release strategy, 140; storyline, 137 Gossip blogs: Cruise, Tom, and, 195–96; fashion and, 206–7; format, 197–98, 205; function, 197; immediacy of, 204; manipulation and, 209; star production and, 196–97. See also Hilton, Perez Grant, Cary, 211–12 Great Santini, The, 160 Greenlighting process, 1–12; audience, built-in, 10 –11; history, early studio, 4 – 6; horizontal integration, 6–7; marketing, 7–10; production costs, average, 1; screenplays, 1–3 Guardian, The, 43– 44 Guber, Peter, 57–58, 59 Haggis, Paul, 104 Harold Buttleman, Daredevil Stuntman, 146 Hausman, Michael, 154, 165– 66, 167 HBO, 161, 165. See also Time Warner HDNet Films, 179 –80, 181–82, 186, 191–92 Head Trauma, 146 Hedge fund partners, 3 Hell’s Angels, 135 Hepburn, Audrey, 208–9 High-definition technology, 179, 181–84, 188, 189, 190 Hilton, Paris, 202, 203, 204, 209 Hilton, Perez: Beckham, Victoria, and, 209 –10; camp and, 203– 4, 205; Cruise, Tom, and, 199 – 200, 202; fashion and, 205– 6; function of blog, 197, 211, 212, 213; Hilton, Paris, and, 202, 203, 204; influence, 196; magic/talent and, 207–8; nature of the medium and, 209 –10; outing of celebrities, 200 – 201, 202; queer identity of, 196, 200, 202; as star manipulator, 202– 4; on Talk Soup, 199 Holland, Del, 69 Hollywood archetypes, 226– 28 Hollywood Pictures, 81. See also Walt Disney Company Holmes, Katie, 195, 199, 202 Holson, Laura M., 188

Homosexuality, of celebrities, 200 – 202 Horizontal integration, 6–7, 55–56 House of Games, 154 –55, 162, 163– 64, 165– 67, 168, 170 –73 House on Carroll Street, The, 162 Howe, John, 98, 101 Hughes, Howard, 135 Huston, John, 18 Iger, Robert, 89 ILM (Industrial Light and Magic), 112–13, 115, 116, 117, 122 “Independence” as marketing label, 129 – 48; actors, 139 – 40; awards, 141– 42; challenges, 142– 44; directors, 138–39; independent trailblazers, 144 – 47; marketing strategies, 135–36; overview, 129 –31; ownership issues, 131–35; release strategy, 140 – 41; storylines, 137. See also Marketing Independent films: history, 155–59; as label, 153–54, 155–56; major studio films versus, 38–39. See also “Independence” as marketing label; specific films Independent Spirit Awards, 141– 42 India, piracy in, 30 –31 Industrial Light and Magic (ILM), 112–13, 115, 116, 117, 122 Information versus entertainment, 221– 23 Intellectual property. See Copyright; Piracy Interactivity, controlled, 44 – 47 Internet. See Web sites, movie Internet downloads, 179, 180, 189 In the Company of Men, 164 – 65 “It’s Being So Camp As Gets Us Going” (Dyer), 205 iTunes, 189, 192 Jackson, Michael, 220 Jackson, Peter: King Kong, 50 –51, 114; Lord of the Rings trilogy, 96, 97, 98, 101, 102, 121 Jarvie, I. C., 204 Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, 167, 174 Jean de Florette, 162 Jedi Academy, 120 Jedi Knight, 120

Index Jedi Outcast, 120 Jenkins, Henry, 116–17, 118, 120, 126 Jolie, Angelina, 207–8, 209 Jones, Tommy Lee, 143 Kafka, 184 Katz, Jonathan, 163 Kaufman, Anthony, 147 Kellogg’s, 66 Kelsey, Jane, 103 King Kong, 42– 43, 44, 50 –51, 114, 134, 141 Kinnear, Greg, 139 Kirsner, Scott, 190 Knowles, Harry, 67 K-Street, 183, 185 La Bute, Neil, 164 – 65 Ladyman, George, 61 Landmark theater chain, 180, 186, 188, 191 Lane, Anthony, 126 Last Romantic, The, 49 Lawson, Mark, 222 LDAC (Letterman Digital Arts Center), 112–13, 115, 117, 122 Lee, Alan, 101 Lee, Ang, 174 Leggat, Graham, 122, 123, 126 Lemire, Christie, 138 Lerner, Avi, 130 Lerner, Preston, 221– 22 Lessig, Lawrence, 24, 25, 28, 30 Letterman Digital Arts Center (LDAC), 112–13, 115, 117, 122 Levin, Gerald, 60 – 61, 70 Liang, Lawrence, 30 –31 Licensing Corp. of America, 59. See also Warner Communications, Inc. Liepzig, Adam, 187, 190 Lion King, The, 78–79, 82 Lionsgate, 8, 39, 46– 47 Little Miss Sunshine: actors, 139; awards, 142; directors, 138; marketing, 136–37; release strategy, 141; storyline, 137 Little Romance, A, 160 Loews Cineplex, 181 LOL, 48– 49 Lopez, Jennifer, 206

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Lord of the Rings: merchandise, 50; race in, 93, 95–96, 97–104, 105– 6; videogame adaptations, 120 – 21 Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (movie), 96, 98 Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (videogame), 118 Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (movie), 97, 99, 118–19, 121, 126 Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (videogame), 117, 118 Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (movie), 96, 97, 98, 100 –101 Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (videogame), 118–19, 121 Lucas, George, 112, 113, 115–16, 117, 188 LucasArts, 112–13, 115, 117, 118, 119–22 Lucasfilm: “independence” of, 132; Letterman Digital Arts Center and, 112–13, 115, 117; revenues, 39; Star Wars franchise, 45– 46, 47, 114 Lukk, Tiiu, 135, 138 Lurtz (Lord of the Rings character), 96, 97 Madsen, Virginia, 139 – 40 Magic/talent, and star production, 207–8 Magnolia Pictures, 180, 181 Makoare, Lawrence, 96, 97, 98–99, 104 Mamet, David: aesthetic vision, 168–72; early work, 162, 163; House of Games, 155, 162, 163– 65, 166– 67, 168, 170 –73 Manipulation, and star production, 202– 4 Manon des Sources, 162 Manovich, Lev, 204, 205, 209 Mantegna, Joe, 168, 169 Maori, 96–97, 102– 4 Marketing: costs, 8; greenlighting process and, 7–10; strategies, 135–36; viral, 47–50. See also “Independence” as marketing label Mass entertainment, movies as, 5 Matrix: Reloaded, 111 Matrix, The, 95, 111 Matrix trilogy, 111, 117, 124 McDonald, Paul, 196 McDonald’s, 63, 64 McGregor, Judy, 103 McNamara, Mary, 139

240

Index

McNamara, Melissa, 200 Medavoy, Mike, 162 Media, blaming the, 224 – 26 Merchandising, saturated, 42– 44 Meyer, Barry, 70 MGM, 18 Miami Vice, 144 Micheux, Oscar, 156 Michigan International Speedway, 68– 69 Miller, Toby, 28– 29 Mills, Mike, 143 Miramax Films: as independent film producer, 39, 136, 140, 158–59, 174; investment in multimillion dollar productions, 173; Lord of the Rings trilogy, 101; publicity and advertising, 136; as specialty studio, 132; takeover by Disney, 158. See also Walt Disney Pictures Mission: Impossible III, 196, 199 – 200 Moguls, 4 – 6 Mohr, Richard, 200 – 201 Molyneux, Peter, 123 Morawiec, Peter, 120 Morris, Wesley, 99 Mortensen, Viggo, 100 –101 Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), 16, 20 – 21, 23, 29, 30 Movie attendance in theaters, 50 MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America), 16, 20 – 21, 23, 29, 30 Mrs. Doubtfire, 134 Multiculturalism, liberal, 94 –95, 99, 104, 106 Multiplier theory, 9 –10 Munich, 129 My Big Fat Greek Wedding, 10, 133 MySpace, 48– 49, 51 NASCAR, 68– 69 New Line Cinema, 50, 101, 102, 132, 173. See also Time Warner New Zealand, 101, 102– 4 Nigerian video-film industry (Nollywood), 32 Nolan, Christopher, 68 Ocean’s 11, 185 Oh in Ohio, The, 49

Omi, Michael, 94 Orion Classics, 162 Orion Home Entertainment, 161– 62 Orion Pictures: distribution deal with Warner Bros., 159 – 61; HBO, partnership with, 161; history, 159 – 62; House of Games, 154 –55, 162, 165; independent film, impact on, 173 Ownership issues, 131–35 Pacific Islanders, 102– 4 Package-unit system of production, 165–67 Paltrow, Gwyneth, 207 Pang, Laikwan, 29 Paramount Classics, 132 Paramount Pictures, 38–39, 132, 196 Paramount Vantage, 132 Passion of the Ark, The (Florsheim and Stolberg), 2 Passion of the Christ, The, 134 Pearl Harbor, 82, 125 Perren, Alisa, 133 Persall, Steve, 137 Peters, Jon, 57–58, 59 Philip, Kativa, 25, 30 Photoshop, 209, 210 Picturehouse, 44. See also HBO; New Line Cinema; Time Warner Piracy, 15–33; as access, 29 –32; as authorship, 25– 28; copyright law history, 17– 20; costs, 186; defined, 16; as free enterprise, 22– 24; as free speech, 24 – 25; future of war on, 32–33; history, 16–17; as resistance, 28– 29; statistics, 16; as theft, 20 – 22 Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, 88 Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, 82–87 Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, 87–88 Pirates of the Caribbean ride, 77–78, 80, 82, 89 –90 Pittman, Robert, 60 Pixar Entertainment, 7–8 Platoon, 161– 62 Pleskow, Eric, 161 Porn, and piracy, 23– 24 “Porous Legalities and Avenues of Participation” (Liang), 30 –31

Index Postman Always Rings Twice, The, 163, 172 Previsualization, 115, 116 Prince, 58–59, 61 Prints and advertising (P&A) costs, 182, 188 Private film financier/hedge fund partners, 3 “Procession of Simulacra” (Baudrillard), 221 Producers, television, 219 Production costs, 1, 182 Public domain, 17, 18 Pula, Chris, 67 Purple Rain, 58 Race: in Crash, 104 –5; film industry and, 93–95; in Lord of the Rings trilogy, 93, 95–96, 97–104, 105–6; in Matrix, The, 95 Racial Formations in the United States (Omi and Winant), 94 Raiders of the Lost Ark, 160 “Recycling Modernity” (Sundaram), 31 Redacted, 186, 191 Redstone, Sumner M., 6–7, 196 Regal Entertainment Group, 181 Relativity Media, 3 Release strategy, 140 – 41 Republic Commando, 120 Resistance, piracy as, 28– 29 Risky Business, 211 Roadside Attractions, 49 Roberts, Julia, 184 Rock, The, 81 Romanelli, Dan, 63, 64, 68 Rossio, Terry, 83–84, 88 Run Lola Run, 124 – 25 Rush Hour 3, 184 Samuel Goldwyn Films, 49 Saving Private Ryan, 186 Saw franchise, 8, 46– 47 Schamus, James, 187 Schizopolis, 184, 185 Schneider, Bob, 66 Schneller, Johanna, 136 Schumacher, Joel, 64, 66, 67 Scooby-Doo, 11 Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, 11 Scott, A. O., 99, 137

241

Scott, Ridley, 124 Screen adaptations, 79 –80 Screenplays, 1–3 Seaton, James, 225, 228 Selznick, David O., 135 sex, lies, and videotape, 157–58, 184 Sexual Perversity in Chicago, 162, 163 Shadows of Empire, 45 Shepard, Sam, 164 Shrek, 83–84 Shyamalan, M. Night, 179, 180, 189, 190 Sideways: actors, 139 – 40; awards, 142; marketing, 136–37; release strategy, 140, 141; storyline, 137 Silence of the Lambs, The, 162 Silent Tongue, 164 Simpson, Don, 81 Simpson, Jessica, 206, 209 Simpsons, The, 18 Six Flags theme parks, 60 – 61, 69 Sixth Sense, The, 189 Smallville, 55 Smith, Kevin, 166, 167– 68, 174 Soderbergh, Steven: Bubble, 181, 182–84, 190; career, 184 –86; partnership with Cuban and Wagner, 179 –80, 189, 191–92 Solaris, 185 Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (1998), 18 Sontag, Susan, 203, 228 Sony, 23 Sony Pictures, 38–39, 43, 44, 132 Sony Pictures Classics, 140, 143, 164 – 65 South by Southwest Film Festival, 48, 51 Sparrow, Jack (Pirates of the Caribbean character), 84 –88 Spartacus, 156, 157 Spector, Warren, 118 Spider-Man, 186 Spider-Man 3, 134, 141, 182 Spielberg, Steven, 111 Spout.com, 145, 146 Star production: economics and, 198– 202; fashion and, 204 –7; magic/talent and, 207–8; manipulation and, 202– 4; nature of the medium and, 208–10 Starrett, Peter, 60 Star System, The (McDonald), 196

242

Index

Star Trek, 100 Star Wars: Battlefront, 111 Star Wars: Bounty Hunter, 117, 118, 119, 122 Star Wars: Clone Wars, 119 Star Wars: Jedi Starfighter, 119 Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, 119 – 20, 121, 122 Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, 122 Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, 46, 95, 119 Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, 115, 117, 188 Star Wars Episode III—Revenge of the Sith, 45 Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, 119 – 20 Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, 119 Star Wars franchise: ancillary industries, 188; digitization, 188; prequels, 132; videogames, 111, 117, 118, 119 – 22; Web sites, 45– 46, 47 Stokes, Francis, 146 Stolberg, Josh, 2 Storylines, 137 Strangelove, Michael, 24 – 25 Strathairn, David, 140 Studios, major, 4 – 6, 38–39, 132–33 Sullivan, Steve, 115 Sundance Film Festival, 141 Sundaram, Ravi, 31 Swanberg, Joe, 48, 50, 51 Synergy, 55–56. See also Batman franchise; Time Warner Taco Bell, 66 Talent, and star production, 207–8 Talk Soup, 198– 200 Taylor, Chad, 201– 2 Taylor, Elizabeth, 220 Taylor, Richard, 101, 102 TeAwa, Joanne, 103 Television producers, 219 Theaters, movie attendance in, 50 Theft, piracy as, 20 – 22 Theme parks, 60 – 61, 69, 79. See also Amusement rides Thing About My Folks, The, 44 Thomson, David, 125, 211

Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, The, 143 Thumbsucker, 143 Time Inc., 55, 57 Time Warner: America On Line merger, 70; copyright and, 61; creation by merger, 57; franchises, 71, 72; losses, 59; media ownership, 132; retail stores, 59 – 60; theme parks, 60 – 61, 69; Turner Broadcasting System acquisition, 65. See also Batman franchise; New Line Cinema; Warner Bros. Titanic, 134, 156–57 Toffoletti, Kim, 219, 223 Tolkien, J. R. R., 97, 121. See also Lord of the Rings Touchstone Pictures, 81. See also Walt Disney Company Traffic, 184 –85 Transmedia storytelling, 116– 21 TriStar Pictures, 3– 4 Turner, Will (Pirates of the Caribbean character), 84 –85, 88 Turner Broadcasting System, 65, 132 Turtletaub, Marc, 138 Twentieth Century Fox, 38–39, 132 2929 Pictures. See HDNet Films Tykwer, Tom, 124 – 25 Tzioumakis, Yannis, 133–34 Underneath, The, 185–86 Universal Pictures: Evan Almighty, 2–3; Fast and Furious, The, 10; King Kong, 42– 43, 44, 50 –51; as major studio, 38–39, 132. See also Focus Features Untouchables, The, 163– 64 Uruks, in Lord of the Rings, 96, 98–99 Utu, 96–97 Vaidhyanathan, Siva, 24 Valenti, Jack, 15, 20 – 21, 24 Verbinski, Gore, 82, 83, 84, 89 –90 Verdict, The, 163, 172 Vertical integration, 4 –5 Viacom, 6–7 Videogames, 111– 26; early, 111–12; Hollywood and, 113–16; media convergence and media criticism, 122– 26; production facilities, 112–13,

Index 115, 117, 122; transmedia storytelling and, 116– 21. See also specific videogames Video market, 157 Viral marketing, organic, 47–50. See also Web sites, movie Wachowski, Andy, 114, 117 Wachowski, Larry, 114, 117 Wagner, Todd, 179 –80, 181–83, 186, 189, 191–92 Walt Disney Company: amusement rides, 77–78, 80, 82, 89 –90; Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, 77–90; profits, 59; retail stores, 59 – 60; screen adaptations, 79 –80; takeover of Miramax, 158; theme parks, 79 Walt Disney Pictures, 38–39, 46, 78–79, 82, 132 Warner Bros., 38–39, 132–33, 159 – 60 Warner Bros. Studio Stores, 59 – 60, 64, 66 Warner Bros. Worldwide Consumer Products, 63 Warner Communications, Inc. (WCI), 57, 58–59, 111–12, 113 Warner Independent Pictures, 39, 132–33. See also Warner Bros. Warshaw, Howard Scott, 116 Wasko, Janet, 38, 42

243

WB Television Network, 55, 67– 68 WCI (Warner Communications, Inc.), 57, 58–59, 111–12, 113 Web sites, movie, 37–52; Batman and Robin, 66– 67; Batman Begins, 69; Batman Forever, 65; controlled interactivity, 44 – 47; Dark Knight, The, 70; major studio versus independent films, 38–39; organic viral marketing, 47–50; promotional approaches, 40 – 41; saturated merchandising, 42– 44 Weiler, Lance, 146 Welcome to the Dollhouse, 140 When Work Disappears (Wilson), 104 Williams, Chris, 119 Wilson, William J., 104 Winant, Howard, 94 Wolf, Mark J. P., 122– 23 World Trade Organization (WTO), 18, 22– 23, 28 Wyatt, Justin, 135 Yar, Majid, 17, 21 Yatt, John, 93, 99 Young, Neil, 121 YouTube, 51, 145, 146, 148 Zulu, 97

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The Business of Entertainment

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The Business of Entertainment VOLUME 2

Popular Music

Edited by Robert C. Sickels

 

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The business of entertainment / edited by Robert C. Sickels. p. cm. — (Praeger perspectives) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978– 0 –275–99838–7 (set: alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–275–99840–0 (vol. 1 : alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–275–99842–4 (vol. 2 : alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–275–99844–8 (vol. 3 : alk. paper) 1. Performing arts. 2. Performing arts—Economic aspects. I. Sickels, Robert. PN1584.B87 2009 790.2—dc22 2008030435 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available. Copyright © 2009 by Robert C. Sickels All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, by any process or technique, without the express written consent of the publisher. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2008030435 ISBN: 978–0–275–99838–7 (set) 978–0–275–99840–0 (vol. 1) 978–0–275–99842–4 (vol. 2) 978–0–275–99844–8 (vol. 3) First published in 2009 Greenwood Press, 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881 An imprint of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. www.greenwood.com Printed in the United States of America

The paper used in this book complies with the Permanent Paper Standard issued by the National Information Standards Organization (Z39.48–1984). 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

I stop somewhere waiting for you. —Walt Whitman

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Contents

Preface by Robert C. Sickels Acknowledgments

xiii

 1

Songwriting, Creativity, and the Music Industry Phillip McIntyre

 2

The Devaluation of Recorded Music: A New Business Model for the Music Industry Richard Strasser

 3

ix

The Macro/International Music Business: Australian Trajectories and Perspectives in a Global Context Guy Morrow

1

21

43

 4

Music Copyright in the Twenty-First Century Robert McParland

59

 5

Rock Brands Mike Emery

75

 6

Mapping the Territory: Cultural Authenticity in World Music Amy M. Corey

93

viii

 7

 8  9

Contents

“I Gave My Rights Away for a Song”: How Billy Bragg Persuaded MySpace to Change Its Tune on Ownership Stephanie Vie 15MB of Fame: Independent Musicians’ Use of MySpace Marjorie D. Kibby “It’s Up To You . . . No Really, It’s Up To You”: Radiohead, Big Music, and the Future of the “Record” Industry Andrew deWaard

 10 The Future of Radio in the Digital Age

107

121

133 155

John Allen Hendricks

 11 The Business of Radio in the Daily Soundscape: Reshaping and Defining the Music Box in Consumer Culture Phylis Johnson

173

 12 The Great Globalization Swindle? The Relationship Between the Global Economy and Music Reconsidered Franz Kasper Kroenig

193

 13 The Independent Record Store as a Site of Cultural Resistance and Anti-McDonaldization—A Case Study of The House of Records David Gracon

205

About the Editor and Contributors

223

Index

227

Preface

The business of entertainment has always been in constant flux, but at the present moment the speed at which change is occurring is singularly unprecedented. As the entertainment industry seeks to evolve and adapt in light of the ascendance of all things digital, 100 years worth of structures and systems appear to be falling away like so much dross. The concomitantly nascent era of “new media,” so the assumption goes, must also by definition mean the death of old media. And in some ways this is true, at least as it concerns the various physical forms of older media such as records and cassettes, VHS tapes, analog television broadcasts, and newspapers actually made of paper. These sorts of things are either already long dead or at best replicating the experience of Homo habilis laying eyes on Homo erectus for the first time; the new era most certainly will not go well for them. In place of the old totems come the new ones—iTunes, HDTV, TiVo, Digital Cinema, and so on—seemingly disparate but unified by their digital make-ups. And this digital nature and the accompanying ease with which music, films, and TV shows can be accessed and made portable allows the new media to be “free.” But free in what sense of the word? Certainly free as concerns the unfettering of the former corporeal state of media. While we need something tangible on which to view it—made unbelievably simple by the proliferation of iPods and like devices—media can be converted into digital ones and zeroes and delivered via the ether almost anywhere in the world at any time. New media is portable and near infinitely accessible, and only becoming more so as technology improves, just as the devices upon which we store our information

x

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grow increasingly infinitesimal (e.g., the iPod Nano). But of greater concern, at least to the giant international media conglomerates that own the rights to so much of what the entertainment industry produces, is the perception that media is actually free—that payment is neither required nor necessary, that the natural state of entertainment is that it should be wholly accessible entirely without cost. This way of thinking is increasingly prevalent in younger consumers, who bristle at paying 99¢ on iTunes for a song or $4 to their cable provider for a movie. Why bother paying for things when you can download them for nothing online with any number of free, very user-friendly, and increasingly hard to trace technologies? And this line of thinking rightfully scares the bejeezus out of the media congloms whose financial lifeblood emanates from their stranglehold on the distribution of their subsidiaries’ products. If, as Michael Wolff claims, “[t]he age of media-distribution monopolies is over,”1 then what comes next? And so the rush is on to answer this and other questions, although I would argue that the desire to bury the old business methods as being somehow inapplicable to new media is, as yet, premature. Yes, it does seem as though the old models aren’t efficient in the present moment and that companies are struggling to hit upon new ones that will be equally profitable. This is especially true as concerns just how the internet will earn income for content providers. And, in fact, perhaps with the exponentially burgeoning number of opportunities for consumers to acquire and view their media, even the attempt to replicate what worked before is questionable. And yet it persists. The ubiquitously adopted concept of media convergence—when a company spreads the promotion and sales of a product across multiple subsidiaries— has yet to prove as profitable as had been hoped, but it’s not like money hasn’t been made. When Sony can make all the Spider-Man movies, which feature music by Sony BMG recording artists, and then sell soundtrack CDs or digital downloads, which can be played on Sony CD players, or ripped for play on a Sony mp3 Walkman, or converted into ring tones for use on a Sony Ericsson cell phone, and sell DVDs to be played on Sony DVD players, and sell video games to be played on Sony PlayStations, and license the images of Spiderman and accompanying characters to be featured on toys, fast food, and any number of other objects—all of which equals billions for the parent company’s bottom line—something is working out as planned. So, it’s no surprise that new media is quickly being bought up not just by other new companies but by the old ones as well—for example, Google owns YouTube while Fox News Corp. now counts MySpace among its subsidiaries. And while they’ve yet to capitalize on just how to maximize profits from these kinds of things or to corner the market on the distribution avenues for new media, it’s impossible to dismiss out of hand the idea that they will. After all, previous innovations and revolutions in the entertainment industry that were supposed to make the companies of old uncompetitive dinosaurs in the

Preface

xi

end only resulted in their becoming bigger and more omnivorous than ever. Who’s to say it won’t happen again? And while it’s fascinating to prognosticate what kinds of industrial changes the latest moment of revolution will result in for the companies involved, what often goes unmentioned in so many breathless glossy magazine features on industry tycoons is what this means for the many artistic folks working in the industry. The same tensions that have always been present between creators and companies remain, none more vivid than the question of whether or not the eternal conflict between art and commerce can ever be peaceably resolved, especially in light of the awesome international dominance of the so-called big six contemporary media conglomerates—Fox, Disney, General Electric, Viacom, Time Warner, and Sony—which control upwards of 90 percent of the U.S. entertainment industry. The creation of entertainment media is the provenance of the artistically minded, whereas the widespread dissemination of their work is the bailiwick of so many Ivy League–trained MBAs. But the digital renaissance has allowed creators more control over their work, especially as concerns making and distributing their art outside of traditional systems. As artists gain more control over their work, how will the media conglomerates, which are always looking to increase the size of their piece of the pie, seek to consolidate their power, and how will this effect what gets made and seen and heard and what doesn’t? How will art and commerce intersect differently in the digital age? And what will the results of their collision ultimately mean for consumers, whose lives are increasingly ensconced in an omnipresent and immediate entertainment industry? While it’s clear that the entertainment industry is once again going through one of its periodic upheavals, what that means is only now beginning to be debated. Are we really going into a new era in which all the old models cease to apply, or will the old behemoths weather yet another storm only to once again emerge intact and even larger than they were in previous incarnations? And how will artists trying to maintain their integrity and beliefs reconcile their visions with those of the corporate entities for which they must almost certainly work should they want their creations ever to be seen by a larger audience? It’s the answers to these questions with which the various authors contributing to The Business of Entertainment: Popular Music grapple. In the opening chapter, Phillip McIntyre’s “Songwriting, Creativity, and the Music Industry,” McIntyre discusses the uninterrupted primacy of the song as the dominant form of the music industry. Next is Richard Strasser’s “The Devaluation of Recorded Music: A New Business Model for the Music Industry,” in which he details the implications of musicians’ newfound ability to release their work outside the traditional system. This is followed by Guy Morrow’s “The Macro/International Music Business: Australian Trajectories and Perspectives in a Global Context,” which elucidates possible

xii

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methods that companies outside of the mainstream U.S. market can use to get the musicians they’ve signed heard in the wider world. Setting the context for intellectual property issues associated with music is Robert McParland’s “Music Copyright in the Twenty-First Century.” “Rock Brands,” by Mike Emery, looks at how bands who have “made it” continue to thrive by establishing themselves as brands, while Amy M. Corey’s “Mapping the Territory: Cultural Authenticity in World Music” shows the role power, economy, and ideology play in understanding the term world music. In “ ‘I Gave My Rights Away for a Song’: How Billy Bragg Persuaded MySpace to Change Its Tune on Ownership,” Stephanie Vie dissects just what the rise of musicians’ self-distribution of their work via Web sites owned by media conglomerates might mean for the ownership of their songs. Conversely, Marjorie D. Kibby’s “15MB of Fame: Independent Musicians’ Use of MySpace” highlights the ways in which musicians can exploit sites such as MySpace to promote themselves and what this could hold for the future of independent music. Central to the idea of new media is who owns it and how much it should cost, which Andrew deWaard deftly discusses in “ ‘It’s Up to You . . . No Really, It’s Up to You’: Radiohead, Big Music, and the Future of the ‘Record’ Industry.” John Allen Hendricks’ “The Future of Radio in the Digital Age” talks about how a perceived old media will likely live on in the new era, even as its traditional form changes. Likewise, Phylis Johnson’s “The Business of Radio in the Daily Soundscape: Reshaping and Defining the Music Box in Consumer Culture” argues that radio is proliferating in the digital era and likely only going to continue to do so. This is followed by Franz Kroenig’s “The Great Globalization Swindle? The Relationship Between the Global Economy and Music Reconsidered,” in which he posits that popular music is art and that as such it is resistant to attempts to render it a commodity. Last is David Gracon’s “The Independent Record Store as a Site of Cultural Resistance and Anti-McDonaldization—A Case Study of The House of Records,” which charmingly discusses the role The House of Records plays in the community of Eugene, Oregon, and what that implies about America at large. Ultimately, it is our hope that these chapters will serve to introduce their readers to the rich and myriad array of issues facing the contemporary music industry and how they might play out on a worldwide cultural stage. And perhaps they will also contribute to new ways of thinking about and researching the business of entertainment as it applies to popular music and what it continues to mean in a rapidly changing industry and world. Robert C. Sickels NOTE 1. Michael Wolff, “The Best of Enemies,” Vanity Fair, April 2008, 134.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks are due to my editor at Praeger Publishers, Jeff Olson, for his patience, invaluable input, and quality baseball talk, even if he is a Red Sox fan. Thanks are also due to Praeger’s Nick Philipson and Lindsay Claire, who helped immensely in getting this project off the ground and seeing it through to completion. Special thanks are also due to all the authors who contributed their pieces to these collections; I am very grateful and appreciative. I’d also like to thank professor Michael Branch of the University of Nevada, Reno, for his tireless guidance, inspiration, and friendship over the years; he showed me a sterling path that I’ve tried my best to follow. Thanks to Whitman College and the support of my colleagues and friends here, especially Robert Withycombe and Jana Byars. And thanks to my dad, who taught me to always do your work and don’t make excuses, and to my mom, who always had time to take me to a movie or buy me a book. Lastly, thanks to my kids, Dutch and Tallulah, who put up with me throughout what was a long and arduous process.

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chapter 1

Songwriting, Creativity, and the Music Industry Phillip McIntyre

Songwriting is at the very heart of the contemporary music industry. Songs are written, performed, recorded, listened to, bought, downloaded, and litigated over. They can make and break artists’ careers. For example, the Gerry Goffin and Carole King classic “The Locomotion” was the song that not only launched Little Eva in the fifties but also Kylie Minogue in the eighties. It demonstrates “the power of a strong commercial song to shoot a newcomer to stardom,” and that power extends to maintaining artists at the peak of their game.1 That power is the essential element that greases the wheels of the music industry’s fortunes. As Jimmy Webb asserts, “songs are the raw material that power the reactor of a large part of the entertainment business.”2 In fact, without these potent symbol systems, there would be no music industry at all. From the early days of the industry when the focus was centered on the publishing houses right through to the later establishment of the recording industry as the dominant industry player, the rights of ownership attached to songs have remained paramount.3 It is the buying and selling of these rights that has ensured that songs remain central to the industry’s processes. This centrality continues to be crucial even as the music industry now appears to be going through another of its periodic upheavals as the digital age works its magic. As Debbie Kruger writes, For many the digital age has transformed the writing process, and especially for those songwriters who create songs for other artists to perform, that process involves the ability to create a fully produced studio demo. Steve Kipner calls himself a “record writer” rather than a songwriter. Even

2

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those who began in their earliest days simply singing out ideas to their bandmates and bringing a song to life in rehearsal are now engrossed by the possibilities of Pro Tools. Fortunately, whatever the method, the songs continue to come.4

While there have been other musical forms used by the music industry, as Tim Wall argues, it is the song that remains the dominant one. It was established “as the dominant compositional structure as early as the late eighteenth century. Most major styles of twentieth-century popular music—including ballads, ragtime, jazz, big band, rock & roll, rock, soul, reggae, punk, metal, indie—have either reproduced this structure or been based upon some modification of it.”5 This continues on into the twenty-first century with hip-hop, gabba, jungle, and a proliferation of other genres and styles. When Lou Barlow, former songwriter with Dinosaur Jr., now with Sebadoh and the Folk Implosion, was learning a song recorded by Shania Twain, he came to the realization, as many other successful writers had done before him, that there was a common element to the songs he was involved with. The way [this] song is written really isn’t that different from the songs I write. There really is a formula to writing songs, and it’s still really satisfying even in its cheesiest forms, like insanely slick modern country. But if I were to strip that song down and play it at an acoustic show, I’m sure someone would come up to me and say “Hey man, what song is that? That’s really good!” You could put that song over on anybody . . . I spent a lot of time in those days creating stuff on 4-track that I thought was subverting the basic song form, not going for the standard verse-chorus-verse-chorusbridge form. But despite all that sort of ambitious thinking, in the end the song wins out. And everyone always loves a great song, even the people with the most experimental tastes . . . I didn’t even know what a middle-eight was until a couple months ago. “That’s the middle eight? You mean the third part of a song?” I just always thought the song should go where the lyrics go: If you’re being righteous through the verse and the chorus and you want to back off a little, that’s what the third part is for. Or if you want to take it totally over the top and start screaming your head off, that’s where the third part comes in.6

Barlow was also impressed with the “inner logic” of the Brill Building writers (legendary New York City songwriters such as Carole King and Neil Sedaka who worked in the Brill Building) and is happy that writers from widely divergent genres work with essentially the same form. “I just realised how many songs you can play with G, C and D. It’s really endless. From Tom Petty to Hank Williams to the Stooges, it’s all there.”7 This idea, that there are primary forms in Western popular music, is reinforced by the writers from the KLF, a collective of British House musicians. They argue that “the

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complete history of the blues is based on one chord structure, hundreds of thousands of songs using the same three basic chords in the same pattern.”8 John Braheny, in his book The Craft and Business of Song Writing, outlines the various forms currently in use by popular songwriters. These not only include, amongst others, the ternary form derived from the European popular music tradition and favored by prewar composers such as Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, and Cole Porter but also the verse/chorus forms and its variants typical of many African-derived musics. Contrary to what critical theorist Theodor Adorno argued, Braheny asserts that, [T]here are no absolute rules or formulas for songwriting. For every “rule,” you’ll find a song that broke that rule and succeeded . . . instead of learning “rules” you need to be aware of principles, the freedoms and restrictions of the medium for which you want to write, and have at your command a wide range of options with which to solve each creative problem.9

The domain of songwriting thus appears to be governed more by formalized convention rather than the precise rules that characterize other domains such as, for example, math. The use of convention rather than precise rules as a central aspect of popular music writing highlights the fact that a songwriter, in terms of the argument being presented here, must draw on the specific domain of songwriting, the forms and conventions of the popular song, itself a subset of the domain of music, in order for that songwriter to write songs. For the Western contemporary popular music songwriter working predominantly in the Anglo-American popular music tradition, the assumption is that the Western harmonic system, the language of music, song structure and lyric construction, and all the associated conventions are significant parts of the symbol system they manipulate.10 Without access to this knowledge, this domain of songwriting, it would be difficult for a songwriter to contribute their ideas to the complex system that throws up popular hit after popular hit. Songwriters therefore must develop what Pierre Bourdeu calls a habitus, in this case a songwriter’s habitus. Acquiring a habitus can be seen as the development of: a “feel for the game,” a “practical sense” (sens practique) that inclines agents to act and react in specific situations in a manner that is not always calculated and that is not simply a question of conscious obedience to rules. Rather it is a set of dispositions which generates practices and perceptions.11

This description has some close similarities to the ideas suggested by Donald Schon on the acquisition of a practitioner’s skill base. He suggests practitioner’s skills become “internalized in our tacit knowing” and argues that “we are often unaware of having learned to do these things; we simply find

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ourselves doing them.”12 In this process, the ability to write, as John Braheny argues, almost becomes automatic. Paul McCartney’s perhaps apocryphal story of the writing of Yesterday is a case in point.13 “Yesterday” came out of the blue, I’ve no idea where from. I dreamed the melody. I woke up and I had the melody in my head. It depends how far you want to go with this; if you’re very spiritual then God sent me a melody, I’m a mere vehicle. If you wanna be a bit more cynical, then I was loading my computer for millions of years listening to all the stuff I listened to through my dad and through my musical tastes, including people like Fred Astaire, Gershwin, and finally my computer printed out one morning what it thought was a good tune.14

So how do songwriters, the central operatives upon which the music industry relies, go about acquiring this tacit knowledge? For Bourdieu the acquisition of a songwriter’s habitus is “the result of a long process of inculcation . . . which becomes a ‘second sense’ or a second nature.”15 More prosaically, research indicates songwriters learn about the domain of songwriting through a number of fairly common methods. These include both formal and informal education processes such as, in no order of priority: having access to poetic skills seen as akin to lyric writing skills in the formal education process; having access to elementary music lessons as part of the compulsory schooling system; receiving semiformal instruction from musicians engaged in private tuition; learning songs as part of learning an instrument; learning songs for performance; engaging in a degree of autodidacticism through access to peer information and ad-hoc mentoring within a form of oral transmission of domain knowledge; absorbing their familial musical influences; and absorbing the information stored in multiple numbers of songs through their access to popular culture transmissions as fans of popular music themselves.16 As an example of how one songwriter acquired his domain knowledge, George Gershwin: began his professional career in “Tin Pan Alley,” a location in New York City where aspiring composers and songwriters would bring their scores to a publisher in hopes of selling the tunes for a modest amount of cash. As a “song plugger” for the Jerome Remick Company, George was exposed to thousands of songs, which gave him a better idea for what songs had a successful quality.17

Once a songwriter has access to this stored information, that is, the accumulated field of works (a concept developed by Pierre Bourdieu in his book Rules of Art ) of songwriting, they move on to manipulating this symbol system to add to and contribute to the wealth of the extensive popular song tradition. As Paul Zollo asserts, “this is precisely the way songwriters learn to write songs, imitating and emulating that which inspires us until our own styles gradually emerge.”18

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In the course of the varied styles developing out of the manipulation of this conventional symbol system known as the song there have been some corresponding changes in the conditions and positions held by songwriters. For example, what songwriters such as Harold Arlen and Hoagy Carmichael did in the earlier part of the twentieth century is different than what songwriters do now. As Bob Barratt explains, “in those days music publishers printed music regularly, few singers wrote their own material and hits were somehow easier to pick. The successful songwriters of today, however, frequently wear more than one hat, doubling as singers, musicians, record producers or even managers.”19 Apart from Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, the songwriting and producing team who were instrumental in many of Elvis Presley’s early hits, who claimed “we didn’t write songs, we wrote records,”20 one of the prime examples of this type includes John Fogerty, formerly of Creedence Clearwater Revival. Fogerty, who wrote, arranged, and produced all of their hits, also managed the band, and after his band’s accountants involved him in an offshore banking scheme, and after losing the ownership of his songs, he lost the veritable fortune that he’d worked long and hard for. He was then sued by his old record company for writing songs that sounded like, of all things, himself. Fogerty now advises songwriters to “pick their friends very wisely.”21 The things that may go wrong don’t come from far over the horizon, from some unseen force over there. It’s usually the people right close to you that are going to be able to do you harm. That’s what happened to me. I don’t mean that you should be cynical. I mean you have to put your face somewhere. But I guess the best advice is to choose your friends wisely. Otherwise you spend a lifetime paying for the wrong decisions. But I don’t want you to come away from our meeting here thinking I’m a cynical person. I’ve learnt a lot. It’s a lot harder to trick me now. One of the saddest things that happened to me, let’s say, was that I wrote all these songs and somebody else owns them because they . . . it’s what’s called the publishing. They own the copyrights. They choose how those songs are used. You may have seen one or more bad movies that my songs are in. That’s another specific thing you could tell young songwriters. Don’t give away your publishing. Keep the ownership for yourself. Still I would say don’t go around poking everybody in the eye either, because if you’re confident and you know your own worth people will come to you. You don’t have to beg. And I think that’s very important for all artists really. Don’t get talked into doing things that you don’t really want to do.22

Prince was another songwriting polymath who produced, arranged, composed, and performed on his own albums and released a string of international hit singles in the eighties. The following decades saw a significant number of producers, especially those working in the variety of genres that typify electronica, carrying on this tradition.

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For an outsider, the industry could thus appear to have become more complex, though no less predatory, for songwriters than it seemed to be in the halcyon days of publishing. But despite this apparent complexity, there are certainly ways to understand its current structures. While the music industry can be seen to revolve around recording and live performance the publishing arm of this industry still remains central to songwriters’ incomes. So how does this system actually work? In the early days of the industry, the emergence of “scoring meant the emergence of a new music-making figure, the composer (who no longer had to take the stage; composition could now be separated from performance), and a new money-making figure, the publisher; composers needed someone to get their work to market.”23 With the advent of recording, this neat arrangement between songwriters and publishers persisted, but while publishers were concerned with the rights of the composer or songwriter, the record companies concerned themselves with the newer rights that subsisted in the material or mechanical object that carried fixed versions of the song. Publishers thus work to promote the song and collect royalties for the songwriter, while the record company works to sell a material object, that is, the recording of the song. In creating that record, the record company has to be granted a license to use the song in this way and must pay a royalty to the publishers in order to do so. Noting that for legal purposes songwriters and performers are generally treated as separate entities, matters become more complex when the songwriter is also the performer on the recording. This situation became the norm after the massive success of Lennon and McCartney in the sixties, a success that was aided by their publisher Dick James.24 Dick James, a songwriter himself, was a struggling publisher when Brian Epstein, the Beatles’ manager, approached him after a recommendation by George Martin about publishing Lennon and McCartney’s songs. James set up a company called Northern Songs to house the songs, and Dick James Music then went into partnership with Lennon and McCartney. James signed Lennon and McCartney to a publishing deal and set about negotiating a good royalty rate with EMI, the Beatles’ record company. But while the Beatles did well, the deal proved to be advantageous to Dick James in the long term. He virtually had a controlling interest in Northern Songs, and when he decided to sell the company, there was little either Lennon or McCartney could do about it, and one of the greatest songwriting catalogues of the twentieth century slipped from the original songwriter’s hands. James went on to sign Elton John to his publishing company. At the time Elton originally signed with him it was normal for the publisher to take the writer’s songs for the life of copyright. Elton’s contract to supply Dick James Music with songs would eventually come to an end. But all the songs he’d given the company during the period of his contract

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would remain the company’s property until seventy years after Elton John had died. Elton didn’t want to wait that long and in 1986 he went to court to get them back. Elton based his case on the fact that Dick James had operated the standard sixties scam of dividing the royalties in half twice, sub-publishing songs to his own subsidiary companies in other countries on a 50 –50 basis. But Elton didn’t sue for the money skimmed from him in this fashion, he sued for the return of his songs which had been assigned to Dick James for “life of copyright.”25

In order to gain some understanding of how situations like this might occur, as Alan Siegel, Tim Whitsett, Lee Wilson, Donald Passman, and Shane Simpson variously explain, it can be seen that as a songwriter you could own 100 percent of a written song. However, if you engage a publisher, a separate business entity, to publish, promote, and administer the song, the royalties earned from the song will be split in two. There is a writer’s share, usually 50 percent, and a publisher’s share, also usually 50 percent. If there is more than one writer, the writer’s share is split between the writers according to whatever agreement they have in place. The publisher’s share goes to the publisher to administer and promote the song. The publisher will usually have the rights in the song assigned to them, that is, the ownership of the song, for a certain period or term. This means the publisher can control the use of the song for this period and may be entitled to maintain ownership in the song for the life of the copyright. However, if a publisher does not do the best thing by the song and does not actively promote it, a reversion clause will allow the song’s rights to be returned to the songwriter. With these conditions in place, the publisher is then able to issue licenses for others to use the song. The publisher is, in essence, obligated to try to get other people to do cover versions and place the songs in movies, in TV shows, and any other places where income can be derived. The publisher should thus actively sell the song for the songwriter. This is their job. They do not, and should not, just collect and administer royalty income. Sometimes a record company will also want to act as a publisher. This is fine if a copublishing deal is undertaken. This means that the publisher’s share, and only the publishers share, can be split fifty-fifty with the writer. In practice, this arrangement means that the writer earns 75 percent of the total royalties on the song, and the record label, as copublisher, collects 25 percent of the total royalties. For their share they must act as a normal publisher would, administering and promoting the song. Conversely, a songwriter might wish to self-publish. In this case, the writer also acts as publisher and receives 100 percent of all income. However, they must administer and promote the song themselves as well as registering their own publishing company with the relevant collection agencies.

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In either case, performance royalties are paid to the owner of the rights in a song whenever the song is played in a public place. Organizations such as BMI and ASCAP in the United States collect all of the income in the form of fees from radio, TV, plays in restaurants, juke boxes, retail outlets, hold messages, mobile phone ring tones, bands playing the song in their live set, and so on. The performing rights organization then, “splits the income fifty-fifty between publisher and songwriter, and pays each of them separately.”26 Synchronization royalties are also paid when a song is used in movies or videos, but most often a negotiated flat fee is paid here. The Harry Fox Agency in the United States, “provides licensing services to thousands of publishers, issuing mechanical licenses to record companies and collecting mechanical royalties on the publisher’s behalf.”27 A good publisher will thus actively promote the song so as to maximize the income from these various sources. In summary, a publishing deal is like taking on a business partner. One partner, the publisher, finances and administers the business, while the other partner, the songwriter, manufactures the basic product for sale, that is, the song. Often the publisher will also loan a songwriter money in order for the writer to keep writing and keep the wolf from the door. This loan is known as an advance, and this money is repaid by the songwriter using the money they collect from royalties. An advance, like any other loan, must eventually be paid back from profits. But like any other business loan, it can help finance an operation. Another way to look at this relationship is to see it as a form of patronage. As Edward Samuels argues, copyright, which underpins this system of patronage, will continue to be important “for as long as we want to encourage the making of creative works.”28 With songwriters having to wear multiple hats, this patronage can certainly be advantageous because, even with the best will in the world, “even if you have the right attitude it’s difficult to be both a songwriter and a publisher because of the time required for each.”29 It not only takes time, but it also costs money to tour, it costs money to record, and it costs money to manufacture, promote, and distribute songs. The field of popular music, the social organization that understands and works with the symbol systems of popular music, wants and deserves to be paid for the activities they undertake and the services they perform. Howard Becker, for one, argues that there are myriad activities to be undertaken for an art work, in this case a song, to come into existence. From inspiration to idea, then on to the execution of that idea, and finally to its manufacture and distribution, the song is subject to a reliance upon a complex network of many players or workers. Becker suggests that in order “to analyse an art world we look for its characteristic kinds of workers and the bundle of tasks each one does.”30 Bourdieu also claimed that this collection of workers, along with the objective social relations they engage with, could be analyzed by looking at various “arenas of production, circulation, and appropriation

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of goods, services, knowledge, or status, and the competitive positions held by actors in their struggle to accumulate and monopolise” various forms of capital.31 From Bourdieu’s perspective, this capital is not just financial but can be symbolic or cultural capital that allows songwriters to not only sell or lease rights but trade on their reputations within this contested space or field. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi also argues that a field is seen as being necessary as it is the function of the field “to determine whether the innovation is worth making a fuss about.”32 With these propositions as guides, evidence can be found that a song’s existence depends on the field for contemporary Western popular music.33 This field can be seen to consist of not only the publishing industry but also the other branches of the music industry to which it is intimately connected, that is, the recording industry, the live performance arena, and the various functions of management, promotion, and distribution. Who is financed to write songs and how and why certain songs receive promotion, publicity, and remuneration are dependent on a set of critical factors songwriters must learn in order to write songs. As Braheny argues, “unsung thousands possess the talent and craft to write great songs, but without understanding the business and the knowledge of how to protect your creations and get them heard by those who can make them successful, those songs are like orphans.”34 A knowledge of the music industry, as it applies to songwriters, is thus essential. For example, Al Kasha and Joel Hirschhorn, who’ve sold over 52 million records, strongly suggest from their own early experiences that knowing what to look for is “the essential factor in achieving artistic and commercial success. These publishers [who looked at their initial efforts] were not able to articulate technically what was lacking in our song—but long experience gave them an intuitive feeling of public taste, an instinct that something was wrong.”35 It wasn’t until they took on board the ideas of the field, a process of being socialized into its norms and enculturated into its practices, and developed a songwriter’s habitus themselves that Kasha and Hirschhorn began to receive their share of success as songwriters within the industry. In this sense, each person that constitutes the actors who are operative in this field, and this includes producers, engineers, managers, other songwriters, artists and performers, agents, promoters, film music agents, film directors and producers looking for songs, road crews, tour managers, A&R execs, sales reps, retailers, radio programs and music directors, music journalists, and so on, can also be seen to operate as cultural intermediaries. The notion of cultural intermediary was introduced by Bourdieu to make a necessary distinction between this idea and that of the related notion of gatekeeping, a term “widely used to describe the process by which selections are made in media work.”36 Gatekeeping, as Keith Negus argues, is too simplistic a notion. He is of the opinion that “most creative ideas and products will not only be filtered but also mediated by the field.”37 Rather than simply letting or not letting

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songs pass intact through the system, the very act of making those decisions has a direct effect on the way songs are produced and created. As cultural intermediaries, recording industry personnel are constantly contributing to the production of and then reorganising, circulating and mediating the words, sounds and images of popular music to audiences across a range of entertainment media and cultural texts (recordings, videos, advertisements, broadcasts, books, magazines, computer games and various merchandise).38

In the case of Bruce Springsteen, this mediation could be taken a step further. Jon Landau, who had an exclusive management arrangement with Springsteen, also had a hand in the creative process that led to the writing of Springsteen’s Dancing in the Dark single. Sensing that the Born in the USA album was not complete, Landua wanted a particular sort of song written, and after much argument, he sent Springsteen away to write a song based on the themes and ideas Landau was suggesting. As Springsteen’s manager, Landau’s reasoning was that the album being recorded “needed it, that it would be artistically incomplete until such a song existed.”39 While this is an acute example, cultural intermediaries are usually less overt in their manipulation of the process. For example, it could be claimed that without the decisions being made about what gets played on radio, in particular, and the increasingly necessary relationship with television, the ability of songwriters to continue to operate in this creative field would be significantly curtailed. There is also some evidence to suggest that certain radio music directors will have a direct effect on songwriting.40 Furthermore, the press, as an ancillary to the music industry, are also vital, and with the proliferation of Web-based media—Web sites, e-mail, blogs, commercial entities such as MySpace, and so on—songwriters are also finding alternative methods of engaging with the field and, ultimately, the audiences for contemporary Western popular music. MySpace, in particular, has recently been touted as a successful alternative way for new songwriters and artists to expose their work to an audience and reach a wide and numerically viable number of them without incurring the costs of touring a significant number of territories or engaging directly with a record company. This Web site is, however, demonstrably only one link in an increasingly complex promotional and distribution chain that uses both traditional and nontraditional means. Two of the more prominent beneficiaries of this process in operation recently can be seen in the case of Sandi Thom and also the Arctic Monkeys. Thom undertook a virtual tour from her basement flat in the United Kingdom when she Webcast her performances on a hosting company, Streaming Tank’s, Web site. She promoted the gigs on MySpace. She was signed to

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Windswept Pacific Music publishers and a small Scottish record company called Viking Legacy and, at the time of the song being released, employed a PR company to promote it. After the mainstream media in the United Kingdom, including The Times, BBC 2, Virgin, and Capital Radio, got involved and pushed the story and thus sales even further, Thom was signed to Sony, who re-released the song and single. It went on to top both the Australian and U.K. charts. The Arctic Monkeys had a similar although more rock-oriented experience. This young band from Sheffield in the United Kingdom had had many of their song demos circulated by fans, which were freely available to them on the band’s Web site. This audience interest was capitalized upon by the band, and they become a popular live act in the north of England. When the British press and BBC radio began pushing the band, along with a Webcast being placed on the Internet, the Arctic Monkeys had secured a large enough audience to enable them to tour successfully across the United Kingdom. The songs, also embedded on a limited number of EP CDs and vinyl singles, were available for download from the iTunes music store and promotion on their MySpace site ensured they sold well. Their first album release became a highly anticipated event. This strategy had worked remarkably well for the band. However, rather than this being a radical replacement model for the operation of the industry, it can be seen as yet another example of an inventive and adaptable way to become a crucial part of that industry. Once the band had attracted the attention of industry players, the cultural intermediaries who could further their success, they played the game well enough to be able to choose who would finance their operations. The band had signed to Domino records and then licensed their songs for certain other territories across the world to EMI Music publishing. They took on a tour of the United States in the same way bands had done for years before them. They even accepted three NME Music Awards in 2006, placing them alongside the then-current mainstays of the industry, such as Oasis and The Strokes. The difficulty all of these rock bands faced was how to stay part of an industry and maintain a romantic artistic ethos and distance themselves from that industry at the same time. The rock world, in particular, has taken on board the romantic view of creativity, which, despite it having little evidence to prove its veracity, continues to be a central belief in a heavily contradictory music world. This problem has occasionally plagued Paul McCartney. One of the more central figures for change in the songwriting world of the twentieth century, McCartney has survived inside the same industry, negotiating many songs through this field of cultural intermediaries despite these apparent paradoxes being in play. He also has now eschewed the traditional form of record company–dominated sales approaches and engages with his audience through his own extensive Web site, e-mail fan lists, Webcasts, DVDs, and

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CDs. His shows are performed as one-off events and then made available as mp3 downloads from companies such as iTunes with hard copies being available from Amazon.com.41 The latest was an iTunes exclusive release titled “Live At The ICA Festival,” which was recorded at his 2007 show at the iTunes Festival in London. Although he still has affiliations with the EMI subsidiary Parlophone, McCartney’s latest financial partner is Starbucks, a company just starting to be known for its affiliation with the music industry. What is significant about these recent examples is that despite the route to success being most often circuitous, and now often virtual, the fundamental need to engage with the field of popular music for these songwriters is still important because, despite the recent emphasis on a new way of doing business, promotion and distribution as primary business strategies remain an essential part of the process of bringing a song to an audience. Others have also realized this. Operating out of the United States, Jodi Krangle, for example, has dedicated herself to producing an e-zine called The Muse’s News.42 This e-zine is for and about songwriters and deals with music reviews, spotlights new artists, and contains songwriting book reviews, promotions of songwriting contests, and market information. It promotes new online songwriting and music business courses and Web sites that inspire, has articles on cowriting for example, and contains classifieds and useful services as well as a list of handy contact information delivered straight to the songwriter’s desktop. Not only has this online dissemination of information been crucial for some songwriters, but many now exist in a virtual online world that has replaced the more traditional one. Mark Wells, one of the songwriters for independent Newcastle, N.S.W., band Supersonic, finds the band’s Web site invaluable: Absolutely. It’s a quick easy reference. You can make one quick phone call to a member of the music industry anywhere and refer them to your website. And they can find out exactly what you’re all about very quickly and very easily. The postage bills have gone down! I mean it’s basically the equivalent of sending out a package that you’d take two days to send down, all the hard copies of the bio, CD and everything. You can have it all locked down on the web. Email tends to be the thing to do now. Everyone wants to correspond by email. It’s a way of confirming and solidifying performance arrangements and communicating with people all throughout the music industry at all levels. I think it seems to be a universal kind of communicator.43

In addition to these uses, this technology has also been useful for Supersonic in terms of engaging with an audience: As an independent band, without the backing of some kind of promotion and distribution company, it’s very difficult to get your music out there

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but when you combine the internet with regular live performance across the country as well as radio airplay on some of the community and noncommercial radio stations that’s when it becomes most effective for us because it enables everyone to be able to easily access our material.44

It can also be contended that the audience for popular music may also be recognized as a significant constituent and active set of cultural intermediaries of this field as it has the ability to regulate the life of a recorded song and partially govern the longevity of a songwriter’s enterprise. What an audience buys and thinks can have a direct effect on the decisions songwriters make, the chords they choose, the structures they’ll tend to use, and the lyric content that attracts that audience. With the reconceptualization of audiences from that of passive receivers of information to that of active participants in the process, in not only using songs for purposes that the writers or manufacturers may not have intended but also in participating in the act of making meaning, it can be seen that the audience itself can be considered a vital part of the creative process.45 These contentions seem to run counter to the commonsense understandings of creativity, which are predominantly focused on single individuals. But, despite its widespread adherence, the essentially romantic beliefs held by actors within the music industry (and this belief system is adhered to by audiences as well) is nonetheless a rather difficult position to invest with a rational explanation.46 The creation of songs and who is entitled to exploit them has been a binding force in the operation of the music industry for some time, and yet, as Roy Shuker asserts, knowledge about this area of creativity, how it happens, is quite sparse.47 There is precious little written in an academic sense about the way choices are made when songs are created and the relationship between those choices and the music industry itself.48 Despite this lack of work Keith Negus and Michael Pickering suggest that: creativity is one of the most important yet unexplored issues in the study of popular music. Its significance is routinely noted, usually in passing, and its value often taken for granted. Its conceptual status in music studies is that of an unquestioned commonplace. Most of all, it is raised in reference to what is taken to be in opposition to it, to what is held as restricting or obstructing its realization and potential . . . What it involves in its own right or what meanings it is made to carry are seldom subject to any critical attention.49

The dearth of rationally focused research into the way songs are created from those researching popular music may have more to do with the music industry’s underpinning and self-sustaining belief in a predominantly romantic artistic ethos than anything else, but the fact of the matter is that “popular music depends on the collaboration of creators and bureaucrats [and] the

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tensions between them, a tension usually read ideologically as art v commerce, is built into the system.”50 The major problem, as Coombes argues, is that: perhaps no area of human creativity relies more heavily upon appropriation and allusion, borrowing and imitation, sampling and intertextual commentary than music, nor any area where the mythic figure of the creative genius composing in the absence of all external influence is more absurd.51

The research world tends to agree. Most often creativity is thought of in a common-sense way with the ideas underpinning it persisting despite problems with the basic assumptions.52 These widespread views could be labeled either the inspirational view or the romantic view.53 Either way, there is such a deeply held belief in these views that a scientific investigation of creativity appears to be not only wrong-headed but almost sacrilegious.54 However, Margaret Boden for one contends that: these views are believed by many to be literally true. But they are rarely critically examined. They are not theories, so much as myths: imaginative constructions, whose function is to express the values, assuage the fears, and endorse the practices of the community that celebrates them.55

Both positions, the inspirational and the romantic, have lead eventually to the stereotypical view of the quasineurotic artist existing in their garret waiting for the muse to arrive or inspiration to strike.56 These views have held sway in the music industry for some time and underpin many of its concerns, including the present issues surrounding copyright.57 But these conceptions of creative persons and their creative activity are difficult to sustain when one examines in any empirical way how artistic work, or any innovative work for that matter, actually does occur.58 Embedded in the research are significant counter propositions to the inspirationist and romantic positions. This research has come from a variety of disciplines. It includes work from sociology,59 including those concerned primarily with art and cultural production,60 the field of literary criticism,61 postructuralism,62 and the media studies arm of communication and cultural studies.63 Psychology, whether in its neuro, cognitive, psychoanalytic, behavioral, or social variants, has produced a significant body of work in this area.64 On their own, each of these schools of thought provides an apparently feasible set of explanations for creativity, but each may be seen as narrowly focused on specific aspects of the phenomenon. What becomes apparent in looking at this research over time, however, is a fundamental move away from viewing creativity as an individual level phenomenon. As Peter Wicke argues, “the shift from a hierarchical model of music—with the composer at the top and all the other participants merely following the instructions

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he has set down in the score—to a collective organised form is the crucial conceptual change.”65 The more recent advent of what has been labeled the confluence approach to creativity, owing a partial debt to Morris Stein, sees creativity arising out of a multiple set of factors, including personal, societal, and cultural ones being in play within a complex, recursive, iterative, and active process. Following Bourdieu, it can be argued that popular music songwriters, while having the ability to make creative choices, are not absolutely free in making those choices because they must engage with a pre-existing set of structures. A songwriter draws on, via their habitus and cultural capital, the specific sets of knowledge pertinent to the cultural practice of songwriting that exists within the traditions of the field of contemporary Western popular music, that is, its field of works. They must also enter an arena of social contestation, what Bourdieu calls a field, competing with each other to have their songs heard and become successful. As exemplified previously, it is the interplay between the spheres of an individual’s habitus, the field they operate in, and the accumulated knowledge that exists in the field of works that actually makes songwriting practice possible. This conclusion, to me, seems to be remarkably similar to that proposed by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s systems model of creativity.66 This model accepts that songwriters work within a system that shapes and governs their creativity while they contribute to and alter that system. Csikszentmihalyi doesn’t ascribe sole responsibility for creativity to the productive individual, but neither does he assert that creativity is beyond the locus of individual producers and located solely within the determinations presented by the societies and cultures they inhabit. Instead he argues that: for creativity to occur, a set of rules and practices must be transmitted from the domain to the individual. The individual must then produce a novel variation in the content of the domain. The variation then must be selected by the field for inclusion in the domain.67

To put it simply, “each of the three main systems—person, field and domain— affects the others and is affected by them in turn . . . The starting point on this map is purely arbitrary.”68 According to this set of hypotheses, when a songwriter engages in a creative act they operate within the tensions of agency, the ability to make choice and structure, determining factors set up by their biological imperatives, their cultural inheritance, and the operation of the creative system, which includes themselves, the domain, and the field of popular music. In this act the creative agent of the songwriter, as seen in the descriptions set out previously, then must necessarily draw on the specific domain of songwriting, which is a subset of the domain of music and at the same time a subset of the

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domain of language and speech. That is, the specific domain of songwriting for a contemporary Western popular music songwriter includes such things as the language of music, the Western harmonic system, song structure, and lyric construction, with all their conventions. Musicians, producers, engineers, publishers, tour managers, audiences, and so on are the individuals who make up the network of interlocking roles that constitute the field of songwriting. It is the social organization of the field that decides whether what the person has produced is admissible as part of the domain. It is the social organization, or field, that decides whether the song is acceptable as a song in the first place and, secondly, how creative that song is in relation to all other songs. From this perspective, creativity is socially and historically specific, for what one period decides is creative another may see as simply bizarre. Each new song that is accepted as being creative via its social validation by the field must then become part of the domain. It is in this way that a culture changes and moves on over a period of time. Furthermore, if Bourdieu is correct in asserting that agency and structure are interdependent, by suggesting that the interplay between these two spheres makes practice possible, Negus may also be correct in assuming that “the industry needs to be understood as both a commercial business driven by the pursuit of profit and a site of creative human activity from which some very great popular music has come and continues to emerge.”69 If it is the case that creativity is indeed systemic, some reappraisal from within the industry by those who both deal with and promote songs may be necessary, especially given the emphasis on songwriters as romantic artists in the latter part of the twentieth century. While this change in focus may present problems in terms of marketing, as the audience also believes in the romantic nature of songwriting and creativity, a systemic approach to creativity may in fact be more accurate and ultimately reveal many more pragmatic opportunities for success than the romantic and inspirationist understanding of songwriting currently allows. The corollary is that this change may also take away the basis of the ideas, centered as they are in romanticist aesthetics, that underpin the questions of artistic authenticity, which are themselves so central to many songwriter’s understandings of themselves and their creative process. NOTES 1. Al Kasha and Joel Hirschborn, If They Ask You, You Can Write A Song (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1979), 23. 2. Jimmy Webb, Tunesmith: Inside the Art of Songwriting (New York: Hyperion, 1998), 308. 3. For a more detailed account of this history see Russel Sanjek, American Popular Music and Its Business: The First Four Hundred Years (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988).

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4. Debbie Kruger, Songwriters Speak: Conversations about Creating Music (Sydney: Limelight Press, 2005), 12. 5. Tim Wall, Studying Popular Music Culture (London: Arnold, 2003), 123. 6. Lou Barlow quoted in James Rotondi, “Alex Chilton: Big Star’s Reluctant Legend,” in Guitar Player, ed. Dominic Milano (New York: Miller Freeman Group, 1994), 81–82. 7. Ibid., 82. 8. KLF, The Manual: How to Have a Number One the Easy Way ( London: KLF Publications, London, 1988), 29. 9. John Braheny, The Craft and Business of Song Writing ( London: Omnibus Press, 1990), vi. 10. For a detailed account of how this process occurs see Phillip McIntyre, “The Domain of Songwriters—Towards Defining the Term ‘Song,’ ” Perfect Beat: The Pacific Journal of Research into Contemporary Music and Popular Culture 5/3, (2001): 100 –111. 11. Randall Johnson, “Editors Introduction,” in Pierre Bourdieu, Field of Cultural Production, ed. Randall Johnson (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), 5. 12. Donald Schon, The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action (New York: Basic Books, 1983), 52. 13. A detailed account of the way this song was written can be read in Phillip McIntyre, “Paul McCartney and the Creation of ‘Yesterday’: The Systems Model in Operation,” Popular Music 25/2 (2006): 201–19. 14. Paul McCartney quoted in Matt Snow, “God In Heaven What Was I On,” MOJO. London: EMAP Metro, November, 1995, 57. 15. Randall Johnson, op. cit. (1993), 5. 16. These details can found in Phillip McIntyre, “Creativity and Cultural Production: A Study of Contemporary Western Popular Music Songwriting,” Creativity Research Journal 20/1, (2008): 40–52. 17. J. Clark Jolley, “GershwinFan.com: Georges Biography,” GershwinFan.com, 2000, http://www.gershwinfan.com/biogeorge.html. 18. Paul Zollo, Songwriters on Songwriting (New York: Da Capo Press, 1997), xi. 19. Bob Barratt, “Songwriting,” in Making Music: The Essential Guide to Writing, Performing and Recording, ed. George Martin (London: Pan, 1983), 59. 20. Quoted in Peter Wicke, Rock Music: Culture, Aesthetics and Sociology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 13. 21. John Fogerty quoted in Johnnie Clott, “ ‘Moon Still Risin’: JohnFogerty/Creedence Clearwater Revival,” Concrete Press, Newcastle NSW, December 22, 1998, 20. 22. Ibid. 23. Simon Frith, “The Popular Music Industry,” in The Cambridge Companion to Pop and Rock, ed. Simon Frith, Will Straw, and John Street (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 29–30. 24. Greil Marcus, “The Beatles,” in The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock, ed. Jim Miller (New York: Random House, 1980), 185. 25. Simon Napier-Bell, Black Vinyl: White Powder (London: Ebury Press, 2002), 327. 26. Michael Fink, Inside the Music Industry: Creativity, Process and Business (New York: Schirmer Books, 1996), 28. 27. Randy Poe, Music Publishing: A Songwriter’s Guide (Cincinnati: Writer’s Digest Books, 1997), 48.

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28. Edward Samuels, The Illustrated Story of Copyright (New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2000), 248. 29. Fred Koller, How to Pitch and Promote Your Songs (New York: Allworth Press, 2001), 42. 30. Howard Becker, Art Worlds (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1982), 9. 31. David Swartz, Culture and Power: The Sociology of Pierre Bourdieu (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997), 117. 32. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention (New York: Harper Collins, 1997), 41. 33. For a lengthy account of the music industry as field see Phillip McIntyre, “The Contemporary Popular Music Industry as Field,” in Musical In-Between-ness: Proceedings of 8th Conference of the Australia-NZ Branch of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music, ed. Denis Crowdy, Shane Homan, and Tony Mitchell (Sydney: University of Technology, 2001), 140 –54. 34. John Baheny, op. cit. (1990), vi. 35. Al Kasha and Joel Hirschborn, If They Ask You, You Can Write A Song (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1979), 18. 36. Denis McQuail, Mass Communication Theory: An Introduction (London: Sage, 1994), 213. 37. Phillip McIntyre, “The Contemporary Popular Music Industry as Field,” in Musical In-Between-ness: Proceedings of 8th Conference of the Australia-NZ Branch of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music, ed. Denis Crowdy, Shane Homan, and Tony Mitchell (Sydney: University of Technology, 2001), 150. 38. Keith Negus, Popular Music in Theory: An Introduction (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996), 62. 39. Dave Marsh, Glory Days: A Biography of Bruce Springsteen (London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1987), 178–79. 40. Phillip Mcintyre, “Radio Program Directors, Music Directors and the Creation of Popular Music,” in Radio in the World: Radio Conference 2005, ed. Sianan Healy, Bruce Berryman, and David Goodman (Melbourne: RMIT Publishing, 2006), 449 – 60. 41. See http://www.paulmccartney.com. 42. Jodi Krangle, ed., The Muse’s News: An E-zine For And About Songwriters, Issue 10, September 6, 2007, http://www.musesmuse.com/musenews.html. 43. Mark Wells quoted in Phillip McIntyre, Creativity and Cultural Production: A Study of Contemporary Western Popular Music Songwriting, unpublished PhD Thesis, Sydney, Macquarie University, 2003, 220. 44. Ibid. 45. For an overview of the way audiences have been conceptualized within popular music studies see Keith Negus, Popular Music in Theory: An Introduction (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996), 7–35. 46. For a broader argument detailing the problems of seeing creativity with romantic eyes see Duncan Petrie, Creativity and Constraint in the British Film Industry (London: MacMillan, 2004) and Keith Sawyer, Explaining Creativity: The Science of Human Innovation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006). 47. Roy Shuker, Understanding Popular Music (London: Routledge, 1994), 99. 48. Notable exceptions are Jason Toynbee, Making Popular Music: Musicians, Creativity and Institutions (London: Arnold, 2000) and Phillip McIntyre, “Creativity and

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Cultural Production: A Study of Contemporary Western Popular Music Songwriting,” Creativity Research Journal (in press). 49. Keith Negus and Michael Pickering, Creativity, Communication and Cultural Value (London: Sage, 2004), 179. 50. Simon Frith, “The Popular Music Industry,” in The Cambridge Companion to Pop and Rock, ed. Simon Frith, Will Straw, and John Street (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 34. 51. Quoted in Joanna Demers, Steal this Music: How Intellectual Property Law Affects Musical Creativity (Athens Georgia: The University of Georgia Press, 2006), ix. 52. For an account of this argument see Keith Negus and Michael Pickering, Creativity, Communication and Cultural Value (London: Sage, 2004). 53. Margaret Boden, The Creative Mind: Myths and Mechanisms (London: Routledge, 2004), 14. 54. Robert Sternberg, ed., Handbook of Creativity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 5. 55. Margaret Boden, op. cit. (2004), 14. 56. Sigmund Freud, “The Relation of the Poet to Daydreaming,” in The Creativity Question, ed. Albert Rothenberg and Carl Hausman (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1976). 57. Phillip McIntyre, “Copyright and Creativity: Changing Paradigms and the Implications for Intellectual Property and the Music Industry,” Media International Australia incorporating Cultural Policy 123 (2007): 82–94. 58. Phillip McIntyre, “Creativity and Cultural Production: A Study of Contemporary Western Popular Music Songwriting,” Creativity Research Journal 20/1, (2008): 40 –52. 59. For example, see Vera Zolberg, Constructing a Sociology of the Arts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); Jack Stillinger, Multiple Authorship and the Myth of Solitary Genius (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991); Janet Wolff, The Social Production of Art (London: MacMillan, 1993); and Michael Howe, Genius Explained (London: Cambridge University Press, 1999). 60. Howard Becker, Art Worlds (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1982); Pierre Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977); Pierre Bourdieu, The Logic of Practice (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1990); Pierre Bourdieu, Field of Cultural Production (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993); and Pierre Bourdieu, The Rules of Art: Genesis and Structure of the Literary Field (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996). 61. Rob Pope, Creativity: Theory, History, Practice (New York: Routledge, 2005). 62. See Roland Barthes, “The Death of the Author,” in Image, Music, Text (New York: Noonday Press, 1977) and Michel Foucault, “What is an Author” in Textual Strategies: Perspectives in Post-Structural Criticism, ed. J. V. Harare (New York: Cornell University Press, 1979). 63. Duncan Petrie, op. cit. (1991) and Keith Negus and Michael Pickering, op. cit. (2004). 64. This research has been variously reviewed by Vera Zolberg. See Vera Zolberg, Constructing a Sociology of the Arts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); Carlisle Bergquist, “A Comparative View of Creativity Theories: Psychoanalytic, Behaviouristic and Humanistic,” Vantage Quest, http://www.vantagequest.org/trees/

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comparative.htm; Robert Sternberg, Handbook of Creativity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999); Mark Runco and Stephen Pritzker, Encyclopedia of Creativity (San Diego: Academic Press, 1999); and Keith Sawyer, Explaining Creativity: The Science of Human Innovation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006). 65. Peter Wicke, Rock Music: Culture, Aesthetics and Sociology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 15–16. 66. For elaborations of the systems model see Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, “Society, Culture and Person: A Systems View of Creativity,” in The Nature of Creativity: Contemporary Psychological Perspectives, ed. by Robert Sternberg (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 325–39; Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention (New York: Harper Collins, 1997); and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, “Implications of a Systems Perspective for the Study of Creativity,” in Handbook of Creativity, ed. by Robert Sternberg (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 313–35. 67. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, op. cit. (1999), 315. 68. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, op. cit. (1988), 329. 69. Keith Negus, op. cit. (1996), 37.

chapter 2

The Devaluation of Recorded Music: A New Business Model for the Music Industry Richard Strasser

The release of a new album is usually heralded with much fanfare and enjoyment for those involved in the creation, manufacturing, and sale of the compact disc (CD). However, when the iconic artist Prince released his album Planet Earth, the music industry was not in a celebratory mood. Instead of releasing the album through traditional retail channels, Prince, on July 15, 2007, in a deal believed to have earned him $2 million, released the album through The Mail on Sunday newspaper.1 By bypassing retailers and delivering a CD through the newspaper, Prince’s spokesperson stated that the artist’s “only aim is to get music (directly) to those that want to hear it.”2 This audacious move by Prince infuriated retailers who say that such “giveaways” reinforce that recorded music has no intrinsic value.3 In a keynote speech at the New Music Conference in London, Entertainment Retailers Association of UK Vice-Chairman Paul Quirk stated that, “The Artist formerly known as Prince should know that with behaviour like this he will soon be the Artist Formerly Available in Record Stores.”4 He went on to state that the British Music industry should “not believe the hype about downloads . . . music retailing is currently more than 90% physical and less than 10% digital, the way people talk you would conclude the percentages were reversed.”5 However, according to Nielsen SoundScan data, CD sales recently fell 19 percent compared with the same period from the previous year.6 Data from 2006 sales indicate that physical sales are down by 35.26 percent to 13,880,000, while digital sales have more than doubled to 53,018,000, an increase of 100.49

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percent from the previous year.7 A report by the research group Berg Insight suggests that digital “music sales will overtake physical sales in Western Europe by 2011.”8 These figures seem to suggest that the traditional recording industry is slowly giving way to the digitization of music content. However, what is not clear is what business model will succeed the current system, as multiple actors have entered the music industry and are trying to carve out a niche in this lucrative field. Furthermore, the very concept of music as a business is being tested as Michael Bracy, policy director of the Future Music Coalition, questions, “How do you ‘monetize’ the digital music industry?”9 In fact, the same Nielsen SoundScan data indicates that “while more people are legitimately buying music online, 10 times as many songs are still downloaded for free.”10 To answer these questions and examine the new directions digital music is taking, it’s important to first understand the traditional business model and then explore how the digitization of music is opening new avenues in the music industry. THE TRADITIONAL RECORDING BUSINESS MODEL The traditional business model for the recording industry has been in effect for well over 50 years. Each actor within this value chain is part of a sequential system that adds value to process as product passes from creators to the consumer. At the apex of this system are content creators who straddle both the recording and publishing industries. This includes artists, composers, performers, and to a lesser extent artist and repertoire (A&R) departments of record labels. Apart from acquiring new and promising artists to long-term exclusive contracts, A&R entails the development of repertoire as well as the overseeing of production and creation of an artist’s image. The goal of content creators is the recording and production of CDs. To achieve this, content creators enter into exclusive contracts with record companies who translate artistic productions into consumer products. To encourage content creators, labels finance them through advance payments while retaining control of the manufacturing and sale of the recording. To capitalize on economies of scale, most companies have their own production plants. The big-four record labels—EMI, Warner Music, Universal Music, and Sony BMG—leverage global CD pressing facilities to accomplish worldwide economies of scale. Because consumers generally do not purchase unfamiliar music, airtime on the radio and other means of exposure for a particular artist or band is essential. Labels have well-established relationships with traditional media channels such as press, radio, and TV stations. As with distribution, major record labels (majors) have a global network of branch offices that can handle sales, distribution, and marketing in any desired market. Distribution companies usually work toward large retailers, such as Best Buy and Wal-Mart, who

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purchase a high volume of albums from wholesalers. This distribution channel favors artists with a well-established audience (i.e., stars) while disadvantaging marginal artists (niche performers) who find it hard to be distributed in the market.11 Various economic factors influence the traditional physical-only distribution scheme. Demand factors such as available leisure time, the demand for leisure, related increases in disposable household income, and demographic profiles have shaped the entertainment industry from the consumer perspective.12 Supply-side factors have ensured a stable system that guarantees profits for the recording industry for several decades. These factors have favored large entertainment conglomerates by providing barriers to entry; allowing for control, development, and marketing of new content; and stabilizing industry structures and segments, especially distribution systems. Driving both of these economic factors is the creation of technology and new formats. New music formats and playback technologies have been important in the development of new musical genres (e.g., the synthesizer and art rock) and have led the music industry out of temporary setbacks (such as in the late ’70s and early ’80s) and into new growth phases.13 However, to many in the recording industry, recent technologies have been highly disruptive to existing music markets and well-established distribution mechanisms.14 At the heart of this disruption has been the creation of peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing. P2P REVOLUTION The origins of P2P file sharing began well before the advent of Napster and other P2P sites. In 1986, Sony introduced the Digital Audio Tape (DAT), a revolutionary system that allowed for digital recording and “perfect” reproduction of the master recording. Due to copyright problems, electronic firms delayed development of consumer products, and DAT remained a highpriced professional medium. In 1990, Sony and Phillips, the creators of the CD player, produced the standard for the Recordable CD-ROM (CD-R). Although copying of recorded music or recording of radio broadcasts has been possible since the availability of cassettes and associated players/recorders, the digital format enabled the creation of perfect, identical copies on a large scale, either for private use or for organized music piracy. The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) reported that total sales of pirated media was worth U.S. $4.6 billion in 2003 (i.e., pirate sales accounted for 15% of the legitimate music market) and that in developing country markets such as Brazil, China, and Mexico, physical media piracy levels are over 50 percent.15 Although the physical manufacturing of pirated CDs and DVDs has created significant problems to the recording industry, both from an economic and intellectual property rights perspective, the introduction of online piracy has presented even greater challenges to the recording industry.

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In the past, systems for sharing files and information between computers was extremely limited by computer processing speed and the long time frame associated with downloading music files. The scenario changed dramatically in 1999 with the development of the file-sharing company Napster. Napster operated on a centralized server that monitored which files were available at any given time. Proprietors of Napster could determine which files were being made available by their consumers. Although the company posted a disclaimer on its Web site, stating that illegal use of the network was not permitted, it did not enforce this ruling. By 2001, Napster had a daily average of 1.57 million simultaneous users and 60 million daily users worldwide.16 Ultimately, a group of record labels whose works were being pirated on the Napster network shut down the company. The case against Napster was based primarily on the fact that the company had not only the ability to monitor which files where shared but had the power to prevent copyrighted works from being pirated. This void was soon filled by imitators such as Audiogalaxy, Morpheus, Gnutella, KaZaA, and more recently, BitTorrent, eDonkey, and Warez. These file-sharing networks developed a decentralized system where the network proprietor did not maintain a centralized database but rather distributed an index of information among user computers. Grokster consisted of a series of user networks, known as supernodes, that held and maintained an index of works. As with Napster, many of these filesharing companies were successfully sued and terminated by entertainment companies and their representatives. Yet, early attempts by the major record labels to establish an online presence to counter the success of the file-sharing networks failed due to the lack of user friendliness and a commercially viable business model to compete with free downloading. Complicated user interfaces, comparatively high up-front costs imposed by monthly subscription fees, and the limited size of song catalogs, especially across the label divide, did not convince consumers to embrace label-owned companies such as MusicNet and PressPlay. Furthermore, underdeveloped digital rights management (DRM) schemes only fed the online music community with content to be transmitted on file-sharing sites.17 Yet, it is these illegal file-sharing companies that have become the backbone for the distribution of legitimate music content. In principle, file sharing is an innovative technology that has increasingly useful application in the music industry and several nontraditional music sectors, such as communication (voice over the Internet services such as Skype, on-demand streaming audio/video or other media push services such as Redswoosh), service industries (Linux’s Lindows, which offers software via P2P networks),18 and organizations that share information, such as academia and different government agencies.19 While the first download offers were available from 2001 (MusicNet and Pressplay were launched in December 2001), the breakthrough for online

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music retailing occurred in 2003. In this year, music labels gave permission to online companies to distribute substantial amounts of products online according to license terms in return for royalty payments.20 With the general commercial acceptance of P2P systems and the growing ability for users to have access to music over broadband, companies began developing a variety of e-business models for the music industry. Currently, there are four different configurations for the delivery of music content over the Internet. Two models are structured on the way music is accessed: either via streaming or downloading. The other structures are based on business models that provide the consumer with the ability to purchase or “lease” individual songs, the socalled subscription or “a la carte” models. It is the “a la carte” model used by companies such as iTunes that is currently driving online sales and the comeback of the single format. With the “a la carte” method, music is copied to the user’s hard drive against a payment, allowing the user to subsequently listen to the content without being connected to the Internet. In this model the consumer acquires the music permanently (full sale), but downloaded tracks usually come with some restrictions on usage. DRM technology is designed to control use of digital media by preventing access, copying, or conversion of files to other devices. The iTunes store makes use of FairPlay DRM technology. FairPlay is built into Apple’s QuickTime, a multimedia framework for which the current range of devices includes the iPod, iPhone, and the iTunes Store.21 The success of the “a la Carte” model can be attributed to consumers’ desire to “own” purchased music and the relative ease of application. This purchasing method is linked to an older demographic who have been conditioned to the traditional physical music retail format and are now reconfiguring their music collections. However, when downloading, consumers chose to overwhelmingly (85% of the time) download only one track from an album rather than purchasing the full album.22 Frequently cited figures indicate the continued growth of online purchasing. According to Natalie Kerris, a spokeswoman for Apple, iTunes had sold more than 1.5 billion songs three years after its inception, making it the fourth largest music retailer in the United States.23 A report by SoundScan stated there were 140.9 million legal downloads in the first half of 2004, compared to only 19 million for the last half of 2003.24 In 2006, a report by ResearchandMarketing indicated that annual U.S. online digital music sales were estimated to be $1.1 billion.25 By 2008, iTunes accounted for 30 percent of all U.S. music sales, making it the largest U.S. music retailer.26 Although “a la Carte” downloading is still the preferred method of purchasing digital music, streaming music is becoming a viable alternative. Streaming services allow visitors to hear music in real time without downloading the file to the consumer’s local hard drive. Consumers do not take ownership of the streamed songs but have the ability to scan and explore vast collections. This has led to the development of streaming subscription models that give

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subscribers access to catalogs of music content for a monthly fee. Companies such as RealNetworks’ Rhapsody and Napster provide the consumer with a large volume of music for a monthly fee. On November 2003, 3.2 million Americans visited Napster.com, which was relaunched as a paid online music service in late October 2003. In comparison, Apple’s iTunes, drew 2.7 million visitors in November 2003.27 By March 2007, Napster expected revenues to be more than $28 million with more than 830,000 subscribers making it the number one download store.28 The subscription model is increasingly reliant on advertisement revenue, rather than recording label funding. This requires companies to be able to obtain a high number of subscribers to be financially viable. While subscription models provide the online consumer with large catalogs, portable music systems allow for the portable access of subscriptions. Using Microsoft’s Janus DRM, companies such as Napster offer consumers the ability to enjoy large collections of music not only on their PCs but on their portable devices as well. If the consumer does not pay his/her monthly subscription, the music is cancelled. Usually the number of copies that can be made is limited through DRM technologies. When this limit is reached (sometimes three but often more copies) the song can no longer be downloaded to further devices or copied. The ability to transfer content between portable devices is limited by format and DRM technology employed by the online music service. (i.e., with Open MG/Magic Gate in the case of Sony Connect). A variation on the music subscription format is streaming radio. This system gives consumers access to a variety of genre-specific radio streams for a specified monthly fee. Streaming radio is often bundled with other subscription packages offered by a music company. Finally, a relatively new form of paid serves is subscription file sharing. Unlike previous P2P networks, these systems only allow file sharing to take place between paying subscribers or between purchased songs. Because the music is transmitted through DRM systems, the sampled works can be controlled, and ownership is limited.29 In 2004, the online music market accounted for a small share of total music sales revenues (global sales equaled approximately 1–2%).30 By 2007, global digital music sales were estimated at approximately U.S. $2.9 billion, a roughly 40 percent increase over 2006. This accounted for an estimated 15 percent of the global music market, up from 11 percent in 2006 and zero in 2003. U.S. online sales now account for 30 percent of all revenues.31 The digital music industry is characterized by an insatiable demand for new material supplied by a plethora of new players. In the medium term, overall demand for music may increase through digital distribution and other new forms of music consumption. With the general increase in the number of people who are accessing music via the Internet, there are several players—notably from the nonmusic sector—who are becoming involved

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in online music distribution. Companies such as Microsoft, Cola-Cola, Wal-Mart, and different Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are entering the arena. This rapid surge in players has led many industry commentators to predict increased competition, larger marketing budgets, and consolidation.32 A key requisite for the development of efficient online music delivery is competitive and widespread access to broadband infrastructure. The delivery of online content also necessitates new technologies and an environment that facilitates the creation, acquisition, management, and delivery of content. Secure payment systems are essential for the functioning of a viable business environment. Moreover, a diversity of interoperable standards and hardware are likely to prove most beneficial to competition and efficient online content markets. These demands have opened the way for a plethora of alternative business models and a vast array of companies interested in accessing the lucrative music business. ALTERNATIVE BUSINESS MODELS AND ACTORS Many in the music industry have viewed the proliferation of broadband connectivity to the average PC user as a disruptive technology. However, the development of greater connectivity has opened the way for improved revenue streams and opportunities for music consumption. High-speed connections have allowed consumers to download music rapidly, thus bypassing traditional methods for enjoying music (including unauthorized file sharing). Many of these new entities include players that have long had sustainable links to the music industry, such as consumer electronic manufacturers, software and hardware companies, and DRM firms. Service providers who manage, host, and secure content are going to have to become a new phenomenon in the music industry, especially with the potential growth expected in new broadband technology. Most of these alternative companies make use of a hybrid file-sharing system similar to the Napster model, which relies on users connecting to other nodes within the immediate vicinity to request files. These systems are very popular for various reasons, most notably the ease of use, strong search capabilities, and the ability to download large amounts of data in a convenient fashion. Depending on the nature of the players, very different motives drive their online music activity. This has lead to new co-operations within the music industry as players try to integrate upwards or downwards along the recording industry value chain. Yet, the range of new retail interfaces available to the consumer is considerable, including: online music stores of the major recording labels, third-party online music stores (e.g., Apple, Napster), ISPs and content portals, mobile content suppliers, software and hardware companies (Apple, Dell, etc.), online retailers (Wal-Mart, Amazon, etc), and DRM providers (Microsoft, Real Networks). Most notably companies that traditionally

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have had no relationship to the entertainment industry have began to be actively involved in the music business. Cell phone and communications companies (Sprint, AT&T, etc.), consumer brands (Coca-Cola), physical retailers (systems set up in places such as Starbucks that permit music downloading by customers), and even credit card companies (American Express) are looking to the music industry as an ancillary income generator. M-COMMERCE Technologies often develop in tandem with new markets. This has certainly been the case with the music industry and mobile communications sector. The growth of the global system for mobile communication (GSM) has been important for the development of mobile commerce (m-commerce).33 M-commerce systems involve the direct transfer of music to mobile devices such as cell phones, PDAs, and other handheld devices. The m-commerce market is built on certain value propositions such as mobility, availability, and ubiquity (interconnectivity and roaming). In most cases, music is accessible to the user via a specific player (music jukebox) tied to a particular software program or a type of hardware to play the music (PC, portable device, mobile handset). Added to the development of devices has been the bundling of music content to various devices. For Sony’s new Walkman phone, the company had preinstalled new unreleased tracks by Robbie Williams.34 Wireless operators are also selling full-song downloads. Sprint recently began selling full tracks that subscribers can download to their phones, with Verizon (V Cast) and AT&T expected to open similar services in mid 2008. Sprint’s service has a dual-delivery feature that sends one version of the purchased song to the mobile phone and another version to the PC.35 The need for converged products in digital audio players independently from other electronic devices has meant the demise of the Walkman and portable radio. An essential reason for the creation of independent devices is the need for portability (carry-on functionality while jogging, etc.) not provided by devices such as the laptop. The mobile phone has been the most technically feasible and acceptable single carry-on device to consumers. Other devices that offer audio codec as a secondary feature are smart handheld devices and handheld gaming consoles. Whether consumers will replace dedicated media players with converged devices such as mobile phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), or combined camera/media players is still to be seen. Currently, connection speeds, processing power, battery limitations, and screen size make it very difficult for the portable phone to replace digital audio players or other content devices.36 Originally phones used as tools for downloading content, apart from small files such as ringtones, were restricted to countries such as Japan and Korea.37 Yet, with the development of the iPhone in 2007, customers are able to download content via Bluetooth and telecommunication

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networks. With improving audio compression technology, the iPhone is positioning itself as an important player in the music industry. Within the first 30 hours of the iPhone’s release, Apple sold over 30,000 units.38 Apple expected to sell its 1 millionth iPhone by the quarter ending in September 2007. However, due to overwhelming demand, Apple achieved this goal by the beginning of September of that year.39 In contrast, it took the company seven quarters to sell its 1 millionth iPod. Apple says that it’s still on track to meet the goal spelled out by CEO Steve Jobs to sell 10 million iPhones by 2008.40 Development in m-commerce will expand rapidly with cheaper and faster wireless connectivity via DSL Internet access and improvements in 3G networks. While the benefits of technology convergence are experienced in the home, in the workplace, and on the move, their rapid adoption raises problems with the compliance of such products, both in terms of regulation and cost, especially in comparison with single-purpose products. One of the most important consequences of the blurring of technology borders is the increasing globalization of services. This move calls for standardization and interoperability between networks and services across the globe. Currently, there are no international agencies to allow for the seamless transition of such technology. Apple must negotiate with individual service providers in each country to sell the iPhone, thereby limiting the range of such units and their overall adoption in the market. SOFTWARE COMPANIES A recent entrant into the music industry has been software companies, who have used digital music offerings to power different revenue streams. Entering the music industry is an attractive proposition for software companies because selling low-margin digital downloads and subscription services helps to encourage widespread software usage and increases the importance of specific audio and video formats. Two of the largest software companies, Microsoft and Real Networks, integrated to produce the MSN Music Store. The launch of the MSN Music Store serves several business goals for Microsoft. First, the store helped to increase the importance of the Windows Media Player 10 jukebox, which includes Windows Media DRM. Secondly, all tracks within the store are encoded using the Microsoft proprietary WMA codec, helping to further expand the format’s usage. Thirdly, music helps leverage and increase the Internet audience on their MSN Network service, Microsoft Internet portal. Finally, the move was an important component of Microsoft’s plans to create the digital living room, expected by the company to be a major growth area. The MSN Music Store is available both as a Web-based experience and as part of the Windows Media Player 10. Furthermore, it is an integral component of the Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005. Attracting users to the jukebox is a critical factor in the digital delivery of

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music, but it also allows Microsoft opportunities to control new media revenue streams (Video-on-Demand or Pay-Per-View Movies, live DRM to host concerts, sports events). To increase the perceived value of the Windows Media Player 10 jukebox, Microsoft has created a “Digital Media Mall,” with a host of other digital music services, including Napster, Puretracks, WalMart, Virgin, and CinemaNow (for movies), aggregated into one application. As with Apple’s integration of music service and hardware via iTunes and the iPod, Microsoft has developed synergies between Windows Media Player 10 and Zune. The new Microsoft DRM system called Janus will allow music-service subscribers to listen to rented music on portable devices. Regulatory agencies in both the United States and the European Union have recently urged Microsoft to debundle the Windows Media Player 10 from its overall operating system.41 On February 28, 2008, the European Commission fined Microsoft $ 899 million (U.S. $1.3 billion) for failure to honor the 2004 antitrust ruling against it.42 Furthermore, in the wake of a landmark $761 million legal settlement of its lawsuit against Microsoft, RealNetwork’s Rhapsody will be integrated into Microsoft’s MSN search, instant messaging, and music store services.43 In effect, Rhapsody will become MSN’s default subscription music service, thereby killing Microsoft’s ambitions of developing its own service. INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDERS Another nontraditional entertainment sector to enter the music industry has been Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and Web portals. In many cases there currently exists a “blurring of boundaries” between content providers, broadcasters, and telecommunication service providers. In the ever-changing music environment, network operators are looking at business models that generate revenue, especially with the loss of traditional outlets such as fixedline telephone systems. Furthermore, ISPs have begun delivering bundled services in order to combat competition and sustain customer bases. This has taken the form of video delivery, greater broadband capability, and better document storage and backup abilities. It is expected that licensed material will drive subscriber numbers, especially with premium broadband packages that offer the end-customer an “all you can eat” content service. The ISPs are also looking at the current range of online music purchasing processes, such as pay-per-track services, digital radio (e.g., Radio@AOL), and music TV. For many years, ISPs have been entering into a series of commercial relationships with content aggregators and content owners to offer authorized material. The ISPs and Web portals have one significant advantage over many other players in the online music business: a large Internet audience. According to an OECD report, computer and Internet-related sites such as Yahoo! and MSN Networks have captured around 40 percent of all Internet visits

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with entertainment products.44 The ability of ISPs to position themselves as distributors of music depends on partnerships formed with content generators and their ability to share in the revenue streams generated. Currently, Verizon Online DSL, in conjunction with MSN premium, gives customers preferred access to Rhapsody, allowing them the opportunity to listen to music and radio services.45 Recently, hostilities between content generators and ISPs have heated up with the introduction of the Communications, Promotion, and Enhancement Act (COPE) of 2006. As part of a major overhaul of the Communications Act of 1996, the COPE Act includes network neutrality provisions and an amendment that prohibits service tiering. The bill, which passed the House but is currently stalled in the Senate, would spell out broadband Internet consumer rights but without nondiscrimination language urged by net neutrality advocates such as Google, Yahoo!, and eBay, who want unfettered access to the net.46 The Justice Department has sent comments to the FCC warning that “regulators should be careful not to impose regulations that could limit consumer choice and investment in broadband facilities.”47 Network operators such as AT&T and Verizon, as well as cable companies such as Comcast, warn that a restrictive bill will limit the development of high-bandwidth services and reduce income streams for future developments by the network operators.48 To capture music content, ISPs are reliant on numerous music intermediaries that provide rights clearance, hosting and delivery of content, and billing infrastructure. White label music services have filled this void by handling aspects related to a digital music store such as capturing, storing, and retrieving music content. The ISPs are able to obtain clearance rights for music content without the need to negotiate with content providers. Companies such as Loudeye/OD2 and MusicNet also provide DRM technology, usage reporting, digital music royalty settlements, and other services. Both Loudeye/OD2 and MusicNet serve a diverse range of clients including, Amazon, AT&T Wireless, Barnes & Noble, Gibson Audio, House of Blues, and MyCokeMusic.com. Up until it closed operations on January 19, 2007, BitPass offered solutions that included payment processing, customer service transactions, and promotions management for the delivery of content. Although ISPs are slowly entering the music industry, many in the music industry have not welcomed their presence, especially in regards to copyright infringement. The music industry and its representatives have attempted to hold ISPs liable not only for tolerating illegal P2P traffic but for actually facilitating it. Furthermore, the music industry contends that ISPs have no intrinsic interest in limiting infringer use, as greater broadband use increases ISP subscriber numbers and generates greater advertising income. The music industry has sued ISPs to reveal the names and addresses of suspected music copyright infringers, but ISPs have refuted these allegations and pointed to the technological neutrality of their broadband technology. Furthermore,

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ISPs contend that monitoring and enforcing compliance of copyright imposes significant costs. This was the argument of the ISP Charter Communications in response to RIAA subpoena to reveal the names and addresses of its subscribers.49 The subpoena process adopted by the music industry against ISPs has been examined by courts, especially in a series of legal actions involving the RIAA and Verizon Communications. The U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that subpoenas could not be issued against an ISP that does not store copyrighted material on its computer servers. If the RIAA wished to obtain the identities of users suspected of illegal file sharing, the RIAA would need to file civil law suits against such individuals.50 In a final effort to obtain this information from the ISPs, the RIAA appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. Yet, in October 2004, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected to hear an appeal by the RIAA, thereby ending its litigation of the ISP industry.51 Furthermore, the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998 established a scheme that is designed to limit ISP’s liability for copyright infringement, provided they meet certain requirements. SEARCH ENGINES Search engines, such as Google, Yahoo!, Ask.com, and Live Search, have traditionally functioned as information retrieval companies designed to search for data on the World Wide Web. As with other technology companies, search engines have began to offer their customers a range of music products and services. Yahoo! has several tools available to its clients, including the ability to create mashups via Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) at their Web sites. Mashups are Web applications that combine data from several sources into a new integrated system. YouTunes is a mashup that finds YouTube videos for the top 10 songs at iTunes. The mashup will take the iTunes data and run a search at YouTube for all video titles that match the song titles listed sending it to a consumer’s computer as a clean list.52 Yahoo!’s Pipes works in a similar fashion to YouTunes but collects data from RSS feeds. The site is currently in beta and due for full commercial release within the next year. Apart from offering Web applications, search engines are beginning to act as online retailers. The recent acquisition of MusicMatch by Yahoo!—an online retailer and software firm—for U.S. $160 million sheds light on the dynamic state of the music industry on this market.53 Yahoo!’s free music portal is already completely ad supported and offers Internet radio, music videos, and music news. In 2005, Yahoo! developed the Music Unlimited subscription fee music site as an attempt to undercut competitors such as Rhapsody and Napster and integrate the service with other Yahoo! products.54 The site boasted over 1 million songs encoded as WMA files protected by a DRM scheme similar to Napster and Rhapsody (music will only play on the PC they reside on).55 On February 4, 2008, Yahoo! announced that

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Rhapsody would be the exclusive on-demand service for Yahoo!, replacing Music Unlimited.56 This action would leave three online music subscription companies: Rhapsody, Napster, and Microsoft’s Zune Marketplace, which, in 2008, attempted a hostile takeover of Yahoo!. However, at the time of writing, Microsoft’s $44.6 billion offer for Yahoo! had still not been accepted. A combination of the two companies’ Internet efforts would create a very strong competitor against Google, which currently accounts for 54 percent of all online searches in the United States compared to Yahoo!’s 22 percent and Microsoft’s 10 percent. Although Yahoo! and Microsoft have a long history of partnerships, the synthesis of the array of services, ranging from entertainment to instant messaging, will be difficult to combine, even with the projected revenues from online advertising. HARDWARE MANUFACTURERS The digital music industry has had a profound influence on the PC and electronics industry. Currently, the entertainment market is considered a high-growth market, and the electronics industry is seeing a growing global market for digital consumer appliances both for consumer electronics manufacturers and PC vendors (including chip vendors). Recently, several hardware manufacturers have shown an interest in developing ties to music content providers. Hardware manufacturers such as Samsung, Dell, Sony, and Apple are generating online music offerings (i.e., hardware-Integrated Services) to sell more of their music players. Digital music and the rise of portable audio players is also redefining the boundaries between the somewhat traditionally separate PC, software, mobile handset, content, and consumer electronics sector, which are now competing head-on for the sales of portable audio devices. As the digital music value chain becomes more integrated, interdependency between the individual players and device manufacturers is occurring. (e.g., cooperation between device manufacturers, music services, and software providers) The backbone of the digital music industry has been the portable audio player. Great consumer acceptance, falling prices (in particular for flash memory), rising capacities, and more diverse offerings with multiple storage capacities has increased the number of digital devices available.57 Analysts forecast that this category will continue to grow while the audio consumer electronic market, especially the CD market, will decline. The portable mp3 player category has in terms of unit sales more than doubled in 2004 to over 6.9 million units, and dollar sales have nearly tripled in revenue to U.S. $1.2 billion, compared to figures from 2003 and more than $80 million in 2000.58 According to the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) factory-level mp3 player sales rose 31 percent with 2006 revenue calculated at U.S. $5.56 billion. The mp3 market has enjoyed a double percentage gain since 1998.59 Furthermore, a 2006 study by Ipsos research found

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that one in five Americans aged 12 and older owned an mp3 player. The study indicated that over half of teens (54%) own an mp3 player, averaging 16 hours of use per week.60 CONSUMERS AS CREATORS OF MUSIC CONTENT In “The Futurists,” Alvin Toffler notes that “the emergence of the service society has coincided with extended consumer self-service.”61 For Toffler, the notion of a passive consumer will be exchanged in the future with consumers that are part of the value-chain as coproducers or “prosumers” (producerconsumers). For many analysts, customers today “are concerned about control over available service features and content displayed to them.”62 The change precipitated by digital technologies and an evolution of consumer consumption habits has had a persistent and profound effect on the online music industry. “Innovation and change lead to an unfreezing of established relationships, expectation and roles.”63 The challenge for suppliers is to manage the transformation process, that is, to (gradually) explore new forms of interaction and models of collaboration that involve customers in the process and to shape the relationship with them.64 Therefore, future customer relations in the online community will be built on a triangulation between value propositions and product characteristics, business transaction attributes, and attributes within a computer-mediated environment. Increasingly, companies are looking to incorporate social and business systems that are enmeshed with business output, while adding value and control for customers.65 For current consumers, especially younger demographics, this translates in online entities that not only supply music content but value-added services, such as chat groups, streamed events, and the ability to burn CDs or personalized playlists of digital singles. This means greater choice and flexibility, with consumers able to enjoy music on their terms (i.e., no need to pay for full albums when only a few songs are desired). Seemingly, many various forms of P2P services and online music stores are able to sustain a greater breadth of music types, thus potentially better satisfying consumer demand and niche markets. Moreover, the way consumers find and buy music is slowly gravitating away from traditional online methods to new systems, maybe leading to more music genres and a lesser focus on a few music stars. SOCIAL NETWORKS AS CONTENT CREATORS The impact of the online medium on network users (i.e., interactivity and participation) and diversity of material made omnipresent by the availability of online technologies opens up possibilities for new content created by network users. Apart from having ubiquitous access to music, users have

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become important participants in the chain of content creation, marketing, and distribution. In the context of file-sharing networks that allow the transfer of owned or authorized files, users (e.g., amateur artists) can create their own music and share it with others. This kind of exchange is unique to file sharing in comparison to other online music distribution or traditional music business models. To date, the take-up of this has been limited, and opinions vary as to the scale of its long-term impact. Online social networks occur in many different venues, from those that offer very little interaction, such as e-mail lists and Usenet newsgroups, to realtime online-chat systems and multiuser domains (MUDs). Users can share information, make files available, contribute to projects, or transfer files.66 Consumer-to-consumer music recommendation tools allow consumers to share musical tastes in a collaborative forum. These forums take many forms, from the “collaborative filtering” technique adopted by Amazon for recommending products to service-tied systems, such as iMix on iTunes Music Store or Rhapsody’s Playlist Central tool, which allow consumers to purchase or access the songs in the playlists directly.67 However, there is a growing number of music consumers, especially a younger generation, who aren’t accessing music from subscription or “a la carte” services. Blogging and podcasting allows users to link or post content on the Internet for other people to download or post comments. Similarly, private group sharing sites, such as iMeem and Grouper, enable users to exchange music files. According to a report issued by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 55 percent of American children aged 12–17 claim to visit social networking sites such as MySpace.68 In each of these venues, individuals identify with the values, conventions, and practices of the online group. Researchers show that social interactions shape participants’ opinions, decisions, and relationships and take up considerably high amounts of their time.69 This online interaction has direct consequences on individuals’ interaction with family, friends, and established media outlets.70 Social network sites have been an important addition to the online environment. Most are based on social communities of people who share interests and activities. Users interact through a series of tools, including messaging, e-mail, blogs, file sharing, and discussion groups. On July 19, 2005, Fox News Corporation bought MySpace for $580 million.71 As a fully functional social network site, individuals are able to download music content and share it with their social community. Bands such as Babyshambles and the Arctic Monkeys built fan bases rapidly by posting their music on their Web sites and allowing people to swap mp3s, record performances, and share content through MySpace and other social networks. Since MySpace’s launch in 2003, an estimated 3 million artists have used the site to share information, post tour dates, and exchange music with fans.72 With 12 million unique visitors per month, the site has attracted prominent bands, such as the Black Eyed Peas,

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R.E.M., and Nine Inch Nails.73 In September 2006, MySpace began selling music tracks using an open source standard. The company said they were bypassing DRM content so that MySpace content would be compatible with the iPod.74 The sale of music content encouraged MySpace to develop other music outlets. In an effort to accommodate artists, the company developed a specific MySpace profile for musicians. Unlike traditional MySpace profiles, artists can upload up to four mp3 songs that users can listen to for free. Some bands allow fans to download some sample tracks as mp3s or direct them to third-party sites for purchase. A recent development has been the collaboration between Snocap, a Web-based music distributor, and MySpace to create a digital downloading store called Mypurchase.75 The new service will allow bands to sell music through their MySpace profile directly to fans. Consumers will be able to buy, download, and play files on multiple devices, such as iPods and Microsoft’s Zune. What makes this service different from current MySpace offerings is that artists can set the price of the downloads. What is not yet known about Mypurchase is the distribution fee MySpace intends to charge artists. Chief executive Rusty Rueff told Reuters that the “small” distribution fee was not yet “fixed.”76 Finally, MySpace has leveraged the success of social networking to develop ancillary products and services within the music industry. On October 16, 2007, MySpace launched its first branded music tour. Beginning at the Show-Box in Seattle, the All-Ages MySpace Music Tour stopped off in more than 30 venues through Thanksgiving weekend in Las Vegas.77 Another popular social network system is the blog. Blogs are online journals where individuals and groups provide commentary or news on a particular subject. Musicblogs or mp3blogs are blogs on which the creator or fans make music available for downloading. Often, blogs are used to promote new bands or releases of established artists and have found support from the major record labels. However, in this interaction labels want to control how and to whom the material is posted.78 Music companies are concerned that this new online forum may provide listeners with an alternative source of illegally obtained and streamed music content. However, some labels have begun to realize the potential of blogs as an important promotional vehicle. In August 2004, Warner Music Group began to ask mp3 blogs to post music on their sites.79 Many blogs decided against posting the Warner files because it would be seen by their audience as a paid endorsement of a major label. In response to the music industry concerns about music piracy on mp3 blogs and to tap a vast audience and possible revenues, many blogs have redesigned themselves to be legitimate digital music labels. The mp3 Music Blog Earvolution established Earvolution Records to sell music directly from its blog and other digital retail outlets. Earvolution collaborated with Tunecore, a leading flat-fee independent distributor, to deliver music to iTunes, Rhapsody, Napster, and other digital retail outlets.80 The flexibility of this arrangement is perfect

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for a growing label such as Earvolution and a natural extension of a nascent music venture that has a dedicated clientele. The viral nature of blogs has influenced other blogs to develop sustainable revenue streams. GBox provides users a bit of software code, known as a widget, that are embedded on their blogs. This code allows users to broadcast wishlists of songs to friends and family members within their blog, in hopes of getting them as gifts. With the support of two major labels (Universal and Sony/BMG) the company hopes to turn bloggers from passive commentators to salespeople.81 CONCLUSION Online music has proven to be a major force for the expansion of the music industry for the near future. The development of a multitude of transmission models, from a la carte downloading to streaming to social networks, continues as the market for music expands. Ensuring artistic creation in this environment is dependent on the maintenance of effective copyright protection, payment systems, and the reduction of illegal online piracy. The online music market has begun to diverge with small and innovative players competing with well-established music companies. However, for all parties to succeed in this market there are several key requisites for the creation of an efficient and competitive online music industry. Key to the delivery of music content is access to a competitive and widespread broadband infrastructure; acquisition management and secure payment systems that protect the consumer and provide revenue to both the content creator and intermediaries; and, government agencies that address Internet piracy on a global basis. From a business perspective, many companies have managed to occupy large parts of the online value chain. In the case of Sony and Apple, close to perfect vertical integration has been reached. Apple does not own a catalog but encodes in proprietary AAC format, uses proprietary FairPlay DRM technology, and has its own music store (iTunes) and its own hardware devices (iPod and iPhone). Sony owns its own content and has the ATRAC3 music codec, the SonicStage jukebox software, the Sony Open Magic Gate DRM system, and its range of Sony Network Walkmen and other portable devices. For other online music providers, the music e-commerce environment is often a result of a large number of alliances, especially during a company’s startup stage. For example, Wal-Mart acts as a standard retailer while sourcing in everything from music content, online music store technology, and codec and DRM standards from other companies. Yet, friction between the content industry and technology providers is impeding the development of new technologies. Disagreements between the music industry (labels, collecting societies, and authors associations), technology providers (PC and consumer electronics industry), and network operators may jeopardize the deployment of successful broadband music services in the future. Traditionally, the music

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industry has reacted to these problems by litigation. Yet, according to researchers, decreasing piracy does not necessarily imply increasing profits.82 Rather, maximum profit outcomes occur in the presence of piracy. Seeking regulatory means to stop piracy is likely to be a self-harming strategy. Although the music and movie industries have fallen prey to the plague of digital piracy, similar entertainment industries have been able to prosper in a similar environment. The online gaming industry is thriving, not because it has been able to stop the act of piracy, but because the interactive experience of online gaming cannot be duplicated and pirated. Music by its very nature is a hedonic product whose valuation is based on the experience it provides the consumer. Prince has been the role model for the development of new methods of reaching his audience. Even in the days of dial-up he sought to make his music available online, first as a way of ordering albums and then through digital distribution. The Internet truism is that information wants to be free; Prince’s corollary is that music wants to be heard. Yet, on September 13, 2007, he announced that he was considering legal action against YouTube, eBay, and the Swedish piracy search engine The Pirate Bay for posting material without his consent.83 It seems that Prince’s aim is to control his music content for those who want to hear it, not for his fans to make that decision. Ultimately, Prince’s experiments with redefining the music industry only go as far as getting music to his audience. Although for many artists their relationship with the major labels, especially Prince’s relationship with Sony BMG, both in terms of content and distribution, has been clearly established, the tenuous relationship between creator and audience is still evolving. The ability of consumers to control, manipulate, and transmit music in this digital age has given a once passive receiver a role in the creative process. Prince may be able to bypass music retailers, but the advent of social networking has given his fans an equal say in how they consume his music in this digital age. NOTES 1. John Pareles, “The Once and Future Prince,” New York Times, July 22, 2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/22/arts/music/22pare.html. 2. Ibid. 3. Deborah Amos, “Compact Disc Giveaway Sparks Fury in Britain,” Day to Day, July 13, 2007, http://www.npr.org. 4. Entertainment Retailers Association, “Prince Covermount Plan ‘Beggars Belief,’ ” ERA Newsletter, June 28, 2007. 5. Ibid. 6. Nelda Ulaby, “Music Business Still Groping for Digital Age Plan,” All Things Considered, July 12, 2007, http://www.npr.org. 7. Alan Jones, “2006: The Year the Download Came of Age,” Music Week, January 13, 2007, 16.

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8. Matthew Kapko, “Mobile’s Music to Their Ears,” RCR Wireless News, May 14, 2007, 9. 9. Ulaby, “Music Business Still Groping.” 10. Ibid. 11. Michael X. Zhang, “A Review of Economic Properties of Music Distribution,” Music Industry: Emerging Paradigms (Hyderabad, India: ICFAI Press, 2007). 12. Harold Vogel, Entertainment Industry Economics –A Guide for Financial Analysis, 6th ed. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 254. 13. Ibid. 14. U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, 2004. 15. “IFPI Online Music Report 2004,” International Federation of the Phonograms Industry, http://www.ifpi.org/site-content/library/online-music-report-2004.pdf.; “The Recording Industry in Numbers 2004,” International Federation of the Phonograms Industry, http://www.ifpi.org/sitecontent/publications/rin_order.html. 16. Eliot Van Buskirk, “Which Online Store Works With Your MP3 Player?” CNET, June 29, 2004, http://www.reviews.cnet.com/4520 – 6490_7–5140299.htm. 17. Urs Gasser, “ITunes: How Copyright, Contract, and Technology Shape the Business of Digital Media—A Case Study,” Berkman Center, Harvard University, June 2004, http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/media/uploads/81/iTunesWhitePaper0604.pdf. 18. “Lindows Routes OS Over File-Sharing Networks,” CNET, March 4, 2004, http://www.news.com/Lindows-routes-OS-over-file-sharing-networks/2100 –7344_ 3–5169894.html. 19. “Impact and Perspectives of Electronic Commerce (IPEC): The Music Industry in the Netherlands,” Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development, http:// www.oecd.org/dataoecd/49/2/2072953.pdf. 20. Price Waterhouse Coopers, “Global Entertainment and Media Outlook: 2004 – 2008,” July 14, 2004. 21. Ina Fried, “Virgin: Apple’s Not Playing Fair With IPod,” CNET, August 5, 2004, http://www.news.com.com/2100 –1027–5298642.html. 22. NPD Group, “Digital Music Consumers Choose Fewer Songs; Deeper Catalog,” December 8, 2003, http://www.npd.com/press/releases/press_031208.htm. 23. Eric Benderoff, “Can ITunes Help Music Sales Sprout Higher?: Analyst’s Report Shows Business at iTunes Taking a Dive, as Consumers are Opting to Download Single Tunes Instead of Entire Albums, Adding Pressure to Declining Sales in the Music Industry,” Chicago Tribune, December 13, 2006, n.p. 24. Timothy Burt, “Digital Demand Drives Up Sales,” Financial Times, January 6, 2005, 21. 25. “The Online Digital Music Market Reached an Estimated $1.1 Billion in the US,” M2PressWIRE, May 30, 2007, http://www.m2.com. 26. Bob Lefsetz, “The Lefsetz Letter: First in Music Analysis,” a Yahoo Music Blog. “All Summer Long,” August 12, 2008, http://new.music.yahoo.com/blogs/thelefset zletter/6194/all-summer-long. 27. Consumer Electronics Association, “CEA Corporate Report,” April 16, 2004, http:// www.ce.org/publications/corporate_report/default.asp and updated press release in January 2005, http://www.ce.org/press_room/press_release_detail.asp?id=10650. 28. “Bottom Line,” Music Week, April 14, 2007, 2. 29. Music Week, “New File-Sharing Set-Up to Reward legit Users,” June 14, 2004, 1.

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30. Price Waterhouse Coopers, “Global Entertainment.” 31. “IFPI Digital Music Report 2008,” International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, January 2008, 32. Price Waterhouse Coopers, “Global Entertainment.” 33. David Passmore, “(Un)Acceptable Use,” Business Communications Review 36, no. 8 (2006): 12. 34. “T-Mobile Unveils a Robbie Williams Branded Handset,” Marketing Week 29, no. 16 (2006): 1. 35. Edward C. Baig, “Phone Home on Gee-Whiz Capabilities,” USA Today, March 28, 2007, 3B. 36. OECD (2004a), Information Technology Outlook 2004, OECD Paris. 37. Ibid. 38. Jim Dalrymple, Philip Michaels, and Jason Snell, “Apple’s Record Sales,” MacWorld 24, no. 10 (2007): 18–19. 39. New York Times, “Today in Business,” September 15, 2007, n.p. 40. Dalrymple et al., “Apple’s Record Sales,” 18. 41. Laurie Flynn, “Progress Is Made in Solving Antitrust Issues,” New York Times, December 6, 2004, http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/06/business/businessspecial2/ 06regtech.html. 42. Stephen Castle, “Microsoft Gets Record Fine and a Rebuke from Europe,” New York Times, February 28, 2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/28/technology/ 28soft.html. 43. Jonathan Krim, “RealNetworks, Microsoft Settle Suit,” Washington Post, January 12, 2005, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/11/ AR2005101100661.html. 44. OECD (2004a), Information Technology Outlook 2004, OECD Paris. 45. Frank Aherns, “Music-Selling Rivals Take Aim at ITunes,” Washington Post, August 22, 2007, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/21/ AR2007082100996.html. 46. Known as the Communications, Consumer’s Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act of 2006 [S.2686]), it was introduced in the Senate on May 1, 2006, and has been referred to the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. 47. U.S. Department of Justice, Department of Justice Comments on “Network Neutrality” in Federal Communications Commission Proceeding, USDOJ Press Release, September 6, 2007, http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2007/September/07_at_682.html. 48. Burt Helm, “Tech Giants’ Internet Battles; Web Titans Like Google and Yahoo! Are Battling Some of the Smartest Lobbyists in the Business. And They’ve Just Lost a Big One on Capitol Hill,” Business Week Online, April 27, 2006, http://www.busi nessweek.com/technology/content/apr2006/tc20060426_553893.htm. 49. Charter Communications, Inc.’s Motion to Quash Subpoena Served by the Recording Industry Association of Ameff.org E.D.Mo., Case No. 4:03 MC00273CEJ, October 3, 2003, paragraph 6. 50. Emily Umbright, “8th U.S. Circuit Court Rules Against Music Industry’s Appeal to Access ISP’s Customer’s Records,” The Daily Record, January 7, 2005, 1. 51. Mark H. Anderson, “Supreme Court Rejects Music Industry’s Appeal,” Dow Jones Newswire, December 11, 2004.

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52. Jon Jacobi and Mark Sullivan, “Make Your Own Web Mashup,” PC World 25, no. 10 (2007): 89. 53. “Alive and Kicking,” The Economist, September 25, 2004. 54. Anthony Bruno, “The Future of Music: Industry Transformation Is Just Getting Started,” Billboard, December 3, 2005, 49. 55. Ibid. 56. “Yahoo Dumps Music Service, Sends Customers to Rhapsody,” Gawker:Gizmodo, 2008, http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/228905224/yahoo-dumps-musicservice-sends-customers-to-rhapsody. 57. IDC—Press Release (2004), “Booming Market for MP3 Players According to IDC’s Latest Forecast,” http://www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/News/Details. aspx? News Id=10625. 58. Consumer Electronics Association, “U.S. Consumer Electronics Sales & Forecasts 2000 –2005,” June 2004, http://www.cea.org. 59. Joseph Palenchar, “MP3 Player Sales Push Record ’06 Audio Sales,” TWICE: This Week in Consumer Electronics 22, no. 6 (2007): 8. 60. “Portable MP3 Player Ownership Reaches New High,” Ipsos Research, March 10, 2008, http://www.ipsos-na.com/news. 61. Alvin Toffler, The Futurists (New York: Random House, 1972). 62. Nicholas Negroponte, Being Digital (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1995). 63. Ibid., 53. 64. Martijn Poel, Paul Rutten, Pascal Verhoest, and Graham Vickery, “Impact and Perspectives of Electronic Commerce (IPEC): The Music Industry in the Netherlands,” OECD Electronic Business Impact Project, 2007, prepared by http://www. oecd.org/dataoecd/49/2/2072953.pdf. 65. Richard Normann and Rafael Ramirez, “From Value Chain to V Constellation: Designing Interactive Strategy,” Harvard Business Review (1993): 65–77. 66. OECD, “Information Technology Outlook 2002,” OECD Paris, 2002. 67. Michael McGuire, “Media Research Report: U.S. Online Music Industry Sustains Solid Growth in 2004,” Garner/G2, May 20, 2004, 1–11. 68. Michael Shields, “Teens on Social Networks Favor MySpace,” Media Week 17, no. 2 (2007): 4. 69. Katelyn McKenna, Arnie S. Green, and Marci Gleason, “Relationship Formation on the Internet: What is the Big Attraction?,” Journal of Social Issues 58, no. 1 (2002): 19. 70. Robert Kraut et al., “Social Impact of the Internet: What Does It Mean?,” Communications of the ACM 41, no. 12 (1998): 21–22. 71. Richard Siklos, “News Corp Buys and Internet Company,” New York Times Online, July 19, 2005, http://www.nytimes.com. 72. Matthew Wastradowski, “Bands Find Groove on MySpace,” The Columbian (Vancouver, WA), March 16, 2007, n.p. 73. Ibid. 74. Brian Garrity, Brian Butler, and Ed Christman, “The MP3 Question,” Billboard 118, no. 37 (2006): n.p. 75. Ethan Smith, Nick Wingfield, and Julia Angwin, “MySpace to Partner with Snocap in a Possible Online-Music Push,” Wall Street Journal, September 2, 2006, A3.

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76. Robert Levine, “MySpace Music Store Is a New Challenge for Big Labels,” New York Times, September 4, 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/04/technology/ 04myspace.html. 77. Leila Cobo et al., “The Latest News from.Biz,” Billboard, September 8, 2007, 36. 78. Joel Rose, “Uneasy Ties Bind Music Companies, Music Blogs,” Weekend Edition, July 28, 2007, http://www.npr.org. 79. David Gallagher, “Warner’s Tryst with Bloggers Hits Sour Note,” New York Times, August 16, 2004, Business and Finance Section. 80. Jeffrey Price, “You Can Go Your Own Way,” Remix, 14 August 2007, 60. 81. Elise Ackerman, “GBox Aims to Blend Digital Music Sales with Social Networking,” San Jose Mercury News, August 21, 2007, n.p. 82. Sudip Bhattacharjee et al., “Consumer Search and Retailer Strategies in the Presence of Online Music Sharing,” Journal of Management Information Systems 23, no. 1 (Summer 2006): 129–59. 83. Robert Johnson, “Prince Takes on YouTube,” The Guardian, September 14, 2007, http://business.guardian.co.uk/technology/2007/spe/14/1.

chapter 3

The Macro/International Music Business: Australian Trajectories and Perspectives in a Global Context Guy Morrow

In both its local and international forms, music industry success (measured in terms of profitability) is dependent on successful access to and exploitation of markets of sufficient scale to generate the income necessary to cover production and various artist development and facilitation costs. So few artists and managers achieve viable long-term careers that it is often said of the music industry that “failure is the norm.” Given that is the case in mainstream Western markets (such as the United Kingdom and the United States), with their massive markets, concentrated populations, and economies of scale, the issues facing performers from smaller, geographically isolated contexts such as Australia are considerable. If an artist manager and artist stay and operate in Australia alone, they will only ever be able to access two percent of the global market for popular music.1 However, there are multiple ways in which an Australian artist can break into foreign territories, and therefore, this chapter will put forth the Australian experience as a microcosm that will resonate with most artists who hail from countries that are outside of the larger mainstream Western territories such as the United States and who wish to have an international career. This chapter will specifically focus on two Australian companies: Eleven and Engine Room. These organizations exemplify the notion that artist managers and their companies are rising up the value chain that exists in the music industry and that major labels are looking to buy artist management companies so that they can participate in the income from all

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five key revenue stream groups: records, song publishing, merchandise, live performance, and sponsorship. The argument here is that there is now more pressure on the artist and artist manager to build the artist’s career in the new online industrial climate, and therefore, some management companies are effectively shadowing record companies through the way in which they are beginning to fulfill many of the responsibilities that used to belong to independent or major record labels. These companies are analogous to production companies that exist within the film industry. Furthermore, this trend within the music industry needs to be located within a larger trend that is occurring in the global economy. In this wider context, successful corporations are increasingly producing images of their brands rather than products, and this has, therefore, shifted the emphasis from manufacturing to marketing. What these trends and changes mean for new artist management and production companies such as Eleven and Engine Room will be explored. Of the myriad ways in which Australian managers can see their artists’ recordings released in foreign territories, the following three methods have been identified for comparison here: 1. Signing directly to a foreign independent or major label. 2. Licensing or assigning the right to exploit the copyright in a pre-existing record to a label in a foreign territory. 3. Sourcing a deal with a multinational out of Australia and having it released in a foreign territory through an intercompany license agreement.

The Eleven and Engine Room case studies will be considered in relation to the methods outlined here. These entities were established so that the practitioners involved could more efficiently sign their artists directly to foreign independent or major labels and/or license the right to exploit the copyright in pre-existing recordings to foreign labels. Symbiotic relationships have been formed between Australian music management and production companies and major record labels in foreign territories. These relationships have developed as a result of the problems facing major labels in the new digital environment and the challenges Australian artist managers face when trying to break into foreign markets from Australia. As many record companies downsize by employing fewer marketing and promotion staff, and through outsourcing artist and repertoire (A&R) to freelance producers, an interesting trend is emerging.2 Some management companies are effectively shadowing record companies through the way in which they are beginning to fulfill many of the responsibilities that used to belong to independent or major record labels. This is enabling these companies, and the artist managers who run them, to play a much greater role within the music industry. These companies are analogous to production companies that exist within the film industry.3

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In relation to the new Web-based version of the business that has emerged and that has replaced previous business models, influential Australian music manager and song publisher Keith Welsh notes that: It’s so good that managers and bands can now actually manage so much more of it themselves . . . there are so many different websites and so many places you can do it . . . It’s exactly the same problem though because the artists and managers then think “oh my God there are so many more outlets, there are no mainstream outlets now and this means that time becomes a premium and knowing which websites are effective and which ones aren’t becomes a premium as well . . . The research and education that managers have to give themselves now is far greater than at any other time.4

The argument here is that there is now more pressure on the artist and artist manager to build the artist’s career in the new online industrial climate. This suggests that artist managers and their companies are rising up the value chain that exists in the music industry and that major labels are looking to buy artist management companies so that they can participate in the income from all five key revenue stream groups: records, song publishing, merchandise, live performance, and sponsorship. In some situations, major record labels are streamlining their operations by becoming funding operations that foster relationships with artist management companies, relationships that are similar to those between large film studios and film production companies. This process means that outside artist management and production entities have the responsibility for developing and manufacturing the actual product; therefore, the business models they are employing are extensions of the way in which independent record labels have licensed recordings to major labels in the past. This model suggests that major labels will become funding, marketing, and distribution operations that will focus on producing brands rather than products. This trend can be located in an historical context. David Throsby notes that there have been important structural changes in the global music industry since the 1970s.5 He asserts that the independent distribution system that had existed for many years began to break down in the 1980s, and this led to an increasing number of the directors of independent labels agreeing to have their products distributed by one of the major distributors. He notes that: This trend has continued to the point now where many otherwise independent labels are distributed by one of the major transnationals. In fact it has been suggested that the independent record companies act in a way that serves the potential interests of the majors. They are generally involved in developing music outside the mainstream; if their music is successful they may begin to pose a threat to the majors’ market dominance. If so they may be absorbed by the majors . . . the relationship between the two types of companies may be thought of as symbiotic rather than oppositional.6

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The two artist management and production companies that are the focus of this study, Eleven and Engine Room, have taken this already symbiotic relationship between “indies” and “majors” even further. These two companies have been chosen for analysis here because they are emblematic of the central claim that artist management and production companies are rising up the value chain that exists in the music business through the way in which they are operating more like production companies that exist in the film industry. These case studies are also useful for an understanding of how the broader products to brands paradigm shift is affecting the music business. The majors did not absorb these two companies after their beginning as independent record labels in the aforementioned way; rather, the artist managers who began these companies worked closely with major labels from the beginning. Although the way these two companies operate is similar to the way in which independent record labels have operated for many years, these companies are not miniature models of majors that are either symbiotic or oppositional to the larger labels. These companies are in direct partnership with majors; they take only some of the responsibilities that used to belong to the major labels. At its most extreme, this production company model would give musicians the freedom to make records on a project-by-project basis by working with the most appropriate practitioners in a production team, rather than them being signed to one independent or major record label for all of their projects. The product produced by the team would then be signed to whichever record label was willing to work with this company in order to market and distribute a ready-made product. The musicians would then be free to team up with whomever they pleased in order to produce their next project. The Australian music production company Engine Room is the company that has gone the furthest down this path, while the operation of music production company Eleven represents a slighter departure from the norm. The process of signing record deals with multinational companies has frustrated some Australian artist managers so much that they have found other pathways and arrangements. This is because such deals often involve artists “signing for the world,” and when an artist is signed for the world, one multinational company controls their copyrights/intellectual property in all countries/territories. It depends on the individual deal and the company (recording or publishing or combination) as to whether this includes administering performance royalties or mechanical royalties (or both). As will be explained, there is a perception that such deals limit the possibilities for release overseas. Australian artist manager Todd Waggstaff and music producer/songwriter and Engine Room cofounder Andrew Klippel have worked with a number of different Australian artists who were signed for the world from Australia.7 Waggstaff notes that because these artists had to go through the label to

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which they were signed, the artists’ products were neither prioritized nor released in foreign territories. Waggstaff claims that if an artist is signed to a branch of a multinational record company in Australia, the fact that their recordings have to enter foreign territories via the channels this company provides means that there is no bidding war and no discovery process for the A&R staff in this territory. The foreign record company’s employees are simply given a finished record with finished artwork and a finished video clip. Waggstaff and Klippel started Engine Room in partnership with Australian media tycoon James Packer in order to satisfy their desire to work on recording projects that would definitely be released and prioritized in foreign territories. They became frustrated while working with Australian artists who were signed to multinational companies from Australia; these artists would be blocked by the conventional intercompany arrangement. According to Waggstaff, it is not just a question of the discovery process; intercompany license agreements work against Australian artists who are trying to access foreign markets. He specifically states that: The reason why you don’t get prioritised is that when the US company releases an artist signed to the Australian company they have to pay a fixed inter-company license rate, 30% is about the royalty they have to pay, so if Warner Australia sign an artist and Warner America release it, they have to pay 30% as the royalty whereas they pay 15% or 17% for local American product.

Australian artist manager John Watson also desires to work around the limitations that worldwide deals with major labels out of Australia cause.8 However, Watson’s label Eleven is quite different to Engine Room because everything his label does is done in partnership with major label EMI. Discussing the reason for setting up his new label, Watson notes: What we found is that when we approached major labels with artists and said that we wanted to sign for just this part of the world we were told that it couldn’t be done. When we walked in and said that we’re a label and we want a label deal for just this part of the world they said “yeah that’s fine,” and so in that case we said “fine, we’re a label.”

Therefore, the impetus for the creation of these unorthodox arrangements was the fact that such intercompany license agreements hamper Australian managers’ attempts to break into foreign territories. Furthermore, the Australian experience here is a microcosm that exemplifies a truism that is relevant to artists working in most countries outside of the United States. Artists who want to be heard internationally but who do not hail from or live in this larger territory may find this model a prudent one to follow because at times such intercompany deals render their attempts completely ineffectual.

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Although the managers featured in this case study still wished to work with major labels, to meet their goals they needed to change the nature of their agreements with the majors. The particular approaches that these two managers have employed effectively enabled them and their artists to maintain artistic control through the way in which they now, to differing degrees, carry the financial and creative burden of actually producing the product. This product is then licensed to various major record labels that primarily focus on marketing, distributing, and ultimately branding this ready-made product. This trend within the music industry needs to be located within a larger trend that is occurring within the global economy. In this wider context, successful corporations are increasingly producing images of their brands rather than products or things, and this has therefore shifted the emphasis from manufacturing to marketing.9 Naomi Klein claims that the formula of buying products and branding them, rather than producing products and advertising them, has proven to be so profitable that companies are competing in a race toward weightlessness.10 This trend within the larger capitalistic economy, of which the music industry is a part, is enabling Australian artist managers such as Waggstaff and Watson to navigate around the pitfalls of signing and developing Australian artists intended for the international marketplace. On the other hand, this trend is allowing various major record labels to become “weightless” due to the fact that they are no longer burdened with the liabilities associated with record production. In this case, the process of marketing or branding has become their focus. This paradigm shift can be beneficial for the artists it affects. Watson’s label Eleven offers the artists signed to it the advantages of having more creative control over their products and also of receiving more points.11 When setting up Eleven, Watson was faced with a potential conflict of interest. When a manager also becomes the owner of the record label or production company to which their artists are signed there is the potential for this manager to receive a label share of the artist’s royalties (and other income) as well as a manager’s share. Rather than paying himself twice, Watson got around this inherent conflict of interest through passing any potential benefits the new structure generated onto the actual artists: From our point of view the “up-side” we feel that we offer to our clients is as follows. Firstly, because they’re not paying a label share, they’re actually receiving a label royalty which is usually higher than an artist’s royalty. So they’re actually making more per record because the benefit we get from being a label is passed onto them and the benefit that comes to us is generated because our commissions are greater because we’re getting the same size slice of a slightly bigger pie. The second benefit is that we have the control that we want over the marketing and promotion of the records

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and certainly over the A&R of the records as well . . . And finally, probably most importantly from our standpoint, it’s our profound belief that having a person behind the desk in New York or LA or London with a direct stake in your career is more likely to lead to your success internationally.

Watson’s artists had a better deal, and he was in an advantageous position because he was commissioning the standard 20 percent of the artist’s income (under the new arrangement this also included the label share of the royalties). However, Eleven still had the advantage of being able to work through a major label’s marketing and distribution networks. Eleven’s artists are also free to sign with whichever label they please in foreign territories. Watson and his artists are therefore receiving the best of both worlds; Eleven has access to the all-important marketing and distribution networks of a major label—it is still closely associated with EMI Australia—while the artists receive more money and retain a huge degree of creative control. Although Watson set up Eleven as an independent music company, EMI invested in the label. As manager of the successful Australian band Silverchair (a band whose original recording contract with Sony music had expired), Watson was able to bring the band in on the deal and utilize them as “the carrot” to the record company. He negotiated a deal with EMI stating that if they wanted to sign the band they would have to distribute and market the band’s products, accept their terms with regard to creative control, and invest in the label. In this way, unlike Engine Room, Watson has aligned Eleven with one particular major label. This is how Watson was able to get around another conflict of interest that necessarily manifests itself when managers also run their artists’ record company. Australian artist manager Kim Thomas explains the tension and conflict that arises when one person fulfils both roles:12 I actually find it difficult being the manager of the artist and running the record label. The only way that I deal with that is I keep my manager’s hat on and I stay over there as a manager and I treat my other partners in the label as a record label. This is because for me it doesn’t actually work because from a record label point of view there are issues involved with marketing expenditure. For example, the record company will not want to spend the money whereas on behalf of the artist you want the money.

Watson gets around this problem because Eleven is run in partnership with a major label, EMI. This major label is responsible for the marketing expenditure, not Eleven. He states: It’s completely in our interest as Eleven to get EMI to spend as much as possible on marketing our artists and we’re never backwards in coming forward and asking them to spend more because it’s their money not ours and it therefore doesn’t effect our income one bit.

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Watson’s position as director of Eleven also had the potential to change the relationship he had with his artists. The relationships between an artist and their manager and an artist and their record company are fundamentally different. Fred Goodman states that, “a manager is employed and paid by the artist, while a record company essentially hires—and as a rule owns the work of—the artist.”13 By becoming the record company, Watson in a way reversed his relationship with his artists; instead of working for them, they work for him. However, although a superficial assessment of Eleven would suggest that this is the case, Watson is a manager who claims that he has always understood the leverage that he has had at his fingertips through being an artist manager. Watson asserts that although he is now the manager and the record company, the artists are still in charge because they are the only ones who have a trump card to play. He points out that: I think that the artist could say that they don’t want to make music anymore and then just go home. I think that the artist doesn’t always act like they’re in charge and it’s probably in the manager’s interest that that’s the case often, but I think that when the biggest call comes, the artist is the one who ultimately has to make it. They can decide not to make a video; they can decide not to go on tour.

Watson believes that Eleven’s business model gives the artists the power to be in charge of their own creativity and ultimately their own career trajectory. The paradigm shift from products to brands has led to the generation of a management and production company that enables the people who love making music to get more involved with making music, rather than only the people who love making money getting involved with making music. Gregg Donavan states that:14 Sure, the production companies in the movie world want to make money too but I’d dare say they got there because they wanted to make movies, where as this is not always the case with record company guys because they’ve come in from other industries that their parent company owned and they restructure and relocate. They really do just want to make money; they’re really not interested in the art 99% of the time. They always employ someone to act like they care—that’s what A&R guys are.

When artists are signed to a management and production company rather than directly to a record company they belong to more of a supportive artistic community; this suggests that the negative gang-warfare attitude that exists between many artists and bands may become diluted: You’re opening it up to a lot of collaborations and you’re creating a community, which is the idea of what it used to be. I mean that’s where the

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term “stable” came from. You never hear anyone using that terminology anymore. I mean those words came from the Motown guys who really believed in the records they made. They were music people. Most of the MDs back then were musicians with business skills. You find a record executive these days who can strum one note or play a beat—I’d be very surprised. But they’ve all got accounting and law degrees.

Watson’s strategy is in line with the argument that major labels will change how they operate simply through becoming distribution facilities much like the larger entities in the film industry. In this particular case, rather than create content in-house through using their own A&R department, EMI and Watson have fostered a relationship together. EMI is willing to let Watson and Eleven discover acts and develop them while understanding that their role will be to brand these products and get them to people—whether through digital means or through the distribution of physical products. However, unlike Engine Room, Eleven has not fully endorsed a film industry model in which major film stars do not do long-term deals with a particular film studio. It is clear that the musicians signed to Eleven are not entirely free to make records on a project-by-project basis in this way as Eleven is still attached to EMI. Engine Room is more like a production company in the film industry than a record label in the music industry. Engine Room manufactures records completely independently of a major label and then assigns most of the rights to these products to various major labels in foreign territories. The fundamental difference between Engine Room and Eleven is that Engine Room is not aligned with one particular major label and is more like an independent record label. Engine Room signs their artists’ publishing and recording rights for the world from Australia and then arranges partnership deals that involve them assigning most of those rights to whichever label suits the artist or to whichever label gives them the best deal. Like Eleven, Engine Room maintains creative control. However, creative control is maintained through investing the capital needed to make the records and videos themselves. This strategy simultaneously puts Engine Room in a high-risk situation while also generating their main competitive advantage. Because they themselves carry the financial burden of originating their artists’ careers, major labels in foreign territories are more willing to sign their artists. Once Engine Room produces the records and video clips, they are taken directly to labels in the United Kingdom and the United States, territories that lead the worldwide popular music market. Waggstaff notes that: We don’t take out artists and develop them here and then sign them into an inter-company license agreement in this country, we take them overseas and we end up being the middle ground. It’s more expensive to sign

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an artist from us than it is to sign them directly, but then we’ve taken the financial punt and have put up the first maybe half a million dollars, so it takes the risk out of their equation . . . It decreases the royalty you’d have to pay an Australian artist coming through an inter-company license agreement and it decreases the risk that they would have to take if they were signing a local band.

Engine Room is a 50 -50 joint venture between music producer and songwriter Andrew Klippel and James Packer.15 Packer’s ownership of Channel 9 and other online and print media outlets in Australia is advantageous for the artists signed to Engine Room. There is a perception that in terms of the publicity these outlets can provide, Engine Room’s artists are implicitly (or otherwise) prioritized due to Packer’s involvement. Todd Waggstaff is the company’s manager. Waggstaff and Klippel have spent more time over the last decade working overseas than they have in Australia, and this has given them a deeper understanding of what is applicable to specific foreign territories. In a conventional record company, A&R staff and other employees do not go straight to the public to sell new performers; the overall marketing process involves these employees selling artists to their own company first, then to the trade, and then to the record buyers.16 Engine Room has effectively assumed the responsibility of selling artists to record companies. Waggstaff claims that the time he and Klippel have spent working in foreign territories has given them an insight into how to best cater for the subtle nuances of each major territory. He says that they: choose artists who are great and who will hopefully transcend current fashion. We’re not trying to guess what the current trend is, but we do know what certain label’s preferences are, we know what individual A&R people have signed in the past and what they have been successful with. We know where there are holes in the repertoire of certain labels that we could plug something into. So it makes our pitch a little bit more precise in that we understand the market, we understand why our artist is relevant to that market and we understand why our artist is relevant to media in that market.

Within 12 months of Waggstaff and Klippel returning from Los Angeles and securing the funding with Packer in a 50 -50 joint venture, Engine Room, after developing and manufacturing their records and videos, signed Holly Valance to London Warner, The Vines to Capital/EMI in the United States and the United Kingdom, and Carla Werner to Columbia/Sony in New York. Engine Room’s strategic plan involves establishing a track record via the initial success of their artists. Once a few of their artists become financially successful and they demonstrate their ability as a development and production

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company, the slightly one-sided assignment of copyright deals they have to agree to in order to work in partnership with major labels will eventually be replaced with deals that are weighted in their favor. This theory is based on the premise that the balance of power shifts with success. Fortunately, The Vines and Holly Valance have become financially successful artists, and their success should lure other major labels into signing contracts that are increasingly weighted in Engine Room’s favor. Waggstaff notes: We’ll maintain more rights as we move forward . . . so that our economic model is that we start out giving away a whole lot to establish a track record and then as it moves over time we give away less and less and in a few years time, rather than do a license deal, it becomes a license of copyright, then it becomes a short term license of copyright, then it becomes not a license of copyright, but a license to distribute certain records and so it moves from a deal where all the services of a record label outside A&R are performed by our partners, then it moves over time to one where we become a full service label and we perform all functions other than the warehousing and distribution to retail.

Therefore, Engine Room is building toward becoming a full-service label. While it appears they have endorsed a film industry model through becoming a management and production company that shadows various record companies, they are in fact only using this strategy in order to lay the foundation for Engine Room to become a conventional record company in its own right. Although Engine Room’s strategic plan suggests that over time the company’s evolution will enable this entity to become a full-service label, the company faces a number of threats. This strategy may well lead to Engine Room becoming caught in a paradigm shift that involves international record companies beginning to focus more on the marketing of brands rather than the manufacture of product. At first it appears that Engine Room has successfully been able to work Australian acts in foreign territories, and it seems that the model they employ has enabled them to come to the forefront of this sector of the industry; however, on closer inspection it is increasingly clear that Engine Room may have simply been burdened with the liabilities associated with record production. Klein claims that the sports company Nike has become the prototype for the product-free brand. Nike outsources the production of its products to contractors who are located all over the world.17 Freed from the “chains of production” through employing such an outsourced structure, Nike has an abundance of time and money to constantly create and recreate the Nike brand image.18 Klein argues that, in Nike’s case, branding has replaced production entirely and that the staggering success of this business model has led to a wider acceptance of the business philosophy of no-limits spending on branding. This

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means that increasingly there is limited value in simply making things anymore, as value is added by careful research, innovation, and marketing.19 Engine Room’s audacity to take the first financial risk through manufacturing their artist’s products themselves forms their present competitive advantage. However, this means that the advantage the record company involved has is that the capital they would normally spend producing records can instead be allocated to the marketing department. This would give the company a distinct advantage over their competitors because in popular music “image is everything.”20 If this outsourced production structure and marketing focus proves to be successful then the majority of major labels will have to follow this trend in order to remain competitive. The timing of this trend within other industries, and potentially within the music industry, not only reflects branding’s status as the perceived economic cure-all, it also reflects a corresponding devaluation of the production process and of producers in general. If Engine Room’s current business model became the main model endorsed in the music industry because a series of management and production companies successfully employed it, the competition between these companies would potentially lead to them offering major labels the best deals possible at their (Engine Room’s) expense. Not only would these music management and production companies be burdened with the liabilities associated with record production, the competition would mean that they would have to provide these records at rock-bottom prices. Through outsourcing manufacturing and focusing on brand management, the record company would have a distinct advantage over the music production company. The products to brands paradigm shift can be detrimental to artists. There is never a guarantee that any particular musical product will see a release because any deal or relationship can fall over. However, if other companies were to follow Engine Room’s lead and emerge as entities that are analogous to production companies in the film industry, the artists who signed to them would have even less certainty that their work would be released. This is because it is unlikely that other music production companies would have the connections required to form a partnership with someone who is as powerful as James Packer. According to Donavan, because Engine Room is making the records and then looking for the marketing and distribution deals, their business model presents their artists with a large degree of risk. As they are not directly connected to one major label like Watson’s company Eleven is, there is the potential that they will not be able to get a marketing and distribution deal for some of the records they produce. Donavan states, “I would not want to sign a band to Engine Room who’s going to make a record for us that might not see a release. I’d want to know that if I was going to sign my rights over to a record company that I was definitely going to get a record out in the marketplace.”

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According to Donavan, word would start spreading that this particular artist could not even get their first record released, and the artist would then be many steps back from where they started. The artist would not be approaching other industry practitioners with a positive story. From an artist’s perspective, Engine Room’s business model represents a risky situation. Engine Room’s business model is also potentially problematic for their artists because the growth this model generates is not organic. Engine Room’s methodology may only generate short-term interest from the record labels they form partnerships with; Holly Valance’s relatively short career is an illustration of this. Engine Room’s business model is analogous to a production company in the film industry, a company that would be free to be associated with any of the major film studios. From the perspective of the record label Engine Room forms a partnership with, the arrangement may become problematic because this business model could breed disloyalty. A brand (music or otherwise) is built over a long period of time. If a music production company and their artists are free to work with major labels on a project-by-project basis, any label that invests in these artists in order to further brand them through their marketing and distribution campaigns is not necessarily going to be there when the overall long-term branding campaign pays dividends. A production company model that is analogous to certain production companies in the film industry may not work in the music industry. This is because music-marketing campaigns often focus more on the artist as a brand whereas, in the film industry, a film’s title is often the focus, and this lends itself to companies that work on a project-by-project basis.21 Compared to Engine Room, Watson’s company Eleven represents less of a departure from the norm, and therefore, this venture does not present the participants with as much risk. From an artist’s perspective, Eleven’s business model is advantageous. Because Eleven is in partnership with a specific major label, the artists signed to this company receive a guarantee that their work will be released, they have more creative control, and they receive more points while still having access to this major label’s marketing capital and distribution systems. These artists are also still free to sign with whomever they please in foreign territories. From Watson’s perspective as an artist manager, this arrangement takes care of the inherent conflicts of interest that arise when one person fulfills the roles of both band manager and record company executive. Without artist management the music industry could not function; however, it could function without record companies due to the substantial number of alternative revenue streams. Influential international artist managers such as Michael McMartin and Jazz Summers believe that the future will depend more on creative managers’ and artists’ abilities than record companies’ abilities.22 This suggests that artist management and production companies are set to rise up the value chain that exists in the music industry and that

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these companies are going to form closer relationships with (or be bought by) major record labels. While Eleven and Engine Room were initially set up to address the issue that Australian artists and artist managers operating solely in Australia can only ever access 2 percent of the global market for popular music, broadly speaking, the impact of new technologies on the international music business is leading to the emergence of unorthodox companies such as these, companies that have nontraditional access to the five key income stream groups that stem from contemporary music.23 The emergence of such companies has implications for the artist managers involved with them. This is because, traditionally, artist managers have been service providers; they have not been in partnership with their artists. When a manager and artist form a company that enables the manager to not only commission the different revenue streams but to actually have equity in the assets that are generating some of the income, a number of conflicts of interest emerge. In the new industrial climate that is emerging, these conflicts, such as the manager being able to “double dip” by both commissioning the artist’s income from record sales and receiving income because they own the recordings because they are also the record label, need to be negotiated. When artist managers move up the music business value chain there are positive and negative implications for their cash flow. While they may have equity in the company that owns the musical assets, because they are no longer a service provider who is simply investing both expertise and time in the project, they may no longer be able to receive immediate income throughout the development of the artist’s career. Most of the revenue new companies generate is put back into the running of the company rather than being paid out in commissions to a manager who is a service provider. While traditionally the role of the artist manager has involved them persuading other entities into investing money to develop the artist’s career, the new artist management and production companies that are emerging may require managers to invest their own money. As service providers, managers can still earn commissions from artists who do not have financially successful careers, however, if the artist does have longevity and is financially successful, managers who are service providers are in a vulnerable position in the long term. Furthermore, when artist managers set up partnerships or companies with their artists, this tends to bind the artist and manager together and it is harder to terminate the agreement/relationship. It is not as clear as to how the assets that have been generated by the company are to be split upon termination. Due to the declining sales of recorded music in the CD format, the representative arrangements discussed in this chapter ultimately mean that record companies are fulfilling changing roles in the music business, while the influence of artist managers and their firms is increasing. This is because artist managers deal with all five income stream groups that stem from their clients’ work: records, live performance, merchandise, song publishing, and

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sponsorship. While a positive aspect of this trend is that it is leading to the establishment of smaller, more maneuverable companies that can help non-U.S. artists be heard internationally by navigating various pitfalls associated with more traditional business structures, these trends will also potentially have a negative impact on the industry because conflicts of interest will become more common as artist managers rise up the value chain that exists in the music business. The following propositions can be gleaned from this chapter: 1. Artist managers will increasingly assume the role of the record company while also controlling their client’s live performance income, income from merchandise, income from song publishing, and income from sponsorship agreements. 2. While artist managers will increasingly find themselves within a web of potential conflicts of interest, because record companies are moving to participate in income from all five income stream groups because of the decline in record sales, they, too, may face numerous conflicts of interest. 3. The role of artist management will increasingly move from service provision to a situation where the role necessitates owning and controlling the equity in the artistic products/assets.

In the current industrial climate a code of conduct is needed in order to help practitioners navigate their way through this industrial paradigm shift. NOTES 1. All comments attributed to Keith Welsh, Todd Waggstaff, John Watson, Kim Thomas, Gregg Donavan, Michael McMartin, and Jazz Summers in this chapter are, unless otherwise indicated, taken from personal correspondence with the author conducted in November 2003, June 2005, and May 2007. 2. According to IFPI data, world sales of recorded music fell 7.6 percent in value in 2003, and this fourth consecutive year of falling record sales is attributed to the combined effects of digital and physical piracy and competition from other entertainment products (2004). It is in this industrial context that, in 2004, Sony Music merged with BMG in order to generate $400 million in cost savings. BMG chief executive Rolf Schmidt-Holtz said of the deal that: “If (Sony and BMG) stood alone, we would have to cut artist rosters and even closing activities in smaller countries. . . . This merger is the best guarantee that we can maintain a broad roster of artists in the current environment.” IFPI. 2004. “Global music sales fall by 7.6% in 2003—some positive signs in 2004.” London: International Federation of Phonographic Industries Secretariat. 3. Biskind, P. 1999. Easy Riders, Raging Bulls: How the Sex ‘n’ Drugs ‘n’ Rock ‘n’ Roll Generation Saved Hollywood. London: Bloomsbury, 90. 4. Welsh, in discussion with author, May 2007. 5. Throsby, D. 2002. “The Music Industry in the New Millennium: Global and Local Perspectives,” unpublished paper prepared for the Division of Arts and Cultural Enterprise, UNESCO, Paris.

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6. Ibid., 15. 7. Todd Waggstaff (formerly of Festival/Mushroom records, Roo Art records, manager of successful Australian band You Am I in Australia and in the United States and Managing Director of Engine Room), in discussion with the author, June 2005. 8. John Watson (Eleven and John Watson management), in discussion with author, June 2005. 9. The marketing or branding phenomenon has seen a 700 percent increase in U.S. corporate sponsorship spending between 1985 and 1998 (IEG Sponsorship Report, December 22, 1997, and December 21, 1998 in Klein, N. 2000. No Logo. London: Flamingo/Harper Collins, 37). 10. Klein, N. 2000. No Logo. London: Flamingo/Harper Collins. 11. Industry practitioners use the term points to refer to what percentage of the royalties each individual involved receives because 1 percent often represents, or has the potential to represent, a viable amount of money. 12. Kim Thomas (Black Yak Records and Black Yak Management), in discussion with the author, September 2006. 13. Goodman, F. 1998. The Mansion on the Hill. New York: Vintage Books/Random House, 240. 14. Gregg Donavan (Step2 Management; Grinspoon and Airbourne), in discussion with the author, November 2003. 15. James Packer is the son of the deceased Australian media tycoon Kerry Packer and is now the head of the family businesses. 16. Goodman, 1998, 281. 17. Klein argues that Nike lent itself to this business model because the company actually began as an American import/export scheme for made-in-Japan running shoes. 18. Klein, 2000, 219. 19. Ibid., 217. 20. Ibid. 21. Biskind, 1999, 110. 22. Michael McMartin (Melody Management), in discussion with author, June 2005; Jazz Summer (Jazz Summers Management), in discussion with author, June 2005. 23. Welsh, in discussion with author, August 2005.

chapter 4

Music Copyright in the Twenty-First Century Robert McParland

Copyright is literally the right to copy a work of art. It is an intangible property right that provides exclusive rights to authors for the protection of their writings. It grants exclusivity to authors to reproduce and publish their work and prevents others from doing so. Copyright protects how ideas are expressed. The unique expression of ideas is what is copyrighted. Currently, music copyright, once a subject of specialized concern for entertainment attorneys, law professors, music publishers, and songwriters, has emerged as a hot topic for music listeners and consumers. With digital downloading and relatively easy access and distribution by electronic means, the use of copyrighted material has entered a new and often controversial phase. With the new emphasis to protect intellectual property from piracy has come new restrictions that affect the public. The future of the music industry, in part, hinges upon developing legal ways for consumers to buy product electronically while protecting intellectual property. It is increasingly necessary that we come up with creative solutions to the challenges of digital media and public policy. It has become imperative that constitutional concerns regarding copyright and not exclusively business and trade interests be weighed and considered. Those concerned with copyright must balance the public interest with authors’ interests and companies’ economic interests. Legislators must practice Constitutional discourse, as well as business discourse, in this matter. Congress has to consider creators and users, as well as copyright’s impact upon trade and upon America’s future. With the emergence of digital technologies, copyright has entered a period of dispute. Digital technology has advanced rapidly, and copyright has

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been playing catch-up. In a peer-to-peer music sharing environment much is at stake. The discussion is usually framed by corporate interest because accessibility to music product through these digital technologies threatens their traditional revenue streams. However, to find effective solutions, the discussion must move beyond narrowly defined issues of piracy toward innovative reform of copyright and effective uses of digital download technology. One may argue the case that copyright revision will benefit the public, creative artists, and companies holding copyrights. Even so, it is likely that copyright discussions, on the legislative level, will be dominated in the immediate future by corporate music business interests. Much has been written about the problems that are facing us. Peter Jaszi outlined the issues of authorship, contemporary copyright, and collective creativity in the Duke Law Journal more than a decade ago. More recently, he has suggested that his testimony before Congress was not really heard because, in his view, Congress listens thinking of trade rather than of Constitutional issues. Lawrence Lessig, an attorney who continues to lead a battle for the revision of copyright law, is strongly opposed to copyright extensions and believes that they negatively affect the public commons. Rosemary Coombe, in The Cultural Life of Intellectual Properties: Authorship, Appropriation and the Law (1998), urges a cultural studies approach to legal discourse about copyright, one that is social, political, and ethical. Mark Rose, in Authors and Owners: The Invention of Copyright (1992), has looked carefully at eighteenthcentury copyright law cases and concluded his book by arguing that copyright is “an archaic and cumbersome system of cultural regulation.”1 Martha Woodmansee, in “The Genius and the Copyright: Economic and legal Conditions of the Emergence of the Author” (1984), connected copyright law economics and the romantic notion of genius and originality. Paul K. SaintAmour, in The Copyrights (2003), points to the impact of copyright upon cultural memory. He makes no mention of how the European extension of copyright terms to life plus 70 years via the Berne Convention influenced the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act in the United States. The Sonny Bono Term Extension was, in part, a reaction to the participation of the United States in the Berne Convention. Pat Choate, in Hot Property: The Stealing of Ideas in an Age of Globalization (2005), makes a strong case for the need to adapt copyright to the digital age in a way that will safeguard commercial practices and support the public commons. The digital revolution has prompted legislation to guard intellectual property rights. Some have argued that digital exchange facilitates the flow of knowledge and allows for the empowerment of people. They argue that this contributes to the sharing of information and culture. However, digital exchange of music affects the profits and traditional rights systems of the music and media industries.

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At issue is a clear economic reality: Music copyrights are big business. Publishing companies, record companies, and artists assert their copyrights because they have created, purchased, or marketed copyrighted songs. In the 1990s, several domestic and foreign initiatives were taken that attempted to broaden intellectual property protection. These included the 1998 Digital Millennium Act (Public Law 105–304, 112 Statute 2860) and the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act (Public Law 105–298 Statute 3287). The legislative intent of the Digital Millennium Act was to correlate world intellectual property law. It would provide for greater protection for digital and electronic works that are under copyright. The Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, likewise, was intended to make U.S. copyright more consistent with the Berne Convention in Europe. These acts were preceded by the Audio Home Recording Act (AHRA) of 1992, which permitted the taping of a television program for home viewing later (Public Law 102–307, 106 Statute 264). However, copyright law was intended not only to promise protection and incentive for the creators and owners of musical works. It was also drafted with an eye to the public good that would come from such creation. Copyright was originally viewed as providing incentive to creators to contribute their works to the public. Recognizing that ideas and creativity are what advance society in its thinking and feeling, intellectual property law sought a temporary right for artists and inventors to their creations. In its initial intent, copyright law emphasized the “temporary” nature of this exclusive right. It was believed that after a writer, musician, or artist held this copyright to a song for a time, it would then enter the public domain. Access to use of the work would then provide a broader benefit to the society.2 Those who criticize copyright extensions as contrary to the public good sometimes point to the origins of U.S. copyright. The U.S. Constitution, in Article 1, Section 8, gives Congress the charge “to promote the progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.” Thomas Jefferson was instrumental in the article’s creation through James Madison. Jefferson wrote to Madison in September 1789 that the copyright term should be focused on: “This principle, that the earth belongs to the living and not to the dead.” Jefferson, himself a writer and an inventor, wrote to Isaac McPherson on August 13, 1813: “He who receives an idea from me receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.”3 The drafters of the U.S. Constitution stated that their intended purpose for copyright was to “promote progress of Science and Useful Arts.” They gave little guidance on how this was to be done. However, it is clear that the U.S. approach to copyright focuses upon public benefit more than European

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copyright law does. As Christina N. Gifford has pointed out, France’s approach to copyright is more author-oriented.4 However, copyright extensions signed into U.S. law have placed increasing emphasis upon copyright holders, whether writers or companies. Opponents of the present system of copyrights have been bothered by these copyright extensions. For some, this has created darkness for our cultural heritage by limiting our ability to pass the light of creativity along. It has been argued that the public commons has been shortchanged by copyright extensions in recent years. Today, debate persists concerning the appropriate term of copyright. When the U.S. House of Representatives wrote the Copyright Act of 1976, they noted: “The debate over how long a copyright should last is as old as the oldest copyright statute and will doubtless continue as long as there is a copyright law” (HRR, EP No. 94 –1476 [1976]). With copyright extensions, songs do not fall into the public domain. Thus, they are not readily available to other artists and writers to use without authorization, which usually includes a fee. This, some argue, inhibits creativity. Consequently, we now have to confront the issue of how copyright and digital media will impact the creative artist, the consumer, researchers, and educators at the present time and in the future.5 The Copyright Act of 1909 provided for a term of 56 years. There would be an original copyright term of 28 years and a renewal of 28 more years. The 1976 act increased this. The term of copyright protection would be the author’s life plus 70 years. In the case of song collaboration, the term of protection would be 70 years from the death of the last surviving author. In 1998, Congress passed the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, adding protection of 20 years to all copyrighted works. The 1909 Copyright Act had conferred common law protection, and the 1976 Copyright Act brought statutory protection. Under the Copyright Extension Act, copyright holders retain their copyright for life plus 70 years. Copyrights are often held by the widow/widower, children, or executors of the author. Support for copyright extensions has come from large corporations, such as the Disney Corporation, which sought to protect and perpetuate their rights to their cartoon characters, such as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. Companies that hold lucrative copyrights from works produced in the 1920s did not want to see these songs, scripts, characters, or images fall into the public domain. So they argued for copyright extensions. Music publishing companies most often hold song copyrights. Usually, the music publisher contracts with a songwriter for the song he or she has written. The songwriter will receive a writer’s share in such agreements. The music publisher is responsible for exploiting the song. That is, the publisher seeks to get as many “cuts,” or recordings, of the song as possible. When an artist holds ownership to a song this is called a “controlled composition.” Sometimes a producer will control the music publishing rights for recorded

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songs. Performance fees result from the song being played. Mechanical rights emerge when recordings are sold. Copyright holders hope for continued profits from these copyrights. Proponents of copyright extensions have cited four major reasons for lengthening the term of copyrights: 1. The United States needs to maintain global competitiveness in the intellectual property market. 2. U.S. copyright law should be harmonized with the copyright law of the European Community, under the Berne Convention and other agreements. 3. Authors now live longer than in the past and need this protection. 4. In their view, this is a stimulus to new works.

While copyright holders contend that control over uses of a work is necessary, opponents of copyright claim that copyright extensions hinder the common intellectual heritage and cultural progress. At issue is a clear economic reality: Music copyrights are big business. Publishers and artists assert their copyright because they have created and marketed songs. On the one side, the theft of intellectual property has been cited as “a contributing cause to America’s technological decline.”6 On the other, copyright opponents such as attorney Lawrence Lessig argue that the lack of availability of cultural materials under present copyright law extensions may be diminishing our creative progress as a culture.7 Opponents to the Copyright Extension Act argue that U.S. exports of copyrighted material far exceed that of any other country. They claim that it is not possible to fully harmonize U.S. and European law and point out that Europe tends to follow natural law theory while the United States does not. They ask why any copyright should support two generations of an author’s descendants. Finally, they argue, like law professor Dennis S. Karjala, that “a longer term does not automatically drive creative authors to work harder or longer to produce new works.” Rather, this impedes progress. Songwriters and librettists have to get permissions and licenses before they can adapt scripts into musicals. Some works will never be recorded by new artists because of the cost of licenses that are required for them to sing certain songs. Opponents argue further that the Copyright Term Extension Act is contrary to “the public interest in maintaining a rich public domain.”8 Those who think that copyright term protection should be less than the life of the author plus 70 years have not persuaded Congress. Others, like the late Sonny Bono and country songwriter Pat Alger, have insisted that copyright is a form of ownership and should be held in perpetuity. Mark Twain once wrote: “You might just as well, after you had discovered a coal-mine and worked it for twenty-eight years, have the Government step in and take

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it away.”9 Jack Valenti, Motion Pictures Association of America president at the time of the Sonny Bono Extension Act, supported long-term copyright provisions and suggested the phrase “forever less one day.”10 The Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act went into effect in 1998, not long after the songwriter–performer turned Palm Springs Congressman died in an unfortunate skiing accident. This act of Congress became Public Law 105–298 and extended the term of copyright for 20 years. It effectively stopped all 1920s copyrights from 1923 and afterward from falling into the public domain until at least 2019. Thus, it kept the Gershwin Trust from having to give up some of George and Ira Gershwin’s copyrights, and it saved rights to Mickey Mouse for the Disney Corporation. As a result, as Michael Choate points out, “Happy Birthday to You,” copyrighted in 1935, will likely continue to garner an estimated $2 million or more in royalties until 2030. It will do so even if the BMI representative or the ASCAP man fails to raid your backyard party and ask for a payment. AOL-Time Warner can count on getting at least half of that amount. Some present debates continue to revolve around the 1998 Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, which added 20 years to the term of copyrights retroactively. This lengthened the term from 50 to 70 years after an author’s death. COPYRIGHT AND DIGITAL MUSIC Copyright has had to adjust to the “digital revolution” in recording that began in the late 1980s. At that time, computers entered recording studios, and the studios began to put away their reel to reels and tape-splicers. They began to set up digital editing programs. Musicians also turned toward sampling. Sampling is the process of “quoting” earlier music by dubbing portions of previously recorded music into newer recordings. Sampling uses the song from that previous recording. With the appearance of digital technology sampling became prevalent. However, sampling may infringe upon the copyright license of the music publisher and upon the mechanical license of the record company. Suddenly, digital technologies began to pose some dilemmas, especially in the area of “mechanical” rights: the rights that are connected with dissemination of sound recordings. With the appearance of the Internet and digital media, companies and individuals with copyright interests sought means for intellectual property rights to be further defined. Individuals who are concerned with issues of fair use and the public domain also point to the genesis of the Digital Millennium Act. On July 7, 1994, a working group for the Clinton administration led by Bruce A. Lehman issued their “green paper”: a green-covered document that stipulated that movie makers and other content providers could charge for uses of their products. It limited the fair-use standards that allowed writers, librarians, scholars, and

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artists to copy a small portion of a work for education, illustration, or documentation purposes. It further recommended that Internet providers be held responsible for what was transmitted over their wires to their customers. The proposal prohibited the making of backup copies of purchased CDs and DVDs. The opposition mounted by Internet providers prompted revisions. Meanwhile, it appears that the movie companies had overlooked the now multimillion dollar business potential of DVD rentals. In September 1995, the final version of the Lehman group’s document appeared under a white cover: the “White Paper.” The reaction to it was immediate. Internet providers rejected the idea of being held liable. Law professors argued that the proposal worked against the public good. The Home Recording Rights Coalition went to work. Library associations cringed at the prospect of having to obtain permissions before making digital copies of works in libraries. In 1996, the proposed legislation stalled. In Congress, Representative Rick Boucher (D-Virginia), an experienced intellectual property attorney representing a rural western district in Virginia, fervently opposed the legislation, to no avail. The World Intellectual Property Treaty enacted legislation that made it so that the Internet providers would not be held liable for what was transmitted over the Internet. The librarians were not so fortunate. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act became law on October 31, 1998.11 It remained a technical violation to make a cassette or CD copy of a CD recording that one already owned. Further, it was illegal to download any song from the Internet, although this was often being done. Such electronic distribution, called “file sharing,” was illegal. The reason for this prohibition was that each of the songs was “owned” by a copyright holder; writers had invested time, thought, musical training, and qualities of talent and creativity into the creation of these songs. Publishers and record companies had invested money to exploit, record, and distribute these songs. However, now recordings were being duplicated by consumers without mechanical licenses from the record companies who owned the masters for these recordings. No performance royalties were being collected and distributed from downloads to the publishers and writers who were the copyright holders of these songs. On December 7, 1999, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) sued Napster, which claimed some 38 million users worldwide. Napster was charged with damages of $100,000 for each song it had copied and made available. After all, the RIAA argued, no royalties were going to the artists and writers of these songs. In July 2000, a Federal judge issued an injunction to shut Napster down. The idea was put forth to transform Napster into a subscription-based company that would pay artists and companies royalties. The idea did not easily catch on, and Napster folded, selling its assets and its name at auction. In April 2003, Steven Jobs of Apple Computer

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put forth iTunes, a business model that would allow song downloading for 99 cents per song, or $9.99 for an album. This model has since been replicated many times over by other companies. The lawsuits against users of music on the Internet increased in 2003, as music companies sought to protect their profits. Their objective clearly was to educate music listeners that copyrights existed to these songs. A royalty system, handled by the music licensing agencies ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC, was attached to the playing of them. The goal was to make song swapping risky business carrying serious penalties and to encourage consumers to go through legal vendors on the Internet when downloading songs. Sadly, the lawsuits of September 2003 included some people who had likely been ignorant of matters such as performance rights societies, song publishing contracts, and U.S. copyright law. For example, a Duluth, Minnesota, Federal jury fined Jammie Thomas, a mother of four, $222,000 for 24 songs she took from the Kazaa file-sharing program. Some 20,000 people have been sued by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Most have settled for about $3,000 per song. The RIAA asserts that the lawsuits are intended “to defend the constitutionality of the statutory damages provision of the copyright act.”12 Universal Music Group sued MySpace, the social networking site, in November 2006. YouTube was also named for infringement of Universal Music copyrights. Universal took a stake in it before it was sold to Google for $1.65 billion. In 2006, Warner Music Group entered a court battle with Anywhere CD. Warner Music Group dropped its suit against the Imecon music-sharing site in exchange for a revenue-sharing agreement. Music corporations turn to copyright law to protect their investments. Copyright extension works favorably for music publishers who have commercially successful songs of lasting value. It is the goal of a music publisher to “exploit” copyrights: that is, put them into use in the market. A century ago, this meant distribution of sheet music and piano rolls. Today, it primarily means getting a “cut” on a recording. The copyright owner generally agrees to a standard license to record. This tends to allow for openness as to how the song will be treated in a recording session. However, this is a mechanical license, not a copyright. The copyright itself remains with the music publisher or with the original songwriter. Songwriters and music publishers hold copyrights. Frequently, a music publisher will copyright a song following a contract with its writer or writers. Copyrights may also be purchased by music publishers. Songs that have been popular may be among these acquisitions. When one publisher’s catalog is sold to another publisher, often the copyrights, rather than the company’s stock, are transferred. The buyer usually pays for copyrights at about five to eight times the annual performance rate assigned to those songs, as determined by ASCAP and BMI payments. There are statutory copyrights and common

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law copyrights. Writings that are not fixed in print form or in phonograph recordings are protected by common law copyright. As digital sources, cable television, satellite radio, and other media have emerged, new means of generating revenue from copyrights have appeared. These trends are likely to continue in the future. Amid the vicissitudes of the music business, copyrights remain a valuable investment. COPYRIGHT AS PROTECTION FROM INFRINGEMENT Copyright acts as a form of protection for songwriters and publishers. It guarantees that they have exclusive rights to the use and distribution of these songs. Infringement occurs when someone who is not the copyright holder makes public use of the song without permission. Allegations of copyright infringement have produced several famous legal cases. In November 2007, country singer Toby Keith won an infringement suit that had been filed against Keith by songwriter Michael McCloud, claiming that “I Love This Bar” was like his own song. Keith argued that the individual who filed the suit was trying to make money off of him. Beyoncé’s song “Baby Boy” won a lawsuit by songwriter Jannifer Armour of Minnesota, who said that she had submitted music to Matthew Knowles, president of Music World Entertainment, a company connected with Columbia Records. She alleged that “Baby Boy” was her song “Got a Little Bit of Love for You” and pointed out that the phrase “Every time I close my eyes” appears in both songs. However, on September 21, 2006 a Houston judge, Nancy Atlas, found the songs to be in different keys, tempos, and melodies and “substantially dissimilar.” In one of the most well-known cases, George Harrison’s song “My Sweet Lord” (1970) was found to have “subconsciously” drawn upon Ronald Mack’s “He’s So Fine,” performed by the Chiffons. The court said: “His subconscious knew it already had worked in a song his conscious did not remember.”13 This was a handy piece of psychoanalysis. Of course, one might ask if the case would have been brought if Harrison were not a former Beatle and his song had not been #1 on the charts for four weeks in 1970. In 1994, Michael Bolton and Andy Goldmark’s “Love Is A Wonderful Thing” was found by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in California to have shared elements with an Isley Brothers song from their Let’s Go album. Lyric, pitch, musical phrasing, rhythm, and hook were all found to be similar. Thus, $5.4 million was awarded. Bolton and Goldmark sought to overturn the ruling in 1999. The Supreme Court refused to hear the case. Ronald and Marvin Isley have been receiving 66 percent of the song proceeds from royalties and 29 percent of all proceeds from the Bolton album Time, Love, and Tenderness on which the song appeared.14

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In 1994, attorneys for country vocalist Emmylou Harris argued against infringement of her recorded work in Harris v. Emus Records (1984). The 1976 Copyright Act had provided a limitation on the exclusive right to record musical compositions. Mechanical licenses, the law asserted, are in effect when an artist who holds a copyright distributes a recording to the public. In the Harris case, a California court found that the owner of an unlicensed master, who had already issued this, could no longer sell it. Rather, he could only “listen to the master in his own living room” and could make no other use of it.15 Andrew Lloyd Webber spent $2.3 million in legal fees after 1990 to defend against religious folksong writer Ray Repp’s claim that the theme of Webber’s “Phantom of the Opera” was drawn from his song 1978 “Till You.” The U.S. Federal District Court in Manhattan found in favor of Webber.16 These issues of copyright infringement are fairly common in the music business. While in George Harrison’s case infringement was considered “unconscious,” some acts of infringement are clearly willful. When a work is used without obtaining necessary permissions this use is illegal. Further, there are times when someone claims that a work is his or her own original work, and it can be proven to be a copy of another writer’s work. Usually anyone who is charged with such infringement will deny having had access to this copyrighted song. However, if the song has been made available through performance, recordings, Internet distribution, or radio broadcast it is possible to demonstrate access. Some publishers are hesitant to listen to unsolicited new material because of a concern that a songwriter might claim that a published song sounds similar to their own and that the publisher had access to the material. ROYALTIES: MONEY FROM COPYRIGHTS Copyrighted and published music is connected with a performance rights agency. In the United States, there are three of these: ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC. ASCAP collects about $510 million annually for its members, which are publishers and songwriters. About a quarter of this amount derives from foreign sources. BMI collects from $450–500 million annually. SESAC, the smaller performing rights agency, collects about $5 million. Song copyrights that are used in recordings that receive media airplay are eligible for royalties. The performance rights organizations that administer this are a primary source of income for music publishers and songwriters. These organizations track a wide range of music providers from radio stations and television stations to the Internet, hotels, casinos, and concert venues. ASCAP emerged early in the twentieth century as a membership organization that was encouraged by composers such as Victor Herbert. Today,

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Victor Herbert’s piano sits one floor below a winding staircase that leads to the attorneys’ rooms atop the ASCAP building across from Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York. The organization has about 60,000 members, including more than 30,000 music publishers. ASCAP issues a blanket license for its catalog to all radio and television stations. The station’s gross receipts are calculated, and a rate of under 2 percent of the station’s adjusted gross receipts is charged. ASCAP also distributes royalties to songwriters and publishers for online uses of copyrighted and licensed songs. ASCAP has “RateCalc” to help Internet users to figure out their ASCAP licensing fees when online. A basic license and a rate schedule are issued after the inquirer responds to a series of questions. BMI (Broadcast Music, Incorporated) was established in 1940, prompted by the widespread increase in radio. Today, BMI represents more than 3 million copyrighted and published works. Some 140,000 songwriters and 60,000 music publishers have affiliated with this performance rights organization. BMI is a nonprofit organization that works primarily with blanket licenses and has a formula for charges to broadcasters. The BMI Web site has a Hyper Repertoire database for searches for its songs, songwriters, and publishers. It uses “On Ramp” technology services, a Web site that allows direct downloading of songs for fees. SESAC is a good deal smaller. It began as a private licensing company in 1930. The SESAC catalog comprises about 200,000 to 250,000 songs and has about 1,000 affiliated publishers and 1,000 writers connected with the organization. To determine music use charges, SESAC gauges the market population of a radio station and its advertising rates. SESAC also tracks cable television, the Internet, college concerts, hotels, and other places where music is played.17 The largest users of music copyrights are the record corporations that also have affiliated movie companies: Warner/Chappell, SONY/ATV, and Universal Music Group. The interweaving of songs with film and television has become pronounced partly because of the profits that can be generated from performance fees, synchronization fees, and mechanical fees. FAIR USE AND THE PUBLIC DOMAIN Songs written and published before 1922 have entered the public domain. Most songs written after this date remain under copyright, unless their copyright has not been renewed. The public domain consists of compositions that are considered part of the world’s cultural heritage. Educational uses of copyrighted works are governed by a doctrine of “fair use” that some experts say has become attenuated in recent years. Fair use concerns the public’s right to make a reasonable use of a part of a copyrighted

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composition. Fair use only gained force in 1976. Prior to this it was generally recognized that one could include brief passages from published works within criticism, or for educational purposes. A “four-point test” was established in the 1976 U.S. Copyright Law in which nonprofit educational uses were favored. The law stated that one could use such material for criticism and commentary, or for educational purposes, scholarship, and research. A four-point rule held that fair use concerned: (1) the purpose of the use, (2) the nature of the copyrighted material, (3) the portion or amount used in relation to the whole of the work, and (4) the effect on the market for that copyrighted work. Fair use affects musicians, music educators, and those who write about music. There are times when musicians may wish to quote a previous composition within a new song, so he or she may play a riff or hook from it. However, as music business attorney William Krasilovsky notes, the four bar or less rule is a myth. One cannot take four distinctive bars from “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” or “Smoke on the Water” to pay tribute to the Stones or Deep Purple. One must pay for this.18 Musicians who like to play cover tunes are also affected. The larger venues they play in have to be licensed by BMI or ASCAP, and these musicians cannot record their covers without a license through the Harry Fox Agency, usually costing money. For songwriters, there is no “four bar rule” for fair use in including another song within one’s own composition. Rather, what matters is the intended use of the song and this reference. The use of short extracts of melody or harmonic and rhythmic patterns are often viewed by courts as not “fair use.” Educators are likewise affected by fair-use laws. There are guidelines that allow for making a single copy of copyrighted music for music education. Music instructors are permitted to make use of partial excerpts. They can distribute a copy to each student. However, these copies must not exceed 10 percent of the work. So, too, are music arrangers affected by fair use. Arrangements of music from the public domain may be copyrighted. If made with a copyright owner’s consent, arrangements that meet a standard of originality may also be copyrighted. However, usually the musical arrangements made on recordings cannot be copyrighted. Rather, only the underlying song is. Record producers are sometimes involved as arrangers and exert creative influence in recording sessions. Unless a music arranger is connected with the originating writer or publisher or with an affiliated record company he or she will probably not obtain a share in the copyright for a song. These arrangers, instead, receive a payment or salary for their work on a project. Music education is also affected. A musician who copies records for the purpose of learning to play the songs on the record has to be able to show this purpose. This may be possible if the musician is enrolled as a full-time music student. However, many of the best pop and jazz artists are self-taught. Likewise, there are few schools for the study of hip-hop and rap. Musicians

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who copy recordings for study may be hard-pressed by our legal system of copyright to provide evidence of intent if called upon to do so in a court of law. Similarly, musical theater writers are affected by copyright. Rights must be secured before any play or film can be adapted to the stage for a musical. This may discourage some writers and composers from attempting such an adaptation. One cannot insert any copyrighted song into a film or a stage musical without paying mechanical, performance, and synchronization rights. Also, writers who write about music cannot easily quote song lyrics. These uses require permissions. Writing for and obtaining such permissions is a time-consuming process. Often such uses require payment. Our cultural heritage is affected when songs that are still copyrighted fall out of public use. These songs become harder to find. The general public, some argue, tends to lose a bit of its sense of the culture of the 1930s, for example, when most of the songs of that time are out of print and securely hidden away in special collections. HOW TO COPYRIGHT A SONG With the Copyright Act of 1976, all common law works were brought under Federal statutory provisions that became effective on January 1, 1978. The law says that whenever a work has been “fixed” in a tangible form it may be copyrighted. That means if it is on paper, on record, on a disk, or in some other format, it can then be deposited with the Library of Congress and the U.S. Copyright Office. The work does not have to be published. The 1976 Copyright Act provided that there be no requirement for copyright registration. However, such registration is useful to songwriters and music publishers. One may copyright individual songs or collections of several songs, albums, audiovisual material, recordings, remixes of derivative works authorized by copyright holders, and album liner notes. Liner notes that are lengthy may be copyrighted using Form TX (for text). Usually songs are copyrighted using Form PA (performing arts), and recordings are copyrighted using Form SR (sound recording). Copyright claims are registered with the Copyright Office by including a deposit of the work, usually two copies. This may be a recording of a compact disc or a cassette tape, or a printed manuscript copy. This work does not have to be published. However, the deposit should represent “the best edition of the work.” Some 50,000 performing arts works are registered annually. Any recording that is offered for sale and distribution is considered a publication. However, a live performance of a song is not a publication. The work has to be in a tangible, physical form for copyright to be in force. According to the 1976 Copyright Act, musical compositions must be “fixed” in recorded form, or in manuscript form.

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To demonstrate creation and ownership of an unpublished song, songwriters sometimes mail a copy of their song to themselves by registered mail, or in an envelope that they expect will be postmarked by the post office. A formal copyright through the Copyright Office generally provides better protection for the songwriter than this self-mailing method. Copyright registration provides formal recognition and a copyright notice. The U.S. Copyright Office makes available several forms for free. These forms can be obtained on the Copyright Office Web site: (htp://www.loc.gove/ copyright/forms). Form PA is for registering performing arts works. This may include musical works, plays, movies, choreography, and audiovisual materials. The SR form is used for sound recordings. If someone has created a musical, he or she needs to fill out only this form. The TX form is for a nondramatic literary work, like a novel, or a book of lyrics. The VA form is used for visual arts, including record covers, graphics, fine art, photographs, prints, posters, and advertisements. A copyright notice (©) was required for all public copies of a song following the 1976 Copyright Act. In 1988, the United States joined with the international Berne Convention by enacting the Berne Convention Implementation Act. This made the required notice of copyright (©) largely unnecessary. However, music business attorneys continue to advise that copyrighted songs carry the copyright symbol on them. The songs of American composers and lyricists are now protected in all of the countries that have signed the Berne Convention. Interestingly, titles cannot be copyrighted. However, the lyric may embody the title in an important part of the song. The title may also be the title of the album on which the song appears. Any title of this nature must be sufficiently unique for any rights to be asserted. CONCLUSION The future of copyright, many say, will be best promoted through a dialogue between music companies, music artists, and those in sectors of the public who are concerned with fair use and the public domain. In balancing the rights of copyright holders with the needs of artists, educators, and other music users, it appears necessary to reform our present copyright system. In a digital media environment, it is necessary to effectively preserve intellectual property protections and the commercial viability of copyrights. However, it is also important that we broaden the discussion beyond issues of piracy to include reflection upon our common inheritance. We need to remain true to the original purposes of copyright, so that: (1) Creative work will be remunerated and preserved; (2) Creative work can be made increasingly available for creative uses and cultural purposes; and (3) We can build further creative work upon it. In this way, the products of human genius and workmanship can continue to contribute to our cultural memory and to the public good for many generations to come.

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NOTES 1. Mark Rose, Authors, Owners and the Invention of Copyright (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard UP, 1993), p. 142. 2. The purpose for which copyright was designed is to advance the public good. Copyright was originally seen as providing an incentive to creators to contribute their work to the public. Recognizing that ideas and creativity are what advance society in its thinking and feeling, intellectual property law sought a temporary right for artists and inventors to their creations. The law classifies works and works to temporarily exclude uses of the copyright. However, the initial intent of U.S. Copyright law emphasized the “temporary” nature of this exclusive right. It was believed that this would provide an incentive to the writer or artist to create and that the general state of knowledge would be thereby advanced. 3. Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Isaac McPherson, August 13, 1813, cited by Pat Choate in Hot Property: The Stealing of Ideas in the Age of Globalization (New York: Knopf, 2005). 4. Christina N. Gifford, “Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act,” University of Memphis Law Review (Winter 2000). See Web site maintained by Amicus, a group of lawyers opposed, and by Dennis Karjala, Challenge to Constitutionality CTEA at http://homepages.law.asu.edu/dkarjala/OpposingCopyrightExtension/constitution ality.html. 5. For the reasoning of two clear opponents of copyright law as it is currently constructed see Dennis Karjala, “The Term of Copyright,” in Growing Pains: Adapting Copyright for Libraries, Education and Society, ed. Laura Gasaway (Littleton, Colorado: Fred B. Rothman, 1997) and Lawrence Lessig, The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World (New York: Vintage, 2003). 6. Pat Choate, Hot Property, p. 286. 7. Lawrence Lessig, The Future of Ideas (New York: Vintage, 2003), pp. 252–53. 8. Dennis Karjala, “The Term of Copyright,” p. 232. 9. Mark Twain, Arguments Before the Committees on Patents on S. 6330 and H.R. 19853, 59th Congress 116 (1906). 10. Jack Valenti’s comment is cited in Pat Choate, Hot Property. 11. Choate’s discussion in Hot Property of the papers of the Lehman book is particularly informative. 12. Recording Industry Association of America statements about their position can be found on their Web site, http://www.RIAA.com. 13. The case against Beyoncé was dismissed by U.S. Judge Nancy Atlas in Houston District Court on September 21, 2006. The case against Toby Keith by Michael McCloud (aka Michael Snyder) was also dismissed. See Billboard (November 29, 2007). George Harrison’s case was Bright Tunes Music Corp. v. Harrison Music, Ltd. 420 F. Supp. 177 (1976). 14. Michael Bolton’s case was Three Boys Music v. Bolton 97–55150. The Isley Brothers and Pullman Group claimed that Bolton had infringed upon their copyright with his song “Love Is A Wonderful Thing.” 15. M. William Krasilovsky and Sidney Shemel, This Business of Music: The Definitive Guide to the Music Industry, 9th ed. (New York: Billboard Books, 2003), p. 220. 16. Jesse McKinley, “Jury Vindicates Andrew Lloyd Webber,” The New York Times, December 16, 1998. Accessed online August 12, 2008 at http://query.nytimes.com/gst/

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fullpage.html?res=9D0CEEDA123DF935A25751C1A96E958260&scp=1&sq=jury %20vindicates%20andrew%20llyod%20webber&st=cse. 17. Information on the performing rights societies can be obtained from their Web sites, http://www.ASCAP.com, http://www.BMI.com, and http://www.SESAC.com. 18. Krasilovsky and Shemel, This Business of Music, pp. 108–9.

chapter 5

Rock Brands Mike Emery

The Rolling Stones’ “Bigger Bang” tour was the top-grossing tour of 2006 despite the fact that this group has not had a hit single in more than 15 years. That year, another venerable rock act, AC/DC, was ranked number two on Australia’s list of highest grossing entertainers of 2006—second to children’s act The Wiggles and above Oscar-winner Nicole Kidman—even though the group has not released an album or embarked on a full tour since 2000. Even semiactive and defunct rock acts such as KISS, Pink Floyd, and Led Zeppelin are continuing to reach audiences through T-shirts and other merchandise sold at mainstream retail outlets. These veteran rock artists are enjoying continued visibility and commercial success and reaching mass audiences regardless of whether they are actively producing recorded music or performing on stage. Ironically, they may even be enjoying more visibility than many younger, contemporary popular artists. More than anything, these classic rock acts are thriving because they have built successful brands. A brand is defined as any product or service that fosters audience and consumer beliefs by maintaining a consistent identity and offering repeated experiences that are emotionally rewarding.1 Veteran rock artists such as the Stones, KISS, and others have sustained durable brands that are going strong long after their creative and commercial peaks. In this ever-competitive music industry where trends come and go, new artists—particularly groups—can take note of how classic rock brands have survived and continue to attract new audiences. Now more than ever, good branding is vital for new artists and groups. Once upon a time, the earliest records by the Rolling Stones and KISS were not commercially successful. The dynamics of yesteryear’s music industry

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allowed both groups to evolve into top-selling performers and ultimately multimillion dollar brands. Today, however, the music arena is more competitive, and labels (not to mention audiences) are less patient when it comes to second chances. In an age of online digital music purchases and satellite radio, new artists are challenged with making an instant connection with audiences. Even more difficult is maintaining that connection. By understanding effective branding, artists can forge stronger identities that can resonate with publics for years to come. BRAND ANATOMY Daniel M. Jackson contends that a good brand needs more than simply a name. A catchy name paired with a superior product creates the blueprint for a successful brand. He defines a brand as, “Any idea, stemming from a belief that through its consistent identity, experience and the positive emotional investment of stakeholder creates sustainable benefits.”2 While names are strong brand identifiers, logos can also serve as tools for helping connect a brand with its publics, writes Marc Gobe. Gobe cites the IBM logo, a personification of a corporate, business-driven organization, and Apple, Inc.’s logo, which is more human and reflective of the baby boomer generation’s values.3 For a logo to be ultimately effective, it must communicate valid customer experiences. Customer beliefs must be attributed to the actual brand before a logo can convey meaning.4 As Jackson observes, Daryl Travis acknowledges that belief in a brand is conducive to its identity. Brand identity, he writes, exists purely within an audience’s mind and carries specific expectations and promises. Such expectations build audience loyalty, which helps the audience save time during purchase decisions. A familiar name, combined with the expectation of a positive experience, allows an audience or consumer to make an instant purchase decision without comparative research.5 Brands generate belief, Jackson suggests, by asking stakeholders to make a positive emotional investment.6 He cites McDonald’s as an example of a brand that is built on its audience’s beliefs and expectations. The founders of the fast-food franchise promised quality food at low prices and have delivered on this promise. Enhancing this pledge to McDonald’s customers was the fact that all of its locations provided the same services in a similar—if not identical—physical environment. Belief in brands can be defined as an investment of consumers’ emotions, Jackson states. By recognizing belief as an investment, stakeholders are able to identify with the importance of brand belief.7 Matthew W. Ragas and Bolivar Bueno maintain that belief is only one aspect of cultivating a brand. A brand must not only generate belief, but it must inspire individuals to tell others about why it is great.8

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A brand cultivates identities by developing reputations and generating narratives, acknowledges Douglas B. Holt.9 These stories speak to an audience’s desires. Customers value symbolic brands, and they value the stories that are conducive to developing unique brand identities, asserts Holt. Likewise, customers support the brands that personify admirable ideals and help them express their personalities or beliefs. Brands that do this successfully emerge as “iconic brands.” An iconic brand consists of identity myths or simple fictions that address cultural anxieties from worlds other than those in which an audience resides. Such myths involve imaginative aspirations that speak to audiences’ desired identities.10 Any concept or idea that is believable has brand potential, states Jackson.11 Others can embrace a belief held by one person, no matter how innovative or deviant it is. Consistency is the key in sustaining brand belief. Jackson argues that positive beliefs are more often embraced by wide audiences and have had longer survival rates than negative ones. An example is Death cigarettes, which were sold in the United Kingdom in the 1980s. The product acknowledged the health risks associated with smoking. Death ultimately met its demise due to the fact that it perpetuated a negative belief.12 Timelessness also contributes to brand longevity, and when audiences begin to associate certain qualities or characteristics to a brand, it has developed “brand essence.”13 Some brand architects apply unique traits as a means of developing brand identity and as a tool to create “fans” or loyal followers of a brand, stress Ragas and Bueno.14 In addition to being consistent, a brand must be memorable if it is to maintain a long life. While memorable advertising assists in generating brand belief, the brand itself must remain embedded in the public’s memories. Disney has succeeded, through its films and characters, in creating positive memories for children, who then retain these experiences through adulthood.15 When people believe that a particular brand is superior, that belief actually becomes a fact in their minds. A brand can achieve this perception of superiority by effectively proclaiming its authenticity. Claiming legitimacy (such as Cola-Cola’s “the real thing” slogan) often makes a brand credible in the eyes of its audiences. If audiences believe that a brand is credible, they also believe in anything that is said about it.16 BRAND–AUDIENCE INTERACTIONS To sustain veteran rock brands, attention must be placed on reaching ever-changing (and ever-aging) audiences. Once, brands such as The Rolling Stones or KISS focused branding efforts toward teenage markets. Now, brands like these must appeal to fans of all ages. The successful rock brand must cater to the evolving lifestyles of its original audience and acknowledge the fact that its members are no longer youngsters but rather parents or

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grandparents. It also recognizes that this longtime audience now demands a much different concert experience than it did 20 or 30 years ago. With that, artists consistently find new ways of reaching their core fan base while winning over new, younger audiences. Veteran rock brands such as The Rolling Stones have maintained credibility with audiences through their catalog of popular songs. Although The Stones have not charted a hit song in decades (the last was “Mixed Emotions” in 1989), their music is heard daily on rock radio stations. Regardless of their current musical output or chart standings, The Rolling Stones were the highest grossing touring act of 2006. Not surprisingly, the group’s October 22, 2006, performance in Austin, Texas, only featured two new songs in the setlist. While die-hard devotees often appreciate new material from a popular brand, general audiences are more interested in its past hits, says popular culture researcher Joe Kotarba. A well-established rock brand does not depend on new material to keep it viable in the marketplace. Classic material meets audience expectations, he adds. The older songs appeal to younger audiences because they have heard this material on the radio, in film soundtracks, or on television. For audiences who grew up with these songs, however, yesteryear’s classics can symbolize both the artist’s longevity in the world as well as their own. Kotarba cites his recent experiences seeing Paul McCartney perform in Houston, Texas, to illustrate his point: Someone like Paul McCartney can reach way back into his catalog and play the old Beatles’ songs. This music can speak to the people who listened to this music in the 1960s. Basically, it tells them “we’ve been through a lot, and it’s still great.” Hearing a 30 or 40 year old song doesn’t make people feel so old. Instead, it actually rejuvenates them.17

Of course, there comes a time when artists tire of performing the same material night after night, year after year. They then decide to offer a newer product, which often results in mixed emotions from its audiences. In recent years, Bruce Springsteen embarked on two tours that featured all new material and few of the songs that propelled him into the public’s consciousness. His 2005 “Devils and Dust” tour was a largely acoustic affair that featured music from the album of the same title. Meanwhile, the 2006 “Seeger Sessions” tour featured the prolific performer embracing his folk and Americana roots. In both cases, ticket sales were sluggish for a performer who could easily sell out arenas playing his classic hits. David Bowie decided to publicly retire his catalog of classics on his “Sound and Vision” tour in 1993. Two years later, the singer would embark on the “Outside” tour featuring a new sound and only including a handful of past hits. Attendance suffered, and the U.S. leg of the tour never was completed.

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During Bowie’s 2004 tour, the artist quietly “un-retired” his hits from live performance to the approval of his fan base. Once a brand is established, it can be difficult if not impossible to escape from performing the hits of yesteryear. Some artists may not want to play the same old songs night after night, but they realize it’s what the fans have paid to hear. Just ask Motorhead vocalist and bassist Lemmy Kilmister. In his autobiography, White Line Fever, he acknowledges audiences wanting to hear classic material including his band’s signature tune, “Ace of Spades,” a track that grates on his patience. The kids want to hear the old stuff. I mean, if I go to see Little Richard, I want to hear “Long Tall Sally,” and if I don’t I’m going to be thoroughly pissed off. Even though I’m sick to death of it, Motorhead should do “Ace of Spades,” and you can’t fight that. To refuse to play it—or those other tunes—is very bad news.18

Performing popular material during concerts is one way artists connect with audiences to maintain brand belief, but the actual concert experience also strengthens brand–audience bonds, Kotarba says. Concerts are often more than a performance. They foster an environment where fans often dress and behave in ways they would not ordinarily do at home or in the office. They can offer time away from responsibilities, an escape from one’s day-to-day routine. Likewise, concerts provide audiences with a celebratory atmosphere, one where music enthusiasts come together for the purpose of sheer revelry and the enjoyment of particular artists. Of course, the level of revelry and enjoyment varies from brand to brand. An audience at a Paul McCartney concert will behave far different than one attending a Rolling Stones show. While a McCartney concert might be perfect for a relaxing date with one’s spouse, a Stones’ concert is the kind of experience that is shared with a group of friends for the party, says Kotarba. “It is all dependent on the brand. When you think of McCartney, you think of this guy who is one of the greatest living pop music composers. He is a revered figure, so the concert experience will be fun but not wild. The Stones, however, have built a brand around being ‘bad boys.’ Never mind that these guys are grandparents now, audiences still look at them as the rebels, so the concert experience will be decidedly more energetic.”19 Just as most people know what to expect when opening a can of Coca-Cola, many will know what to expect from a Paul McCartney or Stones show. The Stones, in particular, have taken great strides in preserving the spectacular and wild nature of their concerts. For much of their career, the group’s concerts have been large productions often featuring fireworks and special effects. This has been the case since The Rolling Stones’ 1975 tour, which featured a lotus-shaped stage and had outrageous effects such as a

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giant inflatable penis. During its October 22, 2006, performance in Zilker Park in Austin, Texas, the penis was gone, and in its place was a giant pair of inflatable lips—The Stones’ logo—and instead of the lotus, a mammoth stage with towers and large video monitors provided the 42,000 fans in attendance a view of the band’s every movement. The concert was as much a spectacle as it was a musical performance. Neither McCartney nor the Stones initially set out to deliver the kinds of concerts they currently do. Music was at the heart of their creative agendas at the start of their careers. After decades of cultivating brand images, they have effectively crafted live shows that consistently appeal to audiences each time they tour. Other artists, however, have always focused their brands around the live concert experience. Take KISS for example. The group’s bombastic, loud rock was essential in developing its brand but even more so was creating a rock show unlike fans had ever seen. During the 1970s, the group’s concerts became a staple of its brand thanks to intricate costumes, theatrical make-up, and special effects. The audience itself became almost as entertaining as the stage show as fans attended performances in make-up and costume making each affair similar to a masquerade party. This environment was a defining element of the KISS brand and made each concert appearance a must-see experience. During the group’s 2004 “Rock the Nation” tour, the elements that define KISS concerts were still in place (although some of the band members were different), and fans young and old showed up in KISS make-up and regalia. To make the concert experience even more memorable, however, KISS offered fans an opportunity to purchase VIP packages. On the 2005 KISS concert DVD Rock the Nation Live, a segment focuses on fans that purchased these VIP packages during the group’s 2004 tour. Fans are shown meeting the members of KISS during these backstage meet-and-greet sessions. On the DVD, these fans discuss their gratitude to KISS for the years of entertainment it has provided. During these scenes, singer/guitarist Paul Stanley acknowledges that these interactions are particularly important for understanding the brand’s current audience. Those fans pay hard-earned money to come see us, and it’s up to us to make sure that we live up to those expectations. It’s important to know where they’re from, their history, what they like about the band, what they’re feeling about the show. This is a way to stay in tune with the people who keep you in the position you’re in.20

In an article titled “Branding on the Internet,” Helena Rubenstein writes that a brand-audience relationship depends on a dialogue.21 Once, brands spoke to audiences with no feedback. As with KISS, live dialogue can be facilitated for a price, but lesser-known brands will communicate with their constituencies at no charge.

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This was the case when L.A. Guns took time to meet fans following its August 21, 2005, performance at the Sunken Gardens Amphitheatre in San Antonio, Texas. Another former radio staple Faster Pussycat did the same following its August 16, 2006, appearance in the Meridian nightclub in Houston, Texas. Rock vocalist Eddie Money makes himself available to fans for autographs and photos following performances as he did at ArrowFest— an annual outdoor festival in Woodlands, Texas, featuring veteran rock brands—on October 14, 2006. Rubenstein indicates, however, the Internet is becoming more important than ever for brand–audience interactions. Once, brands spoke to audiences with no feedback. Now, the Internet allows audiences to respond to brands. Many rock brands’ Web sites contain message boards or forums that allow fans a chance to pose questions directly to the artist or to engage in dialogues with other fans. In the case of L.A. Guns, its members often respond to fans’ questions themselves, or they post messages regarding tours, products, or other topics. The official KISS Web site (www.KISSonline.com) has a section titled “Ask KISS,” where members of the band answer fans’ questions. Others, such as The Rolling Stones official Web site (www.rollingstones.com), have online forums devoted to tour performances in which fans can post reviews of recent performances. The Internet also serves as a marketing device that brands can use to proactively connect with audiences. Song downloads available on brands’ sites help motivate purchasing decisions of audiences by allowing them to preview sections of songs from upcoming recorded material. In addition to offering product previews, the Internet helps brands communicate new product offerings to audiences. The Rolling Stones, for example, reach audiences through extensive electronic mailing lists. Fans that register with The Stones’ Web site receive regular e-mail notices regarding upcoming performance dates, ticket sales, and available merchandise. Online communication has been integral to twenty-first-century branding.22 Brands now have the opportunity to build and maintain relationships with their most crucial stakeholders through dialogue and instant communication 24 hours a day. LOGOS AS BRANDING TOOLS Effective logos can bolster a brand’s visibility, as well as its longevity. Just as rock brands use artist–fan interactions to reach audiences, they also reach desired audiences through the consistent use of logos. As indicated in the following case studies of Motorhead, The Rolling Stones, AC/DC, and KISS, consistent logos define brand essence, build brand loyalty, create new markets, and are employed as key identifiers. In the article “Grow Your Logo into a Brand,” Jerome D. Smith writes that a logo can become the sum of a brand’s vision, values, characteristics,

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and attributes.23 One particular rock logo that has captured these elements of its brand is Motorhead’s “Snaggletooth.” In its original rendition or in its variations, its vicious visage indicates to neophytes that the rock trio’s sound is traditionally hard, raw, and abrasive. For longtime fans, it’s a reminder of the group’s penchant for lyrical subject matter focused on war, sex, and outlaw activities. The image also matches the band members’ nonglamorous, no frills image, particularly that of lead vocalist and bassist Lemmy Kilmister. With his trademark moustache, rough voice, and rugged exterior (large warts protrude from his left cheek), Kilmister is an unlikely rock idol. Since forming the band in 1975, Kilmister has fostered a tough image to match Motorhead’s coarse, hard rock sound. Kilmister was formerly associated with the psychedelic hippie music of the late 1960s and early 1970s, having played with the free-spirited group Hawkwind. Soon after forming Motorhead, Kilmister painted his multicolored amplifiers a flat black and adorned them with silver skulls. Musically, the Motorhead sound was a harsh counterpoint to the peace and love generation. Kilmister summed up this sonic attitude by telling the press, “If we moved in next door, your lawn would die.”24 Fans agreed. A readers’ poll in Britain’s Sounds magazine named the band as “the best worst band in the world.”25 Joe Petagno designed “Snaggletooth,” which made its first appearance on the band’s self-titled album in 1977. He also continues to illustrate album covers for Motorhead. The “Snaggletooth” image is an integral part of the Motorhead brand, he says: You can’t imagine Motorhead without the logo. The logo is Motorhead, and it will probably outlast the music by decades. Everything before “Snaggletooth” was wishy–washy nonsense left over from the 1960s. When “Snaggletooth” popped up on the scene, the world was astonished at the in-your-face brutal truth that the logo as well as the music and lyrics depicted. Gone forever was the illusion that “all you need is love.” “Snaggletooth” signaled the end of peace, love and happiness and the beginning of war, hate, and greed. It was genuinely a scary picture of the era’s state of affairs and was years ahead of it’s time.26

The ferocious-looking symbol (a metallic, horned, fanged animal skull with chains dangling from its face accompanied by the Motorhead name in gothic typeface) has been featured prominently and in different forms on 18 of the band’s 24 albums (the typeface, however, appears on all 24 albums). The “Snaggletooth” image also adorns a stage backdrop used during performances and on drummer Mikkey Dee’s drum kit. It is also the primary image on the band’s Web site, www.imotorhead.com, and is featured on the band’s merchandise. “Snaggletooth” items include shirts, jackets, caps, and other accessories. In fact, 19 of the 22 T-shirts sold on www.imotorhead.com feature “Snaggletooth.”

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The band’s Web site also features a section titled “Motorhead for Life” that features several photographs of many fans who have had “Snaggletooth” tattooed on their bodies. Some are modest works adorning their arms or legs (sometimes both), but many are intricate illustrations covering fans’ backs, chests, and stomachs. Such measures undoubtedly reflect a lasting loyalty to the Motorhead brand, particularly its logo. Such loyalty to a brand’s logo is not uncommon, says sociologist and rock music researcher Sonia Vasan. She has examined the subcultural aspects of rock music, particularly the hard rock or heavy metal genres. Through ethnographic studies, she found that the art and logos connected to these genres resonate more with this fan base. Logos, she says, contribute to identity formation for both audiences and artists. For audiences, in particular, logos allow them to vicariously experience the imagery and music of artists. Likewise, logos contribute to the subculture associated with heavy metal by offering audiences labels they can use to distance themselves from the mainstream culture.27 Not all audiences accept a brand’s logo as a means for identity formation. In many instances, however, audiences are drawn to rock brands’ logos because they are viewed as fashionable. The Rolling Stones classic “Lips/Tongue” logo has become familiar to audiences of all ages through its increased presence on T-shirts and other merchandise that are available at mainstream outlets such as Kohls, JCPenney, and Target. In addition to this output, merchandise is available through the band’s official Web site, www.rollingstones. com. Jerome D. Smith and Lauren McMullen write that logos can create new business and capture new market shares.28 For The Rolling Stones, its “Lips/Tongue” logo has generated new business in the form of fashion wear, and it is reaching new markets through the availability of such clothing at mainstream shopping outlets. For many years, the only place to obtain Rolling Stones merchandise was by purchasing it at concerts or ordering it from specialty outlets. Now, anyone can wear a Rolling Stones tour shirt without attending a performance. During The Rolling Stones October 2006 appearance in Austin, Texas, a majority of the 42,000 fans in attendance were clad in T-shirts and baseball caps boasting different variations of the “Lips/Tongue” logo. Fans wearing attire with this logo ranged from adolescents to senior citizens. James Garden, rock author and logo designer, says that contemporary audiences are often drawn to rock brands as a result of their logos and that music is by no means the sole motivator in these audiences’ purchase decisions: Everybody recognizes The Rolling Stones logo, regardless of whether they are a fan of the band or not. T-shirts with the logo advertise the band while serving as a fashion accessory. Many artists that are currently not on the charts or on tour will still sell merchandise, because they have a

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logo that looks good on a shirt and it becomes cool. A classic example is AC/DC. They are never in the charts, and haven’t released a new album for several years, but they still sell T-shirts. A friend of mine bought one because he loved the design. He listens to rap and hip-hop and had no idea they were a band.29

There is no exact science when designing a logo that is destined to become a brand’s calling card. Gerard Huerta designed the AC/DC logo for the cover of its 1978 album Let There Be Rock. Using a gothic typeface similar to that found in Gutenberg’s Bible, Huerta created a font to match the album’s semi-Biblical title. Since its introduction, Huerta’s AC/DC logo has been used on 17 album covers in addition to merchandise and marketing materials. The artist had no idea that it would be used over and over again. He attributes its success to the popularity of the brand and its consistent presence: It is difficult to know why one logo over another has such lasting impact. In this case, there are two reasons: its long-term usage and the popularity of the band. I really am perplexed about this, as it was really just some lettering designed for one album cover. It must have struck a chord with AC/DC as it was picked up for future albums.30

Huerta’s experience with logos extends far beyond the realm of designing those used on album covers. A veteran designer, he has designed mastheads for magazines such as People, Time, Architectural Digest, AdWeek, and several others. He’s designed covers for publications such as Newsweek, posters for films such as Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, and logos for sporting events such as Super Bowl XXXV. Sharp design and consistent visibility are conducive to a logo’s effectiveness, he says: It is a combination of design and usage that gives a logo the value for identity. One without the other doesn’t work. Hopefully, uniqueness in the design will help people remember it. I think that long-term usage of any logo can assist in the identity and brand of a group.31

Design and consistent usage has paid off for another logo that has become synonymous with a rock brand. The KISS logo, designed by the band’s original guitarist, Ace Frehley, resembles a comic book masthead. In place of the letter “S,” he created a zigzagging character that resembled lightning bolts. The super heroic logo was a perfect match for the KISS image, which consisted of musicians wearing theatrical make-up and outlandish costumes. The logo has been present on every single KISS album since its self-titled release in 1973. Additionally, it has factored into the group’s live performances, which became an anchor of the KISS brand. KISS concerts have

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always been filled with special effects including smoke, fireworks, and explosions. An enlarged, illuminated logo has always served as a flashy backdrop to fuel the already frenzied atmosphere of their shows. Additionally, the logo has also adorned the drum kits of the band’s different drummers: Peter Criss, Eric Carr, and Eric Singer. Garden cites the KISS logo as one that is crucial to defining its brand’s identity: A recurring logo is extremely important for a band’s identity. A logo needs to be recognizable enough for a person to see it and immediately picture the band. One of the best examples is KISS’ logo. It alone on a T-shirt immediately catches the eye, looks good, and gets KISS into people’s minds. When they toured in the 1970s, they played in front of a huge version of the logo, and that immediately became as important to the brand as its make-up.32

During the 1980s, the KISS brand endured personnel and image changes (most notably, the removal of the make-up, which would be brought back in 1996). Maintaining its traditional sound and dynamic concert performances would keep the KISS brand alive and thriving. The logo also would continue to factor into KISS branding efforts and remain on all merchandise and as part of the stage effects during performances. Despite all of the personnel and image changes in the 1980s, the consistent use of the logo helped reinforce the fact that two of the KISS brand’s strongest assets still were in place: music and live concerts. According to Smith and McMullen, logos grow from representing a brand to defining expectations. The consistent use of marketing vehicles such as logos is key in bolstering the expectations of a brand’s goods and services.33 The recurring use of this logo indicated that the KISS brand remained a reliable source of hard rock and concerts filled with elaborate stages and effects. SUSTAINING A BRAND WITH NEW ARTISTIC PERSONNEL As with corporate entities, employees come and go. This also happens in the world of rock groups. So, what happens when a popular guitarist or bassist departs an established brand? For some brands, replacing members is only a minor obstacle in maintaining a brand. Take KISS for example. The group has had five different lead guitarists and three different drummers in its 35-year history; yet, its brand continues to thrive. With its members in face make-up and costumes, KISS originally built its brand on four distinct fantasy-based personalities: the rock star, the demon, the spaceman, and the catman. The original spaceman, Ace Frehley, and the original catman, Peter Criss, left the band separately in the early 1980s and again in 2002 following a reunion of original KISS members. Currently, replacements

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Tommy Thayer and Eric Singer now respectively portray the spaceman and catman alongside KISS founders Paul Stanley (rock star) and Gene Simmons (demon). Some fans have resisted the notion of having replacements in KISS. On the Web site, KISSin’ UK (www.KISSinuk.com), a message board contains fan dialogue regarding Thayer’s role in the band. One fan admitted that he did not accept Thayer as a member of KISS, indicating that his presence made the current incarnation seem like a tribute act. Another fan’s response argued that having KISS with replacement musicians is better than not having the brand around at all. “KISS is KISS, and, I’ll not be complaining when they tour,” says the fan.34 KISS is only one of many veteran rock brands that faced changes in its artistic personnel. Journey and Styx, among others, are sustaining brand belief with new faces on stage. Both brands remain popular touring attractions. Journey’s recent tour, in fact, was ranked in the top 20 of 2006 tours by the concert trade publication Pollstar. The Journey brand continues although its members’ names and faces have changed, including the temporary addition of new vocalist Jeff Scott Soto, who was recruited shortly after the 2006 tour began. Former Journey drummer Steve Smith says that when a rock brand is well-established, the music is what matters most. As long as the Journey brand delivers the music that made it successful, audiences will be satisfied: The new group carries on the sound that was created during the years of the original Journey’s creative peak. At this point, it is keeping the music alive by touring and is continuing to develop new fans. This is good for the catalogue and the longevity of the music. The fans don’t seem to be interested in new material. They want to hear the hits.35

Kotarba agrees. He says that brands consisting of ensembles rather than individuals, such as Van Morrison or Paul McCartney, are often remembered for their music rather than for their artistic personnel. “People know the songs but they don’t know the players,” he says. “Fans want more of a jukebox experience. They want the hits.”36 KISS’s fourth guitarist Bruce Kulick acknowledges that his status as a nonoriginal member of the group was overshadowed by the music he performed on stage. Kulick joined KISS following the dismissal of two previous guitarists within two years. “I’m not sure fans even knew who I was,” he says. “They may not even know who’s in the band now.”37 Still, while a rock brand must deliver its classic material during performances to appease audiences, key dominant artistic personnel must be present, says Jeb Wright, rock historian and editor of online magazine Classic Rock Revisited. Without a few of a brand’s principal artists on stage, credibility will be lost:

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Now, one must ask if Tommy Shaw left Styx or Gene Simmons left KISS or Neal Schon left Journey would they be able to sell live shows at the capacity they are currently selling them at? The answer is no. While Journey’s original vocalist Steve Perry is absent and Styx does not have its original vocalist Dennis DeYoung a large majority of the fans will stick around as half a team is better than none, but if all key members are gone then you will not see anyone flocking to the show.38

Personnel transitions are commonplace among veteran rock brands, but for younger brands, such changes can present more extreme challenges. In 1981, the Motorhead brand had just begun to enjoy commercial success when its guitarist Eddie Clarke departed. Although the brand was focused on its founder, bassist, and vocalist Lemmy Kilmister, Clarke’s replacement, Brian Robertson, became a disruption in Motorhead, and audiences’ expectations were not met. In his autobiography White Line Fever, Kilmister discusses the challenges of maintaining the Motorhead brand with Robertson as the group’s guitarist. Kilmister recollects Motorhead’s album Another Perfect Day, the first recording with Robertson. The album was a departure from the signature Motorhead sound and offered a more refined, somewhat commercialized sound. Kilmister himself speaks highly of Robertson’s abilities and Another Perfect Day but admits that both seemed to be detrimental to the brand, as fans disliked the record, criticizing its commercial leanings.39 In addition to presenting fans with a Motorhead album that diverted from the group’s traditional formula, the brand wasn’t delivering its previous hits (including its signature hit “Ace of Spades”) while on tour. This, writes Kilmister, was a result of Robertson’s influence. Compounding the problems of new musical direction and not playing the band’s older material was Robertson’s stage presence, which deviated from Motorhead’s black leather and denim image. In his book, Kilmister discusses Robertson’s increasingly distracting stage attire: Brian’s fashion sense continued to shock and horrify fans throughout our tour of Europe at the end of the year. Let’s face it, ballet shoes and Motorhead do not mix! He stood out like a sore thumb, and I guess that’s what he wanted. On our last tour with him, he was wearing what looked like sweat pants, only they were made out of gabardine, and he had them tied up at the bottom with two strips of old, white towel. He was just being awkward for the sake of it.40

Robertson would eventually be fired from Motorhead. Although other eccentric musicians would enter and exit the ranks of Motorhead, there would be no further deviation from the brand’s musical formula, image, or stage presence. The current line-up includes Kilmister, guitarist Phil Campbell,

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and drummer Mikkey Dee. It is the longest lasting version of the 35-year old Motorhead brand to date. Still, Motorhead ultimately revolves around Kilmister. Janiss Garza, rock critic and Kilmister’s co-author on White Line Fever, explains why, without Kilmister, there is no Motorhead. She also points out that multiple changes in personnel have factored into the brand: Lemmy is the one who has sparked the loyalty. A lot of people from the very old days still do miss Eddie Clarke, but the bottom line is that Lemmy is the one who does most of the press and spouts off all the opinions. Because the line-up changes have involved getting new members who are quirky characters in the Motorhead mold, it’s stayed consistent with what Motorhead is about. But Lemmy is the main songwriter in the band. It’s clearly one voice that has carried on from album to album. Yes, the other guys have contributed musically, and I know Phil Campbell is a strong writer in his own right, but it all boils down to the Motorhead vibe, which boils down to Lemmy.41

CONSISTENCY IS KEY Meeting audience expectations is key in maintaining a successful and visible rock brand. This has indeed been the case for the classic rock brands discussed in this chapter and will very well be the case for newer, younger artists as well. Audiences do not want to be surprised by a brand. The Rolling Stones could very well conduct a tour in which they played stripped-down blues standards and none of their hits. Still, one must ask if ticket sales would be as strong as they are during a standard, hit-filled Stones tour? The examples posed by Springsteen and Bowie indicate that established brands must invest time and energy in performing the music that made them household names if they are to sell concert tickets. The true artist will no doubt be horrified by this fact. Being held hostage to one’s past glory is frustrating for artists as evidenced by Kilmister’s disdain for his band’s signature hit “Ace of Spades.” Still, a brand must put its audience well above artistic integrity if it is to survive. Because brands such as the Stones, Motorhead, Bowie, and Springsteen have become institutions (at varying levels of commercial success) in the rock world, many audiences do not see their catalogs growing beyond the hits of yesteryear. In fact, most general audiences are likely to purchase a greatest hits package rather than a new product. Again, this is no doubt frustrating for artists who seek to create new works and not rest on the laurels of past glories. Still, the goal is to make the fans happy. The hits define the brand. New material appeases the loyalists while the general audience might head to the concession stand when it’s performed live. Rock brands must maintain a certain visual appeal as well as maintain its audio integrity. Not every successful rock brand has a logo, but many do.

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From the most popular examples (Stones, KISS) to lesser-known but consistently used designs (Motorhead), logos are key identifiers for rock brands. Additionally, they form associations between the brand and its persona. KISS’s logo complements its garish, cartoon-like stage presence, and its jagged “S” design helps define its brand of heavy metal. Likewise, the Stones’ Lips/ Tongue design reflects the brand’s raunchy, sexy appeal. The power of logos extends beyond its definition of the artists and their music. Timeless rock logos can become fashionable whether they are on apparel or other merchandise. Stones and AC/DC T-shirts are worn by audiences of all ages. Often times, the person wearing the logo has no idea that it’s even connected with a brand. Through strategic placement of their logos, many brands, particularly KISS, have extended the use of these identifiers into live performances. The logo—as used on stage, in special effects, or on drum kits—contributes not only to an audience’s expectations, but to its experience when seeing the brand perform live. Sometimes, a logo’s design is strategic, as the case with Motorhead. The artist created an image to complement the caustic sound and image that the band favored. In other instances, such as the AC/DC logo, the design may be rendered as a one-time marketing piece then adopted for future use. Artists designing these logos are both professional designers—such as Gerard Huerta, designer of AC/DC’s logo—or simply an artistic band member such as KISS guitarist Ace Frehley. In both cases, there was no marketing science employed in the design of these successful logos. Repetition bred familiarity among the fans, which led to widespread recognition by general audiences. Ironically, logos are more permanent aspects of brands than some artists are. In many rock groups, members come and go, which can impact a brand. When a popular member leaves, his/her replacement might not be received as warmly by audiences. As shown in the Motorhead case study from the early 1980s, a new personality in a relatively young brand can impact audiences’ beliefs and expectations. Additionally, the new face in the group also might have an impact on the group’s creative output as Robertson did on Motorhead’s. As Kilmister explained, the group’s previously stripped-down sound became polished, which alienated devotees. Likewise, his stage presence did not jive with the Motorhead image. After one album and one tour, he was sacked. As recently seen in contemporary veteran brands such as KISS and Journey, however, audiences can accept replacement personnel for the sake of keeping the brand intact. Of course, it helps when the brand’s primary creative team or charismatic members still remain. KISS can still be KISS as long as vocalists Stanley and Simmons are present. Accordingly, the Stones continue to tour (for now), and KISS continues to release new merchandise (predominately archival DVD footage, clothing). What can new artists learn

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from these veterans that continue to thrive when so many others have retired from the music industry? In a word, consistency. These brands and many others have remained fairly unswerving in terms of music, performances, logo usage, and in retaining key personnel. The saying “change is good” does not always apply to successful brands. Simply, revisit the NEW Coke fiasco of the 1980s as a perfect example. Consistency is certainly key for contemporary rock brands because they must now contend with audiences who have little patience for disappointment and more options for instant entertainment. Now more than ever, it’s crucial that new rock brands meet audiences’ expectations. Thanks to digital technology, buying music is a little like purchasing fast food. In fact, it’s almost priced like fast food at 99 cents a song. Regardless of the cost, music is often purchased for use on mobile devices (iPods, phones, mp3 players) and used on-the-go. Think about what happens when you cruise through your preferred hamburger chain’s drive-thru line, place an order, then discover when you’re home that an unfavorable recipe change has been made on your favorite sandwich. Your expectations of this chain are dampened. The same scenario holds true for the fan of a contemporary rock brand, who buys several new tracks, then discovers during an hour-long commute that the group sounds nothing like it did on its previous record. Of course, he could have previewed them, but because he’s a fan, why should he? He knows what his favorite artist sounds like. Or, at least he thought he did. Just as there are other fast-food chains to choose from, there are plenty of rock brands (both new and classic) to explore as well. Locking in with audience’s needs will keep them coming back for more. As evidenced by The Rolling Stones’ 2006 ticket sales, people stick with a proven commodity. New rock brands, however, are challenged with proving themselves again and again before truly connecting with a long-term audience. NOTES 1. Jackson, Daniel M. 2003. Sonic Branding. New York: Palgrave, 86. 2. Jackson, 51. 3. Gobe, Marc. 2001. Emotional Branding. New York: Allworth, 131. 4. Holt, Douglas. 2004. How Brands Become Icons. Boston: Harvard Business Press, 211. 5. Jackson, 80. 6. Jackson, 63. 7. Jackson, 68. 8. Ragas, Matthew W., and Bolivar Bueno. 2002. The Power of Cult Branding. California: Prima Venture, xxix. 9. Holt, 211. 10. Holt, 211.

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11. Jackson, 80. 12. Jackson, 80. 13. Holt, 211. 14. Ragas and Bueno, 2. 15. Jackson, 90. 16. Kotarba, Joseph, interview with author, Houston, Texas, September 2006. 17. Kotarba, interview. 18. Kilmister, Lemmy, and Janiss Garza. 2004. White Line Fever. New York: Citadel, 168. 19. Kotarba, interview. 20. KISS: Rock the Nation Live, dir. Jonathan Beswick, 136 min., Image Entertainment, 2005, DVD. 21. Rubenstein, Helena. 2002. “Branding on the Internet.” All About Branding (March). http://www.allaboutbranding.com/index.lasso?article=175 (accessed January 2007). 22. Ibid. 23. Smith, Jerome D., and Lauren McMullen. 2002. “Grow Your Logo Into A Brand,” From BrandEvolve Web site. January 1, 2002, n.p. http://www.brandevolve.com/news/ wp_growyourlogo.php (accessed August 10, 2008). 24. Kilmister and Garza, 98. 25. Kilmister and Garza, 101. 26. Petagno, Joe, interview with author, e-mail, August 2006. 27. Vasan, Sonia, interview with author, e-mail, August 2006. 28. Smith and McMullen, n.p. 29. Garden, James, interview with author, e-mail, Houston, Texas, January 2007. 30. Huerta, Gerard, interview with author, e-mail, Houston, Texas, September 2007. 31. Huerta, interview. 32. Garden, interview. 33. Smith and McMullen, n.p. 34. KISSinUk.com, http://www.KISSinuk.com/bb/? (accessed December 22, 2006). 35. Smith, Steve, interview with author, e-mail, Houston, Texas, September 2007. 36. Kotarba, interview. 37. Kulick, Bruce, interview with author, e-mail, Houston, Texas, October 2006. 38. Wright, Jeb, interview with author, e-mail, Houston, Texas, February 2007. 39. Kilmister and Garza, 167. 40. Kilmister and Garza, 167. 41. Garza, Janiss, interview with author, e-mail, Houston, Texas, January 2007.

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chapter 6

Mapping the Territory: Cultural Authenticity in World Music Amy M. Corey

Music has the ability to both transport and inspire. In world music specifically, listeners can explore the lands and cultures of the globe through sound. We can climb the Andes Mountains, sail the South Pacific Sea, or trek through the Arabian Desert. As world music invokes remote locations, it also calls forth ideas of exotic instruments and foreign cultures. World music can provide listeners with a sense of cultures and lifestyles far removed from their own experiences. This picture of world music is but one snapshot and, most notably, is taken from a Western point of view. Instead of invoking a form of imperialist nostalgia, exploring world music from an American perspective must immediately acknowledge not only context but also privilege. Because I take both context and privilege as both given and accountable, my journey through world music is a challenging one. Rather than simply mapping the cultural territory of distant lands, the journey through world music is one that must traverse power, economy, and ideology. Itself, world music is a problematic category. It accommodates various forms of music from different geographical regions. The category specifically refers to forms of ethnic and folk music with strong ties to local, regional, or even national sounds. As a form of folk culture, it can be defined as the musical and artistic expression of a given group of people and is thought to convey something about a unique way of life within a local community. Furthermore, folk music is regarded as “music of the common people that has been passed on by memorization or repetition rather than by writing, and has deep roots in its own culture.”1 Because the whole of folk culture was originally rooted in oral traditions, rather than in mediated or technological contexts, it is perceived

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as an “authentic” cultural expression. Authenticity refers to the qualities of genuineness and legitimacy in original forms of culture. In this way, folk music is regarded as pure culture as it remains essential and untouched. Most notably, it remains untainted by the interventions of the mass production technologies of the culture industry. The culture industry, as conceptualized by Theodor Adorno, refers to the ways in which the processes of mass production and mass consumption forever alter the artistic value and inherent integrity of cultural forms.2 Through production technologies, music itself becomes formulaic and standardized. Consequently, “culture has become openly, and defiantly, an industry obeying the same rules of production as any other producer of commodities.”3 In this way, the production of a musical product, such as a song or album, is indistinct from the manufacture of an automobile or a bar of soap because “culture now impresses the same stamp on everything” that is mass-produced.4 In this view, standardized production also results in standardized consumption, bringing with it the dangers of “regressive listening” in which listeners are distracted from fulfilling their “true needs” such as autonomy and creativity through their consumption of popular music. The danger lies not only in commodifying musical forms, but also in its numbing effects on listeners. In other words, through standardization and mass production, the culture industry threatens to debase and trivialize music itself as well as those who listen to it. However, because world music is tied to local and ethnic cultures, it seems to retain a certain degree of distance from the mainstream popular music of the culture industry. In fact, it is often defined in opposition to popular music. Specifically, world music is regarded “as an authentic, self-driven collective expression . . . [ positioned] against music as commodity or industry product.”5 Through a perceived distance, world music retains a sense of purity, and its genuine cultural expressions are positioned outside of the mainstream. This distinction, however, is highly problematic within the current phase of capitalist production, distribution, and consumption of world music. For instance, On the one hand, music is a primary form of artistic expression; since the dawn of civilisation, music has been one of the most significant means by which cultures have defined themselves. On the other hand, in the contemporary world, music is a relentlessly commercial industry generating billions of dollars in revenues for composers, performers, publishers, record companies, and many other players. This paradox is sometimes represented as a contradiction—creativity versus commercialism, the muse versus the market, culture versus economics—whereby the two forces must inevitably pull in opposite directions.6

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In a music sector that generates $130 billion annually, artists, consumers, media conglomerates, and independent labels alike are caught up in these contradictions.7 As an industry itself, world music is thoroughly enmeshed within the very systems of reproduction and commerce that original definitions of folk music disavow. In a context of global culture and global economy, these definitions are immediately called into question. For instance, what happens to “authentic” forms of world music as they are removed from local, ethnic contexts and transformed for global markets? In identifying the form and content of these musical commodities in a context of cultural and economic globalization, how is authenticity created or exploited? What connections can be made between authenticity and ethnicity? Finally, how do these distinctions organize world music through the production of market positions? GLOBALIZATION: MONEY, MUSIC, AND MIGRATION The popular consumption of world music in the United States highlights both the process and the politics of globalization. First, popular consumption is marked by world music’s increase in both availability and reception. Once available only in the geographical site of its production, forms of world music are now available in numerous locations. For instance, various styles of the world’s music can be found on online sites such as Worldmusic.net and itunes.com. Making cyberspace a significant point of access, digital downloads increased 54 percent in 2007.8 Furthermore, world music is available for listeners’ pleasure—and for purchase—everywhere from the Virgin Megastore and Wal-Mart to Starbucks Coffee Shops. Actually, Starbucks Entertainment Company has produced a multivolume series titled Hear Music that showcases world music artists such as Cesaria Evora, who sings traditional morna from Cape Verde; Bebel Gilberto, who sings bossa nova and other Brazilian styles; The Gotan Project, who compose techno tango; and The Spanish Harlem Orchestra, who perform salsa and Latin beats. Also indicating the popularity of world music, The Recording Academy awards 15 Grammys in world and folk music categories such as Best Traditional World and Best Contemporary World.9 Not only mainstream venues but also small, independent recording labels such as Putumayo World Music are significant factors in this trend. In fact, since Putumayo’s founding in 1993, the label has sold over 20 million CDs and, in 2006, generated over $24 million in sales.10 Second, globalization names the practice of crossing, and even condensing, geographical as well as economic borders. Two of globalization’s defining factors include: (1) a perceived shrinking of the world and (2) the consolidation of capitalist market forces across the globe. First, “globalization

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refers to the process by which planetary distance is being overcome. As the theory has it: a new ‘borderless’ world is appearing, freed from the tyranny of distance.”11 Globalization invokes advances in technology through which it is now possible to not simply travel but also to communicate across great distances in relatively short periods of time. This aspect of globalization has positive or progressive potentials because it provides a means to explore the world’s geographical regions, peoples, and heritages. World music is the vehicle for the journey through which listeners can experience a variety of world cultures. In this way, globalization and popular consumption are linked as “the world keeps getting smaller . . . you can go to Borders now and find the latest Algerian rai CD or a great African artist nobody knew before.”12 In short, globalization makes smaller, or “shrinks,” the world by making culture accessible. In this way, world music is also embedded in the technology through which it becomes available. Within this viewpoint, experiencing cultures as global can foster diversity and intensify a sense of human interconnectedness. Here, world music holds great potential for the development of diversity, intercultural dialogues, and understanding. Motivating this musical journey is a more fluid definition of not only music but also of culture itself. Under globalization, “cultural formations . . . are becoming increasingly mobile.”13 In fact, “culture is not a thing or a even a system: it’s a set of transactions, processes, mutations, practices, technologies, institutions out of which things and events [e.g., world music] . . . are produced, to be experienced, lived out and given meaning and value to in different ways within the unsystematic network of differences and mutations from which they emerged to start with.”14 Defining culture under globalization complicates the aforementioned definition of folk culture that was clearly embedded in particular traditions and locations. Instead, regarding cultures as sets of transactions and mutations, rather than as simple artifacts of ways of life, immediately uproots them from their local or “folk” origins. An apparent contradiction, the world music movement not only foregrounds but also embraces the mobility of cultural formations. Only through globalization has world music become accessible. Once embedded in local folk traditions, world music is now uprooted through processes of musical migration. However, the process of musical migration exceeds culture because world music is also big business. Take, for example, the New York–based Warner Music Group who reported earning $869 million in only the fourth quarter of 2007.15 In this vision, music is at once culture and commodity. As a crucial function of globalization, when culture crosses borders, so does capital. For instance, Warner Music International, a division of Warner Music Group, promotes “local repertoire around the world, which it distributes and markets across a network of affiliates in more than fifty countries.”16 It is clear that Warner Music International not only distributes and markets, but it also

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profits from the production of “local repertoire.” Rather than growing in heterogeneous or even democratic ways, multinational recording corporations tend to condense economic power. Identifying a tension between local and global present in world music, global economies tend to absorb local economies. Not simply Warner Music Group but each major recording company houses a division for world music because “the big multinational corporations that dominate the music industry themselves organize their music divisions into units each concentrating on a different genre and audience.”17 For instance, Sony BMG is not only organized through divisions such as Sony BMG Latin, but it also serves as an umbrella for a collection of smaller music labels worldwide. For instance, Sony BMG houses several labels that produce local music including Swedisc in Scandinavia, AKTH in Greece, and Warnada in Malaysia. This form of organization is typical in multinational media conglomerates that account for over 85 percent of music sales.18 Specifically, Warner Music Group accounts for a 20.3 percent market share; Sony BMG accounts for a 25.0 percent market share; Universal Music Group accounts for a 31.9 percent market share; and EMI accounts for a 9.4 percent market share.19 These four corporations are responsible for the majority of production, distribution, and of course, profit from music sales around the world. In this way, large multinational corporations are integral to processes of musical migration. Such corporations mobilize great amounts of capital to produce and distribute world music. However, directional flows of music and money are not equal. In fact, capital from media conglomeration (and the corresponding amounts of economic power) tends to flow from north to south and from west to east.20 In contrast, world music culture tends to flow from south to north and from east to west. Such inequitable flows result in “the increasing control of local and national economies by big capitalism” and is a primary function of economic globalization.21 In sum, processes of globalization are formed at the convergence of geographical, cultural, and economic developments. In this way, forms of music can “travel across geographical borders; they merge and separate; they cross and disrupt [economic] political and social divisions, and also, sometimes, they strengthen them.”22 While globalization may create greater diversity and accessibility in cultural flows, it also creates more power and centralized control in economic terms. COMMERCIAL CATEGORIES AND THE PROCESS OF SELECTION The problems concerning cultural and economic flows are compounded by the very category of world music itself. Most significantly, the category has been commercially, rather than musically, determined. Because world

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music is inherently diverse—it is made up of dissimilar sounds from distinct regions—it is difficult to define as a discreet musical genre. For instance, how can we compare the quick clave of a Cuban guaguanco with the deep doumbek of an Egyptian beledi? How are these more traditional forms related to hybrids or global electronica? All are categorized as world music but do not share the same rhythms, melodies, or even the same instruments. World music is made of diverse and essentially incomparable forms of music that are placed in the same marketing, rather than generic, category. In other words, “world music is not a musical genre but constitutes, at best, a marketing category for a collection of diverse genres from much of the developing world.”23 Focusing on the developing world also highlights the process of grouping music within the category as a process of discrimination. This is a strategic practice that confirms music’s classification as complex and, above all, highly selective. In specific terms, selective categorization occurs across two dimensions that identify world music as: (1) foremost a commercial category and (2) an overwhelmingly non-Western cultural form. First, “world music can be conceived as a selective commercial category of music, rather than a genre that has inherent links to particular world regions.”24 While world music includes such disparate sounds as koto drums from Japan and panpipe from Peru, these cultural forms retain a common link only through their “foreign” market value. The world music category itself was created in 1987 when vendors added a new section to music stores.25 This section was created to provide a central location, and thus a central point of access, for a variety of musical forms. This category effectively grouped together all forms of foreign and folk music that couldn’t neatly fit into any of the other existing genres. Creating world music as a category also established its market position as separate from, even an alternative to, previously established (i.e., popular) musical categories. In other words, the category/grouping also created a location/position. Unlike other musical categories brought together based on musical similarities, forms of world music were brought together for the purpose of marketing. This also effectively unified disparate forms of music in a way that connoted a sameness across a variety of distinct musics. Secondly, world music is an overwhelmingly non-Western musical form. Although some world music originates in the West, such as Celtic melodies or Gregorian chants, the vast majority of world music comes from more “exotic” African, Asian, Latin, Middle Eastern, and Pacific locations. For instance, of the distinct world music subgenres featured by National Geographic, less than 10 percent are of Western origins.26 In addition, of The Rough Guide to World Music’s eight featured picks, none are of Western origins, though three feature hybrid music.27 Because these are musical categories and featured picks, not simply top-selling artists, it is clear that the process of selecting and classifying music is consequential.

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Although Western folk music is clearly a part of the genre, the marketing focus of world music remains concentrated on the more exotic aspects of ethnic music. Rather than constituting a market category based on musical similarities, the emphasis of the category is based on a standard of ethnicity. Most significantly, the standard of ethnicity functions as a brand identity. In this way, world music is essentially branded along ethnic lines. The focus on ethnicity is also significant because it marks a distinction between Western and Other cultures. As “a marketing category for a collection of diverse genres from much of the developing world,”28 ethnic brand identity is thereby associated with third world cultural identity. Another way of looking at this as problematic is to identify that “world music” actually refers to third world music. Remember that all music is theoretically world music (i.e., originating on one world or globe), but only certain music is categorized (i.e., branded) that way. In other words, world “music is a perennial feature of all societies across the globe, but only some are labeled as such.”29 The process of selection and categorization is not accidental. World music is selected and categorized as a way of branding ethnicity and capitalizing on the third world locations and identities. In this way, world music should be regarded not simply as a market category but also an ideological category. The ideological association is problematic for the world music category because: (1) it backgrounds the presence of Western folk music, and (2) it marks and commodifies third world cultures. IDEOLOGICAL CATEGORIES AND ESSENTIALIZING ETHNICITY As an ideological category, third/world music is based upon a basic binary distinction between “The West and The Rest.”30 Here, there is a clear division between the West/first world and the Rest/third world. In marking this division, terms such as civilized/primitive, culture/nature, and even commercial/ authentic are employed in order to distinguish the first world from the third world. At base, binaries define through difference. A binary consists of two mutually exclusive terms that are defined in opposition. Viewed hierarchically, one term is valued, and the other term is devalued. As well, the definitions link with one another to essentially form a chain of meaning. In this way, primitive, natural, and authentic become linked terms in defining the third world. Additional binaries that are invoked through world music include pure/debased, exotic/ordinary, spicy/bland, and even inside/outside. As a basic meaning-making function, definition through difference may seem necessary to making sense of the world around us, but binaries remain, at best, ideological. Specifically, a binary system of representation reflects “a sense of fixity [that] is usually implied whenever music is discussed for pre-capitalist

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societies, both in relation to the cultural and geographical origins of the music, but also through the link to nostalgia—related to yearnings for past glories, lost youth and claims for styles of music that evade the ‘corrupting’ influences of contemporary society and economy.”31 These meanings are not natural but created and held in place by ideology. Moreover, binary definitions also work to essentialize identities and fix locations because within the binary system of representation “continuity is valued over change, stability is preferred to cycles of fashion, and . . . links [from] music to particular places establishes those links as traditions and genuine aspects of local cultures.”32 Effectively essentializing third world identities, a link is created between ethnic tradition and cultural authenticity. Capitalizing on the ideological functions of binary definitions, the First World also establishes unequal structures for cultural circulation through economic power in the global marketplace. Specifically, the distinctions between The West and The Rest are exploited in order to stabilize a particular market segment by stabilizing a definition of ethnic music as authentic music. Recall that the global marketplace does not consist of egalitarian exchanges across cultures or economies of equality. Under globalization, flows of capital are unequal and function to secure the dominance of the Western marketplace. Displacing the utopian vision of globalization, world music is traded in a space of commerce and competition. This space is not a democratic global marketplace but instead truly refers to Western capitalist marketplace. In other words, when ethnic music enters a global market, we are really talking about third world music entering a first world capitalist market. At this point, a contradiction surrounding world music in a global context is unearthed. As a form of global culture, it is fluid, but as defined through binaries, it is fixed. Recall that global culture is extremely mobile and contingent. It exists as sets of transactions and processes rather than locations or artifacts. As a form of global culture, world music is uprooted and becomes de-essentialized. In this way, the creation of music, identity, and even location are contingent processes. However, the binary system of representation seems to work against these notions of cultural mobility. This mode works to fix, rather than uproot, cultural formations. Under a concept of globalization, ethnicities and identities can’t be essential, yet, they are regarded as such under a binary style of thought. In this way, branding world music along ethnic lines works to embed meaning in exotic locations and ethnic identities. Take, for example, Cesaria Evora, the “barefoot diva” from Cape Verde. Called the barefoot diva because she typically removes her shoes before singing, she performs morna, the traditional folk music of her birthplace. Her sound is smooth, soulful, and melodic, and as culturally embedded, can be seen as an expression of the people in this geographical location. Here, Evora provides listeners with access to an authentic, ethnic experience as rooted in the music of Cape Verde. However, even as morna is a sound implanted in a

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particular geographical region, it is also listened to all over the world. Recall that Evora is featured in Starbucks Entertainment’s Hear Music series. As well, she has produced 18 albums, many of which are distributed by BMG Classics, a division of Sony BMG. Situated within the opposing forces of up/rooting, morna is transported from the cafés of Cape Verde to the Virgin Megastores of London or San Francisco. In this way, world music simultaneously relies on both the mobility of global culture and the fixity of ideologically based binaries. This inconsistency should not be read as a simple contradiction but as the way in which the very concepts of fixity and fluidity are ideologically produced. Divorcing world music from the concept of essential ethnicity also complicates the notion of cultural authenticity. Recall that world music is commonly regarded as a pure or authentic form of culture due to its origins in the oral traditions of folk culture. As a global cultural formation, however, world music can no longer be seen as truly pure or authentic. Nevertheless, world music retains what Walter Benjamin calls an “aura” of authenticity.33 By tying art to its origins in ritual practice, Benjamin claims that a work of art—or for that matter, any cultural form—retains the “aura” of the practice from which it is derived. For instance, “we know that the earliest art works originated in the service of ritual—first magical, then the religious kind. It is significant that the work of art with reference to its aura is never entirely separated from its ritual function.”34 As world music originated in local folk cultures, a strong bond is formed surrounding its tie to authenticity in which ritual is the location of its original value. Moreover, “small scale societies in every world region, emphasiz[e] the role of music in both everyday life and ritual life.”35 In this way, the link between authenticity and world music is strengthened because of its proximity to folk culture. A cultural form can never be completely separated from its original ritual function, and world music is perceived as even “closer” to these rituals. Binary definitions coupled with the proximity to folk culture work to stabilize and essentialize the primitive functions of local cultures. While “true” authenticity is, of course, an impossibility within global culture, world music continues to be perceived as authentic music. Ironically, world music’s tenuous claim to authenticity is also central to its commercial success. MAKING MUSIC AND MARKETING AUTHENTICITY World music retains a sense of authenticity through an “aura” that is enhanced through its proximity to folk culture. The sense of authenticity is also enhanced through a perceived distance from popular music. Recall that folk music is often defined in opposition to popular music in which “music as an authentic, self-driven collective expression . . . [is positioned] against

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music as commodity or industry product.”36 The sense of distance is created through: (1) the presence of divisions for world music within major record labels and (2) the positions created by independent record labels. Both sets of divisions imply that world music is somehow different from popular music, and the divisions effectively set it apart. While a sense of distance is present for the world music divisions of major record labels, such as Sony BMG, it is not as strong as the sense of distance produced by smaller independent labels. Independent labels such as Putumayo World Music, New Earth Records, Real World Records, and Rough Guide Releases focus production exclusively on world music rather than on diversified musical forms. One way of looking at this phenomenon is to define independent labels simply in relationship to a niche market. This, however, would be an oversimplification because the major labels also have a relationship to the same niche market. Instead, the presence of independent labels is central in creating a sense of authenticity for the world music category as a whole. In specific terms, the perception of authenticity is enhanced through the independent label’s position. Most significantly, independent labels are positioned outside of the majors. In this way, “outside” effectively names an alternative market position. The association is made because as world music remains separate, it also seems to remain pure. In other words, through independent labels, world music appears to be “untainted” by the culture industry. Of course, this is far from true because: (1) independent labels use the very same production technologies as major labels, (2) they rely on the very same networks for distribution as the major labels, and (3) they are also complicit in the creation and exploitation of ethnic/authentic definitions. Independent and major labels alike use the same production, reproduction, and distribution technologies. Even WOMEX, the world’s largest music networking conference, is implicated in these systems. WOMEX is designed as a forum for independent artists and labels to gain exposure and distribution.37 According to UNESCO, WOMEX is the most important international professional market of world music of every kind. This international fair brings together professionals from the worlds of folk, roots, ethnic and traditional music and also includes concerts, conferences and documentary films. It contributes to networking as an effective means of promoting music and culture of all kinds across frontiers.38

Using “networking as an effective means of promoting music” appears to stand in opposition to the mass distribution techniques of the culture industry. As “outside,” the artists and labels participating in WOMEX effectively produce world music independently. However, they ultimately will have to

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work within the confines of major labels to achieve mainstream distribution. In specific terms, world music “is more usually produced by independent labels than by majors, although majors often distribute and market music produced independently.”39 As the smaller, independent labels achieve distribution through the systems of major labels, such as Warner Music International or even the International Online Distribution Alliance, they clearly take part in the culture industry. In this role, the distinction between commercial and authentic becomes less distinct. Rather than constituting a pure contradiction, however, this functions as an organizing principle in which “the commercial/authentic distinction also organizes so much music making and marketing” for major and independent labels alike.40 As an organizing principle, it solidifies world music’s alternative market position thereby confirming its perceived authenticity. However, the perception of this distance cannot be legitimized in light of recording, mass production, and especially mass distribution techniques that make it available. Specifically, This trend has continued to the point now where many otherwise independent labels are distributed by one of the major transnationals. In fact it has been suggested that the independent record companies act in a way that serves the potential interests of the majors. They are generally involved in developing music outside the mainstream; if their music is successful and generates new audiences, they may begin to pose a threat to the majors’ market dominance. If so, they may simply be absorbed by the majors (and in the process the sharp edge of whatever new sounds they have championed may become blunted by being re-packaged for mass taste). Thus, insofar as independents may act as a source of new talent and new sounds to feed the demands of the majors for novelty and innovation, the relationship between the two types of companies may be thought of as symbiotic rather than oppositional.41

This organizing principle is further problematic because the “criteria to differentiate ‘classical,’ ‘folk,’ and ‘popular’ music are artificial and at best localized.”42 Under a concept of global culture, the distinction between categories of music may no longer by applicable at all. For instance, “all music that is heard and enjoyed can be interpreted as ‘popular’ in some sense. Whether talking about ‘traditional’ musical styles that remain important in the social practices of individual communities or migrant groups, the mass produced output of record labels, or the categorization of music in record shops.”43 The categories that previously defined, differentiated, and fixed cultural forms have been uprooted under globalization. As a foundational definition for world music, the very distinction between folk music and popular music is cast into doubt.

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CONCLUSION As a form of global culture, world music is part of a mobile formation that traverses distance in a “borderless” world. However, world music is caught in the tension between the drive to embed and the desire to uproot. This process is also realized through unequal flows of culture and economy. As a commercial category, rather than a distinct musical genre, world music is an overwhelmingly non-Western cultural form. Disparate sounds are grouped together based solely on their foreign market value. Additionally, because the world music category remains focused on ethnicity, “world music” needs to be reconfigured as third world music. As a problematic ideological category, the distinction for third world music is firmly held in place through a binary system of representation and especially through a distinction between The West and The Rest. Tying third world music to nostalgic notions of rituals in primitive cultures also works to strengthen its “aura” of authenticity. As a market category, world music labels work to create a sense of distance from the mainstream culture industry. World music is, of course, deeply enmeshed within the production and distribution systems of the culture industry, but it retains the appearance of purity through its alleged distance. Each factor contributes to the production of perceived authenticity in world music. Here, world music is not simply a form of culture or musical genre but a carefully constructed brand. The brand capitalizes, both literally and metaphorically, on ethnic forms of music as authentic forms of music. However, the question of authenticity is no longer a question of truth or falsity; instead, it is a question of production. As heterogeneous forms of world music enter a global marketplace, authenticity is strategically produced through commercial categories, ideological categories, and market positions. Most significantly, it is not the sounds or rhythms, not the melodies or music itself, but “authenticity” that is the product being sold. As enabled by the continuing processes of globalization, world music will most certainly continue to grow commercially. New venues and technologies, especially digital downloads, make it easier than ever for global consumers to discover the “new” sounds of “primitive” cultures. In fact, “early indicators are that the new digital revolution will be a huge plus for folk music, helping it to be heard by millions of people that the old filters of the pop industry prevented it from reaching.”44 Implicated here is the possibility for technology to diversify distribution, thus creating a more democratic system and potentially mitigating corporate conglomeration. However, because independent music creates alternative market positions that actually serve the interests of major labels, this “filter” increases their potential to control local music and local economies. In other words, this is a filter that does not exclude but instead absorbs more and more of the world’s music and the world’s audiences. These trends ultimately point toward the continued

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concentration of global economy. Also implicated in this trend is a greater need to be critical of the investments and consequences as economies of entertainment traverse the globe. NOTES 1. Virginia Technical Institute Department of Music, “Music Dictionary,” Virginia Technical Institute, http://www.music.vt.edu/musicdictionary. 2. Theodor Adorno, The Culture Industry (London: Routledge, 1991). 3. J. M. Bernstein, “Introduction” to The Culture Industry, by Theodor Adorno (London: Routledge, 1991), 9. 4. Theodor Adorno, Aesthetic Theory, trans. C. Lenhardt (London: Routledge, 1984), 120. 5. Simon During, Cultural Studies: A Critical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2005), 127. 6. David Throsby, “The Music Industry in the New Millennium: Global and Local Perspectives,” paper presented at the meeting for Global Alliance for Cultural Diversity, UNESCO, Paris, France, October 2002. 7. International Federation of the Phonographic Industry Market Research, “Music Market Data 2007,” International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, http://www.ifpi.org/content/section_statistics/index.html. 8. Ibid. 9. The Grammy Awards, “50th Grammy Awards Nominations,” The Recording Academy, http://www.grammy.com/GRAMMY_Awards/50th_show/list.aspx. 10. Patricia Meschino, “Island Hopping,” Billboard, December 8, 2007, 49. 11. Simon During, Cultural Studies: A Critical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2005), 81. 12. Jim Bessman, “The Year in World Music,” Billboard, December 29, 2001, 113. 13. Simon During, Cultural Studies: A Critical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2005), 6. 14. Ibid. 15. Warner Music Group, “Warner Music Group Annual Report 2007,” Warner Music Group, http://investors.wmg.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=182480&p=irol-reports annual. 16. Warner Music Group International, “About WMG,” Warner Music Group, http://www.wmg.com/recordedmusic/?id=8a0af8120da8434e010dadfc69890538. 17. Simon During, Cultural Studies: A Critical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2005), 124. 18. International Federation of the Phonographic Industry Market Research, “Music Market Data 2007,” International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, http://www.ifpi.org/content/section_statistics/index.html. 19. Ibid. 20. Jonathan Bignell, An Introduction to Television Studies (London: Routledge, 2004). 21. Ibid., 87. 22. Simon During, Cultural Studies: A Critical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2005), 7. 23. John Connell and Chris Gibson, Sound Tracks: Popular Music, Identity, and Place (London: Routledge, 2003), 153.

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24. John Connell and Chris Gibson, “World Music: Deterritorializing Place and Identity,” Progress in Human Geography 28, 3 (2004): 343. 25. T. Brennan, “World Music Does Not Exist,” Discourse 23 (2001): 44 –62. 26. National Geographic Music, “Music Genres A–Z,” National Geographic, http:// worldmusic.nationalgeographic.com/worldmusic/view/page.basic/home (accessed October 5, 2007). 27. The Rough Guide to World Music, “Features and Interviews,” World Music Network, http://www.worldmusic.net/wmn/news/features (accessed October 5, 2007). 28. John Connell and Chris Gibson, Sound Tracks: Popular Music, Identity, and Place (London: Routledge, 2003), 153, italics added. 29. John Connell and Chris Gibson, “World Music: Deterritorializing Place and Identity,” Progress in Human Geography 28, 3 (2004): 343. 30. Stuart Hall, “The West and The Rest: Discourse and Power,” in Formations of Modernity, ed. Stuart Hall and B. Gieben (Cambridge, UK: Polity Press in association with the Open University, 1992), 275–332. 31. John Connell and Chris Gibson, Sound Tracks: Popular Music, Identity, and Place (London: Routledge, 2003), 19. 32. Ibid. 33. Walter Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” in Media and Cultural Studies: Key Works, ed. Meenakshi Gigi Durham and Douglas M. Kellner (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2002), 48–70. 34. Ibid., 53. 35. John Connell and Chris Gibson, Sound Tracks: Popular Music, Identity, and Place (London: Routledge, 2003), 22. 36. Simon During, Cultural Studies: A Critical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2005), 127. 37. WOMEX, “This is WOMEX,” The World Music Exposition, http://www. womex.com/realwomex/main.php?id_headings=65&id_realwomex=10. 38. Ibid. 39. Simon During, Cultural Studies: A Critical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2005), 129. 40. Ibid., 128. 41. David Throsby, “The Music Industry in the New Millennium: Global and Local Perspectives,” paper presented at the meeting for Global Alliance for Cultural Diversity, UNESCO, Paris, France, October 2002. 42. John Connell and Chris Gibson, Sound Tracks: Popular Music, Identity, and Place (London: Routledge, 2003), 4. 43. Ibid. 44. Scott Alarik, “The Business of Folk Music in the New Millenium,” Sing Out, 51, 3: 72.

chapter 7

“I Gave My Rights Away for a Song”: How Billy Bragg Persuaded MySpace to Change Its Tune on Ownership Stephanie Vie

WHO OWNS THE MUSIC, MTV OR ME? When one voice rules the nation/Just because they’re top of the pile/ Doesn’t mean their vision is the clearest. —Billy Bragg, “Ideology” English musician Billy Bragg has long championed the underdog, the disenfranchised, and the downtrodden. The lyrics of his songs speak for the generations of individuals who have stood strong in the face of injustice, and he himself is no stranger to controversy, having championed the socialist party in England for many years. His music, a blend of traditional folk and punk rock, often features eloquently worded protests—against the futility of war, against the fascist party, against homophobic sentiment. These songs are “infused with genuine insight and humour, as well as a sustained and personal commitment to political and humanitarian issues.”1 Born in 1957, Bragg has thus had a long, though not particularly profitable, career as a musician, punctuated by his work at political rallies, his one-time championship of socialism, and the release of his 2006 book The Progressive Patriot, which continues Bragg’s unflinching cry for British nationalism. In early May 2006, Bragg once again drew headlines, this time not for his political polemicism but instead for the sudden removal of all of his music

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from the popular online social networking site MySpace.com. Originally the singer had joined the site to promote his music, presumably to an audience of individuals likely not familiar with Bragg’s music—that is, the majority of MySpace.com users, who largely fall between 13 to 25 years old. Like all online sites that house user-generated content and data, MySpace has particular terms and conditions; the site offers free (ad-supported) server space for musicians to upload songs, music videos, and images. A concerned friend, however, pointed out to Bragg that MySpace’s terms and conditions seemed to imply that the site had “a nonexclusive, fully paid and royalty-free worldwide license” to any songs uploaded.2 The full text of the original terms and conditions noted that: by displaying or publishing . . . any Content . . . on or through the Services, you hereby grant to MySpace.com, a non-exclusive, fully-paid and royaltyfree, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense through unlimited levels of sublicensees) to use, copy, modify, adapt, translate, publicly perform, publicly display, store, reproduce, transmit, and distribute such Content on and through the Services. This license will terminate at the time you remove such Content from the Services. Notwithstanding the foregoing, a back-up or residual copy of the Content posted by you may remain on the MySpace.com servers after you have removed the Content from the Services, and MySpace.com retains the rights to those copies.3

Bragg withdrew his entire catalog of music from MySpace in protest. About a month later, in the face of Bragg’s repeated complaints in the media regarding these terms and conditions, MySpace changed them to specifically reassure users that they—not the site—continued to own the rights to their materials. Afterward, in a Guardian article “Who Owns the Music, MTV or Me?” Bragg posed a question central to the debate regarding intellectual property ownership in online social networking sites that I believe offers us insight into one of the essential concerns that have emerged from the widespread use of social networking sites to promote music: The demand that users waive all moral rights to their material in order to join a service brings into question the role of social networking sites. Will they usher in a revolution in the music industry by allowing self-promoted artists to circumvent the major record companies who have stood as gatekeepers of public taste for so long? Or will they simply be the means by which the industry keeps its monopoly on copyright ownership and earnings through the silent harvesting of intellectual property rights?4

Bragg’s campaign for artists’ rights provides an opportunity for academics to enter into a conversation regarding digital intellectual property rights as

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applied to media posted in online social networking sites. His experiences with MySpace.com illustrate the difficulties even professional musicians face in understanding the legalities of copyright law as they exist in online spaces. Although traditional copyright of physical materials is often convoluted, placing works in an online realm introduces new challenges to copyright, namely how intangible digital materials should be addressed with regard to ownership and fair use. Because changes in digital copyright law are slow-going, outright resistance and protest such as Bragg’s are the most efficient and necessary way to enact revolutions.

A HISTORICAL OVERVIEW OF COPYRIGHT LAW Intellectual property constitutes one of the most pressing and broadranging concerns of our times.5 This song is Copyrighted in U.S., under Seal of Copyright # 154085, for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, cause we don’t give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to it. Yodel it. We wrote it, that’s all we wanted to do.—Woody Guthrie6 Ownership, authorship, and copyright will never be issues that we will be able to simply write into law and then walk away from. However, by examining the various shifts in intellectual property and copyright law throughout the ages, we can see a pattern emerge, one that takes creative freedom away from artists and places oftentimes unnecessary restrictions on the use of media in our culture. Even today, many aspects of intellectual property law are being hotly debated, such as music sampling, fair-use guidelines, and parody, to name a few. We have come, it seems, to a crossroads: Shall we radically revise our notions of copyright, authorship, and property in the wake of a digital age, or shall we attempt to hold on to previous, perhaps outdated, notions of ownership? Certainly intellectual property and copyright law has been challenged with the propagation of peer-to-peer file-sharing programs such as Kazaa and Napster and court cases such as the 2005 MGM v. Grokster Supreme Court decision. Conclusions regarding the fate of copyright in our culture will not be easily reached, but the rocky transition may be eased by carefully examining the past, for debates over copyright law and intellectual property are surely nothing new. Just as new technologies of reproduction in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries were followed by major upheavals in copyright law, we seem poised on the verge of a similar paradigm shift in the twenty-first century as the ramifications of the Internet and digital media reproduction force additional revisions of copyright and intellectual property law.

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The emergence of the concepts of authorship and ownership of works occurred in sixteenth-century Britain with the London Stationers’ Company’s monopoly over printed works.7 It was not until the early eighteenth century that authors began to truly assert ownership of their works. One of the most notable cases of copyright law infringement was a case in 1774, Donaldson v. Becket, in which Thomas Becket had purchased a book copyright from an estate and then challenged Andrew Donaldson, who argued that statutory copyright gave him the rights to reprint the book in question: “Becket and his partners had paid £505 at Millar’s estate auction in 1769; had they bought anything?”8 At the center of this case was the idea of property as an intangible rather than tangible good. Becket had purchased an idea, the rights to a book that he did not originally author. Could he then legally lay claim to this “property” in court? Copyright law currently differentiates between ideas, which cannot be copyrighted, and their expression, which can be copyrighted; furthermore, the law states that only material objects can be protected.9 As a result, these differences “raise difficulties for the definition of ‘music’ (and reflect copyright’s origins in the protection of literary works).”10 Donaldson v. Becket was the beginning of a long chain of legal and social struggles to understand ownership of intangible property, of an author’s ideas, a struggle that continues today as we puzzle out the complexities of the changing nature of technology, reproduction, and ownership. One of the things that makes intellectual property such a complicated concept is its high fluidity compared to physical property.11 Intellectual property can be copied, shared, and distributed without diminishing its value at all. In fact, the worth of intellectual property, “measured economically, culturally, politically, and/or socially, is often dramatically enhanced by the extent to which it circulates.”12 Today, marketing terms such as “buzz” and “the tipping point” highlight the fact that advertisers want and may even need to offer substantial samples of goods to generate interest and guarantee sales of goods. Consider the case of pop star Britney Spears, whose October 2007 album release, Blackout, has been promoted almost as much by the accounts of her personal turmoil in the gossip rags as the likely purposefully leaked singles disseminated online to anxious fans. Blackout peaked in second place on the Billboard Hot 100 music charts, and Spears’ recent single “Gimme More” climbed the charts as well to reach number three. Spears’ success is not unusual; she is the only female artist in the United States to claim four Billboard Top 100 Number One albums in a row.13 However, Blackout was successful not so much because the album generated interest on its own, but because fans were intrigued by the media portrait portrayed of the troubled singer. After her divorce, custody of her two young boys was taken away after she was declared an unfit mother, and she was ridiculed mercilessly in the press after her failed attempt at a comeback on the 2007 MTV Video Music Awards show. During 2007 and 2008, Spears has been in and out of rehab as well

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as hospitalized and held for psychiatric evaluation. Despite Spears’ personal life falling apart around her, marketing buzz was still able to provide her with more-than-adequate sales of her fifth album. Along with the ill-defined marketing term buzz, Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point offers a satisfying metaphor for advertising success. The tipping point of an idea or product is the moment at which a critical mass of participants or purchasers has been reached; it is difficult to predict how or why a tipping point will be reached, and quite often it seems to be the result of luck and timing above all. Gladwell’s The Tipping Point and Blink both discuss social change and reasons why individuals make decisions or perform certain actions, focusing in part on how “connectors” and “mavens” help promote social change. In social networking sites in particular, new ideas are spread via charismatic individuals or those who simply reach a wide group of users, an easy accomplishment as social networking sites aggressively promote the formation of both strong and weak ties. In fact, MySpace itself is a perfect example of the power of buzz. The site’s popularity spread mainly based on word-of-mouth promotion and the aggressive marketing efforts of its cocreators, two connectors/mavens who had an idea for a particular kind of networking site they wanted to see take off. Though early British copyright law was muddled and difficult to understand, it clearly placed the foundation of an author’s claim to copyright in the registration of his claim to the work. The law was radically transformed in 1911 such that an author’s claim to the copyright of his work was the term of his life plus 50 years. With the reformation of copyright law in 1911, an author’s rights began at the creation of his work, whether it was music, sculpture, a painting, or a book. All were given equal treatment under the new law, which both simplified the matter as well as placed control back into the hands of the author. Over the years, however, there is “no doubt that there has been a gradual extension of copyright regulation. The period of copyright has gradually been extended, there is no longer the need to renew copyright and the scope of material has extended to cover derivative works. Much infringement has been criminalized and technical protection devices recognized.”14 In 1998, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Copyright Term Extension Act, which lengthened the copyright term to the life of the author plus 70 years, 20 years beyond the earlier 1911 copyright law. Commonly referred to as “the Bono Act,” after Sonny Bono, who championed the law, the Copyright Term Extension Act: was passed by Congress after intense lobbying from companies like Disney (the copyright for Steamboat Willie, the first cartoon appearance of Mickey Mouse, was due to expire in 2004). It also extended copyright protection for valuable songs like “Happy Birthday to You” and “This Land Is Your

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Land.” These two songs ironically emerged from a folk tradition that emphasized the borrowing of lyrics and melodies, and which saw culture as a common resource to be shared, not privately owned. Both songs were built on preexisting melodies that date back to the nineteenth century.15

As McLeod points out, there is a certain delicious irony in the fact that the copyright protections of two folk songs were extended despite the fact that “the folk song is, by definition, and as far as we can tell, by reality, entirely a product of plagiarism.”16 The irony also extends to Bragg’s fight against MySpace’s terms and conditions, as several of the songs he pulled from the site were songs based on unrecorded Woody Guthrie lyrics used with permission from Nora Guthrie, his daughter; Guthrie is perhaps most famous for recording one of the songs protected by the extended copyright act, “This Land Is Your Land.” As a result of the Bono Act, even commonplace songs such as “Happy Birthday to You” remain protected under copyright law and can cost several thousands of dollars in royalty payments when used in public performance. “Happy Birthday,” originally composed in 1893 and copyrighted in 1935, is not scheduled to expire from copyright until 2030 in the United States. Its use in film and public performance can command around $5,000 to $20,000 for a single instance of the song. “Happy Birthday to You” is one of the clearest examples of how current copyright law in the United States often goes too far in its protection of long-dead artists’ copyrights. Over these many years, then, copyright law has been fundamentally transformed as a result of the influence of emergent technologies. What is most crucial in a historical account of these legal changes is an explanation of why they occurred, “partly because of new forms of unfair competition, partly because of pressure on the patent system, but largely because of new developments in what we now call ‘the media.’ ”17 In the nineteenth century, the phonograph allowed for the easy reproduction of music; in the twenty-first century, digital reproduction of music and film was made both affordable and easy via the use of CD and DVD burning software and hardware. And, with the emergence of the World Wide Web, the transmission of digitally reproduced files through peer-to-peer networks became a simplified process with complex ramifications. As Simon Frith points out in his article “Copyright and the Music Business,” “the details of musical copyright are themselves a somewhat incoherent response to changing circumstance.”18 As intimated earlier, one of the major changes in U.S. copyright law is the emergence of online social networking sites and other spaces where digital media can be swapped and shared. Social networking sites shed interesting light on the gray area of copyright law in the United States. In particular, the case of Billy Bragg vs. MySpace.com shows that even professional artists can often be unaware of the intricacies of our convoluted copyright laws.

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ONLINE SOCIAL NETWORKS AND DIGITAL COPYRIGHT ISSUES Although online community-oriented social gathering spaces have been around almost as long as the Internet itself, online social networking sites represent a significant shift in our understandings of what it means to connect with others on the World Wide Web. In the early eighties, Howard Rheingold waxed rhapsodically about the Whole Earth ‘Lectronic Link (the WELL), a virtual community where individuals could share materials, post their thoughts, and band together. Today, though the WELL is still around, its popularity has been far eclipsed by online social networking sites, which have captured the attention of hundreds of millions of individuals across the globe. Social networking sites are “virtual digital places that occupy neither space nor time. They are inherently discursive spaces where people actively convene to commune with others.”19 Such computer-mediated environments allow users to move beyond the confines of actual physical space; participants can thus convene from any place, at any time, in many different ways. Social networking sites build upon many of the features that previous computermediated environments such as MOOs and chat rooms offered, but one major difference is that most current social networking sites such as MySpace, Friendster, and Facebook offer more than just the opportunity for users to chat, converse, and interact verbally. These sites provide a space for users to portray themselves in a particular light—their online self-identity—and forge connections with others who have similar interests by networking. These sites attempt to link individual users via degrees of interest, affiliation with a group, or social connections; individual users are like nodes, which are then connected via social ties, forming interwoven networks of participants. On MySpace, for example, users are said to be “friends” or “in your extended network” if they are a friend of a friend. MySpace in particular offers features that were not possible in earlier computer-mediated environments, such as the ability to upload profile photos, upload music and music videos, write blogs where others can comment, and so on. The combination of these features allows for many different ways participants can approach the social networking aspect of the site. Because of their rich variety of features and, in particular, the ease of sharing multimedia compositions with others, online social networking sites have captivated millions of users and are quickly becoming ubiquitous on college campuses in particular but also throughout the world. These networking sites focus on the interests and activities of the individual while allowing them to use basic HTML along with embedded multimedia clips, such as music videos, to jazz up their profile pages and share them with friends. Much of the media shared on these sites contributes to

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what Lawrence Lessig has termed the “remix culture,” works that rely heavily on sampling already-published material. Thus, online social networking sites—because of their large membership numbers and easy-to-use communication tools—are rapidly becoming repositories of this user-created content. To more easily share materials among individuals, their sites can be linked together by declaring a friendship bond between the two users; larger connections can then be made by establishing links among many different possible friends available in a network. To some extent, collaborative elements are built into the site design, along with features that allow for more traditional individualistic expression; the combination of the two combined with word-of-mouth promotion has pushed MySpace into headlines and the collective consciousness of many twentieth-century individuals. It is important to consider the impetus for the social networking site MySpace before assessing its effect on copyright and intellectual property. Cofounder Tom Anderson weathered several failed attempts to promote his band. Instead, he created a site where he envisioned bands could easily network and connect with each other for free. MySpace therefore has aggressively worked to promote itself as a site to share one’s own music as well as discover new bands. The founders of MySpace, Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolfe, designed the site by borrowing the most attractive features displayed in other incarnations of networking sites and blogging sites, compiling these features in one easy-to-use Web site. Their site included photos, blogs, personal profile spaces, and so on—all successful aspects of earlier sites that capitalized on the establishment of social networks. However, to pitch MySpace as a unique addition to the social networking universe, Anderson and DeWolfe added an additional layer to the site: music promotion. Bands began to use MySpace as a space to advertise concerts and music, and the site was quickly picked up in various media, highlighted as a new opportunity for musicians interested in self-promotion. MySpace became immensely profitable for Anderson and DeWolfe, who sold the site to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation in July 2006 for $580 million. Interestingly, many users have begun utilizing MySpace as a free dating site and are thus moving away from for-profit sites such as Match.com and eHarmony. Some business owners promote themselves via their MySpace profiles, and a small portion of users have emerged as “MySpace celebrities,” individuals who have aggressively pursued fame through MySpace. Tila Tequila, one such MySpace celebrity, is a former Playboy model who wanted to move into acting and singing. As the front woman for her band, Jealousy, she was featured on the first MySpace music compilation. Tila is infamous for her MySpace networking—at last look, she had almost two million “friends” on the site. The immense popularity of the site helps users to successfully tailor the site to their needs for promotion and marketing, such as Tila Tequila’s rapid rise to fame through MySpace. What prompted MySpace to take off so fast,

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and so far—a feat which was largely accomplished without spending money on advertising—was a lucky combination of kairotic timing, word-of-mouth, and appealing design. Anderson noted in an interview with Forbes that the site provided features and freedoms that other social networking sites didn’t, thus offering users a site that built on the success of other online community sites, but with a twist: A lot of the early growth . . . had to do with the features and what our competitors were not allowing people to do. We recognized from the beginning that we could create profiles for the bands and allow people to use the site any way they wanted to. We didn’t stop people from promoting whatever they wanted to promote on MySpace.20

Because of his experience as a musician in a band that failed to take off, Anderson believed that a networking site such as MySpace would allow smaller bands to succeed in a society that, until recent years, has favored artists who sign on with large corporations that invest huge amounts of money in promoting the artists. Though artists often receive an initial advance, this money is usually pitted against the amount of the parent company’s promotion; an artist or group who doesn’t make the cut and sell enough units can end up bankrupt rather quickly. But the technological advancements in recent years have shifted the means by which bands are promoted. No longer must artists rely on the protective backing of large corporate interests or else go the more difficult route of aggressive self-marketing through their own label. Today, artists can hype themselves as a product in social networking sites such as MySpace and reach their target audiences quickly and easily. However, MySpace was acquired by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation when that company bought MySpace’s parent company, Intermix Media Inc. for $580 million. In large part, Bragg’s decision to remove his music from MySpace was prompted by the fact that the site was now owned by a large media conglomerate; originally, he could not necessarily be reassured that his work would not be used without his consent for other purposes. Ironically, Murdoch chose to acquire Intermix and MySpace because of the possibilities that media convergence in these spaces offered, such as the ability of MySpace to provide unedited, unfettered access to content and news to users. In an interview with the BBC News, Murdoch railed against the idea of newspapers “editing content into a one-size-fits-all package to be consumed without question by the reader:” Young people “don’t want to rely on a God-like figure from above to tell them what’s important,” Mr. Murdoch said. “And to carry the religion analogy a bit further, they certainly don’t want news presented as gospel. Instead, they want their news on demand, when it works for them. They

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want control over their media, instead of being controlled by it. They want to question, to probe, to offer a different angle.21

Ironically, Murdoch’s assertion that people “want control over the media, instead of being controlled by it” was encapsulated quite clearly in Bragg’s response to MySpace’s terms and conditions. Rather than being controlled by the site’s peculiarly stringent intellectual property clause, Bragg chose instead to resist this media and protest against it. His concern was for the generations of young musicians who might, like him, not carefully read the terms and conditions and, as a result, might sign their rights away for the privilege of allowing MySpace to promote their songs. Though Bragg had been careful over the years to retain most of the copyrights to his songs, licensing them to the record companies that have released his albums over the years, his concern was for “the generation of people who are coming to the industry, literally, from their bedrooms.”22 Indeed, many young adults growing up in the wake of constant technological access are growing up less critical of media, unable to analyze at a deep level just what it means to be a participant in a certain technology. These socalled digital natives are unlikely to read the terms and conditions of a Web site before clicking through and agreeing. Bragg’s origins are in the resistance movements of early British punk and folk music, with the “underlying philosophy among some practitioners . . . of a communal effort where commoditization of the product was undesirable or even unavailable.”23 As such, he has long been steeped in the idea of protest, of a (perhaps cynical) distrust of big business and media conglomerations. For Bragg, fighting the restrictive terms and conditions of a social networking site is another step in a long tradition of opposition against fascism, homophobia, religion, and so on. Can we necessarily assume the same of today’s digital natives, who have grown up accepting the ubiquity of technology in their lives? Not necessarily. Bragg’s protest, thus, is a clear case of the necessity of encouraging all users of technology to approach cautiously, to think about the impacts of terms and conditions on their rights, and to think above all of what they may be giving away and receiving in return. After all, Bragg almost gave away his rights for the ability to promote his songs that epitomized the fight against the relentless encroachment of capitalism; it would have been a disappointing quirk of fate if MySpace had in fact retained control of Bragg’s music without his explicit, informed consent. The site did change its terms and conditions eventually, though it did not explain any connection between Bragg’s protests and the revised terms and conditions, which included the words, “The license you grant to MySpace.com is nonexclusive (meaning you are free to license your content to anyone else in addition to MySpace.com).” After being interviewed about the changes, Bragg noted that he found the possibilities of social networking sites both exhilarating and disturbing:

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“Social networking sites are a revolutionary tool for new artists who utilise [sic] them in order to gain a following,” said Bragg. “Any ambiguity about the ownership of rights could have serious implications not only for artists but for the sites themselves. If this new medium is to attain its full potential, it is crucial that artists are able to post content secure in the knowledge that doing so will not hinder their future career and earning potential.”24 CONCLUSION In order to benefit from their intellectual property, copyright owners have to be able to administer their rights.25 Changes in intellectual property and copyright laws are often the result of change that is forced by the emergence of particular technologies. With the creation of Gutenberg’s movable type printing press and the shift from priceless hand-lettered books to books distributed on a much larger scale, notions of intellectual property surfaced that aimed to protect the monetary rights of the author. Once books could be bought and sold for a profit, then individuals wanted to assure their ability to turn that profit. Similarly, when technologies such as the phonograph, the cassette tape, and the compact disk allowed for simplified copying of music recordings, intellectual property law shifted to once again restrict the ability for individuals other than the record company and, to a lesser extent, the artist to make money off of their music. Now with the growing popularity of peer-to-peer file-swapping and online social networking technologies, we are likely to see a resultant shift once again in the dominant paradigm of intellectual property law. Indeed, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 has made it illegal for individuals to circumvent copyright protection measures on digital media such as compact disks and digital music downloads. The DMCA in fact makes it illegal to even post information that would allow an individual to potentially circumvent such measures—one does not even have to follow through to be in violation of the act. Each iteration of change to intellectual property law has resulted in laws becoming stricter; their approach is quite simply punitive in most cases. Rather than championing the complexity and sophistication of movie trailer remix projects such as “Shining” and “Office Space Horror,” for example, movie studios are instead forcing these remixes—which are often protected at some level as parodies of the original—to be removed from sites such as YouTube and MySpace. The documentary film Eyes on the Prize was delayed in its re-release for quite some time because of copyright issues stemming from the use of archival footage (including the use of the “Happy Birthday” song) that cost significant amounts of money to clear. Even educational fair-use guidelines in school settings are becoming increasingly difficult for instructors to navigate, particularly those unschooled in legal doctrines.

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Without those who, like Bragg, stand up and raise their voices in protest of the escalating severity of U.S. intellectual property and copyright law, we may soon face a world in which our abilities to compose multimodal works is severely limited. In such a world, we might face the daunting task of gaining approval from copyright holders before using even brief materials for classroom use. We might face a world where parodies of popular songs and images are no longer protected. Chillingly, what we face is a world where creativity is in fact restricted by the very laws that aimed to protect that creativity in the first place. Bragg’s tale offers us a chance to think about the moment where we are poised, a moment where we can decide to raise our voices and protest that we will not give away our rights only for a song. NOTES 1. Everything about Billy Bragg, “Biography,” http://billybragg.co.uk/biography/ index.html (accessed October 26, 2007). 2. Robert Levine, “Billy Bragg’s MySpace Protest Movement,” The New York Times, July 13, 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/31/business/media/31bragg.html (accessed October 26, 2007). 3. Billy Bragg, “Sorry There’s No Music!!” MySpace.com, May 18, 2006, http://blog. myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=34570397&blogID=1224 81288 (accessed October 26, 2007). 4. Billy Bragg, “Who Owns the Music, MTV or Me?” The Guardian, August 31, 2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2006/aug/31/comment.media (accessed October 26, 2007). 5. Ted Striphas and Kembrew McLeod, “Strategic Improprieties: Cultural Studies, the Everyday, and the Politics of Intellectual Properties,” Cultural Studies 20, nos. 2–3 (March/May 2006): 119 –44. 6. Rachel Metz, “Sue You: This Song Is Our Song,” Wired, 29 July 2004, http://www. wired.com/culture/lifestyle/news/2004/07/64376?currentPage=2 (accessed January 25, 2008). 7. Joseph Loewenstein, The Author’s Due: Printing and the Prehistory of Copyright (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2002), 5. 8. Loewenstein, 13. 9. Simon Frith, “Copyright and the Music Business,” Popular Music 7, no. 1 (1988): 63. 10. Frith, 63. 11. Gilbert B. Rodman and Cheyanne Vanderdonckt, “Music for Nothing or, I Want My MP3,” Cultural Studies 20, nos. 2–3 (March/May 2006): 247. 12. Rodman and Vanderdonckt, 248. 13. Yahoo! Music, “Britney Spears Sells 609,000 Copies of ‘In the Zone,’” December 1, 2003, http://music.yahoo.com/read/story/12064351 (accessed January 25, 2008). 14. Richard Jones and Euan Cameron, “Full Fat, Semi-skimmed or No Milk Today– Creative Commons Licences and English Folk Music,” International Review of Law Computers and Technology 19, no. 3 (2005): 262. 15. Striphas and McLeod, 9.

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16. Jones and Cameron, 63. 17. Loewenstein, 5. 18. Frith, 73. 19. Robert V. Kozinets, “On Netnography: Initial Reflections on Consumer Research Investigations of Cyberculture,” Advances in Consumer Research 25 (1998): 367. 20. Natalie Pace, “Q&A: MySpace Founders Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson.” Forbes.com, January 4, 2006, http://www.forbes.com/digitalentertainment/2006/01/ 04/myspace-dewolfe-anderson-cx_np_0104myspace.html (accessed August 10, 2008). 21. Jeremy Scott-Joynt, “What MySpace Means to Murdoch,” BBC News, July 19, 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4697671.stm (accessed October 26, 2007). 22. Levine. 23. Jones and Cameron, 260. 24. Julia Day, “Bragg Claims Online Victory for Musicians’ Rights,” The Guardian, http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2006/aug/24/news.newmedia1 (accessed October 26, 2007). 25. Frith, 67.

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chapter 8

15MB of Fame: Independent Musicians’ Use of MySpace Marjorie D. Kibby

There is a perception that the ability to swap, purchase, or trade music files over the Internet has revolutionized the music industry. However, while compressed files and online distribution may have hastened the revolution, they were not in themselves the source of the current upheaval in the industry. The changes toward a consumer–artist business model can be traced back to the early nineties mergers and acquisitions creating ever-larger record labels, plus rising promotional costs and a slump in the sale of compact disks, combining to produce a climate in which the major labels were reluctant to take a risk with new artists, emerging genres, or innovative formats. In response, small independent labels began to produce music that people wanted to hear, catering to niche markets. Home taping became a major concern for the labels as consumers created and swapped their own music products, more suited to their musical tastes than the CDs on offer in the stores.1 One effect of this trend was that the artist–listener relationship grew closer than it had been for a long time, as consumers bypassed established promotional channels and sought out individual artists, sharing information on releases and tours with others in their taste culture. The role that mp3s and the Web played in the revolution was to facilitate a movement that had already begun; speed, convenience, and cost effectiveness proving to be a major impetus to the move to connect artists and audiences without an intermediary. “Online music allows the consumer to be in control, not the A. & R. executive,”2 and it enables independent musicians and small labels to challenge the stranglehold of the major labels, “bringing about a return to the independent musician as the centre of the music world.”3

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The business of music has three major components: production, marketing, and distribution. The major labels were able to control the music business by controlling these three components through symbiotic relationships between recording studios, music press, retailers, merchandisers, radio stations, and performance venues. This enabled them to lock the three components into a package that was provided to the musicians who signed with them. However, recording artists have become increasingly dissatisfied with the terms enforced by major labels in return for this package, including recording restrictions, retained revenues, ownership and control of the music, and restricted marketing options.4 Developments in recording technologies enabled the small studio, allowing some musicians to take back a measure of control over the production process. Now musicians are using the Internet to circumvent the labels’ domination of marketing and distribution. As Darryl McDaniel of Run DMC says of promoting your own music online, “You don’t have to answer to A. & R., you don’t need anyone’s permission, you can make your own music.”5 While the Internet provides a way for artists to market their music direct to consumers without having to chain themselves to a binding, lengthy, and often inequitable recording contract, freedom of distribution is not the same thing as effective marketing, and independent musicians who move their business online will need to create effective links to consumers they can distribute to. Recording technology placed a distance between performer and listener; however, fans still maintained a connection with the musician as “symbolic links were developed to maintain a sense of commonality between performer and listener, and create a community among fans.”6 The development of social networking provided a way to restore those links in a more tangible form, and independent musicians are using social networking sites such as MySpace to connect directly with their fan base without the intermediation of a major label. MYSPACE AND IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT MySpace is one of over 200 social networking Web sites—online spaces that provide a variety of ways for people to connect. The sites facilitate community development by combining a range of communication tools from one-to-one to many-to-many modes; for example, from instant messaging through blogs to wikis and file uploads. These sites allow users to find others with similar interests, to maintain contact with distant acquaintances, or to extend their circle of friends. At a fundamental level, social networking sites mimic the development of face-to-face acquaintances through networks; users meet new people through existing friends and the friends of friends. At the core of the MySpace site is the ability to create a profile, an expression of who the user is through descriptions of interests and tastes, a blog of

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daily thoughts and activities, and personal photos and videos. These profiles are linked through friends’ networks. With 80 percent of the market share, MySpace is currently the most visited of the social networking sites. Initially, when it was launched in 2003, it was primarily populated by 20-somethings interested in the LA indie music scene. It still has a strong association with contemporary music and was the first of the social networks to provide a specific profile for musicians and bands to communicate with their audiences, including the representatives from publishers, venues, and broadcasters that also use MySpace. The popular media now regularly cover stories of musicians using MySpace as a springboard, such as that of Ingrid Michaelson, an unsigned musician whose music was discovered on MySpace and featured on four episodes of the television drama Grey’s Anatomy. danah boyd sees three major issues surrounding teens’ use of MySpace: identity production, hanging out, and digital publics.7 For MySpace musicians the issues are very similar: impression management, making fans of “friends,” and digital marketing. As boyd says, “the dynamics of identity production play out visibly on MySpace.”8 Users are given basic tools (words, images, colors, sounds) from which to construct an impression of their identity. An interpretive textual analysis of the MySpace sites of seven musicians and personal follow-up interviews with them suggested that, for them, the music was a primary source of their identity production with other elements playing a more or less minor role. The elements that MySpace provides musicians on their homepage include: icon, headline, location, profile, genre categories, influences, sounds like, label and type, music player, friends’ space, signature, and visitors’ comments. Musicians make use of the available tools within the given constraints to create a space that depicts the image of the band that they want to project. Impression management is the process of employing a range of methods in order to influence or control the impressions others form of one’s identity, a process first described by Goffman.9 A study of participants on Facebook and MySpace revealed that a profile on these sites is “judged on the impression management skills of its creator.”10 The MySpace screen is a cluttered place, and while there are numerous third-party applications, such as Pimp-My-Profile, most seem to add glowing text and raining symbols to further complicate the layout rather than methods for projecting a clear, streamlined message. The top left of the screen is a key area for creating an immediate visual impression to accompany the music that plays as the site is opened. The musician’s photo on the top left of the screen becomes the icon displayed on friends’ sites and beside the comments left on other pages, so it is a key signifier. The genre categories display immediately above the image, below the artist’s name. The three elements (image, name, and genre) have the potential to be linked with the track being played to create a strong, unified impression of the musician and their music.

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The background colors, photos, and videos and how the site varies from the standard format all contribute to the image of the musician. As Nick Green from Heartbreak Club said, “there are little details you can employ to further certain things you would associate with your music.”11 Other elements that can be used to create a band identity are the “influences” and “sounds like” sections where musicians can list other artists or give a description of their musical philosophy. These sections come up in MySpace searches, so it is a way for bands to enhance linkages rather than simply provide similarities; a search for a known musician will bring up the sites of those that have described themselves as sounding like the original. This would seem to be one of the strengths of MySpace as a promotional tool over a standalone Web site; there is the ability to create networks that enhance identity production and promotion. Yet, it did not seem to be an element that was consciously or constructively used in this way by the musicians interviewed. While identity management is a documented concern of individual users of online social sites, musicians seemed to have less interest in communicating “this is who we are” than “this is our music,” though Matt Baker of Thirsty Merc said that “MySpace means you can go and assess an artist on your own time and in your own terms and make your decision based on the way they have presented their website.” The Thirsty Merc MySpace site gave neither influences nor sounds like musicians; Anthony Snape used both spaces for a poetic description and a slideshow of images; the other five musicians gave a list of 10 to 25 influences, but none provided the names of musicians they sound like. This space was used for links to an online store, a sign-up for a street team, and reviews of the music from the press. The nonuse of this feature was explained in terms of the musician having an original sound, one that did not sound like anyone else. How individuals present themselves isn’t always a conscious choice. As Goffman explains, some aspects of identity may be actively given, but others are given off without conscious intent. Beliefs, philosophy, history, and so forth can leak out through a number of channels without the individual’s knowledge. With the musicians of MySpace, the artist’s image is not only being communicated through the consciously constructed profile but also through other site elements such as the comments left by visitors, the listing of top friends, and the groups belonged to or managed. With up to 50 comments displayed on the homepage, the comments are a highly visible symbol of the artist, yet one that does not seem to be actively controlled by most musicians. A line of artists with icons that mesh with the artist’s profile; or that are funny, clever, or informative; or that positively review the musician’s performance or recordings enhance the group’s projected identity. Many of Thirsty Merc’s visitors use an icon that features them posing with the group’s lead singer, giving off the impression of an approachable, fanoriented band. A long line of amateurish icons, simple “Thanks for the add”

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messages, large advertisements for incompatible music styles, and spam selling mobile phones and computer software may all have a negative impact on identity management. While deleting comments may seem to be counterproductive to building a fan-base, the high level of visibility of the comments displayed makes it valuable to select to display those that project the desired image, or at least to delete those that reflect an undesirable characteristic. While a user can have thousands of MySpace friends, the icons of the top 4, 8, or 16 are displayed on the homepage. It is possible to “View all friends,” but the top group is an immediate signifier of musical or stylistic connections. By default, the friends who have been MySpace members the longest are displayed, which may convey very little information about the artist’s affiliations, whereas eight prominent artists in the same genre, or eight similar performers, or eight musicians who have appeared at the same venues can give a clear and immediate impression. For example, MC Lars’ top friends are quirky storytellers: Weird Al Yankovic, King Missile, Bowling for Soup, and Atom and his Package suggesting a similar approach to material by MC Lars. MAKING FANS OF FRIENDS For many people, music is the method through which acquaintances are made and friendships develop. “In a context where individuals were free to discuss absolutely anything that they considered relevant to the task of becoming acquainted, the majority talked about music.”12 People believe that their musical preferences are more revealing of their personalities than other tastes and interests,13 particularly for young people who report much stronger musical preferences than older adults.14 Most social interaction involves music, and the social interaction on MySpace is no different. MySpace represents a new system for hanging out and hooking up, activities in which music has an integral role, but it follows traditional patterns. Individuals believe music preferences reveal information about their identities,15 they deliberately use music preferences to convey information about themselves,16 and they use music as a common topic of conversation when getting to know someone.17 MySpace is structured on a network of friends. Music preferences play an important role in constructing these networks, and as a result, musicians are able to use friends’ networks to introduce themselves to new audiences and maintain contact with existing fans. Unlike musician-oriented discussion boards, where fans talk to each other, on MySpace visitors leave comments addressed to the site owner, and a response is made by leaving a comment on the visitor’s site. There is no conversational flow but rather a series of parallel statements directed at the musician. Fans have always drawn pleasure from a mostly imaginary reciprocity with their favorite musicians. The

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commodification of popular music that followed the development of recording technology inscribed a division between music producers and music consumers. But despite an increasing gap between them and the performer, fans retained a belief in the bonds linking them, though these links were largely illusory. MySpace enables the connection to seem a little more real. MC Lars believes that with music the product is not something physical but rather “the interaction with the listener,” the connection that is formed between a musician and an audience. Nick Green agrees, saying that MySpace provides “that sense of communication with the artist. It’s a lot more personon-person, even just leaving a comment gives a feeling of connection.” MySpace provides a number of ways of building Friends networks, including a search by keywords, topics, areas of interest, and artist names; perusing the Friends list of similar bands and looking through the comments section on relevant musicians sites and browsing for people based on postcode, age, and other demographic criteria. The browse feature was probably designed to facilitate online dating, but it can be a useful tool for targeting a market segment. Mark Wells of Supersonic sees MySpace as “a sort of word-of-mouth equivalent on the net, where people find out about other’s acts just by referring people on to their mates’ sites and stuff like that.” Matt Baker of Thirsty Merc says that they are less interested in the social aspects of MySpace: “I’m not playing the game that a lot of them do, where they treat it like an internet chat room. For me it’s a business thing, not a social thing . . . that’s how I’ve set [my MySpace site] up, and it’s basically like an online resume—the equivalent of a website but in MySpace format.” However a comment left on Thirsty Merc’s site says “Do you guys ever respond to comments? You should.”18 Morgan Evans of Solver believes “That’s the secret to why we’ve had 15,000 hits in the last month and a half, and every other Newcastle band has had, probably, 3,000—because we actually sit on there for an hour to two hours every day, each and reply . . . through those 200 messages, people feel like they’re getting to know us, and they come to the shows.” A visitor to MC Lars’ site left the following comment “I’ve gotta say, when I read my comments, and saw you had commented, I kinda went like, crazy. It’s awesome that you take the time to like, reply to your fans.”19 Solver also uses bulletins with appropriate subject headings to communicate with specific groups of fans. You don’t need EMI to tell people in one city the details of dates and venues, “When we want to promote one of our tours . . . in the heading we’ll say what it’s about, like ‘Insurgency begins in Port Macquarie.’ ” Young people’s creation and maintenance of Friends networks using social software has been explained in terms of the fundamental values that drive their use of communication technologies. A study of young consumers’ use of interactive technologies revealed five key values: the opportunity to express one’s identity, social interaction, immediate and constant entertainment, discovery, and the ability to create and record.20 People in their

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teens and early twenties are going through a stage of identity formation and development, and music plays an important part in this process. MySpace facilitates both the linking of self and favorite artists and the publicizing of that link to others. In this age group, the specific activity is less important than the social environment in which it takes place. MySpace allows users to be in a social environment almost permanently; they can be an integral part of each of each others’ lives, sharing every significant moment. Young people are accustomed to immediate and constant entertainment, and they turn to technology to provide entertainment on demand. The multimedia environment of MySpace presents a range of entertainment activities within a social context, providing a wealth of activities that keep MySpace users on the site for nearly three times as long as static Web sites. Young people value discovering information and experiences for themselves, “it provides them with a unique and tailored experience over which they feel a sense of ownership.”21 An element of the appeal of MySpace is that the user-generated content is seen as authentic in comparison with entertainment products that are perceived as being marketed to users.22 Another of the pleasures of MySpace is that of discovering new music and musicians. As Anthony Snape said, one of the thrills of MySpace is “that excitement of finding an artist” and being able to say “I knew them first before they became big.” This sense of involvement, of ownership, meshes with another of the values that drive young people’s use of technology, that of being able to create. Being able to not only set up one’s own site but also to add to favorite musicians’ sites, and to do so in a variety of media, allows users to create reproductions of their lives and interests. Through MySpace facilities such as enabling the addition of their tracks to users’ sites, musicians can integrate their marketing strategies into the recreational practices of young people. DIGITAL MARKETING Viral market has been around since the beginning of commerce. Spreading the word through word-of-mouth was the world’s first form of marketing. But the Internet has taken this organic from of marketing to new heights by making communications better and communities of people tighter—thus making word-of-mouth even more effective. Viral marketing takes advantage of networks of influence among customers to inexpensively achieve large changes in consumer behavior. Network-based marketing moves viral marketing online, taking advantage of Web-based links between consumers to increase sales.23 Sharing music recommendations is also not a new concept; music as a social currency is well documented, and the transition from physical to virtual access to both music sources and social networks has led to a rapidly burgeoning use of consumer recommendation tools as a music marketing technique. Harnessing consumers’ natural inclinations to share

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music and information about music to social software applications was an obvious step. During the past 25 years, the record industry has become highly concentrated, and radio and TV have acted as a marketing bottleneck, playing a principal role in shaping tastes. This led to a situation where a very small proportion of music was available for acquisition, “Wal-Mart must sell at least 100,000 copies of a CD to cover its retail overhead and make a sufficient profit; less than 1 percent of CDs do that kind of volume,”24 so only around 1 percent of major releases find their way to Wal-Mart shelves for purchase. However, Rhapsody, a subscription-based streaming music service (owned by RealNetworks), offers over a million tracks, and all of these tracks are streamed, by someone, somewhere. Rhapsody streams more songs each month beyond its top 10,000 than it does in its top 10,000. This market, which lies outside the reach of the physical retailer, is big and getting bigger. As Anderson says, “Forget squeezing millions from a few megahits at the top of the charts. The future of entertainment is in the millions of niche markets at the shallow end of the bitstream.”25 He offers three rules for making the most of ‘the long tail’: make everything available; cut the price in half, then lower it; help me find it. On MySpace, musicians can provide up to four tracks and make them available for download, or streaming, or link to a sales point. Fans can also rate the songs or comment on them and access the lyrics. Fans can then add a track to their own MySpace site. For the most part, musicians make available four single tracks. Anthony Snape has edited a spoken introduction to his tracks. Other musicians not part of this study have provided four samples each consisting of several excerpts edited together with spoken commentary. Through MySpace, independent musicians can take advantage of the long tail in the music market to create or locate a niche market for their music products. One fan hears a song and “tells” a dozen others online. Each in turn sends the information (and sometimes the entire song file) to another dozen people, and so on. The song is mainly sent to friends with similar tastes so a niche market can be covered almost instantly, and if the song’s hook is catchy and universal enough, the artist can reach thousands of fans in a matter of seconds. The portable music file player symbolized by the iPod has changed the way that music is used. Music is now worn as an accessory or exchanged as a means of communication. Contemporary music use is oriented toward large, current, disposable playlists, and online musicians are well placed to take advantage of this trend offering individual tracks, samples, and ring-tone sized bites. Anthony Snape says, “MySpace is a really excellent tool for independent artists. . . . I’ve just been over to Perth . . . if I were with a major record company I would have done radio, I would have had articles in magazines, we would

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have done some sort of television thing . . . I use MySpace to target audiences in areas that I’ve never been to.” Snape described making friends of musicians whose music is similar to his, in the area that he is about to visit, and then sending invitations to that network. He says that some will support you, but “of them you might get twenty or thirty people who become passionately involved . . . they’re the people who will ring the radio station and ask for the CD in mainstream outlets. And before MySpace there was no access to those people.” He went on, “I think the internet is absolutely incredible and fantastic. It’s blown a big hole in the industry, and it has definitely made room for other artists, independent artists. Independent artists are charting now, independent artists are out there doing the business.” MC Lars felt that, “The problem with the major labels is that they are slow to get trends, and they’re slow to react to what is happening to the music scene and the underground.” Trent Greenwell of the Seabellies reported that an A&R rep (Mark Holden) from Universal explained that “the days of the A&R guy signing unknown artists is over and basically said that it’s all about what’s happening on the internet . . . and on the road.” Nick Green of Heartbreak Club also sees that “MySpace, or online distribution, is part of the process of proving that you have worth as an artist.” Morgan Evans believes that “the amount of legwork that [the band] can do online in terms of promotion, compared to what a distributor is prepared to do is just like ridiculously different.” Evans and Solver use MySpace— “MySpace is recognized by everyone, we sell CDs on there through PayPal, we sell tickets to our show, and we promote ourselves to venues when booking a tour.” CONCLUSION MySpace seems like the realization of a musician’s utopian ideal. It at least marginalizes the traditional gatekeepers between those who make music and those who listen to it. A band doesn’t need a recording contract, a single on radio high rotation, or a video on MTV to find an audience. The audience will find them through their friends on MySpace. Perhaps a MySpace site alone will not propel a musician into superstardom—cross media promotion such as a television reality program or a film soundtrack might still be required for that—but in enabling musicians to participate directly in their fan communities and to target networks that constitute specific taste cultures, it does allow them to establish viable markets and to retain most of the profits from those markets. MySpace could make it easier for musicians to earn a living from their music without the intervention of a major label. In the face of declining CD sales, the dominant industry response was to raise defenses around the CD; using digital rights management, proprietary hardware, and legal action to prevent consumers from acquiring alternative

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music products and to impose what had been traditional consumption patterns upon music users. It is rather ironic that MySpace is revolutionizing the music industry not by doing anything new, but by making it a little easier for people to do what they now wanted to do. Young people were already sharing information about favorite music and new bands, bands were already communicating with fans, consumers were already ranking and rating music, and musicians were already using fan communities to market their music. MySpace music just streamlined the process, limiting the need for a record label to create the links between music consumers and music producers.

NOTES 1. Steve Jones, “The Cassette Underground,” The Cassette Mythos (Autonomedia, 1990), http://www.halcyon.com/robinja/mythos/SteveJones.html (accessed October 12, 2007). 2. Yinka Adegoke, “Sound Bytes: The Internet is Having a Huge Impact on the Music Industry,” New Media Age, May 4, 2000, 39. 3. Michael Pfahl, “Giving Away Music to Make Money: Independent Musicians on the Internet,” First Monday 6, no. 8 (2001), http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue6_8/ pfahl/index.html. 4. Steve Albini, The Problem with Music, http://www.negativland.com/albini.html (accessed October 15, 2007). 5. Andy Patrizio, “MP3 Can’t Beat Old School,” Wired, Dec 16, 1999, http://wired. com.news (accessed October 17, 2007). 6. Marjorie D. Kibby, “Home on the Page: A Virtual Place of Music Community,” Popular Music 19, no. 1 (2000): 99. 7. danah boyd, “Identity Production in a Networked Culture: Why Youth Heart MySpace,” American Association for the Advancement of Science Conference (St. Louis, Missouri, Feb. 19, 2006), http://www.danah.org/papers/AAAS2006.html (accessed October 12, 2007). 8. boyd, http://www.danah.org/papers/AAAS2006.html (accessed October 12, 2007). 9. Erving Goffman, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (New York: Doubleday, 1959). 10. Catherine Dwyer, “Digital Relationships in the ‘MySpace’ Generation: Results from a Qualitative Study,” 40th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, 2007, http://csis.pace.edu/~dwyer/research/DwyerHICSS2007.pdf (accessed October 13, 2007). 11. All unfootnoted quotes in this chapter come from personal interviews conducted by the author in February and March of 2007. 12. P. J. Rentfrow and S. D. Gosling, “Message in a Ballad: The Role of Music Preferences in Interpersonal Perception,” Psychological Science 17 (2006): 241. 13. P. J. Rentfrow and S. D. Gosling, “The Do-re-mi’s of Everyday Life: The Structure and Personality Correlates of Music Preferences,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (2003): 84.

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14. A. LeBlanc, W. Sims, C. Sivola, and M. Obert, “Musical Style Preferences of Different Age Listeners,” Journal of Research in Music Education 44, no. 1 (1996). 15. Rentfrow and Gosling, “The Do-re-mi’s.” 16. A. C. North and D. J. Hargreaves, “Music and Adolescent Identity,” Music Education Research 1 (1999). 17. Rentfrow and Gosling, “Message in a Ballad.” 18. MySpace comment by Victoria, May 30, 2007 2:27 P. 19. MySpace comment by Samurai WIRIAMUZU Taira, June 4, 2007 11:54 A. 20. Damien Arthur, Claire Sherman, Dion Appel, and Lucy Moore, “Why Young Consumers Adopt Interactive Technologies,” Young Consumers: Insight and Ideas for Responsible Marketers 7, no. 3 (2006). 21. Arthur, Sherman, Appel, and Moore, 35. 22. Ting-Jui Chou and Ting Chih-Chen, “The Role of Flow Experience in CyberGame Addiction,” CyberPsychology & Behavior 6, no. 6 (2003): 663. 23. Shawndra Hill, Foster Provost, and Chris Volinsky, “Network-Based Marketing: Identifying Likely Adopters via Consumer Networks,” Statistical Science 21, no 2 (2006): 260. 24. Chris Anderson, “The Long Tail,” Wired 12, no. 10 (October 2004), http://www. wired.com/wired/archive/12.10/tail.html (accessed October 15, 2007). 25. Ibid.

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chapter 9

“It’s Up To You . . . No Really, It’s Up To You”: Radiohead, Big Music, and the Future of the “Record” Industry Andrew deWaard

What is noise to the old order is harmony to the new. —Jacques Attali Let me begin with a question: Can you think of any mass-produced, massdistributed commodity for which you, as the consumer, get to choose the price and assign its value? Possibilities include eBay and other auction-like economies, though these are individual items, not distributed en masse. Minor bartering sometimes occurs over mostly fixed prices, such as automobiles or housing, but this only happens on a per-item basis. The concept of a “suggested donation” and tipping is another possibility, but again, these are not attempted on any mass scale. I do not believe that the option of personally assigning monetary value to a mass-produced commodity exists in the current structure of Western late capitalism. Until now. On September 30, 2007, infamous British rock band Radiohead posted a new message on their blog, Dead Air Space: “Hello everyone. Well, the new album is finished, and it’s coming out in ten days; we’ve called it In Rainbows. Love from us all. Jonny.” With that simple announcement, a media storm ensued and decades of music tradition was turned on its head. Not only was the world’s biggest band going to self-release its long-awaited new album, bypassing the corporate record industry and its major label dominance, but it was going to release it online for whatever price each consumer felt appropriate. When one logged on to InRainbows.com to download the album, instead

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of a price at the checkout basket, there was a box to fill-in with a question mark beside it. Clicking on the question mark prompted a message: “It’s Up To You.” Clicking again refreshed the screen: “No Really, It’s Up To You.” This included zero dollars, if one was so inclined. Guitarist Jonny Greenwood describes the strategy as the band wanting “to make people pause for even a few seconds and think about what music is worth now. I thought it was an interesting thing to ask people to do and compare it to whatever else in their lives they value or don’t value.”1 The press was quick to comment that this was the first major album whose price was determined by the consumer, but to my mind, it is the first major commodity whose price is determined by the consumer. This Radiohead “paywhat-you-want” experiment, then, was not just about the changing nature of the music industry but of late capitalism itself, of our conceptions of commodity value, labor, and intellectual property in the digital age. By putting the onus of value on the consumer, Radiohead allowed the public to vote for an alternative vision of society by way of, increasingly and unfortunately, the only method available: the consumer dollar. The shifting terrain of popular culture and the entertainment market, especially the music industry, is at the forefront of the paradigm shift in social order we are experiencing in the digital revolution. Music is uniquely equipped for the digital age in terms of production and distribution because of its simplicity and ease of use. Music itself is easily made, compared to the other art forms in popular culture. Unlike the massive collaborative teams needed for filming (cinema and television) and programming (video games), musical creation is available to anyone with a home computer and ever-more-affordable recording equipment/software. While film, television, and video games are able to be shared electronically, they require large file sizes and more advanced computer skills, which will keep the average consumer away until advancements are made in Internet speed and distribution convenience. The mp3, meanwhile, is only a few megabytes per file and is quickly and easily transferred in a variety of manners, including file-sharing networks, instant messaging, hyperlinking, free file-hosting services, mobile phones, and recordable compact disc media. It is also embedded and streamed within a Web page quite easily, a method of distribution that has gained immense popularity with social networking Web sites such as MySpace and Facebook. As a result of these many technologies, music has been extremely destructive in ignoring and appropriating copyright law: Because music is digital, it can be easily produced, copied, and transferred and it can be easily adapted, modified, and transformed. Any given piece of digital music can quickly be borrowed, mutated, sampled, morphed, and adapted into a new piece, and this practice tests the assumptions that underpin copyright law and the nature of ownership.2

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As a result, the barriers to production and distribution are now much easier to overcome in the music industry than in any other popular art form, which is why we are seeing such bold innovations occur in its economic structure before other popular forms. Jacques Attali proclaims that music “is prophetic. It has always been in its essence a herald of times to come.”3 Noise traces the political economy of music across the history of human culture, expounding how the musical process of structuring noise is also the political process of structuring the social order. Music is both a mirror—it “runs parallel to human society, is structured like it, and changes when it does”4—and a prophecy; Attali chronicles a history indicating this ability in previous social orders. The French Revolution, for example, was preceded by the struggle for ownership rights and subsequent liberation of French composers. If “every major social rupture has been preceded by an essential mutation in the codes of music, in its mode of audition, and in its economy,”5 then what is our music telling us about our impending social order? Attali wrote his treatise in 1977, well before the rise of personal computers, the Internet, and the digital revolution, yet, the progression he identifies is traceable to the current age, as we shall see. “Our music foretells our future. Let us lend it an ear.”6 A BROKEN SYSTEM, AN INDUSTRY IN TRANSITION There is no denying that the music industry is currently in a state of flux; a multitude of technological changes—including the steady rise of personal computers and the Internet as well as the recent popularization of file sharing and digital music players—has prompted widespread shifts in the way consumers access music. However, it is important to note that the music industry is in a very healthy state; there is more music available and more people creating and listening to music than at any time in history. It is the record industry that is in dire straits, namely the monopoly maintained by Big Music. Also referred to as the Big Four (technically making it an oligopoly, rather than a monopoly), Big Music is comprised of Universal, Sony-BMG (who merged in 2004), Warner, and EMI, the major labels that collectively control 80 –85 percent of global recording sales. Faced with rapidly declining compact disc sales, Big Music and its many lobbying fronts—namely, the Record Industry Association of America (RIAA)—have been very vocal about blaming their financial woes on file sharing. Hiding behind this supposed ethical mistreatment of artists and musicians, Big Music makes moralizing claims about “stealing music” in an attempt to maintain their market hegemony, misconstruing the true impact of file sharing while continuing their long history of exploitation.

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I would like to frame this consideration of Radiohead’s “pay-what-youwant” experiment within the battleground that has developed concerning not only the future of music production and access but of popular culture and intellectual property as a whole. As we will see, the “digital music wars” are but the precursor in a vast technological transformation of the entertainment market and the struggle over access and control that will ensue. Crucial to this dispute, popular music has become a central site in popular culture by which we talk about labor and value. In debating the ethics of file sharing and digital music, “supporting the artist” is always of utmost importance, while the impact on the record label (and its corresponding corporation) is inconsequential. However, up until this point, the consumer has always been caught in the middle by having to support Big Music in order to support the artist. By cutting out the middle man, and by directly raising the question of how much we value music in an era where we can easily get it for free, Radiohead cuts to the heart of the problem and strikes a major blow against Big Music. Hyperbolic rhetoric aside, it is not as if Radiohead has created a viable new model for music distribution—nor did they even attempt to do so—but in their subtle, almost poetically simple act, they have reminded us that the media monopoly will not completely control our cultural expression, and they have proved that an alternative is possible. Attali claims that the “process of aggression [in music] can only succeed if the existing code has already become weak through use.”7 The corrupt practices of Big Music and their unfair treatment of its artists are welldocumented and are becoming more and more well-known. As Eduardo Porter delightfully expresses in an op-ed for The New York Times, part of the reason for the success of Radiohead’s experiment was the “pleasure at being able to bypass the record labels, which many see as only slightly worse than the military-industrial complex.”8 The industry works hard to earn this reputation, engaging in such draconian tactics as the RIAA suing a single mother of two who makes $36,000 a year to pay $222,000 in damages for having made copyrighted songs available on a file-sharing network. Nowhere else are we so concerned that the individual artist get their due, that is, the worker get paid appropriately for the production of their commodity. “Flush with admiration and gratitude,” Peter C. Baker of The Nation writes concerning his purchase of the album, “I started thinking seriously about my payment. My goal was not to work through the constellation of disputes and options that define today’s music business, just to buy In Rainbows at a price that felt fair and respectful.”9 Unlike film, television, and video games, music is a popular art form whereby consumers are able to make a conscious division between the art and the industry. The two are inexplicably entwined—and will be for the foreseeable future—but because music seemingly comes from a comparatively small group of artists (setting aside the important creative input of producers, engineers,

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technicians, and the like), the consumer continually aligns his or herself with the artist, and the business be damned. As Rodman and Vanderdonckt proclaim: Musicians are being robbed . . . but the principal thieves are all those industry suits, rather than the filesharers, and an honest economic analysis of the music business undermines the claim that downloading fans are taking bread out of the mouths of struggling artists.10

Even if we set aside its long history of corruption (payola, price fixing, underpaying its artists, widespread mistreatment of minority artists, etc.), the record industry continues to engage in lengthy, unfair recording contracts and devious accounting practices, making the biggest abusers of artists’ rights the record companies themselves. A persistent “honest economic analysis” is required to cut through the mistruths and deceptions of Big Music. Operating as an economy of scale, Big Music has fostered an industry in which the cost of record sale success has continued to escalate, as album pressing, marketing, music videos, tour managing, packaging costs, studio time, and other services must all be paid back to the label before an artist can receive royalties from their album. The result is a system in which only 10 percent of recordings break even,11 and the record companies recoup their investment on a mere 5 percent of new artists.12 Profit is made predominately with “hits,” the massive sellers by folks such as Eminem and Britney Spears, which subsidize all the failed investments. This also means that only a small minority of artists make any money from album sales; the vast majority do not and make their living primarily from touring, merchandising, and licensing. Such an unbalanced arrangement has been justified by the claim that the record labels are assuming all the financial risk. However, this is exactly how Big Music retains such a tight monopoly over the industry, escalating the cost of entry into the business and controlling the means of production and distribution. File sharing has provided an alternative distribution system, but it is not at the heart of the record industry’s woes as they would have you believe. Big Music is correct in claiming that the decline in “units shipped” and “gross receipts” began at the same time as the early years of file sharing, around the turn of the millennium, but that does not make file sharing the culprit. In fact, a multitude of reasons contribute to the drop in compact disc sales. During that same period, Big Music significantly reduced their rosters of active artists and cut almost 20 percent of their workforce, resulting in far fewer new albums being released.13 Meanwhile, Big Music actually raised the standard list price of compact discs, despite the decreasing cost of production and negligible economic inflation. While its total units shipped may have fallen, the per-album profit margin appears to have risen as a result of its self-imposed industry shifts.14

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Outside of internal industrial changes, a number of other reasons contribute to declining CD sales. Competition from other forms of entertainment, including video games and DVDs—ostensibly providing more bang for the entertainment buck—is a crucial factor. Another is the corresponding changes occurring in the radio industry, as consolidation by the likes of Clear Channel Communications and Infinity Broadcasting has resulted in shorter, homogenized playlists. Consider this chilling statement concerning the state of music on the radio from Clear Channel’s CEO Lowry Mays: “We’re not in the business of providing well-research music. We’re simply in the business of selling our customers products.”15 Furthermore, talk radio has been replacing music-centric radio for some time, while music television (MTV, MuchMusic, etc.) has moved away from music videos toward reality and lifestyle programming. Another key change in the record industry in recent years, rarely reported or discussed, is the drastic shift in the U.S. retail music channel. The previous coexistence of smaller, specialized shops along with larger, wide-ranging retailers, which fostered diverse selections and sales strategies, has been replaced by the dominance of mass-market, “big-box” retailers such as WalMart, Costco, and Best Buy. These stores, which now account for the vast majority of CD sales, sell a small selection of albums at heavily discounted prices, often below the actual wholesale price. Using compact disc sales as a “loss-leader” to attract consumers to purchase other goods in their stores, these giant retailers have pushed many independent music stores and dedicated music chains (such as Tower Records) out of business, as they cannot compete with the big-box pricing power. Moreover, compact disc sales are of little importance to these retailers, accounting for a minimal percentage of overall revenue; in the case of Wal-Mart, which holds the largest share of the U.S. market, compact disc sales are less than one-tenth of 1 percent of their revenue. “The business strategies of the record labels are no longer aligned with the strategies of their main distribution partners,” explain Kusek and Leonhard, leading them to sarcastically ponder: “Could this be a recipe for disaster?”16 Amidst this faltering business strategy, what of the artist? The musician, Attali notes, “is the one who provides the insight into labor-value as the standard for capitalist-exchange.”17 Currently, music is perhaps the only commodity whereby consumers can respond to what they feel is unfair treatment of labor; many consumers actively engage in “stealing” music online, guilt-free, and support the artists they choose, in the manner they choose (concerts, merchandise, exposure, etc.). The current paradigm—which Big Music is fruitlessly attempting to maintain—of paying 10 to 20 dollars for a physical album that may only contain one or two enjoyable songs is seen by most consumers as, at best, outdated and unfair and, at worst, as a blatant case of pricegouging. “The profit bonanza of an $18 CD? Those days are gone forever.”18

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Online, music becomes a virtual commodity that can be attained for a nominal fee or free-of-charge. In recent years, the capital required for both the production stage and distribution stage of music has drastically decreased in many respects. Affordable home audio-recording technologies and various online distribution methods have knocked down some of the barriers of entry upheld by Big Music for the last 70 years. While album mastering, international distribution of physical product, and many forms of marketing are still expensive endeavors, there is no denying that a multitude of alternatives to Big Music’s hegemony have arisen. Case in point: Radiohead’s “pay-whatyou-want” experiment. THE ACT THAT LAUNCHED A THOUSAND THINK-PIECES Radiohead’s In Rainbows “pay-what-you-want” experiment was a resounding success. Though the band is refusing to release official statistics (to avoid, I suspect, the backlash of revealing the massive profit they earned from their “little” experiment), Gigwise.com, citing a source close to the band, reported that the album was downloaded 1.2 million times on its first day alone, and is said to have been “pirated” even more.19 Industry newsletter Record of the Day conducted a poll revealing that nearly a third chose to pay nothing for the album, but the average price was about $8.00.20 Another online survey conducted by ComScore estimated the average payment, factoring in free downloads, to be $2.26, though this survey did not include college networks, Radiohead’s prime demographic.21 The band issued a statement rejecting the accuracy of these figures, calling them “wholly inaccurate” and “exaggerated,” though Thom Yorke, lead vocalist and multi-instrumentalist for the band, did admit in an interview that In Rainbows had passed well over one million downloads. Nevertheless, with minimal costs for hosting the files on their server maintained by their merchandising company and “cyber-cottage industry” W.A.S.T.E., and subtracting producer fees and the costs of operating their own recording studio, Radiohead is estimated to have made at least $1 million and upwards of $5 million from their experiment. And this is not including the profit from the $80 deluxe mail-order “gift box” version of the album including two compact discs, two vinyl records, and a booklet they offered alongside the download, which is reported to have garnered between 60,000 and 80,000 orders. Unlike major label contracts that would allocate to the artist(s) 15 percent—at best—of revenues earned from album sales after label’s expenses are recouped, Radiohead retains both publishing rights and recording rights of In Rainbows, earning them 100 percent of revenues from the digital release. “In terms of digital income,” Thom Yorke explains, “we’ve made more money out of this record than out of all the other Radiohead

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albums put together, forever—in terms of anything on the Net.”22 According to Jon Cohen of Cornerstone Promotion, “it’ll be the most profitable album of this current era.”23 On January 1, 2008, In Rainbows was released in traditional compact disc form, licensed to independent label TBD (part of ATO Records) in the United States, boutique label Maple Music/Fontana in Canada, independent label Hostess in Japan, and independent label XL Recordings across the world. It debuted at number one on the U.S. Billboard 200 chart, the U.K. Album Chart, the Canadian Albums Chart, and the United World Chart. The band is sure to have negotiated a much more lucrative deal as free agents with ATO as opposed to the exploitation they would have faced from Big Music. In Rainbows was also the first album the band decided to release on iTunes, requiring it be available in DRM-free “iTunes Plus” format. Despite its availability for free for two months preceding its “official” release, the album still managed to become iTunes’ No. 2 top-selling album in its first week. In Rainbows has continued to succeed in all its various “windows” of release; its stellar critical reception, appearing on the vast majority of critics’ year-end lists, has no doubt buoyed this economic victory. Equally as impressive as their successful challenge to Big Music’s economic domination was the subsequent media storm they unleashed. Radiohead’s scant 24-word announcement on its Web site triggered a torrent of reports and arguments, running the gamut from blog discussions to vast mainstream press coverage. Critics everywhere were weighing in with what they felt the industry repercussions would be and what it meant for the value of music. Even business sections considered the implications of “pay-whatyou-want”; The Economist wondered whether it was “The Day the Music (Industry) Died?” and BusinessWeek pondered “The Big Record Labels’ NotSo-Big Future,” while The Financial Times went on the defensive, claiming “Radiohead MP3 release a tactic to lift CD sales.” MTV.com proclaimed 2007 “The Year The Music Industry Broke,” while The New York Times Magazine named “The Radiohead Payment Model” as one of its 70 big ideas that shaped 2007. Not bad for an idea hatched during a “stoned philosophical conversation about the value of music” between Radiohead’s managers.24 While Radiohead’s act was certainly the most high-profile challenge to the music industry in 2007, a slew of major artists defied the norms of the record industry, contributing to a possible artist-led “tipping point” in the economic structure of Big Music. Within days of Radiohead’s announcement, Trent Reznor—known to encourage concert-goers to “steal” his band’s albums online—also made a notable blog post: “Hello everyone. I’ve waited a LONG time to be able to make the following announcement: as of right now Nine Inch Nails is a totally free agent, free of any recording contract with any label . . . it gives me great pleasure to be able to finally have a direct relationship with the audience as I see fit and appropriate.”25 Reznor went on

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to distribute Saul Williams’ latest album, which he produced, in a similar strategy to Radiohead’s “pay-what-you-want” experiment. On October 16, in the midst of the Radiohead publicity storm, Madonna announced that she was dropping from her long-time music label Warner, opting instead for a “global partnership” with concert promoter Live Nation, Inc., a $120 million deal in which she became a shareholder in the company. Responding to the paradigm shift in the record industry, the Material Girl struck a “360 deal” that would encompass a wide range of revenue streams, including album releases, touring, merchandising, licensing, sponsorship, film and TV projects, DVD releases, and her invaluable brand name. Spin would award its 2007 “Story of the Year” to this cluster of challenges to Big Music, aptly naming it “The October Surprise.” Earlier in the year, Prince sparked controversy in July when he gave away 2.5 million copies of his album Planet Earth for free in the United Kingdom through the newspaper Mail on Sunday, and everyone who attended one of his 21 sold-out shows in London also received a free copy. Always the provocateur, Prince was the first major artist to release an entire album—1997’s Crystal Ball—exclusively on the Internet. In December, the Charlatans released their latest single and album for free through the radio station Xfm, making the shift to complete reliance on touring and merchandise for financial return. The Eagles signed an exclusive deal with WalMart, as well as offering their album on their own Web site, while Joni Mitchell ditched Warner and Paul McCartney abandoned EMI in favor of Starbucks’ new record label, Hear Music. Oasis and Jamiroquai are the latest big-name bands rumored to be considering dropping their major label and considering alternatives upon completion of their contracts. Artists have long been challenging the hegemony of the record industry, one might trace Radiohead’s “pay-what-you-want” experiment back to the Grateful Dead, who allowed fans to freely distribute recordings of live shows and encouraged a trading system whereby fans could mail one another blank tapes in order to get new “bootleg” recordings of live Dead shows. Public Enemy and its outspoken front man Chuck D have been staunch supporters of digital distribution, first releasing 1999’s There’s a Poison Goin’ On over the Internet and on zip drives, and 2007’s How to Sell Your Soul To A Soulless People Who Sold Their Soul through ad-supported, online file sharing. The Smashing Pumpkins encouraged fans to share a limited pressing of 2000’s Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music online. Wilco’s infamous experience with Warner is another success story. Having been dropped from their Warner subsidiary Reprise Records for recording an “uncommercial” album, the band negotiated ownership of the master tapes and, responding to low-quality leaks of the album, streamed it for free on their official Web site. Garnering much critical praise and Internet buzz, Wilco negotiated an even more lucrative contract with Nonesuch Records, also a Warner subsidiary

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(in effect paying for the album twice). Yankee Hotel Foxtrot sold more copies than any of Wilco’s previous records. Another example of responding to Internet “leaks,” the Canadian indie band Stars released 2007’s In Our Bedroom After the War for download just 10 days after completing it—and nearly 3 months before its “physical” release date. Countless more examples could be culled from the history of artist-led challenges to Big Music’s hegemony; let us turn to the technologies accelerating these alternatives. MUSIC IN THE AGE OF DIGITAL DISTRIBUTION The digital music revolution has been developing slowly ever since the record industry’s imposition of the digital compact disc format in the 1980s, followed by the development of the ISO-MPEG Audio Layer-3 compression/ decompression algorithm (mp3) in 1992. Along with the steady increase in broadband access, file sharing gained popularity with Internet relay chat (IRC) and other virtual communities until it hit the mainstream with Napster’s release in 1999. Despite legal victories by the RIAA and intellectual property right enforcement through the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) in the United States, peer-to-peer (P2P) networking technologies have continued to evolve with Gnutella, Morpheus, KaZaa, Grokster, LimeWire, and others, leading to the current method-of-choice: BitTorrent. Estimated to represent 18–30 percent of all Internet traffic, BitTorrent is a P2P protocol that operates with a much more decentralized structure whereby each user supplies pieces of data to newer users, reducing the cost and burden on individual sources and allowing for more effective use of Internet bandwidth. A multitude of Web sites carry the metadata “torrent” files (which contain no copyrighted information) needed to begin downloads, and whenever any such site is shut down by legal injunction, many more arise in its wake. Legal downloading has also increased significantly in recent years, as 2007 saw digital album sales rise 53 percent and legal downloads of individual tracks increase 45 percent.26 With the popularity and success of Apple’s iTunes and other legal downloading options, Big Music has finally embraced digital music to some extent, but the battleground for the future of the record industry is still being shaped. With such drastic changes to the music industry occurring so rapidly, it is worth returning to Attali’s suggestion of the predictive nature of the political economy of music. “The hit parade,” Attali claims, “bears a relation to the dream-form of the socialist economy, in which price is no longer the sole determining factor of use/exchange value, in which choice is expressed not only by disposable income but by the democratically expressed preferences of the consumers.”27 Attali goes on to dispel this fantasy, locating the actual structure of the hit parade from the 1930s to the 1970s in records sales and industry manipulation; but online, with file sharing, the virtual commodity,

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and limitless choice, do we not see the birth pangs of a socialist economy? As Chuck D of Public Enemy proclaims, “P2P to me means ‘power to the people.’ ”28 What began as a subcultural “gift economy” has evolved into a vast, decentralized network of digital music distribution.29 An influential paper written by employees of Microsoft in 2002, titled “The Darknet and the Future of Content Distribution,” popularized the term Darknet, which refers to a collection of networks and technologies used to share copyright-infringing digital content, such as the P2P file-sharing networks. Peter Biddle and his colleagues suggest that the Darknet forces businesses to compete “on the Darknet’s own terms,” a practice that values “convenience and low cost rather than additional security.”30 The efficient and convenient sharing of files is at the heart of this issue, not copyright infringement or protection. It is not hard to imagine why consumers would operate in such a manner. Simply put, “copies of digital media proliferate freely in network environments because sharing music is a basic ritual held in common across cultures.”31 There is more to the story of file sharing than Big Music and its lawyers will acknowledge. Not only has Big Music ignored the cultural imperative of file sharing, it has ignored the positive impact on music sales that many surveys and studies have indicated. Some conservative studies find a negative impact of P2P on music sales but agree that the impact is low.32 Conversely, many studies conclude that there is no negative impact but, in fact, a positive one. A 2001 survey by Jupiter Media Metrix found file sharing to be a “net positivetechnology,” with 52 percent of experienced file sharers increasing their music purchases.33 A study of direct data of download activity by Oberholzer-Gee and Strumpf in 2002 found most downloading to be done by younger users who would not have had the disposable income to purchase the album even in the absence of file sharing. Older users, however, were found to use file sharing to “sample” new music, a practice that, like radio, increases sales.34 A widely cited study for Industry Canada in 2007 that used representative microeconomic data found that there is “no direct evidence to suggest that the net effect of P2P file-sharing on CD purchasing is either positive or negative for Canada as a whole.” Even more surprising was the finding that among the dedicated file-sharing subpopulation, “P2P file-sharing tends to increase rather than decrease music purchasing.”35 More akin to promotion than piracy, file sharing could have been harnessed by Big Music for greater sales opportunities; instead, they chose to treat their customers as thieves and earned its “image as a ravenous, heartless vampire.”36 According to Attali, music “explores, much faster than material reality can, the entire range of possibilities in a given code.”37 As a result, “internal and external noises do violence to the code and to the network.”38 The digital revolution has made this come true, literally: mp3s are music transformed into binary code, exchanged through the network of the Internet, enacting

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violence to the traditional structure of the record industry. It is estimated that roughly 20 billion songs are illegally downloaded or swapped each year, by as many as 200 million users worldwide. Clearly, people do not feel overly guilty about this illegal copyright infringement and are more concerned with the convenience and diverse access this new system of distribution allows them. Now that the cat has been let out of the bag, so to speak, there is no going back. Consumers demand the latest technological convenience, and it is quite apparent that technology has outmoded the traditional model of the record industry. The sheer popularity of digital downloads is forcing Big Music to move beyond an infrastructure predicated on the sale of “hard goods” such as compact discs. iPods need to be filled, and mobile phones need new ringtones: What model of distribution is going to meet this demand? David Kusek and Gerd Leonhard, in The Future of Music: Manifesto for the Digital Music Revolution, propose a “Music Like Water” business model that they foresee as the future of the music industry. Although it is overly idealistic and does not account for some of the harsh economic realities of the entertainment industry, the book provides a useful metaphor for considering the transformation of music when it “imagine[s] a world where music flows all around us, like water, or like electricity, and where access to music becomes a kind of ‘utility.’ ”39 Freed from the constraints of being treated as merely a product, music becomes a service: “ubiquitous, mobile, shareable, and as pervasive and diverse as the human cultures that create it.”40 A central concern for Kusek and Leonhard is whether we are leading to a system in which access replaces ownership. If we can access whatever music we want, whenever we want, wherever we want, then “owning” music becomes unnecessary. In this new musical economy, the traditional model of selling “content” is abandoned in favor of “a very potent liquid pricing system that incorporates subscriptions, bundles of various media types, multi-access deals, and addedvalue services.”41 Music has been viewed as “static” for too long; treating it as a more fluid and participatory entertainment experience is more consistent with music’s dynamic nature of continual evolution and change over time and between musicians and cultures. Music as a product, something to be owned, is a relic of the Industrial Age. In the Information Age, access is key. This transition will not come easy and will be a dire time for some people and businesses, but like the invention of the printing press, the automobile, and the television, the chaos the Internet is causing will be followed by tremendous access and diversity. Attali could not have anticipated the technological transformation that we are now experiencing, but he did accurately predict that there would be a “new status for music” that would not be “a new music, but a new way of making music.”42 He called this era Composition, and it is not hard to see its presence in our current digital age. “Composition: in which there is no

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longer any usage, any relation to others, except in the collective production and exchange of transcendence.”43 Furthermore: “Music is no longer made to be represented or stockpiled, but for participation in collective play, in an ongoing quest for new, immediate communication, without ritual and always unstable.”44 So, here we have two ingredients for a new social order: collective production and collective play. The Internet, of course, is the ideal facilitator for both of these functions. Open source software (such as Linux and Firefox) and social networking sites (such as Facebook and Flickr) are popular examples of simultaneous collective production and collective play that occur online, but we can find many pertinent examples within the realm of digital music as well. The proliferation of fan Web sites, message boards, and blogs dedicated to music of all kinds has promoted vibrant and diverse online fan communities. Radiohead is no exception; they are known to have a rabid and obsessive fan base of Internet users. W.A.S.T.E. is Radiohead’s own fan service and has been operating ever since the band began releasing records in the early 1990s. Starting out as letters posted by Radiohead themselves, it has grown along with the band, providing a direct link between the fans and the band, with Web services, ethically sourced merchandise, tickets, and now the digital release of In Rainbows. Radiohead is keenly aware of this cyber dimension to their fan base, maintaining an expansive and oft-updated Web site including frequent personal blog posts and offering unique benefits to its online fans, such as their “thumbs_down” and “Scotch Mist” promotional Webcast performances on radiohead.tv. In the four-year lead-up to the release of In Rainbows, fan sites documented every new ounce of material, and countless recordings showed up on YouTube, some dating back to the late Nineties. “Nude,” for instance, has been a fan favorite for more than a decade, previously only available in concert (or on YouTube) before being officially recorded for In Rainbows. “Videotape” debuted the previous year as a solo piano ballad on producer Nigel Godrich’s online show From the Basement, then progressed as many different fullinstrumental incarnations in concert, before returning to the stripped-down swan song it now occupies as the final track on In Rainbows. In this way, the collective fan community could witness the development and evolution of the new songs, feeling a part of their growth and maturation. Attesting to this direct relationship with the fans, Thom Yorke concluded the “thumbs_ down” Webcast with an appropriate sign-off: “See you on YouTube.” Radiohead’s online interaction with its fan base is indicative of a largescale industry trend in which artists are harnessing technology to directly communicate with their fans. The success of Fall Out Boy, for example, is attributed in large part to their very active online presence, building a community with its young, Web-savvy demographic. Bassist/lyricist Pete Wentz went so far as creating his own social networking site, FriendsorEnemies.

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com. Kembrew McLeod argues that file sharing and direct marketing has been a boon to those musicians working outside the major label system. Independent artists and the owners of indie and micro-labels operate on more balanced, profit-sharing models that rely on a small but loyal fan base. It is now possible for a musician to succeed in the industry by selling fewer units but retaining their copyright and disregarding the Big Music strategy of needing to sell a half million records just to break even. As a result, an independent sector of “middle-ground” artists is emerging, founded on the principle of community. Collective production and collective play online has also resulted in many unique economic approaches to collective music making. SellaBand.com, where “you are the record company,” gives music fans the chance to invest in up-and-coming acts and even earn money if they turn out to be a success. Similarly, Slicethepie.com aims to “turn every music fan into a record label” and enables artists to raise money directly from their fans to record and release an album. Fans can earn money, too, and a stock market–style “trading exchange” allows investors to gamble on the success of the artists and “help [themselves] to a slice of the music industry.” Amazingtunes.com describes itself as a “fair trade” Web site, promising that 70 percent of revenues from all music sales, after bank charges and taxes, go straight to the artists. From mainstream file sharing to Internet-based community labels on the fringe, digital music is parading its prophetic nature and revealing many bold new developments that we will no doubt witness in other factions of culture and politics. As in the eighteenth century, according to Attali, “the monopoly over music was one of the first destroyed by the people, before they tackled the others.”45 NOT SO FAST: BIG MUSIC ADAPTS TO THE CELESTIAL JUKEBOX Before we travel too far with this technologically determinist, “cyberutopian” train of thought, we must account for Big Music’s recent attempts to regain its footing in this new digital paradigm. Though it may have been dragged into the digital age kicking and screaming and litigating, Big Music has also been hedging its bets and investing in new structures and sources of revenue. In a particularly enlightening example, in 2001, BMG was involved in a joint venture with Grokster to establish a model for distributing licensed music through a P2P network while at the same time suing Grokster in the MGM v. Grokster case. The writing on the wall has been visible for quite some time: the Internet, along with mobile and satellite networks, is soon going to be the primary mode of digital media distribution and a crucial site of revenue for the media conglomerates. The outcome for control of the distribution of music is being keenly watched by the entertainment industry

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as a whole because it paves the way for control of the illustrious “Celestial Jukebox.” Paul Goldstein popularized the term Celestial Jukebox in 1994 with the publication of Copyright’s Highway: The Law and Lore of Copyright from Gutenberg to the Celestial Jukebox. Imagining it as “a technology-packed satellite,” Goldstein sees the Jukebox as “awaiting a subscriber’s order . . . to connect him to any number of selections from a vast storehouse . . . [combining] the power of a television set, radio, CD player, VCR, telephone, fax, and personal computer.”46 In Digital Music Wars: Ownership and Control of the Celestial Jukebox, Patrick Burkart and Tom McCourt adopt and update the term to describe “the various systems whereby any text, recording, or audiovisual artefact can be made available instantaneously via wired and wireless broadband channels to Internet appliances or home computers.”47 Unlike the idealistic vision of Kusek and Leonhard’s “Music Like Water” model, Burkart and McCourt trace Big Music’s oppressive control of access and assault on intellectual property rights through the gradual implementation of the Celestial Jukebox. There are a variety of opinions concerning the outcome and effect of the Celestial Jukebox, according to Burkart and McCourt. Futurists, such as Goldstein as well as Kusek and Leonhard, believe it to herald a technological utopia of open access and abundant choice. Creators of intellectual property hope it provides them the opportunity to avoid industrial barriers to entry and retain copyright on their work. Distributors expect a huge new revenue stream while eliminating overhead costs and geographic constraints. Electronics and technology companies aim to profit from new devices and software, while Internet, telephone, and cable service providers will continue to roll out lucrative broadband access. And consumers expect a “vast intellectual commons” of diverse, immeasurable choice at low cost. Burkart and McCourt advise us to temper these desires, and consider the “technocratic ideology that in fact underlies the infrastructure of the Celestial Jukebox.”48 While the title of their book suggests a “war” over control of the Jukebox, Burkart and McCourt’s heavy-handed, though insightful analysis indicates their belief that the war has already been won by the corporate media oligopoly, resulting in strict boundaries on intellectual property, pervasive threats to individual privacy, and tight restrictions on access to popular culture and the knowledge-based economy. A crucial element to this imposition of an oppressive, strictly controlled Celestial Jukebox is the legal underpinning aggressively pursued by the RIAA and other lobbying organizations. In 1998, both the DMCA and the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act were passed in the United States, furthering the media monopoly’s competitive advantage in the digital media market. Internationally, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) and the World Intellectual Property Organization

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(WIPO), a subgroup of the World Trade Organization (WTO), are working to coordinate intellectual property protections across the globe. The 1996 WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT) was implemented in the United States with the DMCA and in the European Union with the 2001 European directive on copyright. By incorporating criminal sanctions into multilateral trade agreements such as the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), an “intellectual-property enforcement regime” has been established and is steadily gaining momentum throughout the world.49 In “Who Are the Pirates? The Politics of Piracy, Poverty, and Greed in a Globalized Music Market,” Jack Bishop composes a convincing argument regarding this global imposition of intellectual property policies and unfair pricing standards by Big Music. Looking at music consumption in Latin America, where music occupies an indispensable role in cultural expression, the vast majority of consumers simply cannot afford the suggested list price of compact discs enforced by the RIAA and IFPI. Compact discs are sold for the same price in Latin America as they are in the United States, yet, comparing Mexico’s gross national product per capita of $4,748 with the $33,933 of the United States “illuminates in dollars and sense the disparity between the social classes of each country.”50 Bishop is correct in identifying this practice as a form of neocolonialism and economic oppression. In response to this unjust power structure, music pirates are not seen as thieves in these “lowincome” societies, but Robin Hoods, offering liberation and freedom of choice with each illegal CD-R. From this viewpoint, it is not hard to see who the real “pirates” are. If Big Music intends to implement the Celestial Jukebox internationally with the same disregard for its global audience as it currently employs, it will likely encounter much opposition. In the intervening years since the publication of Digital Music Wars, the two technologies Burkart and McCourt identify as central to the implementation of the Celestial Jukebox—customer relationship management (CRM) and digital rights management (DRM)—have continued to develop in curious directions. Customer relationship management refers to personalization systems in which profiles of user attributes and behavior are developed in order to customize content delivery, while also tracking interactions and purchases in order to assemble merchandising dossiers about individual and general consumer tastes and behavior. The information gathered can be used by companies internally, to automate and further specialize marketing, or it can be traded between corporate divisions and sold to outside interests without the customer’s consent. Burkart and McCourt devote comparatively little space to describing CRM’s impact, instead focusing on Big Music’s reliance on DRM. However, as evidenced by the dramatic increase in popularity and market value of Facebook, MySpace, and other social networking sites, as well as customizable portal Web sites such as iGoogle and My Yahoo!, CRM is playing a key role in the digital

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media landscape and will figure most prominently in any incarnation of the Celestial Jukebox. Digital rights management, on the other hand, has undergone a serious change in direction, rendering moot much of Burkart and McCourt’s analysis. It refers to access control technologies that limit and regulate usage of digital media, requiring the consumer to access content on the provider’s terms. With regards to audio compact discs, Big Music attempted for many years to severely limit consumers’ ability to make backup copies or “rip” the music on to their computer. Use of malicious software—even crashing the user’s computer and exposing them to security vulnerabilities—led to public outcry and several class-action lawsuits resulting in the eventual abandonment of DRM for audio CDs by Big Music. The use of DRM for downloadable music, however, is still a contentious issue. In a rare case of actual competition within the record industry, Big Music denied the advent of digital music and staunchly enforced DRM for so long that it unwittingly handed over significant distribution power to a new competitor. With the overwhelming success of the iPod and the iTunes music store, Apple, Inc. has achieved an estimated 80 percent market share of legal downloads, retaining its own proprietary DRM system, FairPlay, which does not allow any of Big Music’s DRM-encoded downloads to be played on the iPod. Its market domination threatened, Big Music’s only chance of competing with Apple was to offer DRM-free downloads so they could still be played on the iPod, the most popular digital music player. Finally embracing the digital future, the Big Four all individually announced, throughout 2007, that they would be experimenting with DRM-free downloads and are now mounting a challenge to Apple’s domination by aggressively supporting Amazon’s new digital music service, as well as other subscription services such as Universal’s “Total Music.” No longer required to uphold an unfair and ineffective system, iTunes now offers higher-quality, DRM-free downloads, fulfilling its promise to abandon DRM in an open letter called “Thoughts on Music,” written by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple, in February of 2007. Though DRM is not completely dead—WalMart’s service and Real’s Rhapsody continue to protect their files—it has certainly lost precedence. Once a pillar of Big Music’s containment strategy for digital media, DRM has now been all but abandoned by the Big Four, as well as Apple. Though there is no telling how DRM might rear its ugly head in the future, this battlefront of the digital music war appears to be conceded. It is difficult to predict the future of such a fickle and transitory industry with any accuracy, but it is a pretty safe bet to count on a substantial expansion of the digital music market, leading the way into more digital distribution of film and television as well. The desertion of DRM seems to indicate Big Music’s acceptance that their future is in controlling the access to music through various download and subscription services, rather than the sale of

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“products.” The media monopoly will continue their attempt to institutionalize and manage the mass proliferation of music and other digital media, artists will continue to seek larger audiences in innovative new ways, and consumers will continue to aggressively demand wider access and greater convenience. Is the cyber-utopian “Music Like Water” model presented by Kusek and Leonhard really that opposed to Burkart and McCourt’s vision of the oppressive, technocratic Celestial Jukebox? Both, in fact, propose that the future of music is as a service and a utility, yet, they disagree on its impact and effect. If we consider each model as occupying an endpoint on the spectrum of the possible future of music and acknowledge the current position as somewhere near the middle, precariously ready to shift in either direction, we are left with a reasonable depiction of what is on the horizon for the music industry. CONCLUSION: THE DIGITAL DANCE I know today has been the most perfect day I’ve ever seen. —“Videotape,” In Rainbows Important dates in the transformation of the music industry—and the entertainment market as a whole—include the release of the mp3 format in 1992, Napster’s debut in 1999 and shutdown in 2001, and the everapproaching day when digital sales finally eclipse physical sales (will we continue to use the term record?). Besides these and other industrial markers, the digital release of In Rainbows on October 10, 2007, will go down in history as a symbolic moment in music history when the digital future—with all its messy possibilities and complications—was undeniably here. Radiohead embodies the new (digital) music experience. No longer relegated to the margins of the Darknet, digital music is now front and center in an ongoing debate about the future of digital media; In Rainbows signaled a symbolic alternative in which artists and consumers can both win: culturally, artistically, and economically. The “pay-what-you-want” experiment is no model for the music industry, but it represents a symbolic victory against the media monopoly and the capability of music to predict and impact a paradigm shift. The very fact that Radiohead denies they ever intended to subvert Big Music’s hegemony is further proof of the possibility of innovation in the digital age and the capability of music to uniquely, even unknowingly, subvert social codes while foreshadowing new ones. We can now append Attali’s central formulation in Noise. Corresponding to the three stages of the historical usage of music by power—ritual power, representative power, and bureaucratic power—Attali succinctly summarizes music’s violent role: “Make people Forget, make them Believe, Silence them.”51 In precapitalist society, music affirmed that society was possible; it made people forget that normalcy and order had prevailed over carnival

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and freedom. The rise of spectacle and exchange value led to music’s transformation into a commodity and private ownership. This new paradigm of musical production and consumption made people believe in social order: it “characterize[d] the entire economy of competitive capitalism.”52 The invention of auditory recording techniques created a new economy of music based on repetitive mass production, the same basis that would soon define all social relations. As individualized accumulation and stockpiling of music is encouraged through consumerism, community and the collective order is silenced. With the digital revolution, we have now entered the era of Composition, and one is tempted to add “Make them Share” to complete Attali’s formulation. However, that would deny the personal agency that is so key to a collective social order. Instead: Make people Forget, make them Believe, Silence them, Behold them Share. “If representation is tied to printing,” says Attali, “and repetition to recording . . . composition is tied to the instrument.”53 Unbeknownst to Attali, this instrument would be the Internet, the ultimate musical instrument for collective production and collective play. The Round Dance—the culmination of 25 centuries of musical struggle Attali anticipates, signaling a postcapitalistic future—occurs in the electronic global village. What happens there, is up to you. NOTES 1. John Del Signore, “A Conversation with Jonny Greenwood,” Gothamist (October 10, 2007), http://gothamist.com/2007/10/10/jonny_greenwood.php. 2. David Kusek and Gerd Leonhard, The Future of Music: Manifesto for the Digital Music Revolution (Boston: Berklee Press, 2005), 44. 3. Jacques Attali, Noise: A Political Economy of Music (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1985), 4 (emphasis original). 4. Attali, 10. 5. Attali, 10. 6. Attali, 11. 7. Attali, 34. 8. Eduardo Porter, “Radiohead’s Warm Glow,” New York Times (October 14, 2007). http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/14/opinion/14sun3.html (accessed August 21, 2008). 9. “What’s Radiohead Worth?” The Nation (August 15, 2007). http://www.thenation. com/doc/20071029/baker (accessed August 13, 2008). 10. Gilbert B. Rodman and Cheyanne Vanderdonckt, “MUSIC FOR NOTHING OR, I WANT MY MP3,” Cultural Studies 20 (2006): 253 (emphasis original). 11. Harold Vogel, Entertainment Industry Economics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998). 12. Eric Leach and Bill Henslee, “Follow the Money: Who’s Really Making the Dough?” Electronic Musician (November 1, 2001), http://industryclick.com/magazinearticle. asp?magazineid=33&releasedid=9554&magazinearticleid=132835&SiteID=15.

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13. C. Goldsmith, M. Karnitschnig, M. Peers, and B. Orwall, “As Music Sector’s Woes Worsen, Sony and BMG Propose a Merger,” Wall Street Journal (November 7, 2003): A1. 14. Rodman and Vanderdonckt, 255. 15. Kusek and Leonhard, 27. 16. Kusek and Leonhard, 87. 17. Attali, 58. 18. Justin Bachman, “The Big Record Label’s Not-So-Big Future,” BusinessWeek (October 10, 2007), http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/oct2007/ db2007109_120106.htm?chan=innovation_branding_industry+trends. 19. Scott Colothan, “Exclusive: Radiohead Sell 1.2 Million Copies of ‘In Rainbows’,” Gigwise.com (October 11, 2007), http://www.gigwise.com/news/37670/exclusiveradiohead-sell-12million-copies-of-in-rainbows. 20. Adam Sherwin, “How much is Radiohead’s online album worth? Nothing at all, say a third of fans,” The Times (October 11, 2007), http://entertainment.timesonline. co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/article2633798.ece. 21. “For Radiohead Fans, Does ‘Free’ + ‘Download’=‘Freeload’?” ComScore (November 5, 2007), http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=1883. 22. “David Byrne and Thom Yorke on the Real Value of Music,” Wired (December 18, 2007), http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/magazine/16–01/ff_yorke. 23. Lane Brown, “Radiohead, Inc.” Spin (December, 2007): 35–36. 24. Jon Pareles, “Pay What You Want for This Article,” New York Times (December 9, 2007), http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/09/arts/music/09pare.html?_r=3 &oref=slogin&pagewanted=all. 25. Trent Reznor. Announcement on Nine Inch Nails Web site. Reposted on Sixeyes MP3 Blog. http://sixeyes.blogspot.com/2007/10/nine-inch-nails-label-free.html (accessed August 12, 2008). 26. Paul Taylor, “Music downloads speed decline in CD sales,” Financial Times (January 4, 2008), http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/dc29aa7c-ba67–11dc-abcb-0000779fd2ac.html. 27. Attali, 107. 28. Katie Dean, “Rappers in Disharmony on P2P,” Wired (October 1, 2003), http:// www.wired.com/gadgets/portablemusic/news/2003/10/60650. 29. Richard Barbrook, “The Hi-Tech Gift Economy,” First Monday 3, no. 12 (1998). 30. Peter Biddle, Paul England, Marcus Peinado, and Bryan Willman, “The Darknet and the Future of Content Protection,” 2002 ACM Workshop on Digital Rights Management (November 18, 2002), http://crypto.stanford.edu/DRM2002/darknet5.doc: 16. 31. Patrick Burkart and Tom McCourt, Digital Music Wars Ownership and Control of the Celestial Jukebox (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2006), 49. 32. Michael Fine, “SoundScan Study on Napster Use and Loss of Sales,” June 2000. http://www.riaa/com/news/filings/pdf/napster/fine.pdf; Stan Liebowitz, “ Will MP3 Downloads Annihilate the Record Industry? The Evidence So Far,” Advances in the Study of Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and Economic Growth 112 (2004). 33. Matt Richtel, “Access to Free Online Music Is Seen as a Boost to Sales,” New York Times (May 6, 2002): C6. 34. John Schwartz, “A Heretical View of File Sharing,” New York Times (April 5, 2004): C1.

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35. Birgitte Anderson and Marion Frenz, “The Impact of Music Downloads and P2P File-Sharing on the Purchase of Music: A Study for Industry Canada,” Industry Canada, http://www.ic.gc.ca/epic/site/ippd-dppi.nsf/en/ip01462e.html (accessed January 5, 2008). 36. Jack Bishop, “Who Are the Pirates? The Politics of Piracy, Poverty, and Greed in a Globalized Music Market,” Popular Music & Society 27, no. 1 (2004): 103. 37. Attali, 11. 38. Attali, 34. 39. Kusek and Leonhard, x. 40. Kusek and Leonhard, 3. 41. Kusek and Leonhard, 33. 42. Attali, 134. 43. Attali, 45 (emphasis mine). 44. Attali, 141 (emphasis mine). 45. Attali, 73. 46. Paul Goldstein, Copyright’s Highway: The Law and Lore of Copyright from Gutenberg to the Celestial Jukebox (New York: Hill and Wang, 1994), 199. 47. Burkart and McCourt, 1. 48. Burkart and McCourt, 3. 49. Burkart and McCourt, 8. 50. Bishop, 105. 51. Attali, 19. 52. Attali, 32. 53. Attali, 144.

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chapter 10

The Future of Radio in the Digital Age John Allen Hendricks

The late twentieth century brought about rapid technological advancements in the communications industry. In an effort to address antiquated federal regulatory legislation, the U.S. Congress examined and scrutinized the Communications Act of 1934 and determined that it was indeed antiquated and needed to be replaced with legislation that would address the issues and challenges facing the communications industry of the twenty-first century. Moreover, during the 1980s and 1990s, there was a movement toward deregulation of numerous industries, including the communications industry, to stimulate competition in the consumer marketplace. Thus, Congress passed the Telecommunications Act of 1996, and it was signed into law by President Bill Clinton. The 1996 act replaced the 1934 act but kept the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) as the regulatory agency for the communications industry and kept the “public interest” standard as a tenet for twenty-first-century terrestrial media, which required licensees to operate radio stations in a manner that benefits the public’s interests and needs. There were several aspects of the telecommunications act of 1996 that many industry observers found controversial and that played a pivotal role in determining the programming content available to consumers. First, economists posited that deregulation would stimulate competition in the marketplace, but that was not what occurred in the media marketplace upon deregulation because large conglomerates were (a) permitted to own up to 45 percent of the nation’s television households, (b) cross-ownership of television stations and newspapers was permitted for the conglomerates, and (c) there was an elimination on all national radio ownership caps, which

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allowed for ownership of multiple stations in multiple media markets. Thus, the act promoted a concentration of power in the radio industry instead of creating a competitive environment. Second, the 1996 act made license renewals automatic for licensees and extended the period of time a license is effective. These instances created an environment in which the radio industry was owned and operated by a small group of conglomerates that served as informational and musical gatekeepers to millions of television and radio listeners throughout the nation. The effects of deregulation from the 1990s were far different than the purported intentions, especially as concerns the end result for users. In fact, consumers found themselves listening to homogenized, bland formats that did not allow for the introduction of diverse and niche music and programming genres. In fact, as a result of deregulation, four companies controlled more than 50 percent of the total listening audience in regard to 28 out of 30 of the major music formats, while just two companies controlled 42 percent of all radio listeners in the entire nation. DEREGULATION: AN EXAMINATION OF ITS SHORTCOMINGS AND IMPACT ON CONSUMERS AND THE MUSIC INDUSTRY The 1996 act allowed corporations to own up to 35 percent of the nation’s television viewing households. In 2003, the FCC increased the national ownership cap to 45 percent and also granted approval for television–newspaper cross-ownership to occur. This was controversial because it allowed for additional deregulation in an industry where there still remained a robust debate as to whether the move to allow for deregulation in the 1996 act was the best decision,1 thus creating an environment where only a few conglomerates would own a majority of the television broadcast frequencies, which had the potential to limit multiple perspectives and opinions. The 1996 act eliminated all national radio ownership limits and allowed for conglomerates to own multiple stations in multiple media markets throughout the nation. The duopoly rule for radio, where two conglomerates or owners were not allowed to have firm control of a media market, was repealed, allowing for the ownership of up to 8 radio stations in media markets with 45 or more radio stations, 6 radio stations in media markets with 15 to 29 radio stations, and 5 stations in smaller media markets with less than 15 radio stations.2 Critics argued that the 1996 act promoted a concentration of power and conglomerate mergers rather than creating a competitive environment in the media marketplace.3 The 1996 act also extended the length of time that licenses were effective from seven years to eight years. But, more importantly, the 1996 act created a situation where license renewals were automatic unless the licensee

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requesting renewal had demonstrated a pattern of (1) not serving the public interest, (2) demonstrating serious rule violations, and (3) not violating other regulations that combined would constitute a pattern of abuse. Unless these three things combined could be demonstrated by anyone wishing to challenge the license renewal, there was an automatic renewal to the existing licensee. This was a vast departure from previous practices where licensees were required to prove they were serving the public interest and had earned the privilege of receiving a license renewal. DiCola and Thomson note that the 1996 act “virtually ruled out the possibility of licensees being challenged by competitors on the grounds of their public behavior.”4 Prior to 1996, it would cost large sums of money in legal fees for licensees to defend their right to maintain the license and frequency assignment. The purpose of the deregulatory nature of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 was not only designed to stimulate economic growth in the communications industry but also to advance the “core public interest concerns of promoting diversity and competition.”5 The marketplace was indeed stimulated with billions of dollars worth of media mergers taking place just prior to and after the 1996 act was signed into law. In anticipation of the bill’s passage, Chancellor Broadcasting Company owned by Roy E. Disney, a nephew of Walt Disney, paid $395 million for 17 radio stations located in many of the largest media markets in the nation, including New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, and Atlanta.6 In 1995, Infinity Broadcasting Corporation purchased 12 radio stations from Pyramid Communications for $306 million.7 Rather than promote diversity and competition, one study found that two companies alone—Clear Channel Communications and Viacom—were in control of 42 percent of radio listeners and 45 percent of radio revenue. The same study found that only 10 companies controlled two-thirds of all the listeners and all the revenues of the radio industry.8 In the case of Clear Channel Communications, it owned 1,240 radio stations throughout the nation, reaching more than 100 million listeners or nearly one-third of the entire U.S. population.9 This consolidation of ownership had a tremendous impact on the music industry. The same study revealed that only four companies controlled over 50 percent of the total listening audience in regard to 28 out of 30 of the major music formats available to consumers.10 Peter DiCola, the Director of Economic Analysis for the Future of Music Coalition, asserted: Radio consolidation has no demonstrated benefits for the public. Nor does it have any demonstrated benefits for the working people of the music and media industries, including DJs, programmers—and musicians. The Telecom Act unleashed an unprecedented wave of radio mergers that left a highly consolidated national radio market and extremely consolidated

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local radio markets. Radio programming from the largest station groups remains focused on just a few formats—many of which overlap with each other, enhancing the homogenization of the airwaves.11

Gigi Sohn, the Executive Director of Media Access Project, agreed that there is a homogenization of radio formats, observing everything sounds the same regardless of which city the radio station is located.12 Some listeners complain of the blandness of radio formats or the repetitious nature of post-deregulatory programming. Paragon Research conducted a study to determine whether listeners believed radio programming was repetitious and found that 84 percent of listeners thought radio stations should stop playing the same songs over and over, 75 percent of radio listeners thought that stations should play more than one or two songs from a CD or album, and 54 percent of radio listeners thought stations should play more unfamiliar music.13 Clear Channel Communications benefited enormously from the passage of the 1996 act and has been the target of much criticism as a result of its impressive dominance of the radio industry and aggressive business practices.14 Clear Channel is headquartered in San Antonio, Texas, where in 1972 the company started with one radio station; it now owns more than 1,200 radio stations throughout the United States.15 Not only does Clear Channel own more radio stations than any other media conglomerate, but it also owns concert, or live entertainment, venues throughout the nation. The company has been accused of forcing musicians to perform in its concert venues or not have their music played on Clear Channel radio stations.16 In 2003, the Senate Judiciary Committee examined the issue of payola, which is a pay-for-play system in which radio station owners require payment from artists and record companies before music is played on radio stations. Despite the fact that payola is an illegal practice in the radio industry, critics of Clear Channel Communications allege that the conglomerate is engaging in the practice.17 In 2003, Clear Channel Communications adopted a policy that ended the practice of payola in which promoters of music had to pay radio stations to have the music they were promoting played on stations owned by Clear Channel Communications.18 Pay-for-play, or payola, is big business for the industry. Studies show that nearly $100 million is spent annually by record companies through middlemen, known as “indies,” to serve as promoters of a record company’s music.19 The consolidation of radio stations has encouraged the use of pay-for-play. Katunich noted, “With multiple stations in the same market controlled by one entity, the number of station outlets available —should a station in one market refuse to air a song—is considerably reduced,” which encourages record companies to participate in payola.20 Moreover, “New radio conglomerates hungry for revenue to compensate for the expensive consolidation

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process are exploiting potentially illegal ways to increase profits through joint marketing airplay, promotions, and free radio concerts.”21 Pay-for-play can influence not only which songs are played on radio stations but also which songs are heavily promoted to radio listeners and consumers of music. For example, if a large radio station wishes to sponsor a concert to generate a profit, the station will offer a band or artist less than the usual performance price to appear at the concert. If the band rejects the radio station’s offer, the radio station has the ability to stop playing the performer’s music. And, with large conglomerates such as Clear Channel Communications owning the vast majority of radio stations throughout the nation, it could have a detrimental impact on the success of the performer. One observer characterized this as “extortion” by the conglomerates.22 Critics of payola suggest that the system promotes bland, homogenized music that was simply the highest bid from an “indie” rather than “good” music that radio listeners and music consumers actually desire. As a result of the pay-for-play investigation that involved major radio conglomerates such as Clear Channel Communications and others, the FCC concluded that there was inappropriate business practices occurring and that the conglomerates should be required to air 4,200 hours of local and independent music. The Future of Music Coalition blog stated, “This meant that the talented artists that had long been excluded from the airwaves in favor of payola driven play lists were finally getting a small bone.”23 Financially, though, this did not mean much to the independent musicians because Clear Channel Communications required independent musicians to waive their performance rights to prevent the conglomerate from having to pay royalties on the airing of the music. Moreover, when the Digital Performance Act was established, the NAB successfully worked behind the scenes with legislators to ensure that the conglomerates would not have to pay performance rights to musicians from music played on high definition radio. The Future of Music Coalition stated, “That’s right, the richest, largest and most powerful broadcasters—including Clear Channel—secured an exemption for themselves. Other digital broadcasters such as Live365, Sirius, and XM pay the royalty.”24 In 2002, there was an attempt by U.S. Senator Russell Feingold (D-Wisconsin) to get legislation passed, titled “Competition in Radio and Concert Industries Act,” which would have prevented monopolistic practices from occurring in regard to the ownership and control of live entertainment venues.25 At a hearing on the matter by the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, Senator Feingold stated, I have been hearing from independent radio stations and concert promoters in Wisconsin who are being pushed out by anti-competitive practices that are in turn a result of concentration. The Telecommunications Act

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of 1996 opened the floodgates for concentration in the radio and concert industry, and that’s exactly why we are here today—because we need to repair the damage that has been done through this anti-competitive behavior.26

At the 2003 Senate hearing on radio consolidation and deregulation, the CEO of Clear Channel Communications, Lowry Mays, argued that the Telecommunications Act of 1996 actually saved the radio industry from financial collapse noting that before the 1996 act was passed more than half of the radio stations in the nation were not performing well financially and were in the red. Mays noted that while the top 10 largest corporations owning radio stations do indeed produce 44 percent of the industry’s revenue, only 5 record labels control 84 percent of CD sales.27 Additionally, Mays noted that concert ticket prices have increased to account for a decrease in CD sales to listeners and fans and did not attribute the rise in concert ticket prices to anything that Clear Channel Communications was responsible for through its live entertainment venues.28 The regulatory changes of the 1996 act created a situation where programming choices for radio listeners were scaled back. One study noted that oligopolies, a situation where a few producers have a significant affect on the entire market, exist in geographic media markets and music formats and asserts the “consequences of geographic and format oligopolies have more acute effects for the listening public, small businesses, and musicians.”29 In a study titled “False Premises, False Promises: A Quantitative History of Ownership Consolidation,” it was found that large conglomerate-owned radio stations tend to choose from approximately eight music formats, or genres, thus excluding many niche musical formats such as Classical, Jazz, Bluegrass, New Rock, and Folk.30 DiCola and Thomson asserted, “consolidation reduces the number of gatekeepers controlling access to the airwaves.”31 For example, if one company owns most of the stations that format a specific music genre, then that company controls which musicians get air play on radio stations. As a result of ownership consolidation within the radio industry, there now exists a consolidation of formats. DiCola and Thomson suggested: “Few firms controlling a format may mean less competition and less innovation in playlists, resulting in less diversity and less interest.”32 In contrast, an FCC study found that “consolidation has played a very little role in playlist diversity, although this might not be the case in smaller markets.”33 DiCola and Thomson believe that a lack of diversity in radio music playlists has become a reality. A lack of diversity in the playlists is not the only thing some observers of the radio industry have noticed since the passage of the 1996 act. WQBHAM was an African American–owned station in Detroit that programmed

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liberal to moderate talk shows, gospel music, and religious programming but is now owned by a conglomerate, Salem Communications. Now, WQBH no longer exists and has not only changed its call letters to WDTK but also programs conservative talk shows and religious programming on the weekends only. One Detroit radio industry observer noted, “The Federal Communications Commission has destroyed community radio by letting all these big conglomerates buy these stations. It’s leading to the destruction of minorityowned small stations—stations all over the country.”34 In their study, DiCola and Thomson found that every radio format available to radio listeners, except for Adult Standards and Nostalgia, is controlled by an oligopoly. Thus, musicians find it difficult to get airplay time for their music because over 60 percent of radio listeners are controlled by oligopolies—or a small number of radio station owners. DiCola and Thomson observed: “This makes it much harder to gain airplay because only a large promotion budget can get a musician and a song through the bottleneck . . . Coupled with the growing practice of centralized programming, the reduced number of gatekeepers makes access to the airwaves far more difficult for musicians, especially local musicians.”35 Perhaps more alarming to musicians and listeners is the fact that some conglomerates have blacklisted musicians for holding political beliefs that are contrary to the conglomerate’s political beliefs. Clear Channel Communications and Cumulus Media banned all music performed by the Dixie Chicks from being played on radio stations owned by the two conglomerates because Natalie Maines, the lead singer of the Dixie Chicks, criticized President George W. Bush and the Iraqi War.36 Tom Petty’s song “The Last DJ” was also banned by some radio stations because it was considered antiradio. In response, in a Rolling Stone interview, Petty said, “I don’t really give a flying fuck about any of it. I’ve tuned out. But I was elated when my song was banned. I mean, nothing could have complimented me more than to hear they banned it at such-and-such a station because it’s anti-radio. Now, in 2002 to have a song banned that doesn’t have a dirty word, doesn’t advocate violence—it’s fascinating, you know. Like, what are you afraid of ? No record has ever been made that was more pro-radio, you know.”37 In an effort to protest further deregulation that was considered by the FCC in 2003, 30 well-known recording artists signed a letter of protest that stated that deregulation had “reduced marketplace competition, reduced programming diversity and the homogenization of playlists, reduced public access to the airwaves for local programming, and reduced public satisfaction with listening options.”38 The petition was signed by artists from all musical genres, including Jimmy Buffett, Don Henley, Toby Keith, Tim McGraw, Stevie Nicks, DJ Spooky, Pearl Jam, Tom Petty, Bonnie Raitt, and others.

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NEW MEDIA: SATELLITE RADIO AND PODCASTING The rapid proliferation of the World Wide Web has enabled and encouraged innovative ways to distribute information and entertainment. Traditionally, terrestrial radio and television were the primary outlets consumers used to access and listen to music and other types of entertainment. But, the appearance of and mainstream adoption of new media is changing the traditional media landscape. In 2007, at a Congressional hearing on the radio industry, W. Russell Withers, Jr., the founder and owner of Withers Broadcasting Companies, stated: “Now, radio stations are competing for the same advertising dollars as television, cable, newspapers, Internet sites and huge Internet aggregators like Google.”39 Also, satellite radio is increasing its audience size because most new vehicles sold now come equipped with a satellite radio. Currently, there are two satellite radio providers, XM and Sirius. In 2007, there were attempts to merge the two satellite radio providers. Interestingly, although not linking the negative assertions about the merger of the two satellite companies to the traditional radio industry, members of the traditional radio industry proposed that if the merger was permitted by Congress that many of the predicted negatives were exactly what critics of traditional radio charged had occurred when deregulation was permitted within that industry. Withers stated, “A monopoly in satellite radio would clearly harm consumers by inviting subscription price increases, stifling innovation and reducing program diversity.”40 In 2008, the U.S. Department of Justice ruled that the merger could occur. DiCola and Thomson noted that proponents of the 1996 Telecommunications Act suggested that “financially sound radio stations would be able to compete more effectively against new media competitors” such as cable television and the Internet.41 And, former FCC chairman Michael Powell, believed that competition from the emergence of new media such as satellite radio and the Internet balanced the power gained by the conglomerates over traditional terrestrial radio and broadcasting. However, when Powell was considering initiating additional deregulation of the broadcasting industry in regards to television stations, one observer noted: If you think concentration in Old Media is okay because New Media will provide the discipline, then stand up for freeing the New Media from the shackles that Old Media are trying to weld on. Because if you’re not serious about freeing the New Media, then you’re not serious about competition, and what you’re describing isn’t a bold new world, but a sellout.42

Boehlert noted, “When one company dominates an industry, it can leverage its monopoly power in all kinds of unpleasant ways, both politically and economically.”43

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As one observer of the radio industry noted, the “deregulation of radio was tough on good-neighbor radio because Clear Channel and other conglomerates were anxious to vacuum up every station in sight for fabulous sums of cash and turn them into robot repeaters . . . With a whole generation turning to iPod and another generation discovering satellite radio and Internet radio, the robotic formatted-music station looks like a very marginal operation indeed.”44 Another observer offered additional criticism of terrestrial radio: “By the 1990s terrestrial radio had ceased being entertainment. Instead it became a real estate grab and a political game.”45 The traditional radio industry has had a difficult time integrating Internet radio as a means to offer ancillary programming to listeners. The Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) was criticized by the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) for implementing copyright law it deemed incompatible with traditional radio practices. Specifically, there were three copyright conditions the NAB requested to be removed from the traditional radio stations who stream audio via the Internet, which included (1) the prohibition of playing three tracks from the same CD within a three-hour period, (2) the prohibition of pre-announcing songs, and (3) the requirement of providing text data identifying the programming. Withers noted, “Radio stations should not be forced to choose between either radically altering their over-the-air programming practices or risking uncertain and costly copyright infringement litigation.”46 Satellite radio is growing in popularity. As one observer noted, “In a marketplace where seemingly every company wants evergreen monthly charges on consumer’s credit cards, satellite radio delivered a product that millions upon millions of end users thought was worth it and they bucked up.”47 Several core approaches are believed to have contributed to the success of satellite radio. They include the ability to offer satellite radio listeners local programming through traffic reports and weather reports in the major media markets, offering better programming based on listener preferences, having a satellite radio installed in all news cars, and increasing the audible quality of sound of satellite radio through digital quality audio and surround sound.48 By 2001, technological advancements permitted audio files to be transferred to and from Web pages thus creating a rudimentary form of podcasting. A podcast is an mp3 file that is located on Web pages for consumers to download and listen to at a convenient time, known as time shifting. There are many Internet podcast, or mp3, portals, such as iTunes, that permit consumers to purchase music and download it to mp3 players or download programs, similar to traditional radio programs, that discuss specific topics. Hendricks noted: As a result of this technology, consumers can listen to podcasts at their convenience. Traditional terrestrial broadcasting does not offer consumers this flexibility, or time shifting. If a listener misses a favorite radio show,

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then he must wait until the following day or week when the show is programmed. Podcasts significantly change this listening paradigm by offering consumers the ability to access programming and listen to it at a time that is convenient to their schedules.49

In 2005, one study indicated that approximately 11 percent of all Americans own iPods.50 Moreover, one study indicated that more than a billion songs have been downloaded for podcast, or mp3, use.51 Podcasting is being marketed to not only an older consumer but also to younger consumers in their teens and preteens with such programming as Disney’s High School Musical and Nickelodeon’s Zoey 101. Most importantly, podcasting permits consumers to access the genre of music they desire, and it permits consumers to listen to that music when and where they desire. Traditional radio cannot make that claim. Niche programming, diverse programming, and consumer driven programming are the desires of the twenty-first-century music consumer, and podcasting offers it all to consumers. LOW POWER FM RADIO STATIONS On January 20, 2000, the FCC authorized the issuance of licenses for a new form of terrestrial radio referred to as low power FM (LPFM) radio, and the rules for this new type of broadcast license became effective on April 17, 2000. Although noncommercial educational facilities are eligible to apply for a license and operate a LPFM radio station, individuals are not permitted to apply for a license. The maximum wattage for a LPFM station is 100 watts, which would provide geographic coverage of approximately three and a half miles, while the 10 watts is the smallest LPFM station and would provide geographic coverage of approximately one to two miles. There will be no commercial LPFM radio station licenses issued by the FCC nor can companies currently owning cable systems or newspapers be granted a LPFM radio license. The FCC must specify certain windows of time when applications can be submitted for a LPFM license.52 The NAB, a powerful lobbying group that represents traditional terrestrial broadcasters, has successfully opposed the full-scale licensing of LPFM radio stations. The NAB argued that LPFM radio would introduce technical interference by being placed alongside traditional FM radio stations on the radio dial. In 2007, at a Congressional hearing on the future of radio, Withers stated, “local broadcasters do not oppose the licensing of LPFM stations.”53 Coincidentally, in the same testimony before Congress, Withers stated, “local broadcasters oppose S. 1675, the Local Community Radio Act of 2007,” which allowed for licensing of additional LPFM radio stations.54 In 2000, there was Congressional wrangling over whether the LPFM radio stations should continue to be allowed to exist. The FCC allows for

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public comments when such matters are considered, and the LPFM radio issue generated more than 3,000 written comments from the public, which was more than the FCC had received in its entire history on any single issue.55 Additionally, the LPFM radio issue had an impressive list of supporters, including the Green Party, the Catholic Conference, the Library Association of America, the ACLU, the Council of Calvin Christian Reformed Church, Native American tribes, the United Church of Christ, and several high-profile celebrities such as Jesse Jackson and Bonnie Raitt.56 Initially, not only did the NAB oppose LPFM radio, but also National Public Radio (NPR) opposed the concept. Public Radio’s Regional Organization recommended that LPFM radio be delegated to the Internet and not the FM spectrum despite the fact that more than 100 million Americans lacked Internet access.57 The traditional radio industry encouraged Congress to push through legislation increasing the use of FM translators, which allows for the retransmission of existing radio signals to further points in a geographic area. Withers stated, “Affording preferential treatment to new LPFM stations would jeopardize FM stations’ delivery of important, locally-oriented programming to many parts of the country via FM translators.”58 In June 2007, U.S. Congressmen Mike Doyle, a Democrat from Pennsylvania, and Lee Terry, a Republican from Nebraska, announced their intention to introduce legislation that would promote the creation of more LPFM radio stations. The Future of Music Coalition Blog viewed this as a positive move for the music industry and stated, “Given the shrinking playlists and bland programming brought about by radio consolidation over the last decade, low power FM has the potential to create radio that is truly radio: local voices, cutting edge music and genres that are not regularly heard on commercial radio.”59 Low power FM radio stations have the ability to serve underrepresented community groups and musical genres that have been overlooked by large, mainstream, traditional radio stations owned by conglomerates. A fact sheet from the Future of Music Coalition asserts: “Music that is not perceived as highly profitable is not usually heard on the radio in many communities, impacting the livelihoods of many musicians, including jazz, classical and world music artists. Musicians find it increasingly difficult to reach listeners via the airwaves, while presenting organizations, orchestras and opera companies have fewer opportunities to promote their performances and broaden their audience base.”60 Illustrating this point, the Future of Music fact sheet on LPFM radio stations pointed out that Opelousas, Louisiana, was the birthplace of Zydeco music, but the genre could not be heard on local radio stations until a LPFM radio station was licensed to that community.61 Moreover, LPFM radio stations offer women and minority opportunities to own and work in radio, musicians are afforded valuable airtime for new and diverse music, religious groups get access to airtime, farmers benefit

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from agricultural information that can be targeted to that demographic, and LPFM radio stations provide yet another viewpoint.62 Proponents of LPFM radio stations note that 51 percent of the population is female, but only 6 percent of radio stations are owned by women; also, 33 percent of the population consists of ethnic minorities, yet only 7.7 percent of all radio stations are owned by minorities. Low power FM radio has the potential to improve these statistics. Observers of the LPFM radio movement, noted that the low wattage stations have not been as successful as groups such as the National Federation of Community Broadcasters (NFCB) had hoped. Proponents of LPFM radio stations believe the licensing process is too slow with the FCC and is risky on the front end of the venture because the FCC requires that the LPFM stations be built in advance of a license being issued. Also, the existing LPFM radio stations have failed to offer the diverse programming some had predicted. Silverman stated, “nearly half of the 710 low-power permits the FCC issued have gone to religious organizations.”63 A LPFM radio station success story, however, is KEDU-LP in Ruidoso, New Mexico, which broadcasts both local and international news, music, and a women’s football team; the station relies on local DJs with local programming.64 FUTURE OF RADIO Technological advancements are having profound influence on traditional mass media in general and particularly the radio industry. The Internet and other new media such as LPFM radio offer unprecedented outlets and choices to music consumers. Perhaps more importantly, the Internet and new media technologies are enabling music consumers to obtain music and information that is tailored specifically to their individual interests. Technological advancements are providing consumers the ability to have more control of what they listen to and when they listen to it, rather than to have it all filtered by large media conglomerates. Regarding new technology’s impact on radio and music listening habits, one study noted that the dialogue was well underway regarding whether podcasting is simply a fad that will soon fade or a rapidly proliferating new mass medium that will rival modern radio.65 It is not evident if one considers that Adam Curry, the individual considered to be the founder of podcasting, has a “traditional” radio show on Sirius satellite radio that can be listened to with traditional radio receivers versus an mp3 player. However, in contrast, one could also point to the fact that satellite radio differs greatly from traditional radio and is actually a form of new media similar to podcasting. In this regard, Greenlee stated, “podcasting is more about the grassroots creation of audio content and listener control than about being a technological revolution.”66

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As new media such as podcasting, satellite radio, Internet radio, and LPFM radio generates more advertising revenue and listener support, Greenlee asserted that “all the same issues of distribution and advertising placement will come back into play and the model that made broadcast radio successful will make podcasting [and all other new media] a commercial success.”67 The sizeable new media listener base should remain steady as young consumers of music mature and remain loyal to the technological advancements. Also, it is possible that technological advancements will continue to attract new and younger listeners to other Internet-based interfaces, thus creating the possibility that traditional radio listenership will continue to decline. Specifically, regarding satellite radio, observers noted, “As these new satellite services mature and grow in popularity, they will become an increasingly important vehicle for fans who delight in the discovery of music.”68 Internet-based technology such as Pandora, which is an Internet radio station that can be listened to on computers and home entertainment systems, offer a truly extraordinary experience for consumers of music. Other popular and growing Internet radio services include AOL, Musicmatch, and Yahoo!’s Launch.69 Using a “musical taxonomy” called the Music Genome Project, once the listeners provide Pandora with the name of a favorite song or artist, the listener is then provided a list of artists and Internet radio stations that precisely match their musical tastes.70 Pandora boasts 8.5 million registered users and is the third largest Internet radio service in the United States. Furthermore, studies indicate that music listeners prefer niche programming, and Pandora-type technology certainly takes it to an elevated level. Regarding Pandora, Westergren stated, “Something unique about Pandora is that all music, once analyzed by our musicologists and entered into our database, wins and loses audience in the purest of democratic processes. If listeners vote ‘thumbs up’ a song and artist are electronically added to more station playlists, the exposure is greater, and more people can offer opinions about that music. If listeners consistently vote ‘thumbs down’ then the song is performed and heard less.”71 Pandora has a music library of hundreds of thousands of songs from all genres that “range from the most popular artists to the completely obscure.”72 Furthermore, while only 10 percent of the music on traditional radio is performed by independent musicians, on Pandora that number is more than 50 percent. This is indeed the future of radio precisely because music consumers are adopting these new technologies and all of its advantages over traditional radio. In total, Internet radio boasts more than 70 million listeners, while traditional radio and homogenized music formats are losing listeners. Above all, to maintain its listener base and effectively compete in the marketplace, traditional radio must confront several important constraints that new media do not face. New media posses several advantages: (1) the popularity for new media illustrates consumers’ desires for niche programming;

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(2) new media can be archived for later use, or time shifted; (3) audiences are attracted to the less intrusive advertising used in new media versus the commercial breaks that interrupt programming in traditional broadcasting; and (4) new media programming is mostly unregulated by the FCC. In sum, traditional broadcasting remains strong, but the industry must stay alert as emerging technologies offer listeners more personal, unfiltered programming options for music aficionados.73 In conclusion, David Kusek and Gerd Leonhard note, “Podcasting is pirate radio for the twenty-first century, and will have as profound an effect on traditional radio as blogging has had on publishing.”74 The reason that podcasting, along with other forms of new media such as satellite radio and LPFM radio stations, is expected to have a significant impact on the future of radio is due in part because of its ability to deliver interesting, diverse, and new music along with consumer driven programming. New media also offer less repetitious programming and less homogenization in regard to programming. The future of radio is reliant upon its ability to recognize and deliver better programming based on listener preferences in accordance to the desire of consumers to hear what they want to hear when they want to hear it as they can with other new media such as iPods, Satellite radio, and LPFM radio. Despite the emergence of new media, the traditional radio industry remains robust and has a long history of successfully adapting to competition (e.g., television), and consumers will remain the beneficiaries of this competitive media marketplace in the twenty-first century. NOTES 1. “FCC Gives Big Business A Boost With Latest Ruling Dated June 2, 2003,” Swingmusic.net, http://www.swingmusic.net/FCC_Music_Ownership_Media_Mergers. html (accessed November 18, 2002). 2. George Williams, Keith Brown, and Peter Alexander, “Radio Market Structure and Music Diversity,” Federal Communications Commission, Media Bureau Staff Research Paper (September 2002). 3. John Allen Hendricks, “The Telecommunications Act of 1996: Its Impact on the Electronic Media of the 21st Century,” Communications and the Law, 21 (1999): 39–53. 4. Peter DiCola and Kristin Thomson, “Radio Deregulation: Has it Served Citizens and Musicians?” Future of Music Coalition, http://www.futureofmusic.org, p. 12 (accessed November 18, 2002). 5. FCC Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, November 8, 2001. 6. Allen R. Myerson, “The Media Business; Chancellor to Acquire 17 Radio Stations,” The New York Times, August 4, 1995, http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage. html?res=990CE0D9143FF937A3575BC0A963958260 (accessed November 9, 2007). 7. Ibid. 8. Peter DiCola and Kristin Thomson, “Radio Deregulation: Has it Served Citizens and Musicians?” Future of Music Coalition, http://www.futureofmusic.org, p. 12 (accessed November 18, 2002).

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9. Ibid. 10. Ibid. 11. Peter DiCola, “False Premises, False Promises: A Quantitative History of Ownership Consolidation in the Radio Industry” (December 2006), p 5. http://www.futureof music.org/research/radiostudy06.cfm (accessed December 18, 2007). 12. Matt Spangler, “Can’t Find Nothin’ On Radio?: Consumer Advocates, Group Heads Clash Over Consolidation’s Effect on Programming Diversity, R&R Online, July 31, 1998, http://www.radiodiversity.com/nothingonradio.html (accessed on November 11, 2007). 13. Ibid. 14. Randy Dotinga, “Murky Water for Clear Channel,” Wired, August 7, 2002, http:// www.wired.com/print/techbiz/media/news/2002/08/54038 (accessed November 10, 2007). 15. “Clear Channel CEO Defends Radio Deregulation,” The San Antonio Business Journal, January 30, 2003, http://www.bizjournals.com/sanantonio/stories/2003/ 01/27/daily29.html?t=printable (accessed November 11, 2007). 16. Eric Boehlert, “Clear Channel’s Big, Stinking Deregulation Mess,” Salon.com, February 19, 2003, http://dir.salon.com/story/tech/feature/2003/02/19/clear_ channel_deregulation/ (accessed November 11, 2007). 17. Ibid. 18. William Baue, “Blacklisting, Voicetracking, and Payola: Clear Channel and the Effects of Media Consolidation,” Socialfunds.com, May 23, 2003, http://www.social funds.com/news/print.cgi?sfArticleId=1130 (accessed November 11, 2007). 19. Lauren J. Katunich, “Time to Quit Paying the Payola Piper: Why Music Industry Abuse Demands a Complete System Overhaul,” Loyola of Los Angeles Entertainment Law Review, 22 (April 29, 2002). 20. Ibid., 654. 21. Ibid. 22. Ibid., 667. 23. “Low Power Radio Bill Drops as Clear Channel Causes More Static,” Future of Music Coalition Blog, June 19, 2007, http://futureofmusiccoalition.blogspot.com/ 2007/06/low-power-radio-bill-drops-as-clear-html (accessed November 10, 2007). 24. Ibid. 25. Eric Boehlert, “Clear Channel’s Big, Stinking Deregulation Mess,” Salon.com, February 19, 2003, http://dir.salon.com/story/tech/feature/2003/02/19/clear_ channel_deregulation/ (accessed November 11, 2007). 26. Clear Channel CEO Defends Radio Deregulation,” The San Antonio Business Journal, January 30, 2003, http://www.bizjournals.com/sanantonio/stories/ 2003/01/27/daily29.html?t=printable (accessed November 11, 2007). 27. Ibid. 28. Ibid. 29. Peter DiCola and Kristin Thomson, “Radio Deregulation: Has it Served Citizens and Musicians?” Future of Music Coalition, http://www.futureofmusic.org, p. 32 (accessed November 18, 2002). 30. Peter DiCola, December 2006, “False Premises, False Promises: A Quantitative History of Ownership Consolidation in the Radio Industry,” http://www.futureofmu sic.org/research/radiostudy06.cfm (accessed December 18, 2007).

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31. Ibid., 36. 32. Peter DiCola and Kristin Thomson, “Radio Deregulation: Has it Served Citizens and Musicians?” Future of Music Coalition, http://www.futureofmusic.org, p. 36 (accessed November 18, 2002). 33. George Williams, Keith Brown, and Peter Alexander, “Radio Market Structure and Music Diversity,” Federal Communications Commission, Media Bureau Staff Research Paper (September 2002): 18. 34. Luther Keith, “Detroit Radio Lost Community Fixture,” The Detroit News, June 13, 2005, http://www.detnews.com/2005/metro/0506/13/A02–213375.htm (accessed November 9, 2007). 35. Peter DiCola and Kristin Thomson, “Radio Deregulation: Has it Served Citizens and Musicians?” Future of Music Coalition, http://www.futureofmusic.org, p. 40 (accessed November 18, 2002). 36. William Baue, “Blacklisting, Voicetracking, and Payola: Clear Channel and the Effects of Media Consolidation,” Socialfunds.com, May 23, 2003, http://www.social funds.com/news/print.cgi?sfArticleId=1130 (accessed November 11, 2007). 37. David Wild, “Tom Petty is Pissed: And He’s Got Plenty of Good Reasons,” Rolling Stone, October 23, 2002, http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/5933643/ tom_petty_is_pissed (accessed January 13, 2008). 38. Bill Holland, “Artists Take Stand Against Radio Deregulation,” Billboard, April 29, 2003, http://www.allbusiness.com/retail-trade/miscellaneous-retail-stores-not/ 4610310–1.html (accessed November 11, 2007). 39. Testimony of W. Russell Withers, Jr., on behalf of the National Association of Broadcasters at the “Hearing on the Future of Radio.” United States Senate, Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, October 24, 2007, pp. 5–6. 40. Ibid. 41. Peter DiCola and Kristin Thomson, “Radio Deregulation: Has it Served Citizens and Musicians?” Future of Music Coalition, http://www.futureofmusic.org, p. 13 (accessed November 18, 2002). 42. Glenn Harlan Reynolds, “Open and Shut,” TCS Daily, May 20, 2003, http:// www.tcsdaily.com/printArticle.aspx?ID=052003B (accessed November 11, 2007). 43. Eric Boehlert, “Clear Channel’s Big, Stinking Deregulation Mess,” Salon.com, February 19, 2003, http://dir.salon.com/story/tech/feature/2003/02/19/clear_chan nel_deregulation/ (accessed November 11, 2007). 44. Garrison Keillor, The Nation, May 23, 2005, http://www.thenation.com/doc/ 20050523/keillor (accessed November 11, 2007). 45. Jerry Del Colliano, Jr., “Will One Satellite Provider Be Better Than Two?: How Satellite Radio Can Rule Supreme and Save the Music Business at the Same Time,” Audio/Video News, February 22, 2007, http://www.avrev.com/news/0207/22.xm sirius015.shtml (accessed November 11, 2007). 46. Testimony of W. Russell Withers, Jr., on behalf of the National Association of Broadcasters at the “Hearing on the Future of Radio.” United States Senate, Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, October 24, 2007, p. 11. 47. Jerry Del Colliano, Jr., “Will One Satellite Provider Be Better Than Two?: How Satellite Radio Can Rule Supreme and Save the Music Business at the Same Time,” Audio/Video News, February 22, 2007, http://www.avrev.com/news/0207/22.xm sirius015.shtml (accessed November 11, 2007).

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48. Ibid. 49. John Allen Hendricks, “Podcasting vs. Broadcasting: An Analysis of Listener Pervasiveness, Advertising Revenue, and Regulatory Considerations,” Feedback, 48, p. 17. 50. L. Rainie and M. Madden, “Podcasting,” Pew Internet & American Life Project Data Memo, http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_podcasting2005–05–06-podcast (accessed June 12, 2007). 51. D. Smith, “Why the iPod Is Losing Its Cool,” The Observer, http://observer. guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,1869042,0 (accessed September 9, 2006). 52. “Low Power FM Radio Service,” Federal Communications Commission, http:// www.fcc.gov/mb/policy/lpfm/ (accessed November 10, 2007). 53. Testimony of W. Russell Withers, Jr., on behalf of the National Association of Broadcasters at the “Hearing on the Future of Radio.” United States Senate, Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, October 24, 2007, p. 7. 54. Ibid., 6. 55. Eric Boehlert, “Big Radio Bites Back!” Salon.com, October 16, 2000, http://archive. salon.com/ent/feature/2000/10/16/lpfm/print.html (accessed November 10, 2007). 56. Ibid. 57. Eric Boehlert, “Mixed Signals,” Salon.com, April 11, 2000, http://archive.salon. com/news/feature/2000/04/11/print.html (accessed November 10, 2007). 58. Testimony of W. Russell Withers, Jr., on behalf of the National Association of Broadcasters at the “Hearing on the Future of Radio.” United States Senate, Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, October 24, 2007, p. 8. 59. Future of Music Coalition Blog, June 19, 2007, “Low power radio bill drops as Clear Channel causes more static,” http://futureofmusiccoalition.blogspot.com/2007/ 06/low-power-radio-bill-drops-as-clear.html (accessed November 10, 2007). 60. Future of Music Coalition on Low Power FM Radio Fact Sheet 2007, http://www. futureofmusic.org/articles/LPFMfactsheet07.cfm (accessed November 10, 2007). 61. Ibid. 62. “Support Low Power FM: Local radio Now . . . Who Benefits from Low Power Radio?” Freepress.net, http://www.freepress.net/lpfm/=benefits (accessed November 10, 2007). 63. Jason Silverman, “Low-Watt Radio Wields Its Power,” Wired, April 26, 2004, http://www.wired.com/print/politics/law/news/2004/04/63198 (accessed November 10, 2007). 64. Ibid. 65. John Allen Hendricks, “Podcasting vs. Broadcasting: An Analysis of Listener Pervasiveness, Advertising Revenue, and Regulatory Considerations,” Feedback, 48. 66. R. Greenlee, “Is Podcasting Becoming Just Radio?” Web Talk Radio, 2005, p. 1 http://www.webtalkguys.com/5182005.shtml (accessed July 2, 2006). 67. Ibid., 2. 68. David Kusek and Gerd Leonhard, The Future of Music: Manifesto for the Digital Revolution (Boston, MA: Berklee Press, 2005), 63. 69. Ibid. 70. Testimony of Tim Westergren on behalf of the Digital Media Association at the “Hearing on the Future of Radio.” United States Senate, Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, October 24, 2007.

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71. Ibid., 2. 72. Ibid. 73. John Allen Hendricks, “Podcasting vs. Broadcasting: An Analysis of Listener Pervasiveness, Advertising Revenue, and Regulatory Considerations,” Feedback, 48. 74. David Kusek and Gerd Leonhard, The Future of Music: Manifesto for the Digital Revolution (Boston, MA: Berklee Press, 2005), 62.

chapter 11

The Business of Radio in the Daily Soundscape: Reshaping and Defining the Music Box in Consumer Culture Phylis Johnson

Millions of Americans listen to radio when they wake up in the morning, perhaps with a song serving as their alarm on their digital clock. Others depend on radio to entertain them in cars as they head for work. They scan the radio dial, with a large number of drivers seeking out stations with more music, less talk, occasionally allowing for a minute or two of headline news. Satellite radio services offer competing options with a plethora of music genres not previously available to drivers. The daily soundscape of music listening is being redefined at home, at work, and on the road. Many listeners choose to tune to favorite Internet stations off their laptops or music downloaded into their mp3 players. Radio, as a concept, is no longer confined to the AM/FM dial. That should not be so surprising given that radio, as a medium, has historically been in a state of transition as new technologies improved listeners’ experiences. Such experiences have usually centered on listening to live music performances and recorded renditions from popular singers. Technological changes have moved radio out of the house to the streets and into the factories and offices, as well as across the world through the Internet. Radio Today (2007) reports that radio is doing well even among fierce competition for audience attention: Well over 90% of all consumers 12 years and over listen to the radio each week—a higher penetration than television,

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magazines, newspapers or the Internet. Radio reaches people everywhere they are: at home, at work, in the car, in stores, restaurants and online— and, more recently, via cell phones. Regardless of age, time of day or geography, radio is America’s true media companion.1

From the radio industry’s vantage point, the business is doing well. Radio executives acknowledge that the impact of competing technologies and music services cannot be ignored. The chipping away at radio’s audience has made a number of companies proactive in their approaches to maintaining listenership. In a 2007 panel that I moderated as part of my university’s alumni celebrations, Clear Channel Radio executives stated that they are closely analyzing the listening trends among young consumers, particularly within the 7- to 10-yearold age range, to determine future directions for radio and music listening. On the other hand, college students and young adults increasingly voice complaints that AM/FM radio stations have outlived their usefulness to their lifestyles, given the availability of new satellite services and the growth of Web radio. To some, it is a matter of time before these new technologies completely capture younger demographics, while older audiences cling on to familiar technologies. The question then, is this: How will these new technologies change the definition of radio for the consumer in terms of their listening to music? With the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) continual relaxation of radio regulation and the subsequent growth of already super-sized corporate media entities, it is timely to consider the expectations of radio audiences, especially with regards to the wants and interests of music listeners given consolidation trends in entertainment industries in general. Moreover, one needs to consider the impact of these expectations on commercial radio stations that have historically generated audience and revenue primarily from music airplay and promotion. Particularly of concern are three relevant themes that appear to dominate industry discussions on the business of radio: (1) how to define radio culturally and technically in the digital Disney era, which began in the late 1990s with the launch of Disney radio marketed to young children and tweens on terrestrial stations and over the Internet; (2) the personalization of radio —the impact of customized online playlists on listening trends; (3) and the transformation of music technologies into viable global social platforms that promote lifestyles as well as songs. Online communities such as Last.fm and Second Life give us a glimpse of future listening and perhaps threaten to complicate the relationship between radio, record industries, and the listener (as a digital consumer). THE CONCEPT BEHIND HIT RADIO Since its inception, U.S. radio quickly assumed its role as an information and music provider. Music provided an inexpensive way to fill massive

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amounts of radio time. When live performances filled the airwaves, radio complemented the recording industry. When it began to merely play songs freely over the airwaves, the industry became concerned whether listeners would buy songs or albums. Radio’s relationship with the recording industry became particularly acrimonious when tape-recording technologies became available to consumers. When the listener was able to tape their favorite songs or popular song countdowns, the record industry would once again think long and hard about its association with radio and what role radio should have in helping to launch recording artists. The record industry historically has been the primary music supplier for the majority of commercial broadcast stations, and as such it still fuels the radio industry, although mainly with new releases and songs encompassing the past 50 years. In the United States, programming among music stations, in particular, offers little differentiation from one another, aside from falling into the mainstream formats and playlists tracked on the weekly charts of Radio & Records and Billboard Magazine. These publications are leading voices among several of the trade magazines shaping the sound of radio —be it online, satellite, or terrestrial. Radio & Records, the weekly radio industry trade publication, represents the symbiotic relationship between the two industries. Radio & Records reports on everything from the promotion of label executive and radio program directors to weekly station playlists representing every major radio format, from new age to urban to rock and everything in between. Stations report on the number of times a particular new artist is played weekly, and some stations take the lead in determining future hits. In contrast, Billboard Magazine reports on the number of records sold weekly in the consumer market. When Internet radio began to stream music, the radio industry rushed toward buying into its share of the Web market. The idea was to brand radio onto the Web. Prior to this point, the major record labels had a fairly strong and consistent business relationship with AM/FM radio. In fact, station personnel depended on record labels to provide the promotional materials to market new records and artists. Record labels, in turn, counted on radio to add these new artists into its music rotation. Radio has traditionally been a major player in determining what songs would become hits, at least until recent years. Music Television, of course, has been a strong player since the 1980s. But record labels sell songs, not necessarily videos. Radio disc jockeys promoted songs on the air, and listeners would run down to the local record stores. To some extent, consumers were prompted to shop for music when hearing a song on the radio. At the record store, they might pick up a weekly playlist from the number one Top 40 station to help them find new releases. As listeners began to tap into new songs on Web stations and increasingly subscribe to download sites, they began to recognize the convenience of purchasing music online. One could listen to a song, and then buy and download

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it. Others downloaded music illegally from a number of online services, many of which are now legitimate (e.g., Napster). Today consumers create their playlists using iTunes or the like, then archive them online, and download their selections onto personal digital players. They can create their own personal radio stations using WinAmp or Windows Media Player. They can compose and download playlists in several ways and bypass radio completely. The mystery and science behind the playlist is not as relevant in a consumer-driven marketplace. Whereas the radio industry was once dependent on the talents of program directors who could pick future hits, a number of competing services challenge these traditional methods. Consumers make their voices heard not by calling into radio stations on request lines, but by the downloading decisions that they make online while listening to online stations or services. The broadcast industry is dependent on a large song database for its daily airplay, with popular music being the primary product of many stations. In return, the radio stations comply with royalty fee structures established within the recording industry, primarily by contracting with performing rights organizations such as the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) and Broadcast Musicians Incorporated (BMI). Such agencies assist in the tracking of airplay and the payment of such services on behalf of record labels and recording artists. Given that most radio stations, not just AM/FM, air songs by artists represented by established record labels, this system seemed to work fairly well, until recently when new technologies became readily available to consumers through online and satellite services and triggered an industry of digital music bootleggers. Some AM/FM stations began to stream their programming online to their listeners from their Web sites. Add to that, payola scandals have made headlines in news media, with a number of radio personnel at the corporate level accepting promotional gifts and monies for excessively favorable promotion of new artists over broadcast airwaves.2 Independent labels and artists who have traditionally struggled for airplay on radio complain that major corporate radio stations and record labels ultimately restrict access into the music entertainment industry to those outside the mainstream. Many of these independent labels and artists have sought opportunities on Web radio, which has not only been perceived as a threat to the recording industry but an increasing challenge to terrestrial broadcasters who are restricted by tower transmission. Web and satellite radio and download services continue to wrestle with the record industry in determining appropriate licensing fee structures for use of copyrighted music. Listeners now have more access to recorded music (although not necessarily legally) than at any other time in the history of recording technology.

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THE GENERATIONAL GAP: DEFINING RADIO THROUGH YOUNGER EARS The Disney Corporation probably presents the best example of where radio is headed, at least from the perspective of younger generations and those companies that market toward their interests. With the rise of teen stars such as Hanna Montana, Disney radio has demonstrated the buying power of this maturing demographic, and it reaches its audience through a variety of technologies. Disney Radio is available as a format on 54 radio stations, with nearly all of them being AM frequencies.3 Disney has managed to capitalize on AM technology for a particular audience more interested in content than quality. Beginning in the mid-1970s, the bulk of radio audience transitioned to the FM dial, which was marketed as offering a quality listening experience.4 AM station managers sought formats such as news and talk that could generate new audiences, and by the mid-1980s even news/talk moved to FM.5 Meanwhile, Disney did some background research and found that children were hungry for content, regardless of its quality. Their first radios were often bought in stores’ toy departments, and these receivers had stronger AM than FM signals. When Disney Radio was launched in 1999, nearly all of the host stations transmitted across the AM dial. Nearly a decade later, Disney Radio remains strong across America, with most of its programming played on AM stations. Disney radio is also available on XM and Sirius satellite radio, online through iTunes, and through Mobile Radio via certain phone services. The popularity of highly compressed digital technologies such as mp3 players, which offer mobility en lieu of sound quality, gives evidence toward a new generation interested in content and convenience. mp3 players are digital recorders and players that allow the listener to download their music from their computer and play hours of songs on personal portable listening devices. Music played back on these devices has the clarity of compact discs but not the sound quality. mp3 songs typically exist within a narrow bandwidth, similar to the digital music played on satellite and Web radio.6 Defining radio used to be quite simple because it was the only game in town. Children have listened to radio since its early arrival, alongside parents and friends as well as alone in their bedrooms. Advertisers have only learned how to tap effectively into this market over the past two decades. Actually, the evolution toward children’s radio as a market force is not a new idea. Exceptional shows in the days of early radio generated family audiences. A generation of listeners has grown up experiencing radio as more than AM/FM and listens to Web radio or readily available downloads. Redefining radio has been a gradual process that has occurred over the past decade and can be linked to the growth of technology and the children who were part of radio’s transition on to the Internet.

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Since the mid-1950s, very little programming specifically targeted the youth market (particularly ages 11 and under) until 1990, aside from some occasional children’s shows that were aired on public radio in the United States, such as the popular PickleBerry, a weekly half-hour music program syndicated to 55 stations.7 In addition, this show airs on satellite and 300 cable outlets, as well as on the Radio Reading Service for the Blind. It is also streamed across the Internet. It can be heard in New York and New Jersey on Networks Companion Radio, a service for Convalescent Hospitals and Retirement Homes, as well as in four Children’s Hospitals in North California. Radio Lollipop offers a similar cable service that is broadcast in children’s hospital wards in the United Kingdom. Some producers have moved their efforts toward the Internet, believing that National Public Radio did little to support kids’ radio since the late 1980s.8 In 2000, Nickelodeon partnered with the Sesame Workshop (formerly the Children’s Television Workshop) to create Noggin, a network aimed toward 2 to 14 year olds complete with an interactive Web site for toddlers to teens. Noggin Radio soon became available to preschoolers via the Internet. Radio producers and programmers were eager to change the way American children listened to music and sought alternative programming on air and online in an attempt to capture a share of the youth market.9 The genesis of kids’ radio, a trend toward the broadcast of children’s programming on both commercial and noncommercial radio stations, as well as across the Internet, led to a rethinking of radio’s role. Scholarly research with regards to the phenomenal rise of children’s programming on radio and the Internet is virtually nonexistent. For the past decade, only one or two organizations, such as Children Now, have attempted to address the availability and quality of children’s programming on radio. The Internet is home to numerous children’s shows, some of which can also be heard on public and community radio stations. Until 2000, commercial radio —in general—had generally positioned itself away from younger demographics as a marketing strategy and instead targeted the 18 and older audiences. Christopher T. Dahl, single parent of two sons and founder of Children’s Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), has been credited with changing all that with the launch of Radio AAHS—a.k.a., kids’ radio. At its peak, Radio AAHS had 32 affiliates in the United States, with a 40 percent audience share of American households.10 By 1998, Radio Disney had launched a successful competing network.11 The CBC went silent on January 30, 1998. In 1994, Arbitron, the largest radio research company, released the results of its study on children’s radio listening habits and reported that radio reached 91 percent of children, aged 2 to 11 years old, who spend an average of seven hours a week listening to radio.12 Of all the radio shows available to children, many are linked to Web sites, and at least one-third offer programming via the Internet. Children and

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teens comprise the two largest growth sectors on the Internet. Music is its largest product. In 1992, Fox Broadcasting Network was one of the first companies to seek such opportunities, and in doing so, a radio version of its Fox’s Kids’ Countdown was born—indeed a 3-hour advertisement broadcast on contemporary hit radio stations across the United States. Decidedly, this move on the part of Fox management acknowledged radio’s ability to attract young listeners—8 to 17 year olds. Kids’ radio also offered investors another way to tap into the future consumers of America. At its launch, the airplay and marketing of “teen” superstars created huge teen markets: Radio Disney “plays heaping helpings of teen-appeal acts, such as Britney Spears, N’Sync, Backstreet Boys, and Christina Aguilera [and] seasoned with film and TVsoundtrack hits.”13 The children who once listened to early Disney radio are now teens, and Disney radio has established itself as a music market force beyond the AM dial. Commercial radio has historically attracted the attention of the youth market. It is only recently, however, that researchers have acknowledged the role of radio in the lives of youth and adolescents. Little research exists on radio’s presence and impact in the lives of children and teens, with the majority of media research focused primarily on television.14 Paul Guillifor states, “Adolescence is a time to rebel against the authority, and radio may help legitimize that rebellion.”15 Topics include drugs, politics, teen fads, and others, many of which are “most often mentioned on youth-oriented radio stations by disc jockeys, and through the lyrics of popular music.”16 In the November 6, 1999, Testimony of the American Academy of Pediatrics on the Social Impact of Music Violence, Frank Palumbo, MD, stated that music is “crucial” to the identity of teens, and issued a general warning to the Senate Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, Restructuring, and The District of Columbia: “As a society, however, we have to acknowledge the responsibility parents, the music industry, and others have in helping foster the nation’s children.”17 One reason why radio may have escaped much of the attention of media researchers and advocacy groups for children’s rights is because offensive lyrics have been typically blamed on the musicians and the recording industry. Yet, the radio industry, like cable and television, has aggressively pushed content limits over the past decade. Indecent language has filtered through the airwaves and has boosted, in several cases, record sales and airplay for some musicians. The Christian music industry flourished as a result of the backlash from teens and parents seeking Top 40 radio alternatives—pop songs with a positive message. Fox Kid’s Countdown, the “biggest nonDisney” syndicated program, as well as Disney Radio, in contrast, did not seek to provide moral alternatives to today’s popular music, rather its strategies were primarily concerned with ways in which songs capitalize on the teen market.18

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RADIO AS A PERSONAL MEDIUM Certain music formats, such as rhythmic contemporary hit radio, contemporary Christian, active rock, and alternative, have strongly established in-car listening audiences.19 Some of these formats do equally well with other mobile technologies, such as portable digital players. AM/FM Radio has served not only as a personal medium but also a social medium, as it has traditionally brought people together to share in music and culture. Black/urban radio has particularly reached out to help its listeners in times of great strife, for example, during the civil rights era and the Los Angeles riots of the late 1960s and again in the early 1990s. A number of New Orleans broadcasters came together to provide continuous coverage during Hurricane Katrina and subsequent relief efforts. Music, however, was not at the core of these experiences as stations transformed into news/talk operations for the duration of the crisis. Radio has particularly brought people together in times of celebration and crisis. However, listening is increasingly becoming a private experience. Disgruntled listeners tired of worn-out music rotations seek options that are less dependent on rigid corporate formats and polices. Format fragmentation during the 1990s was as much about radio stations’ finding their identity among 50 or so stations in the top radio markets as it was about offering consumers what appeared to be a choice among music genres. Listeners soon became weary of stations with marketing hype, cookie-cutter formats, and tight music rotations in which the same songs played over and over throughout the day. On the other hand, MTV has led the youth music movement since its inception in 1981, boasting a high percentage of male viewers 12–24 years old.20 It presents a mainstream approach comparable to radio with its limited playlist. In 2004, MTV decided to cater to its young male audience segment, which was determined as the “network’s most loyal audience,” through MTV2.21 This channel builds upon its audience’s niche interests in sports, video games, and cars and connects its viewers to content beyond a primarily musical emphasis. MTV seemed to realize that this audience wanted something beyond the music, although that was still important to their lifestyle. Radio managers are waking up to the fact that they must offer content beyond music in order to remain attractive to listeners who can get their music elsewhere. Interestingly, MTV Network Radio is one of the latest additions to the company’s media offerings. Radio is ubiquitous and is present in our listening soundscapes where we shop, work, and live, and some argue that it will remain viable in years to come. Its owners and programmers cannot easily overlook the challenges of Internet and digital radio as competing market forces and perhaps as evolutionary technologies.22 The record and radio industry, as a whole, have struggled toward a modern-day definition of radio not bound by transmission in the face of a consumer-driven market. MediaWeek

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reporter Katy Bachman states, “Today’s listeners can text or e-mail the station, compose playlists, chat with each other and on-air personalities, enter contests and buy music. Technology has allowed them to become truly involved in a station’s programming and advertising.”23 Bachman reports on how radio has been historically “limited by its license,” citing David Goodman, president of marketing for CBS Radio: “Now radio can be more. If you want to listen, that’s great. If you want to interact with the station using another device, you can. If you want to watch radio, you can.”24 Arbitron research clearly indicates that over the past decade radio’s national audience has remained strong. Yet, broadcast practices that worked five years ago are becoming obsolete in the wake of portable digital devices such as mp3 players and iPods. The challenge for the radio industry is to find a way to stay relevant to young consumers 12–17 years old and 18–24 years old, who enjoy a variety of listening options and segue between technologies effortlessly. For some companies, such as Clear Channel Radio, that means a strategic plan that envisions radio as more than AM/FM transmission. More than 50 percent of 12 to 17 year olds own a digital audio unit for personal music recording and playback.25 Arbitron reported in 2001 that radio had a strong role among preteens and younger audiences, and these listeners were more likely to be loyal toward a particular AM/FM station than other demographic groups.26 Other research indicates older teens and young adults are more likely to listen to their favorite tunes on an mp3 player or other digital media, citing reasons such as mobility and playback convenience.27 In doing so, these listeners tend to edit out commercials and nonmusic programming. Satellite users merely expand their listening options to include a variety of genres, without chatter or commercials. Subscribers tend to be in the upper middle class and represent annual household incomes of at least $100,000.28 The availability of satellite as an option to the general public is well known, with Howard Stern’s well-publicized move to Sirius Satellite Radio on January 9, 2006, underscoring its viability as a strong market force. The uncensored Stern is a signal to consumers, provoking them to embrace the new freedom—in speech and music—offered by satellite radio. As new cars come fully loaded with satellite services, FM stations will have to ensure their place on the dashboard. BMW promises that new cars in the near future will stream music and video content, and the company’s emphasis is currently on finding a content provider and working out licensing arrangements. A mini satellite dish would be placed on the roof of the car, and content would be downloaded for playback while on the road.29 As for the immediate future, online stations continue to supplement or replace radio for at-work listening in those settings where the listener sits in front of a computer during most of the day. Many online stations are available commercial free, as well as nearly talk-free, and provide an environment that does not interrupt workflow. Acoustic stations or new age stations offer

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background music and light vocals that do not distract from the workplace. A seemingly endless stream of genres offers advantage to listeners seeking variety and a break from mainstream radio that relies on very structured formats—country, Top 40, rock, and adult contemporary. The good news for AM/FM radio is that the growth rate for online listening has slowed somewhat to 11 percent of U.S. listeners, down 1 percent from 2006.30 As online stations become more reliable in streaming capabilities and develop consistency, listening rates might increase substantially. Of the 18–34 demographic, 16 percent listen to online radio weekly, and 14 percent of those 18–49 years old tune online for programming, mostly music.31 A GLOBAL RADIO CULTURE Music is one way to define social identity individually and collectively, especially in terms of creating a youth culture.32 Both personal and group identities appear shaped by music.33 With trends toward music globalization, the potential for a worldwide youth identity moves toward reality. This trend provides social and political challenges for some Asian countries as their youth begin to reevaluate their beliefs, values, and preferences against a growing World MTV egocentrism that invites, unites, or acculturates (some would say assimilates) them into a world culture.34 Music trends have been typically determined through record sales, but adolescent and college students increasingly have sought music from alternative sources, such as pirated downloads off the Internet, which made headlines in the late 1990s at many universities.35 Growth in the world music market has indicated an increase of $33 billion, from $4 billion in 1985 to nearly $37 billion over an approximate period of 15 years.36 In September 2000, several Asian regional radio stations in Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Taiwan, Singapore, and Malaysia united to create the first Global Chinese Pop Chart to “truly represent a ‘Pan-Asian outlook’ ” on music.37 The Internet became the impetus for the launch of an Asian hit music chart because listeners had immediate access now to music artists in other countries. Genres such as hip-hop and rhythm & blues readily became radio favorites in the Asian market. These genres were also among the top 10 U.S. formats, according to record sales in 2002 and consistently in subsequent years.38 The boundaries are fading, as a larger soundscape and definition of radio articulates listenership in the United States and the world than at any other time in modern history. THE BIG RADIO PICTURE Since the late 1990s, the FCC has paved the way for additional consolidation among the largest media companies, despite public clamor and increasing

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opposition. Its latest round of deregulation comes at a time when “several of the largest radio conglomerates in America—the corporate owners of FM radio stations across the nation—are within the scope of the FCC probe” into what appears to be a modern-day payola scandal, reminiscent of the payfor-play that occurred within the industry in the 1950s.39 Instead of radio deejays at the receiving end, “the money goes to the bottom line of the radio stations and the conglomerates that own them,” according to New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer.40 As industry reporter Eric Boehlert writes: Radio is an entity unique to the music industry. It’s an independent force that, much to the industry’s chagrin, represents the one tried-and-true way record companies know to sell their product. Small wonder that the industry for decades has used money in various ways to influence what radio stations play. The days are long gone when a DJ made an impulse decision about what song to spin. . . . Indeed, say many industry observers, very little of what we hear on today’s radio stations isn’t bought, one way or another.41

Although the record industry acknowledges radio’s traditionally strong role in promoting music artists, it is also aware of how radio is being redefined through the Internet, as is the music business. On June 26, 2007, Web radio stations and channels in North America participated in the Day of Silence in an attempt to rally publicly against royalty fees that would shut down some operations. The rates did increase and a number of small- to mid-size services went dark. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act provides the record industry the opportunity to reevaluate its royalty rates for song play for Internet radio, broadcasters, and other services every five years.42 Corporate radio—be it Web, AM/FM, or satellite —has weathered the escalating rates, while smaller competitors have been forced out of the industry. In December 2007, XM Satellite Radio settled with Universal Music Group over a copyright infringement lawsuit involving its sale of a portable music player that made it possible for consumers to “make digital copies of music.”43 Arbritron’s latest research indicates that Clear Channel Radio’s online stations are the only ones that have made steady and significant gains in listeners.44 Part of the reason might be attributed to its launch of highdefinition radio and a variety of formats offered on its digital subchannels. These stations are also available as Web streams. Pride radio is a new format that targets homosexual audiences with music and information. Other subchannel formats include opera, independent music, future country, extreme hip-hop, and eclectic coffee house formats.45 Under its division Clear Channel Music Group, several live sessions of various artists recorded in its studios are archived and accessible online through the company Web site. Listeners can tune to new music releases on demand and buy CDs through Amazon.

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com. They can also listen to their favorite artists in-concert via the site or watch streams of their music videos. Clear Channel Communications is branding its formats based on its ability to deliver content through terrestrial and online radio. As the largest radio company in the world (with markets in Australia, Mexico, and New Zealand), it has access and money to take the lead in redefining listeners’ radio experiences and positioning itself for the future —with technical quality, format diversity, and a cultural and technological expansion of radio at the forefront of its marketing campaign. Clear Channel’s 10-year programming agreement with XM Satellite Radio expires in 2008, about the time of the anticipated merger between the two largest radio satellite services in North America. Sirius Satellite Radio stockholders voted on November 13, 2007, to proceed with the acquisition of XM Satellite Radio pending FCC approval. Given Clear Channel’s strength in the overall “radio” marketplace, it will be a formidable rival to satellite radio. The radio industry will be dominated by two major radio powerhouses, and the music industry will have to contend for its place among the corporate giants. FUTURE OF RADIO LISTENING Radio listening in the United States has been tracked by noting gains and losses in AM/FM radio formats, which have tripled over the last 30 years. Small and medium radio markets tend to have less format fragmentation than large metropolitan areas. Arbitron tracked 50 formats in 2006, and gains were reported for adult hits, contemporary Christian, country, Spanish, and urban adult contemporary. Among the new formats reported is children’s radio. Formats that remain consistently strong are adult contemporary, rock, classical, easy listening, contemporary smooth jazz, oldies (urban, Spanish, and pop), and nostalgia. Not surprisingly, the largest gains in time spent listening are among those 65 years and older, and listening for those younger than 18 was down 9 percent from 2003 to 2006.46 Behind the multitude of radio formats is station access to the classic hits and songs from the recent past, with the quality of much older songs being a limiting factor in airplay. Record companies fuel the music libraries of stations by granting permission to a variety of songs, repackaged as radio formats through licensing and royalty fees. Over the past several decades, the volume of music produced has grown substantially and so has the number of radio formats—first supplying AM/FM stations and now Internet radio stations. Last.fm began as an Internet radio station and music subscription service in the United Kingdom, and it may provide a glimpse of where radio is headed on a general scale as the social and technical aspects of radio are reconceptualized online. Founded in 2002, Last.fm has become the “social music platform with over 20 million active users based in more than 232 countries.”47

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The service keeps track of user profiles and adjusts their music choices into a weekly playlist, and in fact, in early 2007, it released the Worldwide Music Chart based on customer selections. Through their subscription, customers are given access to an extensive music database from which they can listen to or download songs. System users can connect to each other through their profile spaces, and that appears to have led to the success of the service. CBS bought the company in 2007. Children, adolescents, and young adults are moving toward technologies that allow them to create personal music libraries. FM stations provide a way to listen together, for now, collectively with other listeners. Traditional radio stations in local markets unite a group of listeners who seek out concert events and promotional information regarding a new artist or a release. With services such as Last.fm that allow listeners of like music interests to socialize online, and as the means of social communication is redefined by the Internet, traditional radio stations will need to reconsider both their social and technical roles in an increasingly global and computer-driven world. MySpace.com and its competitors provide additional evidence of such trends. Corporate radio continues to shrink the number of AM/FM stations, and a number of the smaller companies in large and small local markets cannot compete against national dollars. Simultaneously, with the FCC’s call for another round of low-power licenses, community-based radio stations might offer alternative, localized, ways to socialize based on music interests, particularly those representing small labels and niche formats.48 Radio corporations represent one aspect of media consolidation, but the existence of such conglomerates should not be reminiscent of the rise and fall of networks in the early days of radio. Consolidation is not a trend; it is a way of business in modern economy. Successful small entrepreneurs with innovative ideas will be merely bought out like Last.fm. For those willing to challenge the radio powerhouses, they might find themselves outspent by corporations that command incredible resources and audiences. Over the past decade, smaller community stations have banded together and incorporated assets collectively to compete against larger players, and the issue of whether that strategy is effective over the long run will be settled in time. As opportunities abound across the Internet and through other technologies, the radio and music industries will remain in flux, and corporations will be forced to follow consumers as they move and experiment with platforms. For the most part, changes in listening patterns will evolve slowly as people attempt to manage new technologies into their lifestyles and budgets. Second Life (SL), a virtual community owned and operated by Linden Labs since 2003, offers its more than one million residents space to build and design houses and buildings, own businesses, and interact with each other online.49 Second Life also hosts a teen grid. In both communities, residents (as avatars) can

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stream music and video into their virtual properties—personal and public— and anyone flying over these spaces can hear any one of a number of Internet radio streams. Some dance clubs in SL are dependent on these streams, and the issue of royalty fees has not been addressed as of yet. Some record company executives have taken a wait-and-see approach, refraining from imposing restrictions on emerging communities. Second Life attracts college students who are required to participate in the grid for university classes and activities, as well as those who tend to be middle-aged, college-educated, and more computer literate than the general public. To the listener, radio is a service that provides music, regardless of its transmission means. The traditional radio industry has been attempting to play catch-up to some of these listeners, who demand much more from their listening experience. The move toward greater consolidation—if you cannot beat them, own them— seems to be the solution for corporate radio executives who realize that the Internet offers social and technical opportunities that compete with their services. The goal then for the radio industry is to not let the public redefine their business but move proactively among the various listening options to market it uniquely to the consumer while being extremely cognizant of the reasons why listeners tune online or to satellite services. Kurt Hanson, in his column for RAIN: Radio and Internet Newsletter, also points out Internet radio stations need to consider the best way to use the Web that is unique from traditional AM/FM and satellite broadcasters: Webcasters who take advantage of the characteristics of the new medium— e.g., LAUNCHcast, Pandora, etc.—are, I believe, going to be the ones that see the greatest success in this medium. And right now, the Internet efforts of traditional radio broadcasters (AM/FM broadcast groups, satellite radio companies, etc.) are not playing in that game.50

FURTHER IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS Radio’s relationship with the music industry has been in transition from the first broadcast of a song to its expanded role on Internet radio, and its future can no longer be bound to terminology and concepts centered on a particular source of transmission. From an industry point of view, satellite radio, streaming media, and terrestrial stations are competitive players for the attention of listeners. From the listeners’ vantage point, radio in all its forms is part of the larger soundscape in their life. Listeners hear a multitude of songs in the car, at home and work, and in restaurants and stores. The Radio Ink Convergence 2008 conference has become one way to bring traditional and new media broadcasters into the same venue to discuss the future of radio as it relates to streaming, blogging, podcasting, social networking, mobilecasting, and more familiar forms of transmission.51 Such discussions

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are needed within the radio industry, for even with all its consolidation, it is confronting an endless stream of new technologies that are changing the ways Americans and the world are listening and socializing. Nevertheless, the radio industry has been a dominant player in determining what popular music will reach the public. This exposure is invaluable to the music industry. To some listeners, the convenience of tuning into a radio station and learning about a new artist is a significant part of a filtering process that assists them in choices amidst family and work priorities. When the radio industry launched the Jack FM format in 2000, it was based on the rise of the download culture. mp3 listeners had become accustomed to listening to their favorite songs randomly and did not seem to mind when their favorite country song played after a classic metal tune. This sort of listening defies the programming logic long held dear to the radio industry. Jack FM offered a mix of music that tapped into the mp3 way of listening and attempted to make it a viable format. The format developed, in part, as a result of an American Internet radio station by Bob Perry, a radio station manager, who relocated to Connecticut to live near his wife’s aging parents. The positioning statement for Jack FM sprung from the theme “playing what we want” and was introduced to the listening public as “You Don’t Know Jack.”52 Some media headlines, such as in Variety, exclaimed that “radio’s future sounds a lot like the past.”53 The format is syndicated across traditional radio outlets throughout the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom and serves its audience with hits from the 1960s through the 1990s, adding some contemporary favorites into the mix.54 Variations of the brand are Bob, Joe, and Frank, and the format was launched in the United States in 2004, with Canadian stations first airing Jack in 2002. Jack FM and its off-brands, although garnering more than 8 million listeners in the United States and Canada, have not commanded strong and consistent ratings across major markets compared to traditional radio formats.55 The format, as a niche, also cannot compete over the long term against the hundreds of thousands of personal mp3 playlists, the combination of which is mind-boggling and fairly impossible to replicate across formatted radio. Radio’s advantage over mp3s and iPods, according to industry analysts, is the deejay, and many of the Jack formats have eliminated personality in favor of music: No particular order. Bigger playlist than most commercial stations, but just hits. Heard worse. Take it or leave it. Someone else’s iPod . . . Jack doesn’t bother naming the tune or the singers of the songs—unless you want to go to the Web site. Jack is much too cool for that. Just music, commercials, PSAs and those one-and two-liners spoken by the anonymous man. . . . An op-ed writer in The New York Times said: “Jack has attitude but no soul.” A Newsday writer described the march of Jackism as “another step toward the McDonaldization of radio.”56

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At this juncture in media history, the radio industry is best advised to emphasize what it does best—provide information, particularly as in the exposure of music from up and coming artists and established ones. To simply assume that average consumers will find their way through the millions of songs available without any sort of guidance is absurd. Add to that, the record industry works best when new songs and albums are promoted to the public as scheduled releases that can be properly hyped. When deciding which of the six to eight motion pictures to watch showing weekly at the local theater, moviegoers seek guidance from a host of reviewers. Might radio audiences seek similar information with regards to music? As social music communities grow audiences online, such information might be shared in more effective ways than is commonly the case and challenge the need for a radio personality. Why should the radio industry anticipate that music listeners, in general, will be eager to wade through a litany of new artists and new songs without any sort of professional filtering process? The radio and record industries have always been confronted with complaints against their mainstreaming of music, but then again, the majority of listeners remain interested in pop music culture. Online radio stations, for the time being, might build upon AM/FM radio’s emphasis on music and culture and/or differentiate their offerings by developing unique ways of presenting songs and artists that involve less hype and pure music listening. They can provide streams of new music to online subscribers, in addition to their mainstream formats. The end process is the consumer’s ability to purchase music online in an effort to develop personal music collections. No doubt that is why the radio industry has aggressively pursued consolidation of its traditional broadcasting opportunities with those of major online media companies. Convenience will always be at the heart of consumer choices because many listeners do not have the time to sort through new music (and if they do not want to be stuck in a time warp they will turn to popular sites that offer them guidance—radio and online—about new artists and new music). High-definition radio presents the issue of whether the resultant further fragmentation on the radio dial with the availability of digital subchannels will serve the radio industry well in the long run. These subchannels, such as pride radio and urban radio, might cater to diverse populations and underserved audiences, but only to a point. Only the top songs of a particular genre are played by radio stations, simply because most listeners only listen to radio a portion of the day. A multitude of choices online for any genre can be overwhelming without any sort of guidance. The classic hits of yesterday long determined through radio are now increasingly archived into music libraries, which are available to traditional and Web broadcasters alike. Radio has helped to define what music will become popular, even in the age of pay-for-play. Some public clamor has centered on how Clear Channel Radio and other large conglomerates have controlled music playlists in

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collusion with record executives and in effect how these mega companies have made it impossible for the entrance of other artists. Clear Channel has responded to such arguments with the addition of new music forums on its Web site. With a dip in listening to some online services and as well as some declines in traditional radio listening, all that can be really said about the near future is that consumers will continue to enjoy the ability to move between listening media—and as such will continue to divide their time between the available options. As of 2008, traditional radio listening on the AM/FM dial is still strong with most Americans tuned in daily or at least weekly. These radio stations remain key to the launch of new music and to the preservation of older tunes and lifestyles, although they are no longer the only means to determine what songs will become part of American popular culture. NOTES 1. Arbitron, Inc., “Radio Today,” April 19, 2007, http://www.arbitron.com/radio_ stations/arlt.asp (accessed December 14, 2007), 3. 2. Eric Boehlert, “Pay for Play,” Salon.com, March 14, 2001, http://archive.salon. com/ent/ feature/2001/03/14/payola/index.html (accessed December 19, 2007). 3. Disney Radio, Walt Disney Company, http://radio.disney.go.com/speak/request. html (accessed December 20, 2007). 4. Michael C. Keith, Voices In the Purple Haze: Underground Radio and the Sixties (Westport, CT: Praeger/Greenwood Publishing, 1997). 5. Kelly W. A. Huff, “AM Stereo in the Marketplace: The Solution Still Eludes,” Journal of Radio Studies 1 (1992): 15–20. 6. Cory Deitz, “Is the Sound Quality of Satellite Radio: What Do They Promise,” About.com: Radio, http://radio.about.com/od/listeningtipstrivia/qt/blsatellitequal. htm (accessed December 23, 2007); Eric Holdaway, “Sounds from Space: An SQ Comparison of Satellite Radio,” Car Audio and Electronics, http://www.caraudiomag. com/specialfeatures/0310cae_satellite_radio_comparison/index.html (December 23, 2007). 7. Pickleberry Pie, radio show Web site, http://www.childrensmusic.org/pickle berry.html (accessed December 24, 2007). 8. Jeff Silberman, “Children’s Radio: It’s a Small World, After All,” Billboard 112, no. 8 (2000): 67– 69. 9. Jeff Silberman, “Children’s Radio: It’s a Small World, After All,” Billboard 112, no. 8 (2000): 67– 69. 10. P. Hodges, “Radio AAHS Pulling the Plug,” Channel 4000, November 3, 1997, http://www.channel4000.com (accessed May 14, 2000). 11. Radio Business Report, “Judge overturns $20M award,” January 20, 1999 (Lake Ridge, VA: Radio & Television Business Report). 12. Billboard, “91% of Children Listen to Radio,” June 4, 1994: 125. 13. Jeff Silberman, “Children’s Radio: It’s a Small World, After All,” Billboard 112, no. 8 (2000): 67– 69. 14. Paul F. Gullifor, “Family Communication Patterns and Adolescent Use of Radio,” Journal of Radio Studies 1 (1992): 1–14.

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15. Paul F. Gullifor, “Family Communication Patterns and Adolescent Use of Radio,” Journal of Radio Studies 1 (1992): 1–14. 16. Paul F. Gullifor, “Family Communication Patterns and Adolescent Use of Radio,” Journal of Radio Studies 1 (1992): 1–14. 17. Frank Palumbo, Testimony of the American Academy of Pediatrics on the Social Impact of Music Violence. Presented to the Senate Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, Restructuring, and the District of Columbia (Washington, D.C.), November 6, 1997. 18. Jeff Silberman, “Children’s Radio: It’s a Small World, After All,” Billboard 112, no. 8 (2000): 67. 19. Arbitron, Inc., “Radio Today,” February 14, 2006, http://www.arbitron.com/ radio_stations/arlt.asp (accessed December 14, 2007), 16 –79. 20. Megan Larson, “MTV2’s Youth Movement,” MediaWeek 14, no. 35 (2004). 21. Megan Larson, “MTV2’s Youth Movement,” MediaWeek 14, no. 35 (2004). 22. Ken Garner, “The Radio Conference: A Transnational Forum,” Radio Journal: International Studies in Broadcast & Audio Media 2, no. 1 (2004): 49 –57. 23. Katy Bachman, “Stations in the Stream,” Media Week 17, no. 34 (2007): 14 –15. 24. Katy Bachman, “Stations in the Stream,” MediaWeek 17, no. 34 (2007): 14 –15. 25. Arbitron, Inc., “The Infinite Radio Dial 2007: Radio’s Digital Platforms,” http:// www.arbitron.com/downloads/ digital_radio_study_2007.pdf (accessed December 12, 2007), 14. 26. Arbitron Inc., “How Kids and Tweens Use and Respond to Radio 2001,” http:// www.arbitron.com/study/kids_tweens_use_radio.asp (accessed December 1, 2007). 27. Arbitron, Inc., “Bedroom Project Executive Summary 2007,” http://www.arbi tron.com/study/bedroom_project.asp (accessed December 12, 2007). 28. Bruce Gain, “Is Satellite Video Coming to Your Car Soon?” Wired Blog Network, February 6, 2007, http://blog.wired.com/cars/2007/02/is_satellite_vi.html (accessed December 18, 2007). 29. Bruce Gain, “Is Satellite Video Coming to Your Car Soon?” Wired Blog Network, February 6, 2007, http://blog.wired.com/cars/2007/02/is_satellite_vi.html (accessed December 18, 2007). 30. Arbitron, Inc., “The Infinite Radio Dial 2007: Radio’s Digital Platforms,” http:// www.arbitron.com/downloads/ digital_radio_study_2007.pdf (accessed December 12, 2007), 3. 31. Arbitron, Inc., “The Infinite Radio Dial 2007: Radio’s Digital Platforms,” http:// www.arbitron.com/downloads/ digital_radio_study_2007.pdf (accessed December 12, 2007), 3. 32. Hasan Gürkan Tekman and Nuran Hortaçsu, “Aspects of Stylistic Knowledge: What are Different Styles Like and Why Do We Listen to Them,” Psychology of Music 30 (2002): 28 – 47; Hasan Gürkan Tekman and Nuran Hortaçsu, “Music and Social Identity: Stylistic identification as Response to Musical Style,” International Journal of Psychology of Music 37, no. 5 (2002): 277–85. 33. Dolf Zillman and Su-lin Gan, “Musical taste in adolescence,” in The Social Psychology of Music, ed. D. J. Hargreaves and A. C. North (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997); Adrian C. North, D. J. Hargreaves, and S. A. O’Neill, “The Importance of Music to Adolescents,” British Journal of Educational Psychology 70 (2000): 255–72.

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34. B. Simon, “On the Symmetry in the Cognitive Construal of Ingroup and Outgroup: A Model of Egocentric Social Categorization,” European Journal of Social Psychology 23 (1993): 131– 47. 35. Steve McClure, “Japan Market Continues to Decline in 2001,” Billboard 114, no. 8 (2002): 40; Steve McClure, “Japan Music Business, In Crisis, Seek a Turnaround,” Billboard 114, no. 36 (2000): 53. 36. IFPI, International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (London: United Kingdom), http://www.ifpi.org (accessed March 22, 2004). IFPI is the organization representing the international recording industry. It comprises a membership of 1,500 record producers and distributors in 76 countries. 37. Winnie Chung, “The Specialized Market of Chinese-American Music Buyers,” Billboard 114, no. 31 (2002): APQ2. 38. Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), “Consumer Profile,” 2002– 2006, http://www.riaa.com (accessed December 21, 2007). 39. Brian Ross, Richard Esposito, and Vic Walter, “100s of Radio Stations in Payola Probe,” ABC News Online, February 9, 2006, http://abcnews.go.com/Business/ story?id=1600966&page=1 (accessed December 12, 2007). 40. Brian Ross, Richard Esposito, and Vic Walter, “100s of Radio Stations in Payola Probe,” ABC News Online, February 9, 2006, http://abcnews.go.com/Business/ story?id=1600966&page=1 (accessed December 12, 2007). 41. Eric Boehlert, “Pay for Play,” Salon.com, March 14, 2001, http://archive.salon. com/ent/feature/2001/03/14/payola/index.html (accessed December 19, 2007). 42. Chris Taylor, “Web Radio Sites Go Silent in Protest,” CNN Money.Com (Business 2.0) June 26, 2007, http://money.cnn.com/2007/06/26/magazines/business2/ internet_radio.biz2/ (December 20, 2007). 43. XM Satellite Radio, http://www.xmradio.com (accessed December 17, 2007). 44. Daniel McSwain, “Arbitron Releases Online Ratings for September, October,” RAIN: Radio Audio Internet Newsletter, December 17, 2007, http://textpattern.kur thanson.com/articles/128/arbitron-releases-online-ratings-for-september-october (accessed December 20, 2007). 45. Clear Channel Radio, Clear Channel Communications, Inc., http://www.clearch annel.com/Radio (accessed December 17, 2007). 46. Arbitron, Inc., “Radio Today,” April 19, 2007, http://www.arbitron.com/radio_ stations/arlt.asp (accessed December 14, 2007), 7–10. 47. Last.fm, http://www.last.fm (accessed December 20, 2007); Wikipedia Online, s.v. “Last.fm,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lastfm (accessed December 19, 2007). 48. Federal Communications Commission, “Creation of a Low Power FM Radio Service, Third Report and Order and Second Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking,” MM Docket 99–25, FCC 07–204, released December 11, 2007, http://www.fcc. gov/mb/audio/lpfm/ (accessed December 20, 2007). 49. Second Life, Linden Research, Inc., http://secondlife.com (accessed December 24, 2007). 50. Kurt Hanson, “Oft-Ignored Fad: Internet Radio is a Different Medium,” Kurt’s Blog, RAIN: Radio Audio Internet Newsletter, http://textpattern.kurthanson.com/ kurtsblog/130/often-ignored-fact-internet-radio-is-a-different-medium (accessed December 12, 2007).

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51. Radio Ink Convergence ’08 Conference, San Jose, CA, http://www.radioink. com/convergence/ (accessed December 20, 2007). 52. Big Sticks Broadcasting, http://www.bigsticksbroadcasting.com/press.htm (accessed December 1, 2007). 53. “Radio’s Future Sounds a Lot Like the Past,” Variety, August 14, 2005, available http://www.bigsticksbroadcasting.com/press.htm (accessed December 20, 2007). 54. M. Spencer Green, “Increasingly, Stations Move Toward Variety, Eclectic Mixes Offered to Rival iPods, Satellite Radio.” Associated Press/MSNBC, May 24, 2005, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7966705/ (accessed December 12, 2007). 55. Jack.FM, http://www.jack.fm/background.html (accessed December 11, 2007). 56. Lewis Grossberger, “Jack Be Nimble,” Ad Week, September 5, 2005, http://www. adweek.com/aw/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001054449 (accessed December 21, 2007).

chapter 12

The Great Globalization Swindle? The Relationship Between the Global Economy and Music Reconsidered Franz Kasper Kroenig

If we think about the historical situation of music today, we can hardly avoid taking the terms of globalization and economization into account. Music as a form of art seems to be affected by the global condition. Critical observations concerning the “homogenization,” “McDonaldization,” and “Americanization” of culture do not just simply refer to the relation of art to economy but also to art as such.1 This idea means to make the globalized economy responsible for certain changes inside of the art system in general and music in particular and not only for changes in the way music is brought to market, promoted, and distributed. The common view sees an influence of economy on art in the shape of exploitation, adaptation, and standardization, which poses the questions of an art/entertainment-distinction or the equally problematic low-art/high-art difference.2 In this point of view, the economization of art is a problem of growing relevance because economy is conceived of as a global, dominant, and uncontrollable societal force.3 The premise of this view is that economy can influence art in terms of instruction and dominance. However, I doubt the possibility of such an economic influence that makes art a passive object to a societal process driven by economy. On the contrary, I want to show that art is in a special way sensitive to societal evolution and that the current economization of art can be regarded as an autonomous and art-internal reaction of art to the present state of society. Thus, art is not a victim of a globalized economic system but rather an autonomous system that manages to adapt to its environment very well. From

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a historical perspective, we can compare the relation between the globalized economy to the art system with the relation between art and other formerly dominant social systems. In this context, it seems that the role of globalization must be relativized. GLOBALIZATION AS THE GENERAL SOCIAL SITUATION Globalization must of course be understood as a societal phenomenon that affects the “shape and ‘meaning’ of the world-as-a-whole.”4 But still, the prevailing notion of globalization puts all emphasis on the role of economy, politics, and law. The other social spheres such as art, religion, education, science, and health care are not conceived of as the setting of globalization but just as a cultural sphere that passively receives the collateral damages of the globalization process. The reason for this situation is the common idea to construct globalization in the medium of power: Global processes determine local spheres, and local spheres cannot determine global processes.5 The problem—due to this point of view—is that the balance of power between the global market and the nation state is lost and must be reestablished.6 This seems to make sense when it comes to questions of politics and law. The global/local problem is one that affects the political system with its nation states and to some degree the law system. Therefore, the problem with globalization is that we have powerful global circumstances and no powerful global politics and law. Opposed to the political and the law system, which are strongly bound to nation states, there are the global systems of religion, art, science, and economy. If we regard globalization in respect to power, the problem must consequently be that these systems cannot be controlled by national politics and national law. But we can clearly see that we do not suffer from nationally uncontrolled art, religion, and science. The whole discourse on globalization in terms of hegemony, imperialism, and dominance seems to have a severe shortcoming in this point. Power is not the general medium of globalization. THE SPECIAL ROLE OF ECONOMY IN THE GLOBALIZATION PROCESS Whereas we do not object to the globality and uncontrollability of art, religion, and science, we do so in the case of economy. Why is that? Nobody describes a scientification, aesthetification, or transcendentalization of society, but an economization of society is oft noted. It is quite obvious that economy has a greater impact on art and religion than vice versa. This has not always been the case. When we think of the Middle Ages, we can describe religion as the dominant social system. Politics and law were

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legitimated transcendentally; art needed—as Luhmann puts it—to serve religion, and science was subordinate.7 The mercantilist economy was totally under control of (transcendentialized) politics.8 So, it would make as much sense to speak of a transcendentalization of art and other social spheres in the Middle Ages as of an economization today. In the Renaissance we can find more and more examples of a scientification of society, which, of course, does not imply that other x-ifications could not also be observed. With regard to art, the idea of rational beauty comes to mind, and the fact that art could resist the influence of so much science could even be called the real miracle of the Renaissance.9 Currently, it seems that economy is the most influential social system with the greatest impact on all other systems. If we see the comparability to the historical developments, we cannot simply take it as a matter of course from a Marxist point of view that economy is the societal base and art and religion are just parts of the superstructure. The actual dominance of economy cannot be based on any properties of structures of the economic system or of society in general because it is just a contingent historical fact. MUSIC AND THE MUSIC MARKET Still, there seems to be much evidence for our everyday intuition that global economy influences music to an extent that has never been seen before. In order to understand the relationship between music and the music market it is helpful to define music on the one hand and the market on the other. Although this might be a difficult task for many theoretical approaches, it is very easy for the systems theory. There is a music system with well-defined borders and an environment outside of these borders that contains—among others—the economic system. This can be compared to an organism that lives in its environment and maintains certain relations to this environment but is nevertheless clearly separate from it. As much as an organism depends on food from its environment, the music system needs things that it cannot produce itself, most of all money. The thesis of this systems theoretical approach is that music or art in general cannot make money but only art. If a work of art is sold or if a composer earns money, this theory speaks of environmental relations. So financial operations are economic wherever they take place, and music stays music, whether or not it generates income. The counter argument would be that there are some cases where it is not possible to decide whether something is music or economy. In this theoretical setting, the plausibility of the idea that economy influences or dominates art cannot be held up so easily. How should the environment determine the system? When a work of art is bought, this is clearly just an economic operation that does not cross the border to the system of art. Economy observes works of art only as good or bad investments and not as

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beautiful forms. Art cannot be instructed, dominated, or economized by payments for more than one reason. First, the economic environment remains totally opaque for art. Artists can, of course, keep up the intention of making economically promising art, but it will not succeed in most cases because only economy can see and decide what is economically interesting. Anyway, this would just be an example of a self-steering attempt and not of economization. Economy cannot influence art intentionally due to the fact that economy can only observe economically and can never see what is happening inside the art system. But, does this theoretical framework really account for the mutual relations of music and the music market? When we accept these borders between music and economy, which imply a certain autonomy of both systems, we can still question the effects and the impact of the economic environment on music. Niklas Luhmann points out that these so-called structural couplings are often overestimated because art in general cannot commercialize itself without becoming suspect and, in the end, even unrecognizable as art.10 We can imagine that Luhmann thinks of claims such as originality and authenticity here, which are incompatible with the attempt of art to produce for the market. One could argue that Luhmann only takes the so-called high art into account and forgets pop culture phenomena, which could be said to have a much stronger connection to the market. This could be especially the case in the domain of pop music, where we expect a very strong impact of economy. I want to argue that this is merely an illusionary view on pop music, which can probably be traced back to the fact that one only takes note of the commercially successful products of pop music; so that one could strike on the idea that pop was qua pop already successful.11 First, the great majority of all pop cultural production is economically totally fruitless considering all the rock bands in their cellars who keep on rehearsing without even the slightest chance for economic success in the shape of a major label CD release. Secondly, most of the really successful products of pop culture are forced to be original and innovative at least to the same extent as works of high culture. The way for a certain pop song or pop artist to succeed could be compared to an evolutionary survival of the fittest— especially when we think of highly democratic and uncontrolled platforms such as MySpace.com. British acts such as the Arctic Monkeys or Kate Nash became very successful by just putting their songs on this free Web page, whereas millions of other artists could not benefit from the same opportunity. The factors that helped this success cannot be found anywhere other than in idiosyncratic properties of these bands. In contrast to this, the success of so-called serious music can always be suspected of being grounded in arbitrary decisions of public sponsorship, state funding, or organizationally supported inequality. A good example for the latter one is the German GEMA—basically the same as the ASCAP—which subsidizes serious music

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with the money from entertainment music (these are the terms of the German royalty system). For one minute of airplay by a national radio station, the licensees (typically the composers and their publishers) of a string quartet earn $63.33, whereas the licensees of a pop song get only $7.48. The success of popular music, however, cannot be traced back to interventions of cultural policy in such a way. Of course, there are exceptions, such as the politically defined quote for French music in France. In general, I want to argue that the success or failure of pop music cannot be determined by economical or political decisions. Furthermore, the reasons and conditions for the economic success of pop music are completely invisible for economy. Can’t the success of pop music be planned and designed by putting lots of money into it? The artist and repertoire managers, who are responsible for finding and signing new talent, have exactly this impossible job of anticipating and planning the market success of pop music. Obviously, these managers cannot design hits and stars at home, but they have to go out and find preexisting (human and musical) material that they have to assume is shapeable for their purposes. Therefore, it is quite apparent that the music industry is dependent on substantial properties that they cannot determine themselves. The qualities of pop music may be quite different than the ones of classical or avant-garde music, but they are definitely not arbitrary or obsolete. Are singing competitions such as American Idol not an example proving the opposite? Is this not an instance of pop music that is controlled by the music industry and whose success is programmed? On the contrary, these shows demonstrate the impossibility of economic intervention into the aesthetic domain. These televised competitions are an instrument to control all the parameters of success, which seem to be quite reliable. However, none of them are music intrinsic. There are the looks, the charisma, and the technical ability of the candidates, which can to some extent be objectified and selected. The problem for the music industry is that there is no link between these factors and artistic qualities, which could provide for a long-term career of these stars and thus to long-term profitability for the companies. Nobody really expects the successful contestants to contribute to the catalogs of the record companies such as the Beatles or the Rolling Stones did, which makes it essential to keep on producing new seasons.12 The contestants are purely mass-media phenomena and no phenomena of the art system. If they make the step from the mass media to art, this is exactly the step that cannot be done by the mass media or the music industry. However, it is quite obvious that the music industry—which can hardly survive with their catalogs— could in no way subsist on the expensively purchased short-term success of these contestants. The “global recorded music trade value trend” has been almost consistently digressive for 10 years now (exception: very small gains in 1999 and in 2004), and the German music market (the fourth biggest of the world) has even lost 35 percent volume in the 10 years from 1995 to 2005.13

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This music industry’s economic nightmare cannot just be traced back to the damage caused by illegal downloading because it has decreased significantly between 2003 and 2006 as a result of the legal fight against music piracy.14 We can see that the steering attempts in the shape of talent shows have not helped the music industry a lot. What is quite interesting in this regard is to compare the two possible models of economical steering of pop music. On the one hand, there is the model of singing contests such as American Idol, and on the other hand, there is the model of formed bands that have their members cast like actors for a movie. Obviously, the degree of steering is higher in the case of the latter one. If one assembles a boy band, it is possible to consider four or five complementary characters in order to encompass the taste of nearly everybody. A very successful example of such a formed group was the British band Take That (1991–1996). In spite of this example, the model of formed groups must be regarded as a failed attempt at economical steering of pop music for two reasons. First, formed bands are simply too expensive because they need a much greater staff including external songwriters, fashion advisors, and various coaches for the improvement of abilities, which are naturally expected from normal bands, not to mention the fact that even “performers” who fit the “right look” test often lack instrumental skills and performance experience. The other reason is that a serious part of the pop audience does not seem to accept the idea of a cast band. Especially because in genres such as rock, alternative, and indie, or niches such as metal and punk, authenticity has a high value for fans. That revered authenticity is substantially compromised by the model of bands formed via TV show competitions or by casting Svengalis. No matter how hard the music industry tries to gain influence on the autonomous subsystem of music, it is in principle bound to fail. Economy can neither see what is going on inside of the music system—and transparency is the necessary condition for steering—nor can it make music itself, which is a very banal statement with strong implications. SELF-ECONOMIZATION OF MUSIC My thesis is that there can be an economization of music without the assumption that the economic system invades the music system. Maybe it is helpful to compare this situation to the system-environment-relation of an organism again. The food an organism can find in its environment cannot determine the state of this organism. It does not force itself into the organism. Though the organism is dependent on food, it remains completely sovereign and active. This is the way we want to see the relation between music as a system and economy as its environment. In order to survive, organisms must adapt to their environment, and one of the most vital adaptations concerns the economic situation: the scarcity of food. Organisms will inevitably

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develop internal stuctures that adjust to the specific environmental food situation. The point is that this adjustment is a specialization that increases the organism’s dependence on the selected food in the environment. The koala is a good example of how intense this specialization can get. The benefit of being so extremely well-adapted to the leaves of the fever tree is that they become a sufficient food. The cost is, of course, that the efficiency of the adaptation is only possible when the koala gives up its ability to digest other food. To come back to the analogy: Who would ever regard this over-adaptation to the economic environment as a causal influence of the environment on the organism? Who would speak of the eucalyptization of the koala? I want to argue that the relation between music and global economy, which is often described in terms of economization, dominance, and commercialization, can be understood as an over-adaptation of music to economy. This concept allows us to preserve the idea of an autonomous music system. Economization can then be understood as the fact that the music system increases its adaptation to the economic environment and decreases its adaptation to other systems freely. In his famous essay on jazz, Theodor W. Adorno pointed out that there are no evil business people in charge of the commercialization of jazz, but jazz does it itself.15 The means of this self-economization—according to Adorno—are standardization, simplification, and the use of certain tricks, formulae, and clichés. So, these are strictly musical devices that are not forced into the music system from outside but accepted voluntarily. It is quite plausible to suppose that the motive for this development is the attempt of the music system to strengthen its relation to economy. In our time it seems to be a matter of course to do so because we regard the relation to economy as the most important one imaginable. One of the greatest advantages of systems theory is that it can make things that seem to be obvious appear rather improbable. Because the environment of the music consists not only of economy but also of religion, education, law, health care, science, and politics, there are many other possible candidates of importance for music. From a historical perspective we can see that economy has not always been the favorite environmental system for art. If we think of the Middle Ages, it is quite obvious that religion played the role of the dominant system. Beauty was always at the same time transcendent. There was no difference between those completely contradictory preferences (aesthetic vs. religious) for the art system. Every stroke of the brush was as much a matter of aesthetic decision as of transcendental inspiration and service. A composer of that time would not just invent melodies on the basis of his own creativity but would also listen to what the Holy Ghost told him. Many medieval pictures show Pope Gregor I (†604)—later centuries regarded him as the composer of the Gregorian chants—with the Holy Ghost in the shape of a dove dictating the melodies to his ear. So, one would have to speak of a transcendentalization of art in the Middle Ages. An economization is out of sight. In the Renaissance one

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can find more and more evidence that art developed ways for better adapting to another system: science. The beautiful was now true and scientifically correct. And again, there was no conflict between these incompatible preferences for the artist. The scientific view was not an external imposition but a much more intrinsic condition for beauty: Forms, which are mathematically correct or scientifically exact, are beautiful. A good example for this is the so-called pythagorizing architecture of the Renaissance, which resulted in the construction of churches on the basis of complex but harmonic mathematical calculus, even in cases when the effect of these computations were invisible or hidden.16 At that time it was a matter of course that sculptures and pictures should be anatomically correct and detailed. From Leonardo da Vinci we know several studies of the human body and its organs that almost look like they were taken from a modern atlas of anatomy. If we may skip to the last century, we can find an example where art adapted to another system in its environment: the political system. In the 1960s and 1970s, it was suddenly necessary for an artist to be political. This was not just a matter for left-wing intellectuals such as Jean-Paul Sartre but also for pop musicians who had formerly confined themselves to writing and singing love songs, such as John Lennon. Of course there has been an attitude of protest in the earlier rock ’n’ roll era of the 1950s, but this protest was not political in the same sense as in the late 1960s. Political protest in the strict sense is no rebellion against the parental generation and especially not against one’s own parents. The fact of youth and their fight for its free expression as such is not political. Not until there is a concrete will to change the societal structure with determination to gain the power to do so can we speak of political protest. So, the moaning of the blues singers and the rebellion of rock ’n’ roll both lack the political awareness of having the actual power to change the political system. Therefore, there could be an even deeper meaning behind the story that Elvis Presley asked President Nixon to ban the Beatles from entering the United States than just his fear of competition. Maybe Presley was really concerned that the Beatles could spoil America’s youth. The rebellion of Elvis is compatible with supporting the Republican Party because it is an individual, sexual, and, to some extent, cultural rebellion but no political protest. At least from 1967 on, the Beatles, and especially John Lennon, had developed not only a political attitude (pacifism) but also the idea that they could contribute to change the world in this direction. It is quite obvious that music in the late 1960s had strong tendencies to politicize itself in the same sense as it had tendencies toward scientification in the Renaissance and transcendentalization in the Middle Ages. Against this historical background, economization of art is no extraordinary matter. It is simply the situation that art can focus on several different systems in its environment, and now it seems to be economy. The reason

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for this cannot be found in the globalization process or the dominance of economy today. It is rather the other way round: The dominance of economy is established by the other systems’ attempt to strengthen their environmental relation to economy. We can easily observe how this works in the case of art. Walter Grasskamp describes the enormous amounts of money that have gathered behind certain works of art as a kind of magical energy, a unique power, making a strong impression on the observer of such a work in a gallery.17 If a picture is highly expensive, it can somehow claim a right for attention and admiration. If you watch a singer—think of Bob Dylan—on a huge stage with a great lighting system, every meaningless gesture and every casual word is amplified and charged up by the attention of the audience around you. Also, the great blockbuster exhibitions can give us an example of the intermingling of aesthetic and economic values. Whenever there is a Van Gogh or Kandinsky exhibition, the number of visitors to the museums explodes. The longer the people have to line up to get into such a well-advertised exhibition, the greater is the probability that they will attend it at all. About half of the people who went to the Museum of Modern Art in Berlin’s showing of pieces from the New York MOMA’s collection, 18—for which they literally stood in line for hours—had never, or very seldom, attended an exhibition before.19 There can be no doubt about the conclusion that the economic success of art boosts its aesthetic success. This is possible because art improved its adaptation to economy by neglecting its adaptations to the other systems. Religion, science, and politics play a very minor role for the art system today, especially when it comes to music. We find the reason for this development not in the objective dominance of economy but rather in the autonomous over-adaptation of music to economy. CONCLUSION The difference between the common notion of the economization of music in the course of globalization and the self-economization I’ve described has at least two major implications. First, it leads us away from the intuitive idea that economy does something to—or inside of—other systems. Grasskamp calls this thinking in terms of the dirty market, which contaminates the pure domain of art, more naïve than naïve painting can get.20 If artists are confronted with money or scarcity of money, they will react in their very special aesthetic way, which cannot be traced back to this economic environment in terms of linear causality. The example of talent shows makes clear that the economy cannot instruct the art system, even if the artists yearn for being instructed in the hope for commercial success. Second, the matter of globalization does not help us to understand the relation between music and the music market at all. The common notion of globalization as a problem for the autonomy of art depends on a construction

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of globalization in the medium of power, which we could not accept. The relationship between music and economy is not one of control. The idea of steering depends at least on the transparency of its object, and art remains an opaque sphere for economy. The only thing economy gets to see when it looks at art are objects of purchase and investment, and this is—we hope— not all there is about art. NOTES 1. George Ritzer, The Globalization of Nothing (Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge, 2004). 2. Theodor W. Adorno, “Zeitlose Mode: Zum Jazz,” in Theodor W. Adorno: Eine Auswahl, ed. Rolf Tiedemann (Stuttgart: Deutscher Bücherbund, 1971), 131– 45. 3. Thomas Hermsen, “Die Kunst der Wirtschaft und die Wirtschaft der Kunst,” Soziale Systeme 7, no. 1 (2001): 156 –76. 4. Roland Robertson, “Mapping the Global Condition: Globalization as the Central Concept,” in Modernity: Critical Concepts, Volume IV, After Modernity, ed. Malcolm Waters (London: Routledge, 1999), 399. 5. Helmut Wiesenthal, “Globalisierung: Soziologische und politikwissenschaftliche Koordinaten im neuartigen Terrain,” in Globalisierung und Demokratie: Wirtschaft, Recht, Medien, ed. Hauke Brunkhorst and Matthias Kettner (Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp, 2000), 21–52. 6. Joseph Stiglitz, Globalization and its discontents (London: Penguin, 2002). 7. Niklas Luhmann, Die Religion der Gesellschaft (Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp, 2002), 275; Otto Gerhard Oexle, “Luhmanns Mittelalter,” Rechtshistorisches Journal 10 (1991): 53– 66. 8. Niklas Luhmann, Die Politik der Gesellschaft (Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp, 2002), 419. 9. Robert Klein, Gestalt und Gedanke: Zur Kunst und Theorie der Renaissance (Berlin: Wagenbach, 1996), 90; Bertrand Jestaz, Die Kunst der Renaissance (Freiburg, Germany: Herder, 1985). 10. Luhmann (2002), 391. 11. Don Cusic, Music in the Market (Bowling Green, OH: Bowling Green State University Press, 1996), 10. 12. Matt Burton, “Career Profile: Artist and Repertoire Representative,” http:// www.entertainmentmanagementonline.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2002/02/20/ 3c17ea272a6b9. 13. International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), Recording Industry in Numbers 2007: The Definite Source of Global Music Market Information, 10; Bundesverband der Phonographischen Wirtschaft e.V. Deutsche Landesgruppe der IFPI e.V., Die Phonographische Wirtschaft: 2007 Jahrbuch. 14. Ibid. 15. Hermsen (2001). 16. Jestaz (1985), 91. 17. Walter Grasskamp, Die unästhetische Demokratie: Kunst in der Marktgesellschaft (München: C. H. Beck, 1992), 26.

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18. The Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin showed the exhibition of the Museum of Modern Art—normally located in New York City—from February 20, 2004 to September 19, 2004. 19. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, http://www.faz.net/s/RubEBED639C476 B407798B1CE808F1F6632/Doc~E024B34ED1E040B8A6DD889EA30916A3~ ATpl~Ecommon~Sspezial.html. 20. Grasskamp, 26.

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chapter 13

The Independent Record Store as a Site of Cultural Resistance and Anti-McDonaldization—A Case Study of The House of Records David Gracon

The House of Records is a place that focuses on everything outside of the mainstream. We try to cover all the bases that are on the fringes of society. —Fred, employee at the House of Records Other stores are definitely directed more towards retail. It’s a numbers game. We’re certainly not a number game—if it were a number game, we wouldn’t be open. —Gary, owner of the House of Records During a recent visit to my hometown of Buffalo, New York, the local independent record store Home of the Hits closed its doors after 25 years of service. What might appear as a minor event in a city familiar with the disappearance of heavy industry and blue-collar employment, the store’s closing had repercussions on a comparatively minor, yet culturally significant level. A writer from the local alternative weekly paper Artvoice claimed, “Retelling the story (of Home of the Hits), from my journalistic standpoint, feels a lot like what I’d imagine it would be like to write the obituary of one of my best friends.”1 As a high school student, Home of the Hits was a place that drew me out of the homogeneous suburbs, and it was here I discovered a variety of

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political views with the aid of various punk and indie bands, independent fanzines, and a store atmosphere critical of all things mainstream. The store was more than a place of commodity exchange as it reinforced an independent spirit, and it taught me to look beyond the mainstream media outlets in terms of music, culture, and politics—which are ideals that continue to this day. It was a store that provided cultural difference, and people could learn to think differently about music and culture because the overall orientation of the store was built around independence and independent thinking. Home of the Hits disappeared, and I returned to Eugene, Oregon, where I currently live. Eugene’s version of Home of the Hits is a few blocks away from the University of Oregon campus on 13th Ave, a street characterized by a variety of coffee shops, vintage clothing stores, and other independent businesses. The House of Records is a mom-and-pop shop situated in an old house that has been in operation since 1971—and the store has a deep historical and social relevance for those involved. Like most independent record stores in the country, I was curious if this store is also facing a precarious economic future and sought to gain a deeper understanding of what independent record store culture means to its employees and customers. If such a store were to close, which is a distinct possibility, what would be the sociocultural implications of such a closure? This topic is significant because it is symbolic of independent businesses in general, vis-à-vis the dynamics of cultural hegemony and corporate power; whether it be a family grocery store, used bookstore, or an old house that sells vintage vinyl records. Such places have a variety of complex meanings for people, and when they vanish, something happens to the people and communities involved. If the independent record store were to close its doors, do we have less cultural variety (availability of alternative and obscure media) as a result? Do those involved in such cultural practice feel alienated or a sense of anomie when such independent gathering and consumptive spaces disappear? Does the culture become more homogeneous without such specialty stores? In considering the role of The House and Records and its possible fate, a number of questions, each of which has repercussions for thousands of similarly independent businesses around the country, come to mind: What is the sociocultural significance of an independent record store such as The House of Records? Does this shop and their related communities reinforce oppositional thinking and an independent spirit? How does such a space challenge or create cultural alternatives to processes of rationalization and McDonaldization? In what way is the House of Records a form of antiMcDonaldization? A variety of theoretical approaches are appropriate for an exploration of independent record store culture. Perhaps the most important grounding theoretical framework is Ritzer’s (1993) notion of cultural McDonaldization,

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which uses contemporary examples to build upon Weber’s classical research on rationalization.2 This will be followed by a brief exploration of hegemony and notions of cultural resistance. First, let me briefly discuss the nature of my fieldwork. Fieldwork data was gathered through a series of in-depth interviews (semistructured) with all the staff members (a total of 7) and a variety of customers of the store (a total of 13). Ethnographic fieldwork (between January and July 2007) was also utilized, where a written record of observations, daily activities, and interactions were examined—as well as the atmosphere, decoration, and design of The House of Records. Two main research questions derived from the literature and fieldwork guided this research project. These questions are: What evidence suggests that independent record store culture is a form of anti-McDonaldization? What kind of interactions, relationships, and community within the store act as evidence of anti-McDonaldization? MCDONALDIZATION AND HEGEMONY Ritzer’s (1993) concept of McDonaldization explores processes of cultural standardization that occur when notions of rationalization, or the processes of the fast food restaurant, have come to dominate more and more sectors and practices of everyday society. Rationalization is the process whereby an increasing number of social actions and interactions are based on considerations of efficiency or calculation rather than on motivations derived from custom, tradition, or emotion. This standardization is characterized by rationalized processes of efficiency, calculability, predictability, and notions of control, which Ritzer claims lead to “irrational consequences.” The negative effects of rationalization are a sense of dehumanization and disenchantment, and as Ritzer claims, “A fully rational society would be a very bleak and uninteresting place.”3 Here are a few concise examples to illustrate the concept of McDonaldization. For example, instead of eating a healthy home-cooked meal and gathering with friends and family to consume it, people may substitute this tradition by eating fast food alone, a practice that evokes isolation and the consumption of unhealthy food. Likewise, instead of patronizing an independent record store, people are downloading music (usually alone), buying it online, or going to a rationalized chain store to obtain music, a place with limited cultural variety and a rationalized atmosphere. While fast food and the downloading of music are convenient and efficient, and the CDs at a chain store are usually more inexpensive, such practices come at a social cost. My observations at The House of Records highlights a series of social practices that actively challenge processes of McDonaldization, as the store is a space that constitutes custom, tradition, and emotion. Perhaps a culture

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with little cultural variety and opportunity to find or learn about music outside of corporate manufactured paradigms also contributes to a kind of social disenchantment or a society characterized by sameness. An example of McDonaldized culture is the strip mall. A strip mall is a social space that is replicated in countless geographical locations throughout the country, and the products for sale are uniform at all stores, while locality is sometimes considered in terms of product availability. In terms of musical product, a chain store such as Best Buy, or a big box store such as Target, are McDonaldized in that they sell a specific musical product (usually top 40, mainstream music) and exclusively only sell CDs, as opposed to vinyl records. The workers are less likely to have a deep knowledge of musical history or know about the fringes of independent music—and they are less likely to forge strong bonds with specific customers, unlike the possibilities of human interaction that take place at an independent store. The workers wear uniforms and are trained to work in prescribed ways, and the stores share the same aesthetic and lack a unique atmosphere. These aspects of corporate music retail are suggestive of the homogenizing processes of McDonaldization, which, for those invested in independent music culture and consumption, is an undesirable place to be. In the context of The House of Records, a polemic focal point is the corporatization of the landscape and the hegemonic power that corporate media (i.e., powerful record labels, distribution, corporate synergy of musical products) and box stores maintain, while the independent record store actively defines its own specialized niche within the fringes of musical culture—visà-vis dominant culture. The independent record store struggles to exist amongst a variety of social forces (mainly from digital downloading and the corporate dominance of chain stores, major label pricing tactics), and many stores have already closed or are closing. In the first five months of 2006 alone, 378 record stores closed nationally, against 106 closures in 2005, and there are now 25 percent fewer music stores in America than there were in 2003.4 Building on Ritzer’s concept of McDonaldization, it’s clear that the independent spirit, noncorporate attitude, unique aesthetic and space, and cultural variety within The House of Records promotes and reinforces a different kind of human interaction and community based on shared belief systems of independence (which entails corporate resistance and the support of locality)—which are ultimately active processes of anti-McDonaldization. According to Gelder, modern subcultures are in opposition to the banalities of mass cultural forms, and subcultural identity is juxtaposed against the conformist pressures of mass society and massification.5 This sense of massification evokes an aura of alienation—a symptom of McDonaldization. Hegemony is the power or dominance that one social group holds over others and dominance and subordination in the field of relations structured

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by power.6 Its effectiveness depends on subordinated peoples accepting the dominant ideology as normal reality or common sense in active forms of experience and consciousness. According to Gramsci’s theory of ideological hegemony, mass media are tools the ruling elites use to perpetuate their power, wealth, and status by popularizing their own philosophy, culture, and morality.7 To place this into a context of late-capitalism, the dominant music industry, in all its forms of production, distribution, consumption, and general omnipresence in culture, constitutes a market reinforced by hegemonic structures—and this market conceals the fact that other alternative musical cultures exist. Thus, hegemony is an incomplete process as power is never totalizing, and hegemonic structures can be countered and challenged. The selling and purchasing of music, and the gathering of community that exists outside the manufactured channels of corporate media and distribution, is an oppositional act and form of counter-hegemony. An agent can actively choose to reject or oppose mass-cultural music, even though its influence permeates music videos, mainstream radio, soundtracks for film, and it is widely distributed and promoted throughout the culture. Building on instances of counter-hegemony and the practice of antiMcDonaldization, Hall’s Deconstructing the Popular discusses the concept of resistance in further detail: The cultural industries do have the power constantly to rework and reshape what they represent; and, by repetition and selection, impose and implant such definitions of ourselves as fit more easily the descriptions of the dominant or preferred culture. That is what the concentration of cultural power—the means of culture-making in the heads of the few—actually means. In our times, it goes on continuously, in the complex lines of resistance and acceptance, refusal and capitulation, which make the field of culture a sort of constant battlefield.8

Accordingly, empirical evidence from The House of Records examines similar lines of resistance and refusal and views such spaces as a cultural “battlefield.” It is a place where anti-McDonaldization is an active cultural practice. Anti-McDonaldization encourages a humanizing nature, cultural variety and difference, unique and nonrationalized spaces, opportunities for critical thinking, and aspects of community and human interaction. INDEPENDENT RECORD STORE CULTURE AS ANTI-MCDONALDIZATION During the turbulence of the counter-culture era, Gary, the owner of The House of Records, began the store by selling vinyl records out of his garage and later opened the store on 13th Ave. in 1971. While playing in bands and engaging in drug culture, Gary claimed the rationale for starting the store

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was, “To survive, I needed to be my own businessman. I didn’t want to work for anyone else.” The House of Records is situated in an old house. It is blue with red trim, and the appearance is almost carnivalesque, like a funhouse. The store is located midway between the University of Oregon campus and downtown Eugene—a location characterized by heavy foot traffic and a steady flow of bicyclists. The location suggests locality, as opposed to being located on the periphery of town where the chain stores, strip malls, and shopping centers are located (where a car is often required). Outside the entrance is a colorful array of flyers and posters, advertising everything from the hand-scrawled basement punk show to a local film festival seeking submissions. What makes The House of Records an obvious example of antiMcDonaldization is the utter uniqueness of the space. The House of Records is one of a kind. This is remarkable when considering the corporatization of the landscape, where a chain store in one part of the country resembles countless other stores with an identical or rationalized layout and design. One customer enthusiastically commented on the inviting nature of the store and claimed, “It’s like hanging out at somebody’s house.” On a sunny day when the store tends to be crowded (as there tends to be more foot traffic on the sidewalk), the narrow paths separating the rows of records become impassable, or difficult to the point where it’s impossible to not rub bodies with the other shoppers. During the more quiet hours, customers are sprawled out on the floor, sifting through records, or sitting on one of the small blue chairs situated throughout the space. It was common to hear customers, while holding up a record or CD, shout out from across the store toward the counter while competing with the blaring music. One man yelled, “Is this any good?” while holding up a vinyl record. Inside the store, the ambiance was often described by the employees and customers with vivid enthusiasm. Common responses included the phrases “upbeat,” “funky,” “inviting,” “really fun,” “warm,” and most common of all, “comfortable.” Other responses were poetic in description. Respondents adored the musty smell of vinyl records, the warmth of the natural lighting, and the sounds of the creaky old door and wooden floors. It’s a place where older customers relive the 70s and can “take their nostalgia trips.” Customers sometimes would spend hours comfortably sprawled out on the floor leafing through vinyl records while engaging in “an intimate kind of experience.” Such descriptions suggest the humanizing appeal of the store. The inside of the store is characterized by wooden paneling and floors and the remnants of a former house where an old fireplace can be spotted behind the rows of used CDs; the vinyl section is housed in what used to be the dining room. The arrangement of the handmade shelves and racks of music are slightly off kilter, and navigating the space requires movement through some narrow corridors. While rationalized shopping spaces are designed to

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move a customer through the space in a highly calculated and controlling manner, all with the intention to sell, this arrangement is reminiscent of a flea market or an estate sale in someone’s home. While the aim is also to sell merchandise at The House of Records, it does not appear to be so calculated. Sam, a store customer claimed, “It almost feels like somebody’s bedroom, with a lot of records in it, you know. There’re posters up, and kind of like homey and laid back. Organized but not overly organized. Not too meticulous, so it has that kind of organic feel to it.” The wood floors evoke a cozy home feel as the racks of tightly packed vinyl records nearly reach the ceiling. Several of the employees refer to the space as a library, rather than a store, which implies a different relationship to the objects and space—a place that implies learning and congregation, as opposed to sheer commodity exchange. The layout of the shelves and the handmade racks of music are a touch off-kilter, and many of the signs and CD dividers are hand drawn. The space is not psychologically designed or manufactured to sell objects, and the space feels intuitive, organic, and unique. Greg, a store employee for 21 years, said, “Kids love it here, because they can run around and hide in all the nooks and crannies.” The walls are covered with old LP records, from James Brown to Devo, and promotional posters advertising dated mid-90s independent acts such as Bikini Kill and Unwound. Virtually all the walls of the store feature some form of visual stimulation in terms of album covers or posters. Little to no attention is given to new promotional or major label advertising, and the posters on the walls tend to advertise independent acts, which are sponsored by independent record labels. This lack of advertising suggests a different orientation toward the music industry, and the ideal that advertising in the traditional respect is not important. Sarge, a store employee, claimed, “We don’t have much in terms of promotional posters and that kind of stuff because there is no room for it. Here a lot of our demographic are collectors, and they just don’t need that kind of enticement.” The music played in the store is not part of a marketing campaign or a manufactured form of Muzak. The counter is like an ad hoc DJ booth, as the employees have the choice to play music they believe in, actually like, and can likely discuss in great detail. The music includes everything from classical and free jazz to experimental post-rock and anything in-between. During one observation an employee played The Cure’s “Killing an Arab,” a punchy track that politicizes imperialist interventions in the Middle East, which suggests this store is free to promote whatever it wants, even political material. Such an atmosphere is unlikely to occur in a chain store with rationalized Muzak, where the employees have no control over the music selection and hearing music of a political nature is highly unlikely. The actual structure is a former house that was finished in 1918, and it’s one of the oldest houses on the block. Because the actual structure has

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existed in Eugene for such a long time, the store acts as a historical continuum. Greg, a long-time store employee, suggested the architecture and space itself plays an important role in defining not only the unique aura of the store but a connection to and appreciation of history. Greg claimed: One of the things about our society now, that is really troubling is that old is out and new is in. And old buildings are imploded or destroyed, and people are just so into new, and I think old things are important. But as a place I think that this is very important that we do our best to keep something like this alive, fix it up and conserve. We’re in the business of conserving old things (in terms of records and the store), and making sure that they still stay alive for as long as they possibly can.

This connection to history suggests a kind of resistance to social change and the speed of McDonaldization, where old structures are destroyed in favor of new buildings that may lack history or context, or the countrywide pattern where inner cities and small towns are gutted in terms of local business in the midst of urban sprawl and strip mall culture. The House of Records evokes a sense of center within Eugene, and the store acts as a social marker and a connection to local culture and continuity. Chico, a long time customer commented, It’s been here for a long time, and I think sometimes in a really changing world, we like some things that endure. Respect for the past and respect, and openness to the new, I think they’re good concepts. And I don’t think, and I think House of Records has endured in, and flourished on it’s own merit, and not because it was in a lucky place.

Greg later discussed the notion of conservation within the store, and by this he meant stocking an eclectic variety of obscure musical product that perpetuates historical and cultural continuation. The store is keeping certain kinds of music in circulation (especially music that may only be available on vinyl, is out of print, or is not available on CD), and this reinforces cultural variety and difference that otherwise is difficult to find. The cultural variety and musical difference stocked at the House of Records provides an outlet where independent music can circulate that otherwise may not be available through other mainstream or commercial outlets. The House of Records stocks a wide variety of genres ranging from punk, indie, jazz, folk, reggae, world music, spoken word, and hip-hop that cannot be found elsewhere in town. This also means selling music with politically challenging or “dangerous” content that wouldn’t be stocked at a corporate store because the ideas may undermine the chain’s image and ideology of a “family atmosphere.” Because the store does not necessarily focus on what is new, there is a degree of spontaneity and a sense of unpredictability in terms

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of what you could find in the store. If the musical product is not predictable, it is suggestive of a practice that counters McDonaldization. The House of Records provides more cultural variety and adds diversity to a world of increased media consolidation and cultural homogeneity brought about by processes of McDonaldization. Independent music releases are assumed to be more creative, more political, and more diverse than those issued by major labels, and to have access to such media is a form of resistance to the dominant forms or homogenizing tendencies of chain stores.9 A customer claimed, “Most places are so immersed in the pop culture, that if you have interests off the center stage, they can be hard to find.” Another aspect of the anti-McDonaldization of the store is that employees don’t have to wear uniforms, nor must they perform their work in prescribed ways—whereas a corporation has specific protocols and rules that are applied universally to its workers at each store location. While the store has a looser sense of rules, the rather free and uninhibited nature of the employees (for example, swearing, joking, and the ability to share their honest opinions) sets it apart from traditional corporate structuring and renders the store “authentic” in terms of subcultural capital. The grounding idea here is how the anticorporate views of the employees are integrated into how the store functions, which connects to an independent store atmosphere that appeals to the customer of the store. Thorton claims that crowds generally congregate on the basis of their shared taste in music, their consumption of common media, and most importantly, their preference for people with similar tastes to themselves, and that vague opposition is certainly how many members of youth subcultures characterize their own activities.10 RESISTING VALUES, NONCORPORATE ATTITUDES The employees and customers at The House of Records overwhelmingly disdain corporate culture, and this is evident with the harsh criticism given to mall and big-box culture. The community of the store tends to share an anticorporate value system, which is a form of resistance toward the McDonaldization of culture. Those interviewed actively compared corporate culture (in terms of mall and chain-store culture) as being “sterile,” “plastic,” and “homogeneous.” Greg claimed, “We’re turning the entire culture into mall culture, and that’s just ridiculous.” Martha, a store employee commented, “This store is not at all corporate, which is great especially these days where you have people working in cubicles.” A long-time store customer claimed, “Everyone of those [chain] stores is the same, and they assume you as a customer are all the same. That kind of anonymity and distance I can do without.” Customers describe corporate music stores as being extremely limited in terms of cultural variety and obscure items; it is assumed their employees

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lack a specialized musical depth and knowledge of musical history. Corporate culture is viewed as a homogenizing force and an unpleasant place to visit, whereas an independent mom-and-pop store is unique, one of a kind, and resonates on a more humanistic level. A customer claimed, “I run into people here, I visit people here, it’s a marketplace.” COMMUNITY AS ANTI-MCDONALDIZATION The House of Records fosters community in a number of ways, although community is not something actively sought out, it more or less happens organically within the space. It is a place where other like-minded artists, musicians, and audiophiles congregate and spend time leafing through records and discussing music. Customers form relationships with other customers based on their shared interest in music culture. Martha, from the counter, explained, “People exchange phone numbers because they’re interested in the same sort of music.” The clientele at The House of Records is relatively diverse. It’s a mixture of many different musical tastes and demographic backgrounds. Customers have included university professors and students, high school kids skipping school, a man with a tattooed face, older women seeking classical music, and a baby-boomer who nostalgically recalled shopping at the store back in the ’70s (“back when the students were demonstrating in the streets”). Most of the customers interviewed noted the importance of getting “knowledgeable” and “informed” information from staff as being very important. This gives the store “a cultural edge,” and customers want to create a relationship with the store as opposed to engaging in anonymous consumption. Such face-to-face interactions can lead to more than customer service, as several customers considered the workers to be friends, or familiar faces within the community, or adding to one’s subcultural capital. Customers who frequent the store have commented how they enjoy seeing other customers that they know within the store, or as one customer commented, “It’s like a little community within the community.” Thus, the interactions associated with visiting a place where you are likely to encounter people that you know contribute to a shared group identity and sense of community, as it is a place that other like-minded people frequently visit. Buck, a former store employee from the 1970s, recalls some memories from that era: “I mean it wasn’t catering to radicals or anything in particular, but you know, there were a lot of shades of philosophies and ideas at the time, and people expressed themselves in a lot of different ways, and I think this was kind of a home to them all.” Because customers place much trust into the taste and advice of the employees, much information is exchanged (sometimes the flow goes both ways, from customer to employee and vice versa) within the store, and because

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everyone involved is so passionate about music, such advice can lead to breakthroughs in terms of finding something new. The House of Records offers an alternative musical education through face-to-face interaction. Russ, a University of Oregon freshman eager to learn more about the history of independent music, stood at the counter as Aaron, an employee, suggested a number of different artists to compliment his recent purchase of the Wire box set. For about 30 minutes, Aaron rotated a series of records with the attempt to introduce Russ to something new, something he had never heard before. The “student” patiently stood there, deep in concentration until a small grin formed on his face, almost blushingly. The explosive sounds of Mogwai blasted through the speakers. Russ appeared impressed. Russ clearly put his faith in the expert advice of Aaron and kept waiting until he heard something he liked; he ended up special ordering a copy of Mogwai’s Young Team. The counter at The House of Records is an exchange of ideas and a place where people can be exposed to music they may otherwise not have the opportunity to hear. In a way, this counter is an informal education in fringe culture. It’s a place where customers receive a great deal of personal attention, have the opportunity to listen and learn about new and obscure music, and selectively make a purchase based on this education. The customers trust the opinions and recommendations of the employees. Sam, a regular customer commented, Since I know people here, it’s nice to come in, and see what’s new, and see if they have any new recommendations. There’s a different sense of ideals behind what they’re doing. They’re like propagators of fine art, instead of counter monkeys. I like coming down here and looking and doing, rather than sitting in front of a computer.

For many customers, shopping at The House of Records is a weekly ritual. Many browse through the used record bins looking for the latest trade-ins, which are constantly circulating. On one particular Sunday, several customers commented that this is what they do every weekend, and the space is valued in terms of identity and one’s relational community. Herman, a customer for several decades, commented, “If this were in other countries, this would be called a marketplace. I don’t mean a place of selling and buying, but a place of social activities, and people mixing and meeting, and being friendly.” Chico, a long-time customer, discussed the store as a space beyond commodity exchange and music consumption. This could be framed as the social relevance of the space or how the store acts as a subcultural marker of sorts, where people congregate and a sense of community pervades. For example, Chico claimed the store is kind of “detox,” or “like stopping in for a beer after work,” as the environment is relaxing and is a place to unwind from the

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stress of work and happily disappear into the shelves of old vinyl. This community feeling relates to his comments regarding The House of Records as a “family” and “home,” citing an experience of the store in the early 90s akin to “Thanksgiving,” a kind of family atmosphere. He referred to the store as “House of Recs,” as if talking to a close friend with a special nickname. He also described a situation where he will at times field questions from other customers (as recommended by the employees), which implies a more active participation in the space. Another customer commented on the social aspects of music collecting and the social importance of the store—and what this revealed is the collective nature of record collecting and the importance of independent spaces. This relates to what Maffesoli described as the social nature of group development and how group dynamics are learned: “The ritual perpetuates itself, and through the variety of routine or everyday gestures the community is reminded that it is whole, or part of a tribe’s collective sentiment.”11 For such a place to close would mean a lot, and this “collective sentiment” was clearly evident. Jordan, a customer claimed, Well it’s something that me and all of my friends relate to. My friend Joe lives in an apartment just right across the street, and so we’d come over here and pick up records, so it’s a lot of what we talk about, and we share records and sit around and listen to records. It’s a collective part of me and my friends lives. If this place were gone, it would be like part of our life was displaced or gone.

Another customer commented that such independent stores give the community an important flavor, and without such spaces, the city or town lacks a particular spirit. Dan claimed: “If you don’t have a store like this a lot of people would say, what is there to do in town? I mean there are a lot of social things, you can go to a bar, but a music store, there’s something about it. It just gives you a feeling.” Gelder claims that subcultures are always in some way nonconforming or dissenting. Through such views, the group gains cohesion and identity.12 The idea of keeping local business afloat and part of the community as an alternative to big-box stores and shopping malls is also of priority for many associated with the store. Many feel a sense of social responsibility and sense of cohesion in terms of supporting local business. A customer named Buck claimed: I’m really involved in community, and involved in supporting local business, and I’m a union leader where I live down in Medford, and I always try to shop with local people and especially people who treat their employees well. This place represents that to me. I’m always glad to come here and spend my few dollars that I have available, and I sometimes defer purchases that I want to make in music until I get here, for that purpose.

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Numerous customers commented that they like shopping at this store because they enjoy the interactions with the store employees and have, in some situations, forged friendships with them. I observed several customers enter the store and chat with the employees for a half hour or so without buying anything. While researching this store, I was asked to be in a band, to play a variety of records on my college radio show, and was invited to several concerts and events, all while being mistaken as a store employee. I also made a few musical recommendations to customers. In terms of a more general independent spirit, the respondents gave several examples that are evidence of opposition in a broader cultural sense. For example, vinyl records can be construed as a form of cultural resistance to new technologies, as it is often considered “obsolete,” where they have been cited as keeping the store in business in the face of digital downloading, CD copying, and iPod culture. A customer named Jeff discussed how vinyl records connect with notions of community and interaction: There seems to be a lot of file sharing on the net, and I was into that for a long time. Then I got to the point where I missed going to the record store, leafing through records, you know, actually having physical album there, and the cover art, and talking to someone about the music. I think all of that is part of a healthy experience in general, and much less isolating than being on your computer. I wanted to get back to a more human experience. Something more positive comes out of it (by shopping here), rather than sheer consumerism.

Customers take pride in shopping at the store because they are supporting local business, and they are willing to pay a few extra dollars for CDs they could find cheaper elsewhere or download for free. To shop in the store and chat with the employees is part of the experience, which is the sort of interaction that can’t occur online via computer. Hebdige claims it is basically the way in which commodities are used in subculture that delineates the subculture from more orthodox cultural formations.13 For example, vinyl record collectors may have a different appreciation for the tangible musical object, whereas someone who downloads music may not have such an interest, which is a common theme in the store. Or perhaps the music contains ideological or even political messages that strengthen group identity, whereas mass-cultural music is generally apolitical and marketed to a mass population, or “radio-friendly.” It is also important to note that the store reinforces other fringe media outlets such as independent music labels, independent bands, film/video, and magazines. Independent music labels such as Merge, Touch and Go, and K Records share a similar do-it-yourself and mom-and-pop attitude as The House of Records and seek to cultivate an alternative array of musical releases on the fringes of society. Thus, we have independent bands being supported

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by independent record labels. These labels then sell their records at independent records stores where a network of independent communities reinforce each other. According to Straw, in their reliance on small-scale infrastructures of production and dissemination, these spaces are rooted deeply within local circumstances, a feature commonly invoked in claims as to their political significance.14 This relates to The House of Records as they stock music from independent artists and indie music labels, which are small-scale infrastructures, as well as operate as an oppositional space in terms of dominant culture. While much evidence suggests The House of Records fosters community, it is important to note that it can also be viewed as exclusive and not inviting to some. Greg noted that the store could be “too funky,” that the very nonuniform look of the store may keep some people away. While The House of Records is relatively diverse in terms of customers, there tends to be an overwhelming presence of males. One of the few female customers interviewed replied, “Sometimes it can be a little bit intimidating because there’s all these male employees, and being the only female in there, and there’re all these guys, so you sometimes feel a bit excluded.” CONCLUSIONS Independent record stores such as The House of Records are culturally important and representative of processes of anti-McDonaldization on several levels. First, such stores provide an outlet in which independent and alternative music can circulate, which otherwise may not be easily available through other mainstream or commercial outlets. Independent record stores provide more cultural variety and add diversity to a world of increased media consolidation and cultural homogeneity. The unique aesthetic of the space is a form of anti-McDonaldization because it symbolizes something unique and nonrationalized. To many, shopping at such stores is a form of corporate resistance because it reinforces a sense of locality, community, and independence from corporate culture. The store also signifies a connection to history and acts as a community marker of independence as it has been in existence since 1971. Second, the type of social interaction that occurs at an independent record store fosters an independent community, which for many of those involved is a humanizing experience. In the eyes of the employees, the store is like a library (or as Martha said, “It’s like a crazy, chaotic rock and roll library”), where customers can seek out information about music, and an informal education on fringe music often occurs. Not only is it a place of commodity consumption but also a place where people can learn new information, and customers and employees forge friendships with each other. The employees have a very specialized or even expert knowledge of music and often recommend releases to their customers. Yet, at the same time, it is important

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to note the exclusive nature of such stores and that all people may not feel comfortable in such an atmosphere. For a small group of subcultures, music enthusiasts, and independently minded people who prefer the cultural fringes of society, such store closures signify the loss of authentic community space. While obscure records can still be found and purchased on the Internet, such mediations and exchanges do not have the same sense of human interaction and community. The resurgence in vinyl production and sales may be an indication that small groups of people prefer picking through stacks of records in the hopes of discovering something new or unique, while the space in which the records are bought is just as important as the records themselves. While it is estimated the profits at The House of Records are about half what they were in the early ’90s, Greg remained optimistic about the store’s future, especially with the “obsolete” medium of vinyl in many ways keeping the store in existence. While the future of such shops is ominous, the culture will likely adapt to new cultural practices by finding new spaces in which to obtain a similar sense of culture. At the same time, as long as a niche market exists and a core audience of consumers remains dedicated to supporting such stores, the independent record store will continue to exist. On the other hand, the closure of independent record stores leads to increased cultural homogeneity and the McDonaldization of society. It would be one less cultural space in which to explore a subcultural paradigm of consumption and connect a like-minded community oriented around ideals of independent, or noncorporate, culture. The House of Records as a form of anti-McDonaldization encourages a humanizing nature, cultural variety and difference, unique and nonrationalized space, and opportunities for critical thinking and aspects of human interaction. These days, the employees at The House of Records view the future of the store precariously—yet, they see the struggle to stay in business as resisting McDonaldized culture. In terms of the store possibly closing, Greg claimed, “I think for a customer, some of them would probably be driven to tears. I don’t want it to happen, and we’re going to make sure it doesn’t.” This statement frames the store almost as an act of cultural defiance, that to keep it going is an on-going struggle on the cultural battlefield. Greg went on to claim, If you eliminate a place like this, where people can go to find out about music, buy it if they want to, chat with other people who are into music, you eliminate that, you’re just alienating more people. You know, a lot of people would get angry if this place went out of business. And we’re turning the whole culture into mall culture, and that’s just ridiculous.

The depths to which these folks are invested in independent record store culture signifies an ardent interest in the vitality and sustainability

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of businesses such as The House of Records. For such stores to close only adds to an ever-increasing society characterized by processes of McDonaldization, and the struggle to keep it going is in many ways a labor of love (as opposed to earning large profits and wages) and a social act of defiance in terms of corporate culture. The employees of the store keep it going because they truly believe in what they do, and the products they sell and the way they sell them reinforces a vital and oppositional cultural space. The hegemony of the culture industries limits not only cultural variety but also vibrant and unique spaces in which a community of music consumers can gather and share a sense of cultural togetherness and collectively resist the dominant modes of consumer culture. As Greg mentioned previously, the loss of such stores is not only “alienating,” which is symptomatic of McDonaldization, but it further accelerates a culture predicated on predictability, sameness, and “mall culture.” The overall social effect of closing an independent record store is difficult to accurately gauge. When asked what it would be like if The House of Records were to close (along with the disappearance of its related culture), Fred, a store employee, touched upon the complexities of the human condition and its precarious relationship within a McDonaldized world. He claimed, “It’s suffocating. It would be like a whole organ of your body has died. And I think everybody feels it in some way or another. They may not know what’s causing their discomfort, but they feel it.” NOTES Many thanks to Leslie Steeves, Andre Sirois, and Jessalynn Strauss for their generous assistance and feedback. Also, a special thanks to the employees and customers at the House of Records, especially Greg Sutherland, who embraces the trenches. 1. Donny Kutzbach, “The Day the Music Died,” Artvoice, Buffalo, NY, December 7–13, 2006, http://Artvoice.com. 2. George Ritzer, McDonaldization: The Reader, Pine Forge Press, Thousand Oaks, 2006. 3. Ritzer, 2. 4. Andrew Keen, The Cult of the Amateur: How Today’s Internet Is Killing Our Culture, Doubleday Press, New York City, 2007. 5. Ken Gelder, Subcultures: Cultural Histories and Social Practice, Routledge Press, New York, 2007. 6. James Lull, Media, Communication, Culture: A Global Approach, Columbia University Press, New York, 1995. 7. C. Boggs, Gramsci’s Marxism, Pluto Press, London, 1976. 8. Stuart Hall, Notes on Deconstructing the Popular, Cultural Resistance Reader, Steven Duncombe ed., Verso Press, New York, 2002. 9. Stephen Lee, “Marketing the Margins: Wax Trax Records, Alternative Music and Independent Record Labels,” Dissertation, University of Texas at Austin, 1993.

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10. Sarah Thorton, “The Social Logic of Subcultural Capital,” The Subcultures Reader, Ken Gelder ed., Routledge, New York, London, 2005, 184 – 92. 11. Michel Maffesoli, “The Emotional Community: Research Arguments,” The Subcultures Reader, Ken Gelder ed., Routledge, New York, London, 2005. 12. Ken Gelder, Subcultures: Cultural Histories and Social Practice, Routledge Press, New York, 2007. 13. Dick Hebdige, “Subculture: The Meaning of Style,” The Subcultures Reader, Ken Gelder ed., Routledge, New York, London, 2005, 121–31. 14. Will Straw, “Communities and Scenes in Popular Music,” The Subcultures Reader, Ken Gelder ed., Routledge, New York, London, 2005, 469 –78.

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About the Editor and Contributors

EDITOR Robert C. Sickels is Associate Professor of American Film and Popular Culture at Whitman College. He has made several short films that have played nationally at festivals around the country. In addition to publishing numerous journal articles and book chapters, he is also the author of American Popular Culture through History: The 1940s (Greenwood, 2004) and American Film in the Digital Age (Praeger, 2009).

CONTRIBUTORS Amy M. Corey is a visiting assistant professor at Whitman College. She holds a PhD in Communication Studies from the University of Denver. She conducts research in the area of culture and communication with a focus on representation and identity as constructed and contested in media and culture industries. Andrew deWaard is an MA candidate in Film Studies at the University of British Columbia, writing his thesis titled “The Intertextual Museum (and Gift Shop): Towards a Cultural Economy of Transmediality.” He has published on Spike Lee and is currently coauthoring a book on Steven Soderbergh. Mike Emery has worked in corporate communications as a writer, editor, and public relations professional since 1994. Currently, he teaches public relations at the University of Houston and oversees publicity for the university’s arts programs. He’s contributed articles to several music and entertainment publications including Blues

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Revue, Relix, Blues Access, The Guitar Magazine, Austin Chronicle, and Houston Press. He lives in Houston with his wife, Sasha, and dogs, Cookie and Babs. David Gracon is a doctoral candidate in the Community and Society program located in the School of Journalism and Communication at the University of Oregon. His research interests include cultural studies and the political economy of media with a focus on media related subcultures and cultural resistance. John Allen Hendricks (PhD, University of Southern Mississippi) is a professor of communication and former chair of the Department of Communication & Theater at Southeastern Oklahoma State University. His research interests include media policy/regulation, media history, and political communication. His research has been published in numerous journals, books, and encyclopedias on these topics. Phylis Johnson is an associate professor of radio, sound, and new media studies in the Department of Radio-Television at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale. She has published numerous articles in leading journals, such as Journal of Radio Studies, Convergence, Journal for the Study of British Cultures, and Political Communication. She is leading coauthor of Queer Airwaves: The Story of Gay and Lesbian Broadcasting (2001). She was a “radio” contributor to the Encyclopedia of the Industrial Revolution (Greenwood Press) and The Museum of Broadcast Communications Encyclopedia of Radio. Marjorie D. Kibby is a senior lecturer in communication and culture at the University of Newcastle, Australia. Her current research is on an Australian Research Council funded investigation of the impact of the Internet on the way young people acquire and consume music. Previous publication areas include Internet culture and popular music. Franz Kasper Kroenig (Dr.phil) is a lecturer at the Universities of Flensburg and Cologne (Germany) for sociology, philosophy and musicology with specialization in systems theory of society. He is also a singer/songwriter with five album releases (day-glo) under the name of Franz Kasper. Phillip McIntyre is currently the Head of Discipline of Communication and Media in the School of Design, Communication, and IT at the University of Newcastle in New South Wales, Australia. His academic interest is in communication, creativity, and cultural production, and he sits on the editorial board of Perfect Beat: The Pacific Journal of Research into Contemporary Music and Popular Culture. Additionally, he has been a songwriter, instrumentalist, musical director, and manager for various groups dealing with promoters, record companies, and distribution labels. Robert McParland is an assistant professor of English at Felician College in New Jersey. He is the author of Charles Dickens’s American Audience (2009) and Music and Literary Modernism (2006). A composer and lyricist who has written many songs and

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has been involved with the development of two musicals, he is a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). Guy Morrow is a lecturer in the Department of Contemporary Music Studies at Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia. He teaches music business, music theory, and arts management and has recently completed a PhD that concerns contemporary artist management practices in Australia. He has published articles on a range of music-related topics and currently manages a rock band and plays live percussion with a number of DJs. Richard Strasser is an assistant professor of music industry at Northeastern University, where he was the recipient of the 2008 Excellence in Teaching Award. He is author of The Savvy Studio Owner, and the forthcoming book Music Business: The Key Concepts. Stephanie Vie is an assistant professor of composition and rhetoric at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado, where she teaches technical writing and science fiction courses. Her current research in music and popular culture examines the music videos of Gwen Stefani through a neo-Orientalist lens.

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Index

AC/DC, 75, 84, 89 “Ace of Spades” (Motorhead), 79, 87, 88 Adorno, Theodor W., 94, 199 Advances, songwriting, 8 “A la carte” model, 25– 26, 65– 66 Amazingtunes.com, 146 American Idol, 197, 198 American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP), 8, 68– 69, 70, 176 Anderson, Chris, 128 Anderson, Tom, 114, 115. See also MySpace Another Perfect Day (Motorhead), 87 Apple, Inc., 37, 149. See also iPhone; iTunes Arctic Monkeys, 11, 35, 196 Armour, Jennifer, 67 Arrangers, music, 70 Artistic personnel changes, in rock brands, 85–88, 89 ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers), 8, 68– 69, 70, 176 Asian radio, 182 ATO Records, 140 Attali, Jacques: collective production/ play of music, 144 – 45; monopoly in

music, 146; music as prophetic, 135, 142– 43; musicians and labor, 138; noise, 133; violent role of music, 136, 150 –51 Audience interactions, with rock brands, 77–81 Audio Home Recording Act (1992), 61 Australian music business, 43– 44, 46, 47– 48, 56. See also Eleven (company); Engine Room “Baby Boy” (Knowles), 67 Bachman, Katy, 180 –81 Baker, Matt, 124, 126 Baker, Peter C., 136 Bands, formed, 198 Barlow, Lou, 2 Barratt, Bob, 5 Beatles, 78, 200. See also Lennon, John; McCartney, Paul Becker, Howard, 8 Becket, Thomas, 110 Benjamin, Walter, 101 Berne Convention, 60, 61, 63, 72 Berne Convention Implementation Act (1988), 72 Best Buy, 138

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Beyoncé, 67 Big Music (Big Four): adaptations to Celestial Jukebox, 146–50; challenges to, 133–34, 136, 139 – 42; file sharing and digital music, 135–37, 142, 143; music distribution, 138–39 Billboard Magazine, 175 Bishop, Jack, 148 BitTorrent, 142 Blackout (Spears), 110 –11 Black/urban radio, 180, 186 Blogs, 36–37 BMG, 146. See also Sony BMG BMG Classics, 101 BMI (Broadcast Musicians Incorporated), 8, 68, 69, 70, 176 BMW, 181 Boden, Margaret, 14 Boehlert, Eric, 183 Bolton, Michael, 67 Bourdieu, Pierre, 3, 4, 8– 9, 15, 16 Bowie, David, 78–79, 88 boyd, danah, 123 Bragg, Billy, 107– 9, 112, 115, 116–17, 118 Braheny, John, 3, 4, 9 Branding, 76–77. See also Rock brands British copyright law, 110, 111 Broadcast Musicians Incorporated (BMI), 8, 68, 69, 70, 176 Bueno, Bolivar, 76, 77 Burkart, Patrick, 147, 148– 49, 150 Buzz, power of, 110 –11 Campbell, Phil, 87, 88 CBC (Children’s Broadcasting Corporation), 178 CDs: recordable, 23; sales, 21– 22, 26, 137–38; suggested list prices, 148 Celestial Jukebox, 146–50 Chancellor Broadcasting Company, 157 Charlatans (musical group), 141 Charter Communications, 32 Children’s Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), 178 Children’s radio, 177–79, 181, 185 Christian radio, 179, 180 Chuck D, 141, 143 Clarke, Eddie, 87, 88 Clear Channel Communications: consolidation, 138; deregulation and,

163; Dixie Chicks music ban, 161; live entertainment venues, 160; pay-forplay system, 158, 159; radio station ownership, 157, 158 Clear Channel Music Group, 183–84 Clear Channel Radio, 174, 181, 183–84, 188–89 Communications, Promotion, and Enhancement Act (2006), 31 Communications Act (1934), 155 Community as anti-McDonaldization, 214 –18 Community radio, 164 – 66, 185 Competition in Radio and Concert Industries Act, 159 – 60 Constitution (U.S.), 61 Consumers as creators of music content, 34 Copyright, 59 –72; Constitution and, 61; digital music, 59 – 60, 64 – 67, 134; extensions, 60, 61, 62– 64, 111–12, 147; fair use and public domain, 69 –71; historical overview, 109 –10, 111–12; Internet Service Providers and, 32; as protection from infringement, 67– 68; radio and, 163; royalties and, 68– 69; songs, 71–72; songwriters and, 8 Copyright Act (1909), 62 Copyright Act (1976), 62, 68, 70, 71, 72 Copyright’s Highway (Goldstein), 147 Copyright Term Extension Act. See Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act Costco, 138 Craft and Business of Song Writing, The (Braheny), 3 Creativity, in songwriting, 13–16 Creedence Clearwater Revival, 5 Criss, Peter, 85 CRM (customer relationship management), 148– 49 Crystal Ball (Prince), 141 Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly, 9, 15 Culture industry, 94 Cumulus Media, 161 Curry, Adam, 166 Customer relationship management (CRM), 148– 49 Dahl, Christopher T., 178 “Dancing in the Dark” (Springsteen), 10

Index Darknet, 143 DAT (Digital Audio Tape), 23 Death cigarettes, 77 Deconstructing the Popular (Hall), 209 Dee, Mikkey, 82, 87–88 Deregulation, 155– 61, 163, 182–83 DeWolf, Chris, 114. See also MySpace Dick James Music, 6–7 DiCola, Peter, 157–58 Digital Audio Tape (DAT), 23 Digital marketing, 127– 29 Digital Millennium Copyright Act (1998), 32, 61, 64 – 65, 117, 147, 183 Digital music: CD sales versus, 21– 22, 26; copyright and, 59 – 60, 64 – 67, 134; distribution, 142– 46 Digital Music Wars (Burkart and McCourt), 147 Digital Performance Act, 159 Digital rights management (DRM): Big Music and, 148, 149; Internet Service Providers, 31; Microsoft, 29, 30; recorded music, 24, 25, 26; Yahoo!, 32 Disney Corporation, 62, 63, 77, 111–12. See also Radio Disney Dixie Chicks, 161 DMCA. See Digital Millennium Copyright Act Donaldson, Andrew, 110 Donaldson v. Becket (Britain, 1774), 110 Donovan, Gregg, 50 –51, 54 –55 Doyle, Mike, 165 DRM. See Digital rights management Eagles (musical group), 141 Earvolution, 36–37 Economy, in globalization, 194 – 95 Eleven (company), 46, 47, 48–50, 51, 55, 56 EMI: Eleven (company) and, 47, 49, 51; as major record label, 22, 135; world music, 97. See also Big Music (Big Four) Engine Room, 46– 47, 51–53, 54 –55, 56 European copyright law, 60, 61– 62, 63 Evans, Morgan, 126, 129 Evora, Cesaria, 95, 100 –101 Eyes on the Prize, 117 FairPlay DRM technology, 25, 149 Fair use, 69 –71 Fall Out Boy, 145

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Faster Pussycat, 81 Federal Communications Commission (FCC): community radio, 161; deregulation, 161, 182–83; low power FM radio stations, 164 – 65, 166, 185; national radio ownership cap, 156; pay-for-play system, 159; radio consolidation and programming, 160; as regulatory agency for communications industry, 155 Feingold, Russell, 159 – 60 File sharing, 25– 26, 65– 66, 136, 142, 143 Fogerty, John, 5 Folk music, 93– 94. See also World music Formed bands, 198 “Four bar rule,” 70 Four-point test, 70 Fox Broadcasting Network, 179 Fox Kid’s Countdown, 179 France: copyright law, 62; popular music, 197 Frehley, Ace, 84, 89 Future of Music, The (Kusek and Leonhard), 144 Future of Music Coalition, 159, 165 “Futurists, The” (Toffler), 34 Garden, James, 83–84, 85 Garza, Janiss, 88 GBox, 37 German performance royalties, 196 Gershwin, George, 4 Gladwell, Malcolm, 111 Global Chinese Pop Chart, 182 Globalization, 193– 202; economy in, 194 – 95; as general social situation, 194; music and the music market, 195– 98; radio culture and, 182; self-economization of music, 198– 201; world music and, 95– 97 Gobe, Marc, 76 Goffin, Gerry, 1 Goffman, Erving, 123, 124 Goldmark, Andy, 67 Goldstein, Paul, 147 Goodman, David, 181 “Got a Little Bit of Love for You” (Armour), 67 Grasskamp, Walter, 201 Grateful Dead, 141

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Green, Nick, 124, 126, 129 Greenwell, Trent, 129 Greenwood, Johnny, 133, 134. See also Radiohead Gregor I (pope), 199 Grokster, 146 “Grow Your Logo into a Brand” (Smith), 81–82 Guthrie, Woody, 109, 112 Habitus, 3– 4 Hall, Stuart, 209 Hanson, Kurt, 186 “Happy Birthday to You,” 64, 111–12, 117 Hardware manufacturers, 33–34 Harris, Emmylou, 68 Harrison, George, 67, 68 Harris v. Emus Records (1984), 68 Harry Fox Agency, 8, 70 Hear Music, 141 Hegemony, 208– 9 “He’s So Fine” (Mack), 67 Hirschhorn, Joel, 9 Holden, Mark, 129 Holt, Douglas B., 77 Home of the Hits, 205– 6 House of Records, The: community, 214 –18; customers, 213–17, 218; employees, 213–15, 217, 218; founding, 209 –10; location, 206, 210; music stock, 212–13, 218; physical space, 210 –12; resisting values, noncorporate attitudes, 213–14; viability, 219 – 20 Huerta, Gerard, 84, 89 Iconic brands, 77 IFPI (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry), 147– 48 “I Love This Bar” (McCloud), 67 Impression management, 122– 25 Independent musicians, 123– 27, 128–30, 159, 176 Independent record stores, 208, 217–19. See also Home of the Hits; House of Records, The Infinity Broadcasting Corporation, 157 In Our Bedroom After the War (Stars), 142 In Rainbows (Radiohead), 133–34, 136, 139 – 40, 145, 150

Intermix Media Inc., 115 International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), 147– 48 International music business, 43– 44, 46, 47– 48, 56–57. See also Eleven (company); Engine Room Internet: copyright and, 65– 66; music industry and, 121, 122, 144 – 45; radio and, 163, 167, 175–76, 178–79, 183–84, 185–86; rock brands and, 81, 82–83; search engines, 32–33; songwriting and, 10 –13; viral marketing and, 127– 28; world music and, 95. See also MySpace; Social networking sites Internet Service Providers, 30 –32 iPhone, 28– 29 Isley, Marvin, 67 Isley, Ronald, 67 iTunes: “a la carte” model, 25, 65– 66; digital rights management, 149; Earvolution and, 36; In Rainbows (Radiohead), 140; sales, 25; songwriting and, 12; visitors to site, 26. See also Apple, Inc. Jack FM, 187 Jackson, Daniel M., 76, 77 James, Dick, 6–7 Jamiroquai, 141 Jaszi, Peter, 60 Jazz, 199 Jefferson, Thomas, 61 Jobs, Steve, 149 John, Elton, 6–7 Journey (musical group), 86, 87, 89 Kasha, Al, 9 KEDU-LP (radio station), 166 Keith, Toby, 67 Kilmister, Lemmy, 79, 82, 87–88, 89 King, Carole, 1, 2 KISS: artistic personnel changes, 85–86, 87; brand-audience interactions, 77, 80; consistency, 89; logo, 84 –85, 89; as rock brand, 75–76; Web site, 81 Klein, Naomi, 48, 53 Klippel, Andrew, 46, 47, 52 Kotarba, Joe, 78, 79, 86

Index Krangle, Jodi, 12 Kruger, Debbie, 1– 2 Kulick, Bruce, 86 Kusek, David, 144, 147, 150, 168 L.A. Guns, 81 Landau, Jon, 10 “Last DJ, The” (Petty), 161 Last.fm, 184 –85 Led Zeppelin, 75 Lehman, Bruce A., 64 – 65 Lennon, John, 6, 200. See also Beatles Leonhard, Gerd, 144, 147, 150, 168 Lessig, Lawrence, 60, 63, 113–14 License renewals, radio, 156–57 “Lips/Tongue” logo, 81, 83, 89. See also Rolling Stones Lloyd Webber, Andrew, 68 Local Community Radio Act (2007), 164 “Locomotion, The” (Goffin and King), 1 Logos, 76, 80, 81–85, 88–89 Loudeye/OD2, 31 “Love Is A Wonderful Thing” (Bolton and Goldmark), 67 Low power FM (LPFM) radio stations, 164 – 66, 185 Luhmann, Niklas, 196 Mack, Ronald, 67 Madonna, 141 Maines, Natalie, 161 Marketing, digital/viral, 127– 29 Mashups, 32 Mays, Lowry, 138, 160 McCartney, Paul: James, Dick, and, 6; as rock brand, 78, 79, 80; Starbucks and, 141; Web-based media and, 11–12; writing of Yesterday, 4. See also Beatles McCloud, Michael, 67 McCourt, Tom, 147, 148– 49, 150 McDaniel, Darryl, 122 McDonaldization: community versus, 214 –18; described, 207; examples, 207–8; independent record store culture versus, 209 –13 McDonald’s, 76 MC Lars, 125, 126, 129 McMullen, Lauren, 83, 85 MGM v. Grokster, 146

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Michaelson, Ingrid, 123 Microsoft, 29 –30, 33 Middle Ages, 194 – 95, 199, 200 Mitchell, Joni, 141 Mobile commerce, 28– 29 Money, Eddie, 81 Morna, 95, 100 –101 Motorhead, 79, 82–83, 87–88, 89 mp3 files, 33–34, 134, 177, 181 MSN Music Store, 29 –30 MTV Network Radio, 180 Murdoch, Rupert, 114, 115–16 Muse’s News, The, 12 Music arrangers, 70 Music education, 70 –71 Music Genome Project, 167 “Music Like Water” model, 144, 147, 150 MusicMatch, 32 MusicNet, 24, 31 Music producing, 5, 46 Music publishing, 6–8, 62, 66 Music Unlimited, 32–33 Music writers, 71 Mypurchase, 36 MySpace: Bragg, Billy, and, 107– 9, 112, 115, 116–17, 118; buzz and, 111; copyright and, 66; as democratic and uncontrolled platform, 196; digital marketing and, 128– 29; impression management and, 122– 25; independent musicians’ use of, 123– 27, 128–30; ownership issues, 107– 9, 112, 115, 116–17, 118; recorded music and, 35–36; as social networking site, 113, 114 –15, 122– 23, 125– 27; songwriting and, 10 “My Sweet Lord” (Harrison), 67 NAB (National Association of Broadcasters), 163, 164, 165 Napster: Earvolution and, 36; as paid online music service, 26, 32, 33; piracy of recorded music, 24, 65 National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), 163, 164, 165 National Public Radio (NPR), 165, 178 Negus, Keith, 9 –10, 11, 16 News Corporation, 114, 115 Nike, 53

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Index

Nine Inch Nails, 140 Noggin Radio, 178 Noise (Attali), 135, 150 –51 Northern Songs, 6 NPR (National Public Radio), 165, 178 “Nude” (Radiohead), 145

Public Law 105-304. See Digital Millennium Copyright Act Publishing, music, 6–8, 62, 66 Putumayo World Music, 95, 102 Pyramid Communications, 157 Quirk, Paul, 21

Oasis (musical group), 141 Oligopolies, 160, 161 Ownership issues: MySpace, 107– 9, 112, 115, 116–17, 118; radio stations, 155–58, 160, 161 Packer, James, 47, 52, 54 Palumbo, Frank, 179 Pandora technology, 167 Pay-for-play system (payola), 158–59, 176, 183 “Pay-what-you-want” experiment, 133–34, 136, 139 – 40, 145, 150 Peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing, 23– 27, 65 Performance rights agencies, 68– 69, 176. See also American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers; Broadcast Musicians Incorporated Perry, Bob, 187 Petagno, Joe, 82 Petty, Tom, 161 “Phantom of the Opera” (Lloyd Webber), 68 Phillips, 23 Pickering, Michael, 11 PickleBerry, 178 Pink Floyd, 75 Pipes (Yahoo! service), 32 Piracy, 23– 24, 38, 144. See also Copyright Planet Earth (Prince), 21, 141 Podcasting, 163– 64, 166, 168 Porter, Eduardo, 136 Powell, Michael, 162 Presley, Elvis, 200 PressPlay, 24 Prince, 5, 21, 38, 141 Producing, music, 5, 46 Programming, radio, 158–59, 160 Public domain, 69 –71 Public Enemy, 141 Public Law 105-298. See Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act

Radio, 155–89; black/urban, 180, 186; Christian, 179, 180; community, 164 – 66, 185; deregulation of communications industry, 155– 61, 182–83; future of, 166– 68, 184 –86; global culture, 182; hit radio concept, 174–76; Internet and, 163, 167, 175–76, 178–79, 183–84, 185–86; license renewals, 156–57; low power FM stations, 164–66, 185; overview, 173–74, 182–84; ownership, 155–58, 160, 161; pay-for-play system, 158–59, 176, 183; as personal medium, 176, 180 –82, 185; podcasting and, 163– 64, 166, 168; programming, 158–59, 160; recording industry and, 175; satellite, 162– 63, 181; streaming, 26; urban, 180, 186; younger listeners, 177–79, 181, 185 Radio AAHS, 178 Radio Disney, 177, 179. See also Disney Corporation Radiohead, 133–34, 136, 139 – 40, 145, 150 Radio & Records, 175 Ragas, Matthew W., 76, 77 Rationalization, 207 RealNetwork, 29, 30 Recordable CD-ROMs, 23 Recorded music, 21–38, 133–51; alternative business models and actors, 27– 28; CD versus digital sales, 21– 22, 26; Celestial Jukebox, 146–50; consumers as creators of music content, 34; digital distribution, 142– 46; hardware manufacturers and, 33–34; Internet Service Providers and, 30 –32; mobile commerce, 28– 29; “pay-what-you-want” experiment, 133–34, 136, 139 – 40, 145, 150; peer-to-peer file sharing, 23– 27, 65; radio and, 175; search engines and, 32–33; social networks as content

Index creators, 34 –37; software companies and, 29 –30; traditional recording business model, 22– 23 Recording Academy, The, 95 Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA): copyright, 65, 66; file sharing, 136; Internet Service Providers and, 32; as lobbyist, 135; suggested CD list prices, 148 Renaissance, 195, 199 – 200 Repp, Ray, 68 Reznor, Trent, 140 – 41 Rhapsody (company): catalog size, 128; digital rights management, 149; Earvolution and, 36; recorded music and, 30, 31, 32–33 RIAA. See Recording Industry Association of America Ritzer, George, 206–7 Robertson, Brian, 87, 89 Rock brands, 75– 90; artistic personnel changes, 85–88, 89; audience interactions, 77–81; brand anatomy, 76–77; consistency, 88– 90; defined, 75; logos, 80, 81–85, 88–89 Rock the Nation Live (KISS), 80 Rodman, Gilbert B., 137 Rolling Stones: brand-audience interactions, 77–78, 79 –80; consistency, 88, 89, 90; logo, 80, 83, 89; as rock brand, 75–76; Web site, 81, 83 Royalties, 8, 68– 69, 176, 183, 196– 97 Rubenstein, Helena, 80, 81 Saint-Amour, Paul K., 60 Sampling, 64 Samuels, Edward, 8 Satellite radio, 162– 63, 181. See also Radio Schon, Donald, 3– 4 Search engines, 32–33 Second Life, 185–86 Seeger, Pete, 78 SellaBand.com, 146 SESAC, 68, 69 Simmons, Gene, 86, 87, 89 Singer, Eric, 85–86 Sirius Satellite Radio, 162, 181, 184 Slicethepie.com, 146 Smashing Pumpkins, 141

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Smith, Jerome D., 81–82, 83, 85 Smith, Steve, 86 “Snaggletooth” logo, 82–83. See also Motorhead Snape, Anthony, 124, 127, 128– 29 Social networking sites, 34 –37, 108– 9, 113–14, 116–17. See also Internet; MySpace Software companies, 29 –30 Sohn, Gigi, 158 Solver (musical group), 126, 129 Songwriting, 1–16; common song elements, 2–3; copyright, 62, 66, 70, 71–72; creativity, 13–16; importance of, 1– 2; Internet and, 10 –13; process, 8–10; producing and, 5; publishing and, 6–8; romantic/inspirational view of, 13–14; skill acquisition, 3– 4 Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (1998), 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 111–12. See also Copyright Sony BMG: Digital Audio Tape, 23; GBox and, 37; as major record label, 22, 135; Prince and, 38; Recordable CD-ROM, 23; vertical integration, 37; world music divisions, 97, 101, 102. See also Big Music (Big Four) Soto, Jeff Scott, 86 Spears, Britney, 110 –11 Springsteen, Bruce, 10, 78, 88 Stanley, Paul, 80, 86, 89 Starbucks Entertainment Company, 95, 101, 141 Stars (musical group), 142 Stern, Howard, 181 Streaming music, 25– 26 Strip malls, 208 Structural couplings, 196 Styx, 86, 87 Subscription file sharing, 25– 26, 65– 66 Supersonic (musical group), 12–13 Systems theory, 195, 199 Take That, 198 Telecommunications Act (1996), 155–58, 159 – 60, 162 Tequila, Tila, 114 Terry, Lee, 165 Thayer, Tommy, 85–86

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Third world music. See World music Thirsty Merc, 124, 126 “This Land Is Your Land” (Guthrie), 111–12 Thom, Sandi, 10 –11 Thomas, Jammie, 66 Thomas, Kim, 49 “Thoughts on Music” (Jobs), 149 Throsby, David, 45 “Till You” (Repp), 68 Tipping Point, The (Gladwell), 111 Toffler, Alvin, 34 “Total Music” subscription service, 149 Travis, Daryl, 76 Universal Music Group: copyright and, 66, 69; GBox and, 37; as major record label, 22, 135; “Total Music” subscription service, 149; world music, 97; XM Satellite Radio and, 183. See also Big Music (Big Four) Urban radio, 180, 186 U.S. Constitution, 61 U.S. Copyright Office, 71, 72 Valance, Holly, 52, 53, 55 Valenti, Jack, 64 Vanderdonckt, Cheyanne, 137 Vasan, Sonia, 83 Verizon Communications, 31, 32 Viacom, 157 “Videotape” (Radiohead), 145, 150 Vines, The, 52, 53 Vinyl records, 217, 219. See also House of Records, The Viral marketing, 127– 29 Waggstaff, Todd, 46– 47, 51–52, 53 Wal-Mart, 37, 128, 138, 149 Warner Music Group: blogs and, 36; copyright and, 66; as major record label, 22, 135; Wilco and, 141– 42; world music division, 96– 97, 103. See also Big Music (Big Four) Warner Music International, 96– 97, 103

W.A.S.T.E., 139, 145. See also Radiohead Watson, John, 47, 48–50, 51, 55 Web sites. See Internet Wells, Mark, 12–13, 126 WELL (Whole Earth ’Lectronic Link), 113 Welsh, Keith, 45 Wentz, Pete, 145– 46 White Line Fever (Kilmister and Garza), 79, 87, 88 “Who Are the Pirates?” (Bishop), 148 Whole Earth ’Lectronic Link (WELL), 113 “Who Owns the Music, MTV or Me?” (Bragg), 108 Wilco, 141– 42 Williams, Saul, 140 – 41 Windows Media Player 10 jukebox, 29–30 WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization), 147– 48 Withers, W. Russell, 162, 163, 164, 165 WOMEX conference, 102 World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), 147– 48 World music, 93–105; availability, 95; as big business, 96– 97; commercial categories, 97– 99; defined, 93– 94; globalization and, 95– 97; ideological categories, 99 –101; making music and marketing authenticity, 101–3; non-Western emphasis, 98– 99 WQBH-AM (radio station), 160 – 61 Wright, Jeb, 86–87 Writers, music, 71 XM Satellite Radio, 162, 183, 184 Yahoo!, 32–33 Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (Wilco), 141– 42 Yesterday (Lennon and McCartney), 4 Yorke, Thom, 139 – 40, 145. See also Radiohead Youth radio, 177–79, 181, 185 YouTube, 66, 145 YouTunes, 32 Zune Marketplace, 33

The Business of Entertainment

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The Business of Entertainment VOLUME 3

Television

Edited by Robert C. Sickels

 

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The business of entertainment / edited by Robert C. Sickels. p. cm. — (Praeger perspectives) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978– 0 –275–99838–7 (set: alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–275–99840–0 (vol. 1 : alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–275–99842–4 (vol. 2 : alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–275–99844–8 (vol. 3 : alk. paper) 1. Performing arts. 2. Performing arts—Economic aspects. I. Sickels, Robert. PN1584.B87 2009 790.2—dc22 2008030435 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available. Copyright © 2009 by Robert C. Sickels All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, by any process or technique, without the express written consent of the publisher. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2008030435 ISBN: 978–0–275–99838–7 (set) 978–0–275–99840–0 (vol. 1) 978–0–275–99842–4 (vol. 2) 978–0–275–99844–8 (vol. 3) First published in 2009 Greenwood Press, 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881 An imprint of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. www.greenwood.com Printed in the United States of America

The paper used in this book complies with the Permanent Paper Standard issued by the National Information Standards Organization (Z39.48–1984). 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

I stop somewhere waiting for you. —Walt Whitman

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Contents

Preface by Robert C. Sickels Acknowledgments

ix xiii

 1

The Business of Entertainment: Television Fans Patricia Ventura and Beth Mauldin

 2

A Joint (Ad)Venture: The CW Network and the Youth Market Caryn Murphy

17

U Know U Love Me: New Media, Gossip Girl, and the (Un)Changing Discourses of Girlhood Anne H. Petersen

35

 3

1

 4

Why I Love The Office . . . and Hate NBC Sue J. Kim

61

 5

Who Wins with NASCAR on ESPN? Wanda Little Fenimore

83

 6

Show Time: Sundance Meets Corporate America K. Alex Ilyasova

 7

Temporary Resistance: Strategies of Freelance Workers in American Network Television News Kathleen M. Ryan

101

125

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 8  9

Contents

The Economic and Business Realities of Reality Television Richard Crew

143

Reality Television: The Business of Mediating (Extra)Ordinary Life Valerie Palmer-Mehta and Alina Haliliuc

159

 10 “The Way of the Gay”: Bravo TV, Lifestyle Consumption, and Promotional Culture Amy M. Corey

179

 11 The “Real” O.C.: Laguna Beach, MTV, and the Business of Reality Star Production Anne H. Petersen

197

About the Editor and Contributors

213

Index

217

Preface

The business of entertainment has always been in constant flux, but at the present moment the speed at which change is occurring is singularly unprecedented. As the entertainment industry seeks to evolve and adapt in light of the ascendance of all things digital, 100 years worth of structures and systems appear to be falling away like so much dross. The concomitantly nascent era of “new media,” so the assumption goes, must also by definition mean the death of old media. And in some ways this is true, at least as it concerns the various physical forms of older media such as records and cassettes, VHS tapes, analog television broadcasts, and newspapers actually made of paper. These sorts of things are either already long dead or at best replicating the experience of Homo habilis laying eyes on Homo erectus for the first time; the new era most certainly will not go well for them. In place of the old totems come the new ones—iTunes, HDTV, TiVo, Digital Cinema, and so on—seemingly disparate but unified by their digital make-ups. And this digital nature and the accompanying ease with which music, films, and TV shows can be accessed and made portable allows the new media to be “free.” But free in what sense of the word? Certainly free as concerns the unfettering of the former corporeal state of media. While we need something tangible on which to view it—made unbelievably simple by the proliferation of iPods and like devices—media can be converted into digital ones and zeroes and delivered via the ether almost anywhere in the world at any time. New media is portable and near infinitely accessible, and only becoming more so as technology improves, just as the devices upon which we store

x

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our information grow increasingly infinitesimal (e.g., the iPod Nano). But of greater concern, at least to the giant international media conglomerates that own the rights to so much of what the entertainment industry produces, is the perception that media is actually free —that payment is neither required nor necessary, that the natural state of entertainment is that it should be wholly accessible entirely without cost. This way of thinking is increasingly prevalent in younger consumers, who bristle at paying 99¢ on iTunes for a song or $4 to their cable provider for a movie. Why bother paying for things when you can download them for nothing online with any number of free, very user-friendly, and increasingly hard to trace technologies? And this line of thinking rightfully scares the bejeezus out of the media congloms whose financial lifeblood emanates from their stranglehold on the distribution of their subsidiaries’ products. If, as Michael Wolff claims, “[t]he age of mediadistribution monopolies is over,”1 then what comes next? And so the rush is on to answer this and other questions, although I would argue that the desire to bury the old business methods as being somehow inapplicable to new media is, as yet, premature. Yes, it does seem as though the old models aren’t efficient in the present moment and that companies are struggling to hit upon new ones that will be equally profitable.—This is especially true as concerns just how the Internet will earn income for content providers. And, in fact, perhaps with the exponentially burgeoning number of opportunities for consumers to acquire and view their media, even the attempt to replicate what worked before is questionable. And yet it persists. The ubiquitously adopted concept of media convergence —when a company spreads the promotion and sales of a product across multiple subsidiaries— has yet to prove as profitable as had been hoped, but it’s not like money hasn’t been made. When Sony can make all the Spider-Man movies, which feature music by Sony BMG recording artists, and then sell soundtrack CDs or digital downloads, which can be played on Sony CD players, or ripped for play on a Sony MP3 Walkman, or converted into ring tones for use on a Sony Ericsson cell phone, and sell DVDs to be played on Sony DVD players, and sell video games to be played on Sony PlayStations, and license the images of Spiderman and accompanying characters to be featured on toys, fast food, and any number of other objects—all of which equals billions for the parent company’s bottom line —something is working out as planned. So, it’s no surprise that new media is quickly being bought up not just by other new companies but by the old ones as well—for example, Google owns YouTube while Fox News Corp. now counts MySpace among its subsidiaries. And while they’ve yet to capitalize on just how to maximize profits from these kinds of things or to corner the market on the distribution avenues for new media, it’s impossible to dismiss out of hand the idea that they will. After all, previous innovations and revolutions in the entertainment industry that were supposed to make the companies of old uncompetitive dinosaurs in the

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end only resulted in their becoming bigger and more omnivorous than ever. Who’s to say it won’t happen again? And while it’s fascinating to prognosticate what kinds of industrial changes the latest moment of revolution will result in for the companies involved, what often goes unmentioned in so many breathless glossy magazine features on industry tycoons is what this means for the many artistic folks working in the industry. The same tensions that have always been present between creators and companies remain, none more vivid than the question of whether or not the eternal conflict between art and commerce can ever be peaceably resolved, especially in light of the awesome international dominance of the so-called big six contemporary media conglomerates—Fox, Disney, General Electric, Viacom, Time Warner, and Sony—which control upwards of 90 percent of the U.S. entertainment industry. The creation of entertainment media is the provenance of the artistically minded, whereas the widespread dissemination of their work is the bailiwick of so many Ivy League–trained MBAs. But the digital renaissance has allowed creators more control over their work, especially as concerns making and distributing their art outside of traditional systems. As artists gain more control over their work, how will the media conglomerates, which are always looking to increase the size of their piece of the pie, seek to consolidate their power, and how will this effect what gets made and seen and heard and what doesn’t? How will art and commerce intersect differently in the digital age? And what will the results of their collision ultimately mean for consumers, whose lives are increasingly ensconced in an omnipresent and immediate entertainment industry? While it’s clear that the entertainment industry is once again going through one of its periodic upheavals, what that means is only now beginning to be debated. Are we really going into a new era in which all the old models cease to apply, or will the old behemoths weather yet another storm only to once again emerge intact and even larger than they were in previous incarnations? And how will artists trying to maintain their integrity and beliefs reconcile their visions with those of the corporate entities for which they must almost certainly work should they want their creations ever to be seen by a larger audience? It’s the answers to these questions with which the various authors contributing to The Business of Entertainment: Television grapple. In the opening chapter, Patricia Ventura and Beth Mauldin’s “The Business of Entertainment: Television Fans,” they discuss the effect that the digital revolution and Web 2.0 are having on television fandom. This is followed by Caryn Murphy’s “A Joint (Ad)Venture: The CW Network and the Youth Market,” in which she argues that in an attempt to negotiate the realities of a changing marketplace, formerly rival corporations are moving toward cooperation. Next, in “U Know U Love Me: New Media, Gossip Girl, and the (Un)Changing Discourses of Girlhood,” Anne H. Petersen looks at the ways girl spectatorship is being reshaped in the era of new media. In “Why I Love

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The Office . . . And Hate NBC,” Sue J. Kim details how “in both its content (the episodes) and its form (its production and distribution), the show explores the small and large negotiations we make as mere human beings trying to survive in the age of late capitalism.” Wanda Little Fenimore’s “Who Wins with NASCAR on ESPN?” considers what the purchase of NASCAR’s rights by Disney’s ESPN/ABC will likely mean for consumers. Subsequently, in “Show Time: Sundance Meets Corporate America,” K. Alex Ilyasova examines if there are places on television beyond the major networks “where viewers can see the lives of gays and lesbians represented in more complex ways.” Next, Kathleen Ryan, in “Temporary Resistance: Strategies of Freelance Workers in American Network Television News,” posits, somewhat surprisingly, that in many instances people working in TV news prefer freelancing to working under contract. In the remaining essays, Richard Crew’s “The Economic and Business Realities of Reality Television,” Valerie Palmer-Mehta and Alina Haliliuc’s “Reality Television: The Business of Mediating (Extra)Ordinary Life,” Amy M. Corey’s “ ‘The Way of the Gay’: Bravo TV, Lifestyle Consumption, and Promotional Culture,” and Petersen’s “The ‘Real’ O.C.: Laguna Beach, MTV, and the Business of Reality Star Production,” the respective authors analyze the rise and cultural meaning of reality TV as a dominant staple of the contemporary television industry. Ultimately, it is our hope that these chapters will serve to introduce their readers to the rich and myriad array of issues facing the television industry and how they might play out on a worldwide cultural stage. And perhaps they will also contribute to new ways of thinking about and researching the business of entertainment as it applies to television and what it continues to mean in a rapidly changing industry and world. Robert C. Sickels NOTE 1. Michael Wolff, “The Best of Enemies,” Vanity Fair, April 2008, 134.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks are due to my editor at Praeger Publishers, Jeff Olson, for his patience, invaluable input, and quality baseball talk, even if he is a Red Sox fan. Thanks are also due to Praeger’s Nick Philipson and Lindsay Claire, who helped immensely in getting this project off the ground and seeing it through to completion. Special thanks are also due to all the authors who contributed their pieces to these collections; I am very grateful and appreciative. I’d also like to thank Professor Michael Branch of the University of Nevada, Reno, for his tireless guidance, inspiration, and friendship over the years; he showed me a sterling path that I’ve tried my best to follow. Thanks to Whitman College and the support of my colleagues and friends here, especially Robert Withycombe and Jana Byars. And thanks to my dad, who taught me to always do your work and don’t make excuses, and to my mom, who always had time to take me to a movie or buy me a book. Lastly, thanks to my kids, Dutch and Tallulah, who put up with me throughout what was a long and arduous process.

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chapter 1

The Business of Entertainment: Television Fans Patricia Ventura and Beth Mauldin

In the spring of 2006, as both the May sweeps and the season finale neared, ABC’s hit television drama Lost went interactive, joining the wave of Internet–television tie-ins with the “Lost Experience.”1 Lost had already taken tentative steps in this direction, with its fictional Oceanic Airlines Web site (the airline whose plane crash near a mysterious island in the Pacific established the series’ premise). It was followed by another site, purporting to belong to the shadowy black-ops research organization, the Hanso Foundation, which used the island as its base of operations for carrying out its vaguely sinister experiments. These Web sites offered tantalizing extras to fans, but it was not until the launch of the online game “Lost Experience” that one of television’s highest rated shows explored a variety of channels—the Internet, mobile phones, video-on-demand, e-mail, blogs, podcasts, and ARGs—to create buzz and excite interest from nonviewers but, more importantly, to solidify and further captivate the already obsessed—and often obsessive — fan base. Lost is one of countless television shows that, by interfacing with Web 2.0 and utilizing the rapid expansion and diversification of media and communication technology, has redefined the relationship between fans and television and, in so doing, redefined the nature of fandom itself. Neither entirely passive nor unidirectional, fandom has undergone a cultural shift thanks to new digital technologies that enable fans to participate actively in the production, consumption, and distribution of their favorite shows. To understand television today, it helps to be familiar with the combination of marketing buzzwords and academic neologisms that add up to a

2

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deeply useful terminology for understanding the priorities of content providers and fans. Indeed, one of those very terms important to consider is “content providers,” especially as we explore the changing television landscape and what that means for fan cultures. So, to begin our exploration, we have to bear in mind the technological foundation that has enabled much of the changed mediascape, that is, the World Wide Web, especially in its latest incarnation. WEB 2.0 Coined by Tim O’Reilly, computer theorist and publisher, the term Web 2.0 indicates a change that occurred when the 1990s’ dot.com bubble burst and ended what might be called “the irrationally exuberant phase” of the Internet. For O’Reilly, the bursting of the dot.com bubble was really a shake out of the ideas and approaches that did not best utilize the possibilities of the Internet or offer the kinds of approaches users have found most worth their time. What remained after the shakeout were approaches, platforms, and content that are community focused and collaboratively generated; in O’Reilly’s terms, these “embraced the power of the web to harness collective intelligence.”2 To understand how Web 2.0 connects to fandom, we need only turn to a few of the oppositions O’Reilly offers between Web 1.0 and 2.0: • Britannica Online v. Wikipedia • publishing v. participation • personal Web sites v. blogging3

Such contrasts illustrate the key areas in which the participatory cultures of fandom are not only facilitated by the Web but are re-created by it. But perhaps a more telling opposition is one created by New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen between “the people formerly known as the audience” and the traditional media companies to whom he addresses the following manifesto-like statement: You don’t own the eyeballs. You don’t own the press, which is now divided into pro and amateur zones. You don’t control production on the new platform, which isn’t one-way. There’s a new balance of power between you and us. The people formerly known as the audience are simply the public made realer, less fictional, more able, less predictable.4

This public is now freed to become what enthusiasts call “prosumers,” who not only consume programming but have been unleashed by Web 2.0 to produce their own independent media. It is the public that provides much of the content for and serves as a measure of Web 2.0 through the likes of peer-to-peer

The Business of Entertainment

3

file sharing via BitTorrent—which enable large amounts of data, such as a television show, to be distributed widely, if illegally, outside of the intended distribution methods. It is also this public that creates and maintains the blogs and social networking sites that do not merely accommodate the public but whose content is the public communication and participation. For fan culture the implications of such media are profound. As one researcher found in an ethnographic study of online fan cultures, the Internet has absolutely changed the landscape. She cites the discussion of two subjects, Carrie-Ann and Raven, who explained, the Internet has made fandom more acceptable. . . . It’s made fandom more obsessive but also less antisocial and geeky, in that you don’t have to devote time and money to . . . the extent of going to conventions and stuff. Raven, again, replied that the Internet has made fandom “a tighter knit community and much more accessible than it used to be.”5

In Web 2.0 these communities are often found in two key sites: the blog and the social networking sphere. Blogs (originally web logs) have largely replaced Web 1.0 personal communication platforms such as home pages or Usenet groups because they possess many advantages. First, they are easy to create: No particular design knowledge is required to make one; no particular Web capability is required to host one. But importantly, they offer features such as the permalink (permanent link), which enables any blog entry to be easily accessible no matter when it was published, and RSS (Really Simple Syndication), which enables viewers to essentially subscribe to their favorite sites and be notified of changes immediately. Both of these abilities empower user participation and have enabled the blogosphere to become what O’Reilly calls “the voice we hear in all of our heads” and “a reflection of conscious thought and attention.”6 The ability to easily share this voice opens up all manner of possibilities for collective creative endeavor. Fan fiction, for example, has largely moved to the Web with FanLib being a key blogging service. FanLib is a marketing company that provides a platform for fans to meet online to share the stories, or “fanfic,” they produce related to their favorite shows. This self-proclaimed “People Powered Entertainment™ company” also cosponsors online events with producers and publishers designed to produce audience-driven content within a professionally controlled environment.7 In 2007, the producers of Showtime’s The L-Word teamed up with FanLib to solicit script ideas. According to the official Web site, Fans worked with a writer and coproducer of the show to “collectively and democratically” write an original scene that aired in the third episode of season five. Showtime paid the winner $1,000, flew her to Vancouver to watch the scene being filmed, and gave her a credit on screen in the end titles. Fans who voted for

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their favorite submission on the blog won BuzzPoints, a reward for using the Web site that helps them “attain status and earn a reputation within [the] fanisode community.”8 The collaboration was extremely successful, producing over 150,000 site visits for FanLib as well as a 51 percent boost in the ratings for The L-Word over the previous season.9 Social networking services such as MySpace and Facebook allow blogging as well as chatting, messaging, e-mail, video, chat, and file sharing within groups that individuals can easily locate. Here fans can join groups that allow them to communicate with each other about a particular show and, importantly, to view each other’s profiles and see what other groups their fellow fans are a part of. This display of preferences becomes a way to create an online identity—just as clothing style, neighborhood, clubs, and the like are ways to create and display identity in the physical world. In the virtual world, one’s identity is often encapsulated through the use of an image, known as an avatar, that stands in for the person or group being connected to. These avatars are what new-media scholar danah boyd calls “cultural artifacts” that allow fans to both create and perform their identities online.10 They also serve to promote trends, characters, causes, and shows to an audience of people who already have at least one affinity in common—without the expense of traditional advertising; after all, it is the fans who do the work of marketing without even being aware that they are working. And while these same fans act as de facto marketers and content providers, their demographic information—that is their profiles and affiliations—are sold by the site to marketers looking for new ways to target precise audiences. Thus, the business model of Web 2.0 is paradoxically both libratory and utterly surveillance focused: It invites participation so it can measure and sell it. Users thereby not only provide the product being presented—that is, the profiles and activity that form the content of the site —they also provide the product being sold—that is, their very online selves. When the new television network The CW was launched in the fall of 2006, executives decided to use Internet social networking to attract new viewers, generate buzz, and get the audience more personally and emotionally invested in its shows.11 The CW arose from the ashes of two networks, The WB and UPN, which had operated since the mid-1990s. The network focused on the site that was at the time the most popular for social networking on the Web, especially among adolescents and teenagers—MySpace. By establishing its presence there, The CW became the first network to create an interactive, Web-based experience for viewers, encouraging them not only to watch the shows but also to buy from its advertisers. The CW in effect became a “member” of MySpace, creating a profile that echoed the network’s tagline: The CW “Free to Be” Community Hub. It included video from CW shows, interviews with performers, and other special features. There were also options for downloads, music, and episode guides,

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updates, and discussion groups. But in some cases it went even further. For Supernatural, the Free to Be Community Hub enabled members to write their own songs, have other members vote for their favorite, and compete for an opportunity to have the winning song appear in the show.12 The relationship between the Web site and the fledgling network began with a splash. For its mid-September debut, The CW commandeered the MySpace home page, using the “homepage-takeover” option in which ubiquitous banner ads cover the page and allow users to enter CW sites. It was a natural fit and an astute decision because The CW’s target audience was identical to the main demographic that was devoted to MySpace. Signature shows such as America’s Next Top Model and Beauty and the Geek received intensive promotion on the networking site and saw their ratings rise. Given that MySpace draws more than 60 million visitors each month, including approximately 5 million teens, the trend of television networks and programs interfacing with the Internet is likely to continue expanding and evolving. As one insider told Broadcasting and Cable in 2007, “It’s about getting people more involved with the content,” and “MySpace allows characters to come to life in a way that wasn’t possible before.”13 While The CW was the first television network to utilize Web 2.0 through its presence on MySpace, NBC went a step further by creating its own social networking Web site to connect to its audience and target advertising more effectively. Users of “myNBC” can create their own profile pages, upload videos and photos, chat, participate in fan groups, and get reviews and recommendations from other users with similar interests.14 The site was created in time for the 2007 fall television season, and preliminary observations indicated a certain amount of wariness about the advantages of starting an entirely new networking site instead of using well-established and already wildly popular ones. Jack Myers, editor of the Jack Myers Media Business Report, told New York Times writer Louise Story that he believed fans of NBC shows would be receptive to ideas like myNBC, even if they belong to other social networking sites. “I do think they’ll do both,” Myers said. “It’s not so much about NBC. It’ll be Heroes, it will be Friday Night Lights and Bionic Woman fans. Not NBC fans.”15 In addition to entire networks taking advantage of the enormous popularity of social networking sites, individual shows have devised new ways of engaging viewers in a more hands-on, personalized relationship. Several cast members and creators from Showtime’s lesbian drama, The L Word, for example, started a site in 2007 called OurChart.com. It is based on a chart begun by one of the characters, Alice, who uses it to keep track of the sexual encounters within her actual social network. The idea for the Web site was to transform the fictional chart into a Web-based social network, allowing users to create profile pages and maintain their own charts. In some ways, OurChart.com may be better positioned to attract visitors than myNBC.com

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because it is aimed at a niche audience, and it has a strong base of users who seek to identify, and do identify, with the glamour and drama of a group of beautiful, wealthy West Hollywood lesbians.16 As the creators explain on the site itself, OurChart is a place where “women can connect, share and hang out with friends of all shapes, stripes, genders and orientations.” It “provides unreleased gems from the show, along with exclusive original editorial and multimedia content from some of the most excellent creative folks out there. OurChart will also let folks create their own chart of friends, lovers, and everyone else in their own L worlds.”17 This focus on audience identification with the show is not surprising given the dearth of television programming by, for, and about lesbians (notwithstanding the emergence of the all-gay cable network Logo, which includes in its regular lineup lesbian-specific reality shows, dramas, and films). Women who are fans of the show may feel as though they have a greater stake in how lesbians are represented or how “true” or authentic the scenarios and relationships appear. It is precisely this personalized response that makes social networking Web sites so popular and such a promising tool for television executives as well as advertisers and marketing companies. In 2006, Islandoo was created as a site devoted entirely to finding participants and creating a fanbase for a British television show called Shipwrecked.18 The show appears on BBC America and Channel 4. In addition to all of the features provided by social networking sites, users can become a “fan” of other members. Those who garner the largest number of fans can then audition to appear on the show. Another British network, Channel 4, has also begun combining social networking with competition-themed shows. Big Brother, the reality television show that has become a global phenomenon, utilizes a site called E4.com. It differs from Islandoo only in it that is not the means by which all people, but only a small number, are chosen for an audition to appear on the television show.19 This mixture of reality television and Internet-based social networks, in which one medium is inextricably linked to another—for purposes of content rather than merely fan interest or peripheral involvement—has not been replicated in the United States, but the opportunities for generating ratings and advertising dollars will likely not be overlooked as American and other media corporations continue to expand the boundaries of the medium. Such Web 2.0 phenomena, for good and for ill, form what O’Reilly calls an “architecture of participation” in which users do a large share of the work of growing and developing a site, program, or platform.20 In terms of television fans, the impact of this architecture of participation can only be understood if we first deal with another phenomenon enabled by current technology: the development of engagement television.

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ENGAGEMENT TELEVISION In the Broadcast Era, audiences had to plan to be in front of a television when one of the “Big Three” networks aired a show; current technologies, however, enable viewers to watch a variety of programs whenever and wherever they want. Unlike the Broadcast Era’s so-called appointment television, viewers today can access programs at any time (after the show has first aired) with technologies such as DVD, file sharing, on-demand from the network’s Web site or by purchasing episodes from the iTunes Store, and video recording (through old analog media such as VHS and, since 1999, through digital video recorders such as TiVo). This elimination of the time constraint is accentuated with the elimination of the space constraint as portable media players such as mobile phones, iPods, notebook computers, and the like give viewers real flexibility in where they watch programs. In April 2007, CBS established its “Interactive Audience Network,” distributing television shows for free across a variety of online platforms such as Joost, Bebo, Veoh, Netvibes, and Brightcove.21 From the creative perspective, these technologies allow complex and involved storylines that the Broadcast Era’s limited viewing possibilities could not support. With this greater flexibility, the possibilities to reach viewers in deeply intimate and involved ways open up. Certainly serialization takes on new possibilities as fans can easily revisit old episodes to make meaningful connections to developments in newer episodes or simply to watch the show repeatedly. From the marketing perspective, however, the developments have presented a challenge for the television industry. Certainly the changes have profoundly impacted television’s business model because consumers can watch with little or no commercial interruptions. In the Broadcast Era, the scheduled commercials created the revenue stream; the engagement model requires companies to find new ways to advertise. These include integrating the advertisements into the storylines and scenery of the programs themselves. Famously, for example, the judges of American Idol prominently display Coke cups on the table in front of them. But this only solves one problem brought on by new models of television. While the Broadcast Era had only three major networks, today there are hundreds of channels. This means that audiences for nearly every program are much smaller than they would have been in the past—if a given program would have even aired. But if the audience is smaller, it is also likely to be more engaged and more homogeneous because it has presumably hundreds of other programming choices and the choice to not watch at all. It is this last option of giving up on the whole medium of television that some media experts claim will increasingly be selected because alternatives such as highly

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involving (and quickly evolving) Internet-based virtual worlds, such as Second Life, continue to proliferate. This is why many television executives are now using virtual worlds to cater to a niche fanbase. A popular virtual community has emerged at MTV, once considered the standard-bearer for cutting-edge teenage culture. Executives there took note that “Kids were watching Laguna Beach, but then they were going everyplace else on the Web to talk about what they’d just seen.”22 In response, they started the Leapfrog initiative, which is exploring the possibilities of virtual 3-D environments on the Internet. Virtual Laguna Beach was the first of several television series-based sites—including The Virtual Real World, The Virtual Hills, and Virtual Pimp My Ride —that bring together all of the features now considered baseline requirements for any Web 2.0 content with new technology, such as real-time conversation with other people and three-dimensional animation. As Matt Bostwick, vice president of franchise development for MTV Networks Music Group, told Wired, “It’s like the moment you went from listening to music to watching it. Now we’re taking it from watching the show to actually becoming the show.”23 It is this “brand-new kind of media” that envisions a seamless web of television and computers, viewers and consumers, and participants and shapers of content. Some media experts see the increasing entertainment options such as virtual worlds less as competition than as new ways to make profits and new venues on which to advertise. Thus, today, the television program is only one offering among many that media companies produce. For if media developments absolutely require television companies to find new revenue streams, they have found that extending the experiences they provide beyond television is key. Thus, to understand this development we need to rethink the basic unit of the television industry from television program to content. CONTENT For media theorist Ivan Askwith, the term content is “a unit of information or entertainment product that can be sold or sponsored and distributed through a diverse range of channels and platforms.”24 In this way, television companies deal in more than television and compete with more than other television networks. The term mindshare arises here to reflect increased competition among content providers and advertisers, who in today’s vast mediascape enjoy more opportunities to circulate their messages but who also have to fight harder than ever to get the attention of already over-stimulated viewers/consumers. Content providers have found both new properties to market and new ways to market older properties. We have seen some of the ways in which Web 2.0 enables new marketing techniques, but we have not seriously looked at the ways in which the media companies themselves create what at one-time would have been considered ancillary content such as Web

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sites, books, toys, trading cards, video games, digital comics, clothing lines, and more. Beyond watching the actual show, then, the current model centers on an enlarged and prolonged viewing experience that can itself be marketed and that is itself content. And this brings us to our next term. TRANSMEDIA Transmedia is the content available across platforms and well beyond the television material. For some viewers, watching the television show will certainly be enough exposure to the narrative, the action, or the characters, but the more committed fans want more. In marketing speak, this “more” is an opportunity to extend the brand through such media as Web sites, comics, books, games, movies, music, and magazines. From a storytelling perspective, transmedia enables back-story to be introduced in much more detailed ways than possible on a broadcast show, say through Webisodes that are only available online. Here, too, minor characters can take on fully realized lives of their own. From a fan perspective, transmedia allows a more immersive experience and a heightened intimacy with the program and its characters or personalities. But this experience is only possible through the development of the larger process of improved “viewer literacy,” which has developed as a result of the great variety of fan activities possible.25 The more viewers participate in or consume these transmedia, the more “literate” they become in the possibilities and the more content they may themselves create because transmedia content takes advantage of what has been dubbed “hypersociability,” in which fans interact with each other. Another example of this interfacing is CSI: NY, whose fans can experience the show in an entirely new way, by actually playing the role of a virtual crime scene investigator in Second Life and participating in a plotline of a popular network television series. What happens in Second Life is connected to events on the show; the intention is to increase fan engagement with the series but also to get viewers involved in a medium that they may otherwise not even be aware of. And for both, it spells increased advertising revenue and new marketing opportunities. In the episode that launched this joint venture, which aired in October 2007, Mac Taylor, played by Gary Sinise, entered Second Life to track down the person who has murdered a Second Life user. Viewers could then sign up for Second Life (via a link on the CBS Web site) if they were not already members and begin assisting in the investigation. In addition to watching for clues in subsequent episodes of the television show, participants had other entertainment options on the Internet: to play forensics-related games in a virtual crime lab and to participate in a game called “Murder by Zuiker,” which is unrelated to events in the show but involves finding clues and solving a crime (and even, for the top 100 “detectives,” virtual prizes). Fans of the show, then, not only imagine

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themselves in the shoes of their favorite characters, they can now join them, speak in their streetwise syntax, use the same field kit and tools, and feel as if they are literally a part of the show.26 At the same time that virtual role-playing emerged as a new component of television content and programming, producers and writers also began using game-based Web sites as a form of transmedia promotion. Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) engage viewers/users in a variety of media, from the Internet to the telephone, text messaging to e-mail. They involve elaborate show-related puzzles, mysteries, and other games, and they offer hidden plotlines, more in-depth character development, and in some cases simply material that does not fit into the strict confines of television. In 2007, Wired examined the ARGs tied to two of the most popular network television shows, Heroes and Lost. The site Heroes 360 engaged users in a job application and interview process, including emailed applications, text messages from fellow employees, and various puzzles to solve on the Web in order to learn vital new information about one of the major characters. During the final episodes of season two, Lost creators ran ads for the Hanso Foundation. Viewers who called the onscreen number were routed to a Web site to find a possible Hanso conspiracy. Those who solved the puzzle learned the origin of the Dharma Initiative and other secrets.27 From the network side, transmedia has significant potential. Here it is important to understand that networks are not isolated corporations but are part of communications multinationals whose holdings stretch into most aspects of mass entertainment—music, publishing, theme parks, motion pictures, video and other kinds of gaming, sports teams, and the like. This diverse and global reach provides avenues to exploit one product across many platforms and media. For their part, companies advertising their products with these media corporations want their products advertised across these many platforms because they too see the possibilities of transmedia. What these advertisers see is not that they should abandon the more traditional media but that they can maximize their visibility by appearing on both the older and the newer platforms, and this brings us to our next terms. CONVERGENCE CULTURE AND FAN LABOR Convergence culture is Henry Jenkins’s term for the territory where old and new media collide. In the culture of convergence, consumers can access content across a widening mediascape, a place not where new technologies displace old media but where old and new forms converge.28 Jenkins argues that the talk of media revolutions where old forms are killed off by the new-and-improved is more hyperbole than reality. Certainly, the history of technology is cluttered with abandoned innovations, such as the Betamax home video cassette or the 8-track tape, but these are only delivery systems;

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media are the content and the cultural systems that the various technologies and delivery systems enable. From this perspective, DVDs and CDs, for instance, are delivery systems; recorded sound is a medium. These varying delivery systems may well affect a medium’s social status, content, and audience, but they do not erase its existence: “[M]edia persist as layers within an ever more complicated information and entertainment stratum” where “each old medium was forced to coexist with the emerging media.”29 Indeed, the culture of convergence covers the territories of fandom. On this territory the viewer or consumer develops into someone who does not simply passively accept content but who actively seeks it out and, more importantly, creates it. This media convergence has paved the way for fan labor—a key aspect of television’s architectures of participation.30 Fan labor is built into the structures of transmedia and is increasingly essential to the business of television. The fan today is expected not simply to consume programming (and, of course, to purchase the products advertised on TV commercials) but to act as a participant and a producer as well. For example, in 2007, Nicktoons Network launched the cartoon Edgar & Ellen, based on the popular children’s book published by Simon and Schuster. Kids are encouraged to make shortform cartoons of their own and submit them on the show’s Web site; the best user-generated content is then featured in an episode that airs on Nicktoons.31 Whether it is in actually creating bits for shows; helping to promote the brand through linking, blogging, and tagging; or by extending the brand in new ways through creating fan fiction, games, and virtual spaces, fans are engaged in a kind of labor. Here it is critical to note, however, that if this work is exploited because it is unpaid, it is simultaneously unalienated labor for the very same reason—this is because it is voluntary and unpaid. The first part of that formulation—that the labor is exploited—is easy to understand. Television companies save considerable time and money by encouraging the fans to do the work of extending the brand. In this process, the providers have to relinquish total control of their content, which they have not always been eager to do because the brand may be used in ways the providers would not always approve of, as in the case of slash fiction in which fans create homosexual romances between a show’s characters. Some providers aggressively guard its signature characters’ use and resist fan labor, but most contemporary providers understand that the benefits of fan labor are significant. Indeed, profitability comes in this farming out of work without payment. At the same time, the value of the fan labor depends on the uncommodified status of the laborer. Generally speaking, in fandom remuneration takes value away from the product. Payment would signal that the work was not sincere and that the feelings expressed were suspect. But it is for this same reason that fan labor is generally speaking, unalienated, for even though

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there is a form of exploitation happening here —the fans are doing work without being paid—this labor is their own creative expressions, which they share for any number of nondirectly financial reasons: the joy of community, the satisfaction of creativity, the geeky desire to be seen as the most committed fan, and any number of other reasons. In some cases, fan labor is an outlet for professionals to advertise their skills in the hopes of getting paid work in another forum. Other times, for instance, professional writers and artists use their fan activity as an opportunity to create expressly noncommercial work. Now, we could say there is a form of compensation in being seen as an expert on a subject or in getting recognition, but this is not payment in the strict sense, and it is not labor that is required in order to subsist. Indeed, it is labor as leisure. Of course, there are workers who do get paid for fan labor—these are the professionals who maintain show Web sites, create the transmedia content, and create these other formerly ancillary platforms. What is interesting here is that these media professionals often make a point of explaining that even if they do get paid, they too are fans. In an interview with Henry Jenkins, Jesse Alexander, a writer and producer on Heroes, addressed the question of building a devoted fanbase: Being a superfan myself, I approach it from a very authentic place. I think about what I would want for myself. In marketing, it’s important to go after early adopters, influencers. It’s a great strategy for something like Heroes. It’s a problem with servicing this small group and the broad audience as well. But you have to build affinity for both these groups; authenticity for both audiences.32

This status anxiety is quite revelatory and indicates the continued presence of traditional authenticity models that a cynic might expect to have disappeared by now in the wake of the uber-commodification of seemingly all aspects of contemporary life. But, perhaps, it is because of that sheer excess and incomprehensible extensity of commodification that this kind of unpaid labor gets its power. Instead of only being another case of corporations finding ways to generate profits by exploiting workers, which of course it is, fan labor is also activity that gains meaning because it simultaneously operates outside the structures of capitalist production in which workers only produce for a wage, in which products only are valuable in as much as a monetary value can be placed on them. Thus, here we see convergence that is typical of much of the content of Web 2.0: It is both thoroughly commodified and a product of the participatory cultures of the electronic global commons that all can share. In a January 2008 article titled “Art in the Age of Franchising,” New York Times television critic Virginia Heffernan lamented the low ratings for NBC’s

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acclaimed Friday Night Lights.33 Against all odds, the network renewed the show for a second season despite its consistently poor showing in the Nielsen ratings. According to Heffernan, Friday Night Lights suffers from the fact that the show refuses to become a franchise. The creators rely on creative dialog, solid character development, and interesting plot lines to create and maintain a fanbase, not video games, fan fiction sites, or ringtones: This may sound like a blessing, but in a digital age a show cannot succeed without franchising. An author’s work can no longer exist in a vacuum, independent of hardy online extensions; indeed, a vascular system that pervades the Internet. Artists must now embrace the cultural theorists’ beloved model of the rhizome and think of their work as a horizontal stem for numberless roots and shoots—as many entry and exit points as fans can devise.34

While television’s utilization of the Internet, and specifically the social networking, interactive, and communication-focused Web 2.0, is becoming increasingly commonplace, it remains to be seen when—or whether—it will replace commercial television as we know it. One effect of this new interactive model, however, is clearly the eradication of old boundaries and the redrawing of new ones between fans and their shows—a redefining of the term fan itself. NOTES 1. “Lost Game Lets Fans Hunt for Clues,” April 24, 2006, http://abcnews.go.com/ Entertainment/story?id=1881142. 2. Tim O’Reilly, “What Is Web 2.0? Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software,” O’Reilly Net, September 30, 2005, http://www.oreil lynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html. 3. Ibid. 4. Jay Rosen, “The People Formerly Known as the Audience,” Huffington Post, June 30, 2006, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jay-rosen/the-people-formerly-known_ b_24113.html. 5. Bertha Chin, “New Media Technologies: New Ways of Viewing Television?” Television in Transition Conference, Cambridge, MA, May 2–4, 2003. http://web. mit.edu/cms/mit3/subs/works.html#chin. 6. O’Reilly, “What Is Web 2.0?” 7. Fanlib, http://www.fanlib.com/aboutUs.do. 8. Ibid. 9. David B. Williams, “Case Study: The Script Hits the Fans,” March 28, 2006, iMedia Connection, http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/8799.asp. 10. danah boyd, “Fan Cultures.” Talk presented at Futures of Entertainment 2 Conference, Cambridge, MA, November 16–17, 2007, http://www.convergenceculture. org/futuresofentertainment/2006/program/.

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11. Paul La Monica, “Can the CW Make TV a Five Horse Race?” May 18, 2006, CNNMoney.com, http://money.cnn.com/2006/05/18/news/companies/tv_cw/. 12. Cynthia Brumfield, “Broadcast Networks Take Marketing to the Edge,” IP Democracy: Media, Technology, Competition, Policy, September 5, 2006, http://www. ipdemocracy.com/archives/001913broadcast_networks_take_marketing_to_the_ ede.php. 13. David Goetzl, “Using MySpace To Get the Message,” Broadcasting & Cable, April 16, 2007, http://www1.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6433702.html. 14. Pete Cashmore, “NBC.com Social Network,” Mashable: Social Networking News, March 22, 2007, http://mashable.com/2007/03/22/nbccom-social-network/. 15. Louise Story, “NBC Introduces a Social Network,” New York Times, July 16, 2007, http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/07/16/nbc-introduces-a-social-network/. 16. Pete Cashmore, “OurChart.com—The L-Word Launching Lesbian Social Network,” Mashable: Social Networking News, December 18, 2006, http://mashable. com/2006/12/18/ourchartcom-the-l-word-launching-lesbian-social-network/. 17. OurChart.com, http://www.ourchart.com/about. 18. Pete Cashmore, “Big Brother Meets Social Networking,” Mashable: Social Networking News, November 22, 2006, http://mashable.com/2006/11/22/big-brothermeets-social-networking/. 19. Ibid. 20. O’Reilly, “What Is Web 2.0?” 21. Mark Sweney, “CBS backs Joost with a host of new web deals for its TV shows,” organgrinder, Guardian Unlimited, April 13, 2007, http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/organ grinder/2007/04/cbs_backs_joost_with_a_host_of.html. 22. Mark Wallace, “A Second Life for MTV,” Wired, February 2007, http://www. wired.com/wired/archive/15.02/mtv.html?pg=1&topic=mtv&topic_set. 23. Ibid. 24. Ivan Askworth, “Television 2.0: Reconceptualizing TV as an Engagement Medium” (Master’s thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2007), 17, http://cms. mit.edu/research/theses/IvanAskwith2007.pdf. 25. John Caldwell, “Convergence Television; Aggregating Form and Repurposing Content in the Culture of Conglomeration,” in Television after TV: Essays on a Medium in Transition, ed. Lynn Spiegel and Jan Olsson (Durham: Duke UP, 2004), 39. 26. “Producing the CSI:NY/Second Life Crossover: An Interview with Electric Sheep’s Taylor and Krueger,” Confessions of an Aca-Fan: The Offical Weblog of Henry Jenkins, October 24, 2007, http://www.henryjenkins.org/2007/10/producing_the_ csinysecond_life.html. 27. Mary Jane Irwin, “Unlock Hidden TV Show Plots with Alternate Reality Games,” Wired, May 17, 2007, http://www.wired.com/gaming/virtualworlds/mag azine/15–06/st_clue. 28. Henry Jenkins, Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide (New York: New York UP, 2006). 29. Ibid., 14. 30. “Fan Labor,” Convergence Culture Consortium, http://convergenceculture.org/ futuresofentertainment/2007/program/index.html.

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31. Ramin Zahed, “Edgar & Ellen Scare Up Viewers on Nicktoons,” Animation Magazine, September 20, 2007, http://www.animationmagazine.net/article/7375. 32. Sam Ford, “FoE2: Cult Media,” Convergence Culture Consortium, November 18, 2007, http://www.convergenceculture.org/weblog/2007/11/foe2_cult_media.php. 33. Virginia Heffernan, “Art in the Age of Franchising,” New York Times, January 20, 2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/20/magazine/20wwln-mediumt.html?_r=1&oref=slogin. 34. Ibid.

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chapter 2

A Joint (Ad)Venture: The CW Network and the Youth Market Caryn Murphy

This new network will serve the public with high-quality programming and maintain our ongoing commitment to our diverse audience. It will clearly be greater than the sum of its parts, delivering excellent demographics to advertisers, and building a strong new affiliate body. Additionally, The CW will be able to draw from the creative talent and production resources from the top two television production studios in the business, while also seeking programming from all sources—independent producers or other studios. With this move, we will be creating a viable entity, one well-equipped to compete, thrive and serve all our many publics in this multi-channel media universe. —Leslie Moonves, president and CEO of CBS Corporation, January 2006 In a move that seemed to signal the decline of conglomeration, Sumner Redstone, founder of media giant Viacom, split his company into two entities at the end of 2005. The division was an effort to improve stock prices by separating the more stable CBS Corporation, with its emphasis on broadcasting, from the more fluid Viacom, specializing in cable programming and film production. Redstone remains a controlling shareholder in both companies, which are operated and traded separately. Although industry analysts speculated that this move was a first step in a plan to divest one of the companies, this has not come to pass.1 Analysts also argued that the split was part of a trend of media conglomerates responding to the failures of synergy, but this was negated within a month by the announcement of The CW network,

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a joint broadcasting venture between CBS Corporation and Time Warner.2 Leslie Moonves even uses the key synergy phrase “greater than the sum of its parts” in his press announcement about The CW, quoted previously. In January 2006, CBS Corporation and Time Warner declared their plans to shut down their competing broadcast networks, UPN and the WB, and combine their resources in The CW, targeting an audience of 18 to 34 year olds. The venture was designed to complement the media holdings of each conglomerate while addressing a market inefficiency that resulted when their networks increasingly targeted the same specific audience. Among its many holdings, CBS Corporation controls the CBS network, syndicator King World, television production units CBS Paramount TV and Spelling, cable networks under the Showtime banner, CBS Records, publisher Simon & Schuster, CBS Radio, and CBS Outdoor Advertising. The assets of Time Warner, the largest media conglomerate in the world, include Warner Bros. Television production, HBO, CNN, Time Warner cable, a host of magazine and publishing interests, and America Online. The CW demonstrates a tendency toward cooperation rather than competition within the culture industries in an economic era characterized by both globalization and fragmentation. According to media scholar Michael Curtin, media conglomerates are responding to the threat of competition and decreased productivity by shifting their business practices toward flexibility in production and distribution.3 He argues that the culture industries employ two major strategies to maximize performance within these economic conditions; they offer mass media for global or national markets and they target niche audiences with media designed to encourage intense identification and devotion.4 CBS Corporation and Time Warner maintain a competitive position within a global capitalist economy by simultaneously distributing media to mass audiences and targeting specific demographic groups. In Todd Gitlin’s recent update of Inside Prime Time, his classic study of the broadcast industry, he writes, “Broadcast networks today are like networks a generation ago because they adhere to a single unswerving imperative: create, within the demographic target, the largest possible audience.”5 The CW has positioned itself to target a portion of the broadcast audience, viewers aged 18–34, by creating its network as an immersive experience that holds appeal for as many people within this segment as possible. For each of its corporate parents, The CW represents a small part of a larger strategy to dominate the distribution of global media. The network seeks to establish intense identification among its target audience in order to benefit each of its partner conglomerates as a whole. In a critique of conglomeration, Rich Media, Poor Democracy, Robert McChesney argues that, “Ironically, in the eyes of investors, the main problem with the existing media system is that there is too much competition.”6 The competition among these media giants is not typical, however; it is

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characterized by cooperative practices that serve to protect the interests of the market oligopoly. On the practice of joint ventures, McChesney explains, “They are ideal because they spread the risk of a venture and eliminate the threat of competition by teaming up with potential adversaries.”7 The CW eliminated the competition between UPN and the WB over the youth market demographic, turning each network’s strengths toward succeeding with that same audience. The CW planned its launch strategically to capitalize on the strengths of its partner companies but also on the lessons learned during the early years of UPN and the WB about the importance of network branding and target marketing. The new network has also focused on innovation in advertising, luring sponsors with “content wraps” and commercial-free sponsored programming (a strategy that recalls network radio and early television, when advertising agencies produced programming for major sponsors). Barry Meyer, CEO of Warner Bros. Entertainment, predicted early on that The CW would be profitable from the start because of its ability to utilize the strengths of its parent–partner conglomerates.8 However, the first-year results did not come close to meeting early expectations in terms of viewership, and advertising sales’ executives have quickly moved toward major changes in programming, rededicating the vision of the network to its targeted youth audience. The launch of The CW provides an instructive case study about the uses of media convergence, flexible/innovative advertising strategies, and targeted viewership within the current broadcast environment. LEARNING FROM THE PAST: UPN AND THE WB As far back as 1977, Paramount sought to exploit its production capabilities by starting a television network.9 Initial efforts failed, and by the mid1980s, Rupert Murdoch’s Fox had supplanted Paramount’s startup attempts. The idea of launching a broadcast network hung on, however, because it made good business sense for television production companies to also be in the business of distribution (a business that was expanding during the 1980s and 1990s as the broadcast and cable universe continued to grow). During the 1980s, Paramount produced popular television programming including Cheers and the syndicated hits Star Trek: The Next Generation and Entertainment Tonight. When the expiration of the financial interest and syndication rules was announced in 1993, Paramount saw an opportunity to use their successful programming to build their own network rather than face dealing with existing broadcasters who were now free to produce the majority of their own content. Since the 1970s, the financial interest and syndication rules had limited the amount of programming that broadcast networks could produce themselves, forcing the nets to deal with independent producers. The expiration of the rules was seen in the industry as an opportunity for

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networks to regain control of production, leaving independent producers such as Paramount Network Television and Warner Bros. Television without dependable outlets for their content. Paramount and Warner Bros. made the announcements of their intentions to build broadcast networks in 1993 with near simultaneity, and both recruited personnel from the Fox network to guide their startups.10 UPN and the WB launched within days of each other in January 1995, both having access to far fewer homes than the big four networks: NBC, CBS, ABC, and Fox. In order to win viewers, programmers at UPN and the WB attempted to reach more specific target audiences than the big four networks; they strategically sought out audiences who were underserved by major broadcasters but who were also potentially valuable targets for advertisers. These “netlets” closely followed the example set by Fox in its early years, through the calculated development of programming and cultivation of viewership among specific audience segments. Lucie Salhany, a former Fox network head, served as the first president and CEO at UPN, and former Fox president Jamie Kellner became the WB’s first president, developments which were the first point of comparison between the netlets and the Fox network. Fox was well established by 1993, and the strategies that Murdoch’s network had employed to gain viewers, advertisers, and affiliates were put to use at both UPN and the WB. During its early years, Fox rolled out programming slowly; when it went on air in 1986, the network only offered programming three nights a week. This limited production liability, and it also offered affiliates a certain amount of freedom with primetime during the rest of the week. Fox also built its audience by targeting specific segments that were ignored or underserved by the big three broadcasters during the 1980s.11 Early programming targeted African Americans (In Living Color, Martin), young men (The Simpsons, 21 Jump Street), and young women (Beverly Hills, 90210).12 Salhany and Kellner brought these strategies to UPN and the WB, respectively, attempting to use the lessons learned at Fox as a model for success. Both went on air with three nights of primetime programming per week, with differentiated programming aimed at finding viable audience targets. By 1998, the WB had established itself as the network for young viewers, with primetime programming geared toward teen audiences (including Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Dawson’s Creek) on each of its on-air nights. Although UPN was the early favorite in the race between the netlets, it failed to quickly establish a relationship with its multiple audience targets and fell behind the WB in the race to roll out programming and gain affiliates.13 In 1999, UPN stumbled onto a profitable target audience: young males. The netlet aired WWF Smackdown in primetime, drawing its highest non-Star Trek ratings ever and climbing into potential viability for the first time. Historian Michele Hilmes writes, “By spring 1999 UPN had improved its ratings by 35 percent

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and was the number-one network among African- American households.”14 UPN attempted to capitalize on its appeal for the young male audience by maintaining its African American sitcoms and adding science fiction dramas. This strategy did not find long-term success, and the network continued to flail without a clear target audience. Dawn Ostroff was installed as UPN’s president in 2002 and immediately focused her efforts on brand identity and targeted programming. She streamlined UPN toward a focus on young female viewers, just as the WB’s focus on this audience was in decline with the loss of series including Buffy, Felicity, Dawson’s Creek, and Popular. Ostroff previously worked in programming at Lifetime, the cable channel that advertises itself as “Television for Women.” Of her new position, Ostroff stated, “The first step was to find out who our viewers were, then come up with a strategic plan to create a more cohesive, quality-driven schedule.”15 Her strategies included the development of series with racially mixed casts and a heavy reliance on star power to speed up the development of series/network identity. The first successful example of this strategy at work on UPN is America’s Next Top Model, a reality show helmed by African American supermodel Tyra Banks.16 The show’s popularity translated into success on The CW, and the season seven premiere provided the official primetime launch of the new network. The CW was structured to incorporate successful elements of both the WB and UPN. Ostroff, who had established a clear target market for UPN, was rewarded with the presidency of The CW. Rick Haskins, responsible for successful network branding at the WB, became the executive vice president of marketing and brand strategy at The CW. The WB’s 6-night, 13-hour primetime schedule was adopted, as well as its schedule of weekday afternoon and Saturday morning children’s’ programming. When the WB launched, it innovated an affiliate pay model called “reverse compensation,” in which affiliate stations paid the network one-fourth of the profits generated through their network association.17 This upended the traditional broadcast network model, in which the network paid affiliate stations to air programming. The WB’s experiment with this model was considered successful, and The CW adopted this approach in establishing its national network.18 The revenue stream generated from affiliates is intended to foster the network’s longterm financial stability. At the time of The CW’s launch, network heads announced that they had already secured coverage in nearly 50 percent of the country through a 10-year deal with Tribune Company (an investor in the WB network) and the owned and operated stations of CBS Corporation.19 After the launch announcement, there was a race among other stations to affiliate with the new network. UPN had less of a market reach than the WB, and in some areas of the country, although UPN was available via cable, it had no broadcast stations at all. In markets areas that had previously had a broadcast affiliate

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for both UPN and the WB, typically The CW affiliated the station with a stronger signal. FREE TO BE BRANDED I don’t look at us as launching a new network. I look at us as launching a new entertainment brand. —Rick Haskins, CW executive vice president of marketing and brand strategy, September 2006 The CW undertook a major branding campaign in the relatively short period of time between its announcement and launch. This marketing effort was particularly challenging because it involved getting the attention of current UPN and WB viewers but also potential viewers that might be drawn into the new network. The campaign worked to appeal to the youth market across lines of demographic difference including race, gender, and ethnicity. Market research undertaken by the network estimated that their ideal target audience included 60 million people from Generations X and Y and that one of the defining characteristics of this group is that they make no distinction between “old” and “new” media.20 The network’s branding campaign utilized aspects of both old and new media in order to reach potential viewers, emphasizing that The CW would not maintain the same boundaries as other broadcasters. The CW’s “Free to Be” promotion served as its national branding campaign and was circulated heavily in print media and on billboards. Advertisements employed a bright green background along with the network’s logo, rather than a mascot. Each ad featured a different CW series and associated it with the “Free to Be” slogan. Wise-cracking dramedy Gilmore Girls was promoted as “Free to Be Witty,” Chris Rock’s family sitcom Everybody Hates Chris as “Free to Be Funny,” and teen Superman adventure Smallville as “Free to Be Super.” The campaign emphasized the youthful and energetic outlook of the new network but also attempted to brand The CW specifically as a broadcaster. The “free” quality referenced in these ads emphasizes the network’s youthful attitude but also refers to its status as an over-the-air broadcaster, entering a television landscape increasingly populated by pay channels transmitted via cable. The campaign worked to create awareness that familiar programming from the former netlets would be moving to a new location (in some cases, a literal channel change) but would still be available via free broadcast. The “Free to Be” campaign was employed during a mall tour in August 2006, working to target young people specifically. The “mall domination tour,” as CW executives referred to it, visited 35 malls in major markets.21 The tour met with a surprising level of interest. In Los Angeles, several thousand

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young fans showed up to meet the stars of Smallville and Supernatural. The tour also featured major recording artists including Jewel, whose albums are released by a Warner Music Group label, and promotional giveaways with the network logo.22 Visitors to the “CW Lounge” areas found televisions and computers available and were invited to incorporate their own photos with footage from network series to create promotional ads. The winning entries in this user-driven campaign, “Free to Be Famous,” aired during The CW’s first few weeks.23 The strategy was designed to make young viewers see the network as technologically innovative and to see themselves as creative participants in the network. CW Lounges sought to engage young viewers in the digital world in order to draw them into the audience for broadcast television. The CW also reached out to young computer users through advertising on the search engine Yahoo! and the social networking site MySpace (owned by News Corporation), where it was the first network to employ a “homepage-takeover” option that directed all users to The CW’s page.24 The MySpace page promoted the network and its programming and was designed to help get the word out on the new network’s identity through viral communication. The network’s interest in MySpace, a site mainly populated and trafficked by people under 30 years old, was a strategic attempt to appeal to potential viewers within the youth market. MySpace is also a major networking source for amateur musicians, and The CW used their homepage-takeover to promote a contest offering a chance for a band to play on the primetime series Supernatural.25 As with Free to Be Famous, this was designed to make young people see the television network as interactive, offering unique opportunities for viewers to participate in its content. The CW has continued to emphasize convergence, interactivity, and social networking in its branding strategy, indicating that this has been a successful way to connect with viewers and establish itself as an entertainment source for the target demographic. In February 2007, the network promoted a contest called “Making the Cut” that allowed entrants access to Supernatural footage that they could fashion into their own preview for the series.26 The winning advertisement aired during primetime. The industry trade paper Variety uses “the Green net” as a shorthand reference to the network in acknowledgement of the association that The CW has built between its identity and its signature color.27 In its second year, The CW is taking this link in a new direction with its campaign “Free 2 B Green,” which focuses on environmental issues. The campaign, which partners the network with Stop Global Warming Virtual March and the Natural Resources Defense Council, was spurred by market research indicating that environmental issues are of particular importance to the youth audience that The CW is targeting.28 It will include environmentally themed public service announcements (featuring CW stars), national advertising, and in an

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ambitious move, related themes will be incorporated into one episode of each series airing on the network during its second year.29 This branding effort utilizes the “green” association of environmental awareness to cement the association between the network and this color. It builds on the brand identity already established by the network, continuing the “Free to Be” theme, but further promotes The CW as socially conscious and responsive to the concerns of its target market. PROGRAMMING CHALLENGES We want to be the entertainment destination for young adults. —Dawn Ostroff, May 2007 In 2006, Ostroff announced The CW’s first program schedule at the television industry upfront presentation in New York City. She told the gathering of advertisers and affiliates, “By bringing together established hit series with innovative new shows, we were able to create a stellar schedule for our premiere season.”30 In fact, the network premiered only two new shows in fall 2006, African American sitcom The Game and family drama Runaway. The latter was cancelled after only a few airings, leaving the new network with a schedule of veteran series that no longer garnered peak ratings. Prior to the network’s launch, executives anticipated that shows from the WB and UPN might find new audiences and improve their ratings as part of The CW lineup. The pairing of WB’s Gilmore Girls with UPN’s low-rated but critically beloved teen detective series Veronica Mars was frequently referenced as an ideal programming benefit of the new network. Analysts speculated that viewers who enjoyed one of these series would certainly enjoy the other and that airing them on the same night, on the same network would build the ratings for both series. Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas summed up the situation, saying, “Finally, a lead-in (‘Gilmore Girls’) that makes sense for us. We’re not opposite ‘Lost’ and not competing with the WB that had the audience ‘Veronica Mars’ is trying to get.”31 In an unusual programming move, The CW negotiated with the family drama 7th Heaven to return for an eleventh season in September 2006, even though the show had celebrated its series finale on the WB in May.32 None of these series improved their ratings on The CW, and all three were cancelled at the close of the network’s first season in May 2007. One of the early controversies resulting from The CW’s announcement revolved around the status of African American programming on broadcast television. By 2006, UPN was the only broadcaster offering series with predominantly black casts and production teams, and estimates showed that African Americans made up about 65 percent of the network’s audience.33 When the new network announced that they would select the most

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successful programs from UPN and the WB in line with targeting a specific audience segment, there was an outcry over the implied fate of UPN sitcoms that were popular with African American viewers but did not crossover with white audiences.34 In the end, however, The CW retained Everybody Hates Chris, Girlfriends, and All of Us from UPN, and added The Game, which has been successful enough to continue for a second season. Average ratings for the network’s first year were estimated at 3.14 million viewers, lower than either the WB or UPN had earned on their own the previous year.35 Critics argue that the network did not live up to industry predictions because the programming schedule was too diversified; although the branding strategy focused on the youth market, programming was all over the map.36 To address these problems, The CW has intensified its efforts to program for its target audience during its second season. Recognizing that the network’s programming was failing to contribute to the youth-oriented brand identity, Ostroff approved 15 pilots for the 2007–2008 season, more than had ever been produced for UPN or the WB. Older series that are still popular with young viewers, including Smallville, Supernatural, and network stalwart Friday Night Smackdown! were renewed, but many shows from the network’s first year are gone. The new series appearing on the fall schedule manipulate what Michael Curtin refers to as “edge,” a quality designed to engender controversy and inspire intense loyalty among the target audience. Aliens in America, a sitcom about a Muslim exchange student, has already drawn critical fire due to online previews that depict negative stereotypes of religion and ethnicity.37 Life Is Wild also engages with culture clash; the comedy follows a family who leave New York City for rural South Africa. Gossip Girl, a teen drama based on a series of popular young adult novels, raised questions at The CW’s upfront presentation for advertisers and affiliates because it portrays teen sex, drug use, and drinking.38 Reaper, a horror-comedy series about a young man whose parents sell his soul to the devil, is one of the most anticipated shows of the fall season. Kevin Smith, whose talk-heavy, profanity-laden films have a major following among young viewers, directed the pilot.39 The edgy subject matter and young casts of these series are intended to appeal to a larger portion of the target audience and help The CW’s programming contribute to establishing its brand identity as the youth market network. The first breakout hit for The CW emerged midway through its premiere season when the reality series The Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll generated solid ratings and renewed attention. The show features hip-hop star Lil’ Kim as a judge in a contest to find a new member for the successful recording group, demonstrating Ostroff ’s continued commitment to using star power to build audience appeal. The success of Pussycat Dolls, along with continuing strong ratings for Top Model, led to renewed fervor for youth-oriented reality programming at the network. These shows will

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return in the 2007–2008 season, along with the WB-originated Beauty and the Geek and two new series: Farmer Wants a Wife, a reality competition in which women who live in the city vie for the attention of a rural man who wants to get married, and Crowned: The Mother of All Pageants, which follows a mother–daughter beauty contest. A commitment to reality-based programming serves two major purposes for the network. The genre has proven popular with the youth audience that the network is seeking, and short runs of reality shows (8 to 12 weeks) help the network to air year-round programming rather than relying heavily on reruns of scripted series. In a related strategic move, teen drama One Tree Hill will not premiere its fifth season until January, with the storyline advanced four years past the characters’ high school graduation.40 All of the major networks have recently moved toward year-round programming as a way to combat the loss of viewers to cable channels. The theory holds that viewers are more likely to tune in for new episodes of a cheaply produced reality series than for reruns of an expensive scripted show. In one of the more experimental changes planned for its second year, The CW will produce two of its own programs. On Sunday nights, the network will air Online Nation, a showcase for user-generated video clips, and CW Now, a news/entertainment series. These shows are considered low risk because they are inexpensive to produce. Online Nation attempts to further the interactivity that The CW is building into its brand identity by bringing viewer-created content into the network’s regular schedule. CW Now is designed to exploit young viewers’ interest in popular culture and celebrity trends and may follow the lead of Online Nation by incorporating information from tabloid-style Web sites. The show will also attempt to differentiate itself from similar entertainment-themed programs by capitalizing on the success that The CW has found with innovative advertising strategies. APPEALING TO ADVERTISERS In Breaking Up America, Joseph Turow’s study of target marketing and audience fragmentation, he argues that media executives in the new landscape offer two things to advertisers: “claim of efficient separation” and “claim of a special relationship.”41 Ideally, executives want to deliver the exact demographic that the advertiser seeks to reach and promise that viewers will be invested enough in the media format to consume all of the content and advertising that it provides. The CW has made a concerted effort to help advertisers reach viewers and to innovate advertising strategies that encourage a “special relationship” with the network’s content. Executives at the network have cultivated close relationships with sponsors and advertisers and have been willing to experiment with product placement, integrated advertising,

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and other new strategies designed to bring viewer attention to advertising messages. When the network announced CW Now, they stipulated that the show will be commercial-free; three or more sponsors will underwrite each episode, but the show will not feature traditional commercial breaks.42 This requires a balance between content and information about sponsors, and it is still unclear how the show will bring these elements together. However, the series design reflects an awareness of one of the biggest concerns in the industry; increasingly, time-shifting devices such as digital video recorders allow viewers to fast forward through commercial breaks. Advertisers have increasingly asked television networks to be accountable for the loss of these viewers because they don’t want to pay to place advertisements that viewers are not watching. Commercial-free sponsored programming is just one of the strategies that The CW has experimented with to address this concern. “Content Wraps” is a phrase coined by the network to describe brief programming that leads out from a show to commercial break or completely takes the place of the break. Wraps are typically related to the content of the program in which they are placed, but they feature sponsored product information along with information or entertaining content.43 They utilize connections with program content in order to hold viewer attention. Procter & Gamble sponsored one of the first successful content wraps, a mini-story featuring Herbal Essences shampoo that offered hairstyling tips, which aired during an episode of Top Model. Ratings data for the segment indicated that it held nearly 100 percent of the key demographic sought by the advertiser (women aged 18–34).44 Content wraps not only address the concerns of advertisers seeking more effective ways to get viewer’s attention, but they are also part of The CW’s strategy to target the needs and desires of a youth demographic familiar with both old and new media. The mini-stories typically ask viewers to go online to get more information, enter contests, or qualify for promotional giveaways.45 They attempt to blur the boundaries between television and the Internet by introducing more direct participation into the television viewing experience. In recent years, particularly with the surge of reality programming on all of the broadcast networks, product placement and integrated advertising have played a major role in advertisers’ strategies to catch viewers’ attention. Product placement, in which an advertiser pays to have their product shown during a program, is more common. The CW has increasingly experimented with integrated advertising, in which a product is woven into a program’s storyline in such a way that it is not only shown but also discussed. Keds sneakers were featured in a storyline of an April 2007 episode of Top Model, in which contestants posed in a photo shoot designed to draw attention to the footwear. The model whose photo was judged the best was then featured in an ad for Keds in Seventeen magazine. A spokeswoman for Keds commented

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that although the shoes are placed a lot in film and television, the storyline integration offered by Top Model was a more rare opportunity for the company.46 This strategy brought the viewers of the show together with the target market for the shoes and the demographic targeted by Seventeen, a lifestyle magazine for young adult women. Integrated advertising was taken a step further by The CW’s summer reality show Schooled. The program, about students at a New Jersey high school trying to raise money for their school’s music department, not only integrated products from sponsor OfficeMax but was actually directed and produced by The Escape Pod, the company’s advertising agency.47 The arrangement hearkens back to the early years of broadcast television in which the majority of network programming was produced by advertising agencies. OfficeMax not only developed the show but also featured their products as rewards for the students who participated. In a further effort at cross promotion, OfficeMax offered a free DVD of the show in their stores, giving it to customers who spent a certain amount of money on school supplies. OfficeMax helped to promote The CW to its customers with the DVD, and the show itself promoted OfficeMax to the network’s viewers. In early 2007, The CW began streaming episodes of many of its primetime shows through the network’s Web site, www.cwtv.com. Although ABC has been the real pioneer among broadcasters in this effort, even making full seasons of series available online, The CW adopted it as a strategy to reach young viewers who do not access television through the “old” media format. A single advertiser typically sponsors each streamed episode, and the content is interspersed with advertisements that cannot be skipped. The network is able to track how many times their online episodes are accessed and offer this information to advertisers. Streamed episodes offer a way to reach viewers that may prefer to watch episodes online (the youth audience that The CW targets) and to generate additional revenue from effective ad placement. CONCLUSIONS: CORPORATE SYNERGY AND YOUNG VIEWERS The words we use to describe CW, besides the young demographic, are innovation, participation, connection and community. —Dawn Ostroff Although The CW has attracted positive attention from advertisers because of their willingness to experiment with new ways to reach viewers, the network’s innovation hasn’t proven completely effective. The first year’s disappointing ratings dictated low advertising rates for year two and also drew industry criticism about the network’s failure to capitalize on its synergistic potential.48 The CW’s initial attempts to utilize the strengths of its

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predecessors in creating a new network failed to result in a larger audience and have made the network the butt of industry jokes. When Kevin Smith introduced the pilot episode of Reaper at 2007’s Comic-Con in San Diego, he told the gathered crowd, “It airs on The CW. Don’t leave.”49 Although the changes in programming planned for year two are attempts to address low ratings by attracting new, loyal viewers, it is worth taking a look at how the network has employed synergy thus far and how it plans to do so in the future. One of the major advantages of The CW is that it can draw on the television production resources of its corporate partners. Outside of reality-based programming, virtually all of the network’s primetime lineup has been produced by CBS Paramount Television and Warner Bros. Television. This strategy helps to limit financial risk for the network and gives it more control over production costs than it would have through contracts with outside production companies. Reaper is the only scripted show on the fall schedule produced by an outside company (Mark Gordon/Touchstone), and the rest represent a fairly even split between CBS and Warner Bros. Aliens in America was originally set up as a pilot for NBC, but they declined to pick it up because they felt it was too “young” for their viewers.50 The CW expressed interest in the series, but the network was initially unable to come to a financial agreement with NBC regarding the series’ production costs. When NBC relented and sold the rights, it became a coproduction between CBS Paramount and Warner Bros, who now share the burden of its production costs and will benefit equally from its potential success.51 The CW plays a significant role as a distribution arm for CBS Paramount and Warner Bros. programming. Since the expiration of the financial interest and syndication rules, networks are much less likely to buy programming from outside producers; without their own network, these production facilities would have to produce less programming and assume more financial risk. The CW was not initially characterized by synergistic opportunism. In fact, one of the highest-profile industry stories surrounding the network’s launch emerged when Time Warner Cable refused to carry some smallmarket CW affiliates. The new network depended on cable to help it reach nationwide coverage, especially in small markets that only have a few broadcast stations that are already affiliated with other networks. Time Warner Cable, the second-largest cable operator in the United States, demanded payment from The CW in return for carriage. Negotiations with individual affiliates were protracted, with 20 CW stations receiving minimal or nonexistent carriage during the network’s first few weeks.52 Individual stations did negotiate with the cable operator to pay for carriage, an arrangement that seems to negate the assumption of cooperation between The CW and other companies under the umbrella of its corporate parents. In many ways, however, the network has clearly benefited from the resources at its disposal and acted as a resource for CBS Corporation and Time

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Warner. The national advertising campaign that preceded its launch utilized the billboards of CBS Outdoor Advertising and the ad space available in Time Warner magazines. CBS Records was revived in late 2006 with the primary goal of sales through digital distribution and television program placement. The company relies on revenues from music downloads, which it advertises by placing music in television programs and offering artist and sales information at the end of the show, rather than physical product distributed through retailers.53 During the late 1990s, the WB was a pioneer in using its series to promote music; the network saved money on licensing fees by calling viewer attention to the songs and artists that were featured in particular programs. Recording artists from Warner Music Group were successfully promoted on WB shows including Dawson’s Creek, Buffy, and Charmed. Although Warner Music Group spun off from Time Warner in 2004, becoming a stand-alone company, music from its labels continues to be heavily promoted on CW programming (including One Tree Hill, which has released three soundtracks through the post–spin-off company).54 Time Warner’s film production arm, Warner Bros., regularly advertises its upcoming films during CW programming, and many affiliates air CBS news broadcasts.55 The CW’s synergistic vision came full circle with a series of content wraps that aired during Smallville episodes in April and May of 2007. The wraps were created by DC Comics, a Time Warner company, to promote Toyota Yaris, a subcompact car targeted toward the 18–34 demographic. As part of the Smallville: Justice and Doom campaign, these comic book–themed wraps directed Smallville viewers to log on to The CW’s Web site to play a game that tested their knowledge of the series. The game continued for five weeks, and the grand prize winner received a Yaris. This campaign operated on several levels; it brought a product together with its target market, rewarded loyal series fans, and promoted Superman as a Time Warner brand with associated products in a variety of forms. In a key move, it brought television viewers to the network’s Web site and further immersed them in an online game; The CW profited from the advertising revenues but also from the opportunity to promote itself as an entertainment “experience” rather than a typical broadcast network. The CW’s strategy has thus far gambled that courting a youth audience is the best way to capitalize on the strengths of the conglomerates partnered in the joint venture. Attempts to utilize branding and interactivity to reach this audience have yielded mediocre results in terms of ratings numbers but may yet pay off in terms of intense identification and viewer loyalty that translates beyond broadcast programming and into the ancillary business interests of CBS Corporation and Time Warner. As of January 2008, Gossip Girl has emerged as a “hit” by the network’s definition; although the series’ ranking is low when compared to major network hits, it is the number one new show among teen viewers in the 2007–2008 season.56 In addition, the

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show’s ratings improve by approximately 20 percent when DVR usage is included (and this data has also boosted the ratings of Reaper and Smallville). In October 2007, Gossip Girl was the first network television series to be picked up for a full season; this mark of distinction indicates that the show’s success with young viewers, which has translated into Internet traffic and iTunes downloads, serves the strategic vision of The CW.57 Recent programming failures include Online Nation, which was cancelled after just a few airings, and the low-rated Life Is Wild. While overall ratings have not yet reached the levels initially predicted for the network, in its second year The CW has created notable successes by catering to the needs of the target youth demographic.

NOTES 1. Geraldine Fabrikant, “Viacom Split Could Signal Bigger Changes to Come,” International Herald Tribune (December 26, 2005), http://www.iht.com. 2. Ronald Grover, “In Media, Size Does Matter,” Business Week (April 13, 2005), http://www.businessweek.com. 3. Michael Curtin, “On Edge: Culture Industries in the Neo-Network Era,” in Making & Selling Culture, ed. Richard Ohmann, p. 186 (Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press, 1996). 4. Ibid., 197. See also: Michael Curtin, “From Network to Neo-Network Audiences,” in The Television History Book, ed. Michele Hilmes, p. 124 (London: BFI, 2003). 5. Todd Gitlin, Inside Prime Time (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2000), xii. 6. Robert McChesney, Rich Media, Poor Democracy: Communication Politics in Dubious Times (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1999), 27. 7. Ibid., 28. 8. Walt Belcher, “The WB, UPN Fold, Form Joint Venture,” Tampa Tribune (January 25, 2006), retrieved from Lexis-Nexis. 9. Brian Lowry, “The Whims of War,” Los Angeles Times (December 26, 1999), 6. 10. Michele Hilmes, Only Connect: A Cultural History of Broadcasting in the United States (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2002), 305. 11. Alex Ben Block discusses these strategies, as well as the Fox network’s cultivation of a “halo effect” with advertisers in “Twenty-First Century Fox,” Channels (January 1990), 36– 40. 12. Kristal Brent Zook has examined the extent to which Fox developed programming for the African American audience in Color By Fox: The Fox Network and the Revolution in Black Television (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999). 13. Larry Collette and Barry R. Litman, “The Peculiar Economics of New Broadcast Network Entry: The Case of United Paramount and Warner Bros.,” Journal of Media Economics 10, no. 4 (1997), 3–22. 14. Hilmes, Only Connect, 357. 15. Quoted in “Mr. Television: UPN’s New Dawn,” Mediaweek (August 23, 2004), http://www.mediaweek.com.

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16. The Chris Rock–produced sitcom, Everybody Hates Chris, is another example of this commitment to star power. 17. Collette and Litman, “Peculiar Economics,” 14. 18. UPN did not pay affiliates either; the stations derived profit from advertising revenues, according to Collette and Litman, “Peculiar Economics”. 19. “CBS Corporation and Warner Bros.,” http://www.prnewswire.com. 20. Ibid. 21. Allison Enright, “CW Targets Mallrats,” Marketing News (August 15, 2006), 3. 22. Elber, “CW Network.” 23. Ibid. 24. David Goetzl, “Using MySpace to Get the Message: Networks from the CW to NBC Reaching Teens by Linking to the Site’s Huge Numbers,” Broadcasting & Cable (April 16, 2007), http://www.broadcastingcable.com. 25. Elber, “CW Network.” 26. John Consoli, “Promax/BDA, CW, BLINK Pact for Promo,” Mediaweek (February 26, 2007), http://www.mediaweek.com. 27. See Michael Schneider, “CW Channels Future After Rocky Start,” Daily Variety (July 23, 2007), 8. 28. Meg James, “Earth the New Star as Green Fills Screen,” Los Angeles Times (April 23, 2007), C1. 29. Ibid. 30. Time Warner, Inc., “The CW Unveils its First Primetime Schedule,” Time Warner press release (May 18, 2006), http://www.timewarner.com. 31. Quoted in Elber, “CW Network.” 32. The cast members who returned for the eleventh season took pay cuts in order to cut the high production costs of the series. 33. John Consoli, “Buyers Praise Merger of Two Weaker Nets,” Adweek (January 30, 2006), 6. 34. A. J. Frutkin, “For Diversity’s Sake,” Mediaweek (January 30, 2006), 6. 35. Ramin Setoodah, “Channeling Angst,” Newsweek (May 7, 2007), 50; Belcher reports ratings numbers of 3.7 million for UPN and 3.5 million for the WB during November sweeps in 2005 in “The WB, UPN Fold.” 36. Setoodah, “Channeling,” 50. 37. Edward Wyatt, “Did You Order a Muslim? (Yuk Yuk),” New York Times (July 1, 2007), Section 2, 24, retrieved from ProQuest Newspapers. 38. Schneider, “CW Channels,” 8. 39. Bill Carter, “The Early Outlook for ‘Reaper’: Not Grim at All,” New York Times (July 26, 2007), E1, retrieved from ProQuest Newspapers. 40. This storyline advancement strategy was also suggested for a fourth season of Veronica Mars, but The CW declined to renew the series. 41. Joseph Turow, Breaking Up America: Advertisers and the New Media World (Chicago: University of Chicago Press), 55. 42. “ ‘CW Now’ Seeks to be Commercial-Free,” United Press International (May 18, 2007), retrieved from Lexis-Nexis. 43. Elber, “CW Network.”

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44. John Consoli, “CW Content Wraps Draw Strong Retention Ratings,” Mediaweek (October 2, 2006), http://www.mediaweek.com. 45. Suzanne Ryan, “The CW Rethinks the Commercial,” Boston Globe (July 18, 2006), C1, retrieved from Lexis-Nexis. 46. Donna Goodison, “Keds a ‘Model’ of Brand Placement,” Boston Herald (April 7, 2007), 18, retrieved from Lexis-Nexis. 47. “Video: Multi-Platinum Recording Artists, The All-American Rejects, Perform in Schooled Reality TV show Airing on the CW Network,” PR Newswire (July 30, 2007), http://www.prnewswire.com. 48. Setoodah, “Channeling,” 50. 49. Kevin Smith quoted in Jeff Jensen, “It Came from Comic-Con!” Entertainment Weekly (August 10, 2007), 36. 50. Shelly McCrory, former senior vice president for comedy series at NBC comments on this in Wyatt, “Did You Order,” 24. 51. Wyatt, “Did You Order,” 24. 52. John M. Higgins, “Time Warner Cable Squeezes CW Stations,” Broadcasting & Cable (October 2, 2006), http://www.broadcastingcable.com. 53. Ed Christman, “CBS Records Relaunching with Eye on Synergy,” Billboard (December 15, 2006), http://www.billboard.com. 54. Warner Music Group not only releases these soundtracks, but they also feature many of the company’s recording artists. For example, the One Tree Hill soundtracks include songs from the Constantines and Band of Horses (bands who record on the label Sub Pop, which is partnered with Warner through a joint venture), Tyler Hilton and The Wreckers (who record on Warner label Maverick), and Warner Records act Gym Class Heroes. 55. License to Wed (2007) and The Brave One (2007) are examples of Warner Bros. films with a high level of ad placement during The CW’s first year. 56. Michael Schneider and Josef Adalian, “Can CW Spread ‘Gossip’ Mojo?” Variety (November 26–December 2, 2007), 21. 57. Josef Adalian, “CW Spreads ‘Gossip’ Run,” Daily Variety (October 10, 2007), 5.

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chapter 3

U Know U Love Me: New Media, Gossip Girl, and the (Un)Changing Discourses of Girlhood Anne H. Petersen

On November 5, 2007, the Writers Guild of America (WGA) went on strike. The writers’ demands were straightforward: They wished to be compensated based on all viewings of the shows their words produce, whether viewed traditionally (on television) or alternatively (streaming, downloaded, on DVD). I mention the writers’ strike because the teen melodrama Gossip Girl has been used, in publications as various as Entertainment Weekly and The New Yorker, as a rallying cry for the writers’ cause. Gossip Girl, which debuted in the fall of 2007 on The CW, is the brainchild of Josh Schwartz, best known as creator of The O.C. Both shows detail the lives of the very wealthy and the very beautiful—The O.C. in Southern California, Gossip Girl in New York’s Upper East Side. Importantly, both also focus on the lives of high school students, tracking their relations with each other, their parents, and their futures. The settings are sumptuous, the wardrobes spectacular, and the drama high. Unlike The O.C., which became a surprise hit for Fox as a summer fill-in, Gossip Girl has enjoyed only moderate success in the ratings. Yet, in the fall of 2007, Gossip Girl was the most downloaded show on Apple iTunes and the most watched streaming show on Yahoo!—a statistic that speaks to the recent rise of streaming television and alternative viewing devices.1 What’s more, CW offered full episodes, absolutely free, on the Gossip Girl Web site, potentially inspiring new viewing practices: A fan may watch the show piecemeal, chatting with friends, while posting on her blog. While it seems doubtful that the television will disappear from our lives, it will certainly be

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complemented by alternative means of acquiring and viewing content. Such a shift requires scholars to reconsider television reception in the age of New Media, a task already undertaken by several within the field. Yet, the specific area of girl spectatorship—the next generation of adult spectators and consumers—remains unexplored. It is this lack in contemporary reception scholarship that demands redress. Exploring posts in the Gossip Girl VIP Lounge, one perceives the ways that girls seek out, view, share, relate to, and appropriate Gossip Girl for their own use. The findings have been divided into five discourse categories, borrowing from previous scholarship on girls’ media and reception: romantic individualism, fashion/beauty, community, identification, and escapism.2 Each of the aforementioned discourses function to structure and define girlhood. The manner in which each discourse manifests through the Gossip Girl bulletin board thus illuminates how girlhood, writ large, has been constructed in the contemporary, New Media–filled, imagination. While new viewing practices may indeed be visible within these discursive categories, one must also acknowledge the possibility that much of the excitement (and anxiety) surrounding “New Media viewing” may be overblown.3 In exploring these discourses, however, our conception of contemporary reception practices, specific to both girls and to New Media, is at stake. GIRLS AND FANDOM While the study of spectatorship, reception, and fandom took the academy by storm in the early 1980s, relatively little has been theorized concerning girls’ reception, particularly girls’ television reception.4 As such, girls’ studies scholars have been forced to either borrow from feminist reception studies or forge new ground themselves. Feminist reception proclaims “no longer do we assume an unproblematic relationship between image and audience, one in which the text clearly transmits meaning and the viewer easily decodes it.”5 Meaning resides not with the text, nor with the viewer, but in a dynamic space in between. In Wolfgang Iser’s words, the viewer “sets the text in motion, and so sets [her]self in motion too.”6 Reception theory has proven a useful tool for third-wave feminist scholars because its denial of the “ideal viewer” clears the path for a diversity of viewing practices, including redemptive readings of traditionally patriarchal texts. Girls’ reception practices possess similar subversive and liberating potential. Nevertheless, we need to be wary of paralleling woman’s reception practices to those of girls. As Mary Kearney explains, girlhood, similar to womanhood, has emerged in scholarly writing as a “fluid discursive construct which female youth variously negotiate alongside a range of other socially produced subjectivities, rather than a fixed identity that is biologically determined.”7 But girlhood is not womanhood, nor necessarily “little

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womanhood.” American society privileges youth—from our ideal bodies to our ideal consumers, youth are the target. In this way, girlhood has become both a coming-of-age and an age of privilege: As one mother on Gossip Girl wistfully informs her teenage daughter, “You’ll never again be as thin or as beautiful or as happy as you are now.” As a result, I would argue that girls have, to some extent, internalized this notion of themselves as the privileged audience. Like female fans of Valentino or the slew of mid-century melodramas, their spectatorship and fandom is a coveted commodity. This sense of agency—indeed, a form of “girl power”— influences the interaction between girl and text. Of course, other facts—age, level of maturity, real life experience, social and familial relationships—also influence girls’ reception. Yet, I am most interested in this sense of power and agency, especially in the context of Gossip Girl and its reception. How has the rise of girls’ independence through New Media contributed to this sense of control? In turn, how have producers altered their content to better meet this coveted demographic where they “reside,” for example, the Internet? “GIRLWIDEWEB” While relatively little has been published on the subject of girls’ spectatorship, societal and parental anxiety over girls and their presence on the Internet has produced a rich, albeit nascent, field of study. In one of the first examinations of girl and Internet participation and production,8 Susan Murray explores the relationship between girls, the “safe space” of the bulletin board, and their relationship to My So-Called Life, finding that “girl MSCL fans were enmeshed in fluid states of identity play in relation to their spectatorship and the text, and that the online computer chat facilitated that development.”9 Murray claimed that “this second level of rereading, the meshing of individual viewing experience with others, result in an encrustation of meaning surrounding the original television text,” arguing that “the self is continually intertwined with these ‘poached meanings,’ as the text prompts self-reflection, and that girl fans are particularly adept at mastering this process.”10 Her conclusion, circa 1995, is notably optimistic, reflecting both the celebratory attitude toward the Internet and the burgeoning spirit of Girl Power, pre-Spice Girls, that characterized the historical moment. More recently, Sharon Mazzarella’s collection GirlWideWeb explores the manifestation of ethnicity on the Internet, girl cyber-jammers, gURLculture, girl Internet crimes, and social networking, while Shayla Marie Thiel’s Instant Identity: Adolescent Girls and the World of Instant Messaging grapples with girl’s digital communication. Whether through Web sites, bulletin boards, social networking sites, or instant messaging, “it is clear that adolescent girls are speaking on the web—speaking in ways and words that are infrequently heard.”11 While girls may indeed feel safer and less inhibited in expressing

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themselves amidst the relative anonymity of the Web, several scholars caution against too quickly celebrating such behavior. As Christine Scodari emphasizes, Computer-mediated communication, including its mechanisms of net presence, appears to enhance and capacitate otherwise existing proclivities rather than impeding or redirecting them. Teen girls may be encouraged by online anonymity to assert ideas and opinions when they are not in a position to negatively impact their face-to-face relationships or to be judged based on physical appearance, but this does not guarantee that the ideas they expound will be more likely than in unmediated contexts to challenge the status quo.12

In other words, despite the freedom of the Internet and including potential for identity play, girls are likely to reproduce hegemonic notions of femininity, girlhood, adolescence, and social politics. Mazzarella echoes this claim in her study of girl-produced Web sites, through which girls “reproduce[d] the content of mass-produced teen idol magazines.”13 Stern likewise concludes that girls predominantly use IM as a means of policing and reproducing normative discourses of girlhood. Nevertheless, bulletin boards, as fluid, mutable, readily accessible sites, are consummate loci of fan expression. Bulletin boards, along with Multi-UserDomains (MUDs), were amongst the first widespread and interactive uses of the Internet.14 One might speculate that such sites would have died out in favor of more immediate means of fan discourse—IM, chat rooms, and so on. Yet, they remain vital centers of fandom, as well as rich sites for fan and reception analysis; perhaps most notably in the work of Henry Jenkins but also with recent scholarship on fan activism and engaged spectatorship.15 This scholarship positions bulletin board as sites of “net presence,” in which the user becomes “metonymically” present through activities, such as a bulletin board posting, which constitute subjectivity and identity.16 In light of this work, I view bulletin board production as facilitating, influencing, and presenting the development of subjectivity. METHODOLOGY To gain a better sense of how girls are responding to and articulating their fandom of Gossip Girl, I went to the source: The CW Gossip Girl Web site.17 Television shows have long had informal, fan-produced Web sites and bulletin boards; in recent years, networks have expanded their online components, developing full-fledged, “official” sites for individual shows. Starting with the 2005–2006 season, several networks also began streaming online versions of their shows on a time-delay basis. Such is the case with Gossip

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Girl: An episode airs on the CW on Monday evening; it becomes available via the Web site on Saturday. Traffic to such sites skyrocketed with the offer of streaming video, resulting in the networks’ diversification of online offerings. For example, the Gossip Girl homepage offers links and ads for its two main online sponsors (Verizon Wireless and Victoria Secret), previews for the next episode, a special on the music of Gossip Girl, the Gossip Girl Second Life component, Gossip Girl fashions, and the “Gossip Girl VIP Lounge,” a fan-based bulletin board and blog community. As is standard with online bulletin boards, comments are divided into threads. One user starts a thread; others respond to the thread. Sometimes threads never get off the ground (such as “Nothing Like One Tree Hill ”); sometimes a thread garners hundreds of responses (“The Official Chuck and Blair Thread,” “Who Do You Hate the Most”). Moderators from the CW maintain four threads that lord over the top of the bulletin board, regardless of where the user navigates. For the last month, three of the threads have remained constant—“Post Your Questions for the Cast of Gossip Girl,” “Announcing the Gossip Girl VIP Lounge,” and “Create a Photo Gallery.” A fourth thread changes with the introduction of a new episode, encouraging feedback: “November 28th Episode—Tell Us What You Think!” The bulletin board posts, while passionate and numbering in the thousands, remain readily accessible. A handle and avatar accompanies each post. The handle, or nickname, is also linked to a profile that discloses age, location, interests, number of posts, and so forth. Some girls kept their information private, but the vast majority at least disclosed their age, making it possible to limit research to girls who claimed to be between the ages of 12 and 19.18 The sex of the author was ascertained through use of pronouns, post content, profile information, and, in rare cases, handle and avatar gender.19 With the aforementioned discourses as a loose structure, one may observe how discourses of girlhood have changed (or have not) with the growing ubiquity of New Media. Has digitization, the new millennium, and increasing girl autonomy dramatically altered the way that girls perceive themselves, their peers, their potential, and the world around them? Or do girls continue to reproduce the same discourses that characterized the attitudes of their traditional, analog-based sisters, mothers, and grandmothers? Put differently, is all the hype over new ways of viewing and consuming in fact little more than a mask for regression and the persistent propagation of the postfeminist ethos? Hopefully, the answers to these questions will add to and sophisticate the way that society and scholars conceive of girls and girlhood today. ROMANTIC INDIVIDUALISM Gossip Girl focuses on the attendees of an Upper East Side high school. The high school, real or dramatic, is traditionally fraught with conflict—students

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versus teachers, students versus society, students versus themselves. But we never see the characters of GG in the classroom or doing homework, a narrative elision that creates space for the dominant theme of the show: hetero-normative romance. In her study of Jackie magazine, McRobbie pinpointed the “code of romantic individualism” that pervaded the text. Articles, representations, cartoons, advertisements, and stories all conveyed the selfsame notion: “a man can adore, love, ‘cherish’ and be sexually attracted to his girlfriend and simultaneously be ‘aroused’ by other girls.”20 Realizing this “truth,” girls are thus “set against each other” in competition for men.21 McRobbie goes on to bluntly articulate the themes of such romantic individualism: “1) the girl has to fight to get and keep her man; 2) she can never trust another woman unless she is old and ‘hideous’ in which case she does not appear in these stories anyway; 3) despite this, romance, and being a girl, are fun.”22 In other words, the individual girl must eschew the bonds of sisterhood and friendship because all other girls are merely competition for her greater goal: coupledom. What’s more, male infidelity is naturalized. If there is any blame, it is on the girl, who was not attentive enough to her man or to the temptations that surrounded him. And yet, despite the rejection of one’s friend and the constant paranoia and insecurity about one’s ability to attract, please, and maintain a relationship, there is no greater pleasure. Dating, romance, love, and couplehood are thus constructed as the primary concerns of a teenage girl. Achieve those, and achieve happiness. This discourse of romantic individualism is echoed profoundly throughout the Gossip Girl Bulletin Board. First, a bit of background on the show itself: Gossip Girl follows the lives of six high school students: Serena, Blair, Nate, Chuck, Dan, and Jenny. Serena and Blair are age-old best friends, but Serena mysteriously disappeared to boarding school sometime last year. Blair and Nate have been dating “since kindergarten,” but as flashbacks reveal, Serena drunkenly slept with Nate after a wedding, prompting her departure. Hoping for a new start, Serena has recently become interested in Dan, a quasi-hipster from a middle-class Brooklyn family. But Blair quickly learns of Serena’s betrayal, and the sparks fly. Reactions to Serena’s actions are nuanced: As Angels58 points out, The issue that I am having trouble with is a lot of people are blaming just Serena [for] what a bad, bad friend she is. Last time I checked Nate was there. I think the lad should carry some shame as well. He has been a bad, bad boyfriend. Blair either has very low to no self-esteem or is completely acceptable to a cheating boyfriend or a glutton for punishment.

As the author references, many posts have slammed Serena’s transgressions while ignoring Nate’s. In this way, the unfaithful girl is portrayed as a “slut,” while the male becomes a “player.”23 Blair and Serena are also pitted against

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one another—Serena may not desire Nate in return, but Blair nevertheless views her as competition. Interestingly, Serena manifests the same romantic individualism when confronted with her new boyfriend’s ex-love, Vanessa. The competition between the two girls is made manifest in a bout of “Guitar Hero,” a virtual reality video game in which each girl “plays” a song. On the boards, Idealeyez87 put a fine point on the anxiety and competition: Serena and Dan [Serena’s boyfriend] are so hot together it’s not even funny but I was a little scared at first with the whole Vanessa thing. But she totatly [sic] kicked her butt in Guitar Hero! You KEEP your man!

The poster thus affirms both the competition and the win as necessary—a girl must “kick butt” in order to keep her relationship safe. Posters also engage in a fascinating form of “behavior forgiveness” surrounding the show’s bad boy, Chuck Bass. In the first few episodes, Chuck is portrayed as lecherous and manipulative. He attempts to blackmail Serena into sexual activity with him; he corners a freshman girl on a rooftop (Jenny, who happens to be Dan’s sister) and attempts to rape her. Yet, halfway through the season, his eyes turn to Blair (recently broken up with Nate). As numerous comments proclaim, the romance and “sexiness” of their relationship elides all past behavior. Girls confess to fetishizing the clip of Blair and Chuck first hooking up, set to pop music in the back of a limo, reveling in its “sexiness.” As ChuckBassLoves07 explains, “I so forgot about him wanting to rape Jenny lol and the whole problem with Dan . . . plus I have seen the clip over and over it’s crazy.” For a thread titled “You Know You’re Obsessed with Gossip Girl When . . .”, mlwestie replied, “you keep watching B and C’s (Blair and Chuck’s) scenes over and over and over and over again on YouTube, and you suddenly forget what Chuck was like with women pre Blair in the limo.” Much is made of the fact that Blair has allowed Chuck to have feelings, and now that he has feelings, his past self has departed. In this way, Chuck is constructed as the “ideal romantic hero,” a type Mazzarella found in her examination of Chad Michael Murray fan sites.24 Within her study, girls fixated on a construction of Murray as a nice, respectful, sweet guy, one with whom they could safely imagine themselves. Similarly, in reference to Chuck, Iceprincess explains, “he actually cares about her, in his own way, but who cares they are a match made in heaven! I mean the boy couldn’t sleep, was freaking out . . . and had the butterflies! He’s never felt like that before! [. . .] They should get married and have babies!” Iceprincess, like several others on the board, favors a romantic rather than sexual interpretation of their heated make-out session in the back of the limo. Retelling sexual advances as romance, the girls retroactively construct sexual aggression as forgivable. As liveitloveit explains, because Chuck asked Blair “if she was sure” before

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kissing her, he cares about her: “i LOVE that chuck has pretty much disrespected serena and jenny by forcing himself on them (like they’re nothing but just objects) but with blair he even stopped to ASK if she was ok with it . . . argh LOVE THEM SO MUCH!” What is remarkable is the way in which the girls acknowledge the contradiction of their devotion to Chuck—he was a rapist, he was a pig—as they negotiate their affection for him. Yet, the affection is not so much for Chuck himself as much as it is for Chuck and Blair. In bulletin board speak, the names Chuck and Blair have been morphed into “Chair,” spawning uber-popular threads titled “CHAIR Forever,” and so on. Thus, as McRobbie points out, “boys and men, then, are not sexual objects but romantic objects . . . Romance is about the public and social effects of implications of ‘love’ relationships.”25 While girls do fetishize the clip of their hook-up, the subsequent acts of romance and emotion—he gives her a beautiful necklace, he admits he has butterflies—form the discourse concerning their relationship. Accordingly, the most popular fanfic on the boards imagines continued romance between Chuck and Blair: Chuck buying an engagement ring, declarations of love, Blair trying on wedding dresses. Across the boards, romance, hetero-normative coupling (to the exclusion of other girls), and even eventual marriage and babies are privileged as the culmination of fantasy. In conclusion, while the sexiness of Gossip Girl is much more overt than, say, that produced by McRobbie’s Jackie magazine, the codes reproduced in response remain static. From a marketing standpoint, hetero-normative, romantic individualism facilitates the marketing of traditionally feminine products: the elaborate bras, panties, and negligee of major Gossip Girl sponsor Victoria’s Secret, for example. The more the narrative pushes the idea of out-doing and out-dressing other girls (to attract a boy or otherwise), the more girls are encouraged to purchase the products necessary to do so themselves. In the end, what appears to be a bit of nasty cat-fighting reveals itself as yet another means of channeling girls’ consumption. FASHION/BEAUTY The codes of fashion, beauty, and the consumption they entail pervade both Gossip Girl and girls’ bulletin board reactions. McRobbie recognizes the codes of fashion and beauty as “the care, protection, improvement, and embellishment of the body with the use of clothing and cosmetics.”26 Images in Jackie magazine, similar to those on the screen, “provoke the envy and admiration” of the viewer, “offer[ing] her the possibility of achieving such beauty by following the instructions.”27 The “instructions” may be more explicit in a magazine—curl your hair this way; line your lips in this style—but as the Gossip Girl boards display, girls may readily emulate the beauty of main characters through consumption. Stacey positions consumption as a

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practice of identity creation: “Through the use of cosmetic products, then, as well as through the purchasing and the use of clothing, spectators take on a part of the star’s identity and make it a part of their own. The self and the ideal combine to produce another feminine identity, closer to the ideal.”28 The purchase of clothes and lip gloss, then, allows girls to quilt alternate subjectivities with those of the self. The Gossip Girl Web site facilitates the consumption of fashion and beauty products through “Gossip Girl Fashions,” an easy click away from the front page. Here, GG costume designer Eric Daman hosts taped walk-throughs of each character’s style. Interestingly, many of his suggestions, especially for the girls’ styles, focus on Do-It-Yourself style: You can make a necklace like Serena’s through a trip to the hardware store; you can do the same at home. These videos seem to open space for girls as cultural producers—a practice Mary Kearney has positioned as a valuable component to girl adolescent development.29 Yet, the page also links to “Victoria’s Secret Suggests: Gossip Girl Character Looks,” a consumer site that fragments each character’s style into easily purchasable items from the Victoria’s Secret online store. Of course, the relationship between stars, commodities, and tie-ins have a long lineage that dates to early Hollywood, and Gossip Girl engages in an established tradition of media-encouraged consumption. In other words, this is nothing new.30 Several contemporary scholars have attempted to recover the “power” in shopping, even for young ‘tween girls: Farah Malik proposes that “the triangulated acts of magazine reading, internalization of the messages of consumption and shopping experience, can be seen to offer girls a rite of passage through which they can enter an unfamiliar and exciting world, leaving behind a familiar and mundane one.”31 Gossip Girl presents just such an “unfamiliar and exciting world,” filled with designer gowns, elaborate balls, and opulent designs. Accordingly, the discourse on the boards is of brand recognition and desire. In a discussion of the fidelity of the show to the books on which it is based, gossip101 writes: I kind of wonder if anything they use in it is based on the books, like Blair’s many pairs of Manolos, Marc Jacobs clothing, Kate Spade bags, and everything else Bendel’s and Barney’s sells. Basically, all the things I dream of being able to buy sometimes. But being over $500 things and $1000 shoes, its not happening. They go into a lot of detail in the book over fashion, naming basically everything they wear or change into. I do have a pair of Seven jeans, and they have a lot of those, but thats about the only thing thats the same thing in their million dollar wardrobe that I have too. Ah, to be rich.

Granted, this particular girl’s brand recognition is rooted in her reading experience, but other posters demonstrate similar skills in high-fashion

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identification: As katriinuh asks Blake Lively (Serena), “where did u get that dress u wore when u went on a date with Dan in the pilot episode? It’s sooo cute! Is it Chanel?” Other girls create threads to specifically ask for information on how to locate a specific style: “I was wondering where the long black and white coat Blair wore during the pilot is from” (MeggiMo); “I would love to know what the reddish color lip gloss Blair was wearing in the ‘modeling’ episode is called? What is the brand and color, I love it!” (candy 9929). Unlike the discourse of the costume designer, who encourages girls to create a “style” in the vein of the characters, the girls themselves aim for verisimilitude: the exact dress, or as close as they can come to it at their (or their parents’) fiscal level. The “**OFFICIAL gossip girl FASHION thread**” proclaims, “Now, I know they have a style section on the cwtv.com website dedicated to this, but so many items are MISSING!! Like that adorable black dress Blair was wearing at the party . . ? [. .] So this thread is to post EXACTLY where you find all the unlisted style items.” In response, mjlove22 posted links to items “very similar” to those on the show, such as “Serena’s over-the-knee brown boots (worn on the train/Blair’s mom’s party/in the morning at the hospital).” In response to the “You Know You’re Obssessed with Gossip Girl When . . .” thread, several girls mention their compulsive replication of a single character: “You start wearing headbands just like blair, your new favorite color is red, you start curling your hair, you buy an enV just because Blair has one” (lorenevy), or “you look for the clothes and shoes Blair wears in department stores . . . [you] search apartments on the Upper East Side” (Tori 013). It seems that the freedoms for identity negotiation often associated with the Internet have, in this case, reified the notion of consumption as a necessary means to ideal beauty. The Web site and bulletin boards offer clear digital pathways to online commerce, facilitating the duplication of another’s style rather than creating a hybrid, individual style of one’s own. As Thiel Stern points out in her examination of instant messaging, “the IMvironment tells girls that they have the power literally at their fingertips to consume the ideal culturally defined female identity.”32 This perverted form of “girl power” is thus the power to conform and reproduce socially inscribed gender roles. The girls on the Gossip Girl bulletin board revel in this power, but as the first quote of the section acknowledges, they also bemoan their inability to conspicuously consume at the level of the Upper East Side. As a result, the girl power to consume is repeatedly tinged with insecurity and lack. Yet, this lack, and the desire to fill it, drives audience devotion to the show. Girls seem to tune in just as much to watch the fashion as the familial and romantic narrative progression. Similar to Sex and the City, only aimed at a slightly younger demographic and with less crisp writing, the purpose of Gossip Girl is to sell: not only a lifestyle, but a network. Along with The Sopranos, Sex and the City established HBO as a certain type of network, with

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a certain sort of programming—cutting edge, sophisticated, and snappy with high production levels and a cult-like following. The fledgling CW hoped to do the same with Gossip Girl, branding itself in the show’s hip, youthful image. The problem, of course, is that Gossip Girl simply isn’t garnering the “appointment viewing” necessary to regularly draw viewers to The CW. Put differently, despite the growing viewership, the fact that most girls do not actually watch The CW hinders the network’s push for a close association between the two. Yet, the show’s major online advertisers—Victoria’s Secret and Verizon Wireless—enjoy repeated, obligatory viewing of their ads. Unlike users of TiVo or DVR, who may easily fast-forward through commercials, those who watch Gossip Girl online are forced to view the same commercial up to eight times during a single viewing. While this might sound annoying, it’s certainly effective in highlighting the product in the viewer’s mind. Add in product placement and various links through the Gossip Girl site, and advertising with The CW morphs into an immense marketing opportunity: Verizon Wireless reportedly paid around $14.4 million to advertise on the CW in the first six months of 2007, in large part due to myriad marketing tie-ins offered by The CW.33 The strategy of brand saturation seems to be working: Across the bulletin board, several girls mentioned memorizing the words to the commercials; I myself could readily recite the catchy rhyme that accompanies the ad for the Victoria’s Secret Bra and Panties Sale. While The CW may not have succeeded in bundling itself with Gossip Girl, Victoria’s Secret certainly has—one episode features Blair’s mother Eleanor, usually in the business of haute couture, designing a line of “retro lingerie” for the company and giving out V.S. gift bags. As several critics have pointed out, the plot point is both an obvious plug and relatively improbable: As put by New York’s online coverage, “not only would none of the people on Gossip Girl actually wear anything as down-market as Victoria’s Secret, Eleanor wouldn’t be caught dead designing a line for them. That’s like if Carolina Herrera decided to put together a small collection for Fashion Bug.”34 Nevertheless, few teen viewers can distinguish between the relative luxury of Victoria’s Secret (where bras cost upwards of $30 as opposed to $10 at Wal-Mart) and the extreme luxury of, say, La Perla, with few items under the $100 mark. Through its online and in-show presence, a “down-market” company, such as Victoria’s Secret, is insinuated as “up-market,” sophisticated, and desirable—some of the best buzz a business can buy. Ultimately, more than any other network, The CW is working to “crosspollinate different mediums,” to quote executive vice-president of marketing and brand strategy Rick Haskins. In his words, “it’s not just online anymore. It’s not just print. We’re trying to make the mediums work together.”35 It remains to be seen, however, if such untraditional buzz will sustain advertiser

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interest into seasons to come, as The CW’s Nielson Ratings continue in their downward slide. COMMUNITY Throughout the twentieth century, movie, television, and musical fan clubs have served as sites of community and friendship. As Georganne Scheiner points out in her discussion of the Deanna Durbin Devotees, “being members of fan clubs was not only a way in which adolescent girls organized their social lives, but fan membership also constituted a specific form of cultural expression.”36 As a form of subculture, girls within these groups may find solidarity and safe spaces to express opinions otherwise frowned upon or silenced in greater society. At the close of the twentieth century, these clubs transitioned from analog bases (print magazines, newsletters, etc.) to bases in the digital world (fan sites, bulletin boards, listserves). The bulletin board functions as a sort of time-delayed, virtual conversation about the object of fandom, along with more tangential and personal issues. Through the act of participation, fans oftentimes experience “a sense of human connection and solidarity that is rarely achieved in either virtual or real-world communities.”37 As Murray notes in her study of the My So-Called Life fan boards, The writings of girl Lifers contain an activist sentiment that not only worked to save the show, but to save Angela’s “life.” To extend the life of their ideal self against the wishes of powerful and predominantly male network executives—who have the final say on whether or not the show or Angela survives—may possibly be related to the desire to thwart the elite male culture that is working to inscribe stricter codes of femininity to teen identity.38

The girls of Murray’s study regularly extended their musings past the show and into their own lives, engaging in acts of confession and protofeminism. This may be traced to the emotionally complex nature of My So-Called Life, or it may have been the work of a few dedicated girls pushing the board in that direction. Importantly, the MSCL board was fan-created and maintained. While ABC acknowledged their advocacy, the board was in no way associated with or sanctioned by the network. While the board doubtlessly moderated posts for offensive content, it remained outside the bounds of corporate control. The CW and other television networks are relative novices as moderators of digital fan discourse. Networks and Hollywood studios have long served to facilitate fan club activities: With the beginning of the star system in the late 1920s and early 1930s, executives quickly realized that acknowledging fans, even if simply to provide an address to where they could send letters, studios could increase fan devotion and, in turn, profits.39 Until rather recently,

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however, Internet fandom had been characterized by its independence: From the initial, telnet-based bulletin board systems (BBS), starting in the late 1970s, through more accessible fan sites and boards on the World Wide Web in the late 1990s, Internet fandom was profoundly anticorporate in nature. Some boards were individually and privately maintained; others coalesced around themes (science fiction; reality television) or overarching fan communities (TV Without Pity; BuddyTV). In recent years, corporate players have realized the potential of such “grass-roots” media forums: Instead of shutting down individual fan creations on MySpace, Facebook, and YouTube, they create their own offerings, only flashier and better funded. Whereas corporate-funded sites were once little more than window-dressing, they now serve as a primary means of retrieving a show in digital format. The lesson is clear: If you post it, the fans will come.40 In essence, networks have beat the individual fan at his/her own game, or perhaps more appropriately, stolen the ball and declared victory. The fate of the fansite TV Without Pity exemplifies this trend. Known for its vitriolic critiques and series spoilers, the site was recently bought out by the Bravo unit of NBC Universal. In this way, the independent, potentially subversive fan site is folded into the corporate domain. Google and other search engines contribute to this sort of mainstreaming of fan content. If a young girl enters “Gossip Girl” into the search engine, it funnels her directly to the “official” site, rather than other less-linked, unfunded, fan-created sites. The motivation for this type of control is simple: If fans frequent the official Web site, the corporation, rather than a resourceful fan, receives the advertising dollars. What is lost, however, is a fair amount of agency and creativity, as capitalism feeds on, digests, and spits out a sanitized forum for fan expression. As an extension of the CW’s official site, Gossip Girl’s fan community generally limits itself to discussion of the show, its stars, and individual fan practices, a narrowness that may be attributed to CW supervision and control. While The CW claims only to monitor posts for abuse (profanity, solicitation, verbal attacks, racist language),41 it nevertheless implicitly encourages girls to post and articulate their fandom in a particular style.42 As mentioned previously, moderators from the CW maintain several threads at the top of each bulletin board page. The persistence of these threads informs the structure of the community, leading participants to post in a style that preferences adherence to the themes of the show as opposed to themes of “real life.” The first thread always deals with fan opinion of the previous episode: CW Moderators solicit user responses, effectively bestowing a feeling of agency upon the bulletin board community. Put differently, the act of asking for fan opinions insinuates that said opinions are of value. A second stable thread asks users to proffer questions for the cast of the show.43 Importantly, the cast has posted no replies, nor does there seem to be any stated plan to

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submit the questions. Instead, the thread functions as a simulation of connection between fan community and the object(s) of fandom, strengthening the community’s notion of itself as a respected, heard audience. As a result, the majority of fan-generated threads organize themselves similarly: Whether the “Derena” (combination of Dan and Serena) thread, The Official “Chair” Lovers Club, or The Jenny Is Annoying Club, posts engage the show on a superficial level. Not that there isn’t value in expressing attraction to or frustration with characters—in many ways, something as simple as figuring out what kind of character a girl likes can assist in structuring subjectivity. Nevertheless, this particular fan community maintains a narrow focus, mostly on boys, clothes, and music. The discourse rarely strays outside the bounds of the show’s narrative; I’ve yet to find a piece of fanfic that pressures the boundaries of the narrative or suggests a subversive reading. Which isn’t to say that girls do not still manage to find companionship within the virtual pages of the boards, as exemplified by “The Amanda, Katie, Ally, Anna, Beth, Penny, Meika, Megan, And Anyone That Wants To Chat Thread.” While the enumerative quality of the thread seems to create a form of fan hierarchy, this particular group is characterized by warmth and inclusiveness. Manderz, the creator of the thread, proclaims “I made this thread for my girlies back from the ‘brase’ board. Didn’t want to loose (sic) contact with you girls, because I’m not going on the One Tree Hill Boards ever again. we’re all tight, but we all love meeting new people. So if you want to chat, we’ll chat with you.” While the thread, now at over 5,000 posts, is mostly filled with updates on what members are doing (homework) and what they’re looking forward to (the next episode of Gossip Girl ), the inclusive nature of the group is notable. Indeed, we might read such inclusiveness as a positive effect of the disembodied nature of bulletin board participation. As girls are able to judge others on avatar, handle, and written contributions alone, they are less likely to engage in exclusionary tactics. A virtual fan girl is thus the sum of her articulated thoughts: The boards privilege her thoughts and her emotions rather than her beauty or her manifest ability to consume. In this way, even as The CW valorizes a form of sanitized fan discourse over a more individualized one, girls still find comfort and community across the boards. IDENTIFICATION Female fans most often identify with what they see onscreen through consumption and physical emulation. But, as Stacey points out, the process of consumption can inspire secondary effects: “[T]his is a different form of imitation, which is more of a temporary reproduction of a particular kind of behavior which resembles the star. It transforms the spectator’s previous

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appearance, and in so doing offers the spectator the pleasure of close association with her ideal.”44 This close connection with a star or character also invokes an association with the character’s social milieu: a sense of emotional and social identification. This section shifts to an examination of how identification, not just with a character but also with the character’s “world,” instills an impression of solace and community. The fans’ sense of verisimilitude between Gossip Girl and their own experiences emerges in a particularly heated (and rather anomalous) thread titled “Inappropriate Show.” A middle-aged, self-identified mother begins the thread, stating: I am no prude; however, I was excited about this show once they compared it to Sex In The City. The major difference is that Carrie Bradshaw and the gang were in their 30’s. Gossip Girl, which focuses on underage teens in High School, went over the line during their pilot. In one hour I saw attempted suicide, underaged drinking, two attempts at rape amongst many other raw issues. I am not unaware that kids these days know what these issues are, but I certainly don’t need to watch a one hour pilot that exploits them as they are no big deal like they happen every day. When can our kids just be kids—what happened to worrying about what dress to wear for prom?

Responses were immediate and intensely defensive of the show’s “realism.” “Rape and suicide attempts do happen every day,” claims hollowgirlx3, “They are big issues nowadays and I’m glad that there’s a show on television who isn’t afraid to cover it up”; “I honestly think that this show is a reflection of what really goes on for teenagers today, especially as far as the drinking and partying” (crazybeautiful); “those issues DO occur in everyday life to high schools all over the world. GG just brings out the darker side of it” ( jemappelletirah); “I find the show pretty relatable . . . it may not be a perfect world but reality is that kids these days deal with these things. I’m not saying underage drinking is ok but I’m not naïve enough to think that it doesnt (sic) happen to just about everyone” (LoganFan06). The recurring sentiment was, in the words of carcrashx0hearts, “If you’re saying that the show is inappropriate, you’re saying that life is inappropriate. I’m sick of these other shows on Nick and Disney trying to sugarcoat life.” In contrast to those shows, the realism of Gossip Girl, even if at times melodramatic, serves as a comforting recognition of the girls’ lived experiences. Girls also felt strongly that the show, or media in general, was not to “blame” for “bad” behavior. Several girls chided the original poster for her naïveté in believing that teens (1) don’t engage in these sorts of activities or (2) would be blindly influenced by what they see on the screen. As BGirl55 emphasizes, “sure it deals with sex, etc, but most teenagers are already thinking about this kind of stuff without the show influencing them. They’re not

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idiots. When it comes to what age of kids should be watching the show, that is up to the parents if they don’t like the show hopefully they can stop their kids from watching it.” JessicaGGFan exclaims “There aren’t words across the screen that say HEY KIDS GO GET DRUNK BECAUSE IT’S OKAY. They aren’t promoting it at all, they are just showing things that HAPPEN.” In other words, the girls acknowledge that the content is risqué, controversial, and even dangerous, but they want to make it known, especially to this middle-aged mother, that this is what they deal with, think about, and like to see examined onscreen—in Janna7’s words, Gossip Girl “started the conversation.” Interestingly, many girls asserted that parents should know what their children are watching. While they stop at entertaining the idea of watching the show with their parents, Speakez questions “Should parents be aware of what their children are watching? Yes! Can they use this to jump start conversations about drugs and sexual behavior? Yes!” In other words, a show that girls identify as “realistic” could serve as a productive site for communication between daughters and parents. In this way, the discourses of verisimilitude and social identification, so strongly articulated on the board, speak to girls’ desires for their elders to understand their complex, “un-sugarcoated” lives. ESCAPISM This category is organized under the heading of “escapism,” but its focus will in fact be on the novel, multifaceted methods of spectatorship and escapism practiced by girl fans. Traditionally, escapism has taken on pejorative connotations—as Stacey explains, “[E]scapism” has been applied to forms of popular culture in order to dismiss them as insignificant and unworthy of critical or academic attention. Indeed, this has been particularly true of forms of popular culture enjoyed by women—soap operas or romance fiction and films. In the light of such attacks, feminist critics have insisted on taking women’s pleasures in popular culture seriously and understanding exactly what is at stake in their consumption of these particular popular forms.45

Again, we must be careful in conflating girls’ means of escapism with those of grown women. But Stacey’s point—that the pleasure of spectatorship must be taken seriously—certainly applies to girls’ viewing practices, often derided as distracted and frenetic. Such derision, however, is based on a hegemonic notion of escapism—one that privileges patience and traditionally “adult” levels of attention. But today’s girls are changing the how, where, and even why of escapism. Girls and boys alike are clamoring for alternative means of viewing media content: iPods, cellphones, computers, portable DVD players, and so forth.

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As David Denby emphasized in his article “Big Pictures: Hollywood Looks to the Future,” “the video iPod and other handheld devices are being sold as movie-exhibition spaces, and they certainly will function that way for kids. According to home-entertainment specialists I spoke to in Hollywood, many kids are ‘platform agnostic’—that is, they will look at movies on any screen at all, large or small.”46 Denby and others’ palpable anxiety is somewhat straightforward: Kids are okay with a very different sort (and level) of spectatorship than their parents. What seems to be at stake, as a result, is the future of the traditional movie-going experience: the big, sweeping epic, shown on a massive screen, mesmerizing the viewer, pulling her into the world of cinema. Whether the anxiety over new, mobilized screens is based on generational nostalgia or a form of elitist cinema purism, the fact remains that kids are watching content through alternative means. Of course, they continue to go to the movies and watch television, but they have complimented traditional viewing with their own highly mobilized practices. According to an October 2007 study by the Pew Research Center, 53 percent of teens personally own an mp3 player or iPod, 25 percent own a laptop, and 72 percent have their own desktop computer.47 While these statistics do not necessarily mean that teens are using technology to view media, we can safely assume that many of them are. But does a change in screen necessarily entail a change in the relationship between viewer and image? Escapism is often characterized by its vision of “something better”—better than one’s quotidian drudgery, better than one’s unspectacular love life, better than one’s tired, ill-fitting wardrobe. While Stacey stresses the “cinematic pleasure” of spectatorship, this pleasure was in part derived from the “physical escape from the hardships of their lives at this time.”48 One might argue that girls’ alternative spectatorship, despite the lack of dark-room, big-image absorption, continues to offer girls a form of escape. The sumptuous world of Gossip Girl certainly offers an image of “something better”; the mobile nature of computers and other mobile devices allows girls to view the show away from the stresses of family, the domestic, or the public sphere. While their hardships might not be those of 1940s Britain, they are hardships nonetheless, oftentimes characterized by emotional and social strife. Considered this way, downloading GG and watching it in one’s room, on the bus, or during lunch period serves as a profoundly escapist activity. Through viewing practices and online fan participation, Gossip Girl fans participate in their own “girl culture,” moving it from the domestic to the public space. Mazzarella highlights the ways in which girls “appropriate conventions and media content” as a means to [create] a space for themselves—a space in which to engage in a practice (romantic fandom) that has been ridiculed, dismissed, and denigrated

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by the dominant adult culture for decades. Until now, this activity, like many elements of girl culture, has been engaged in in the privacy of one’s bedroom and only in the company of one’s inner circle of closest female friends.49

The Internet, along with other digital technologies, including wireless, cell phones, and iPods, blurs the line between the public and the private, breaking down distinctions of “appropriate” female viewing practices. Girls may view a show completely alone; girls may view it, like the first audiences of the soap opera, while multitasking: completing homework, blogging, or talking with a friend on the phone.50 As Lynn Clark emphasizes: Today’s young people experience constant accessibility, separation from adults and their multi-tasking abilities as liberation and empowering, a way to manage risk and to direct one’s own course. These technologically mediated communication experiences represent for them an openness to possibilities rather than a limit on their possibilities for privacy, personal reflection, and individual direction.51

In this way, uses of technology that adults often consider alienating, even antisocial, may in fact increase a girl’s feelings of agency, participation, and social linkage. Girls are watching Gossip Girl, but they’re not necessarily watching it when the CW would like them to do so. Only 2.7 million viewers tune in when they’re “supposed” to—Mondays at 8 P.M. (EST).52 Instead, they’re watching it via streaming video, on DVR, or via downloads. Accounting for delayed DVR viewing, Nielson numbers rose 20 percent amongst young adults; Gossip Girl was streamed 1.5 million times from the CW Web site during October 2007; the show was the most downloaded show on iTunes and the most streamed on Yahoo! during the same period.53 Importantly, it’s a top-five network show amongst teen girls and the top new teen show on television.54 As a recent article in USA Today points out, It’s a case in point of how Hollywood’s definition of a hit TV series is radically changing. Though still the primary focus, “live” TV ratings are no longer the sole barometer of success. As viewing habits change, programmers are struggling with how to factor in DVR-use, Web-viewing, soughtafter niche audiences and online chatter when weighing shows’ health.55

Entertainment Weekly adds, “The generation watching Gossip Girl doesn’t do appointment television. They are masters at using the latest technology to watch TV when and how they want.”56 Yet, many within the industry are reluctant to rely on such statistics: Not only do Nielson Ratings remain industry currency, but many remain skeptical that users are using alternative viewing practices for anything more than “catch-up.”57

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If we take the conversations across the Gossip Girl bulletin boards as evidence, girls certainly are engaging in alternative viewing practices, sometimes for catch-up, at others as their preferred means of viewing. Some employ the site for repeat viewings: “I just watched the ep again for the 3rd time, I cant (sic) stop I am addicted, lol” (mlwestie); “I’ve seen each of the two episodes about half a dozen times” (Emily117). Such statements are significant: At this point, repeat viewing is possible only through nontraditional viewing sources, such as DVR or streaming video. Others use the boards to seek out missed episodes: MeagsW complains, “so I have missed the last 2 weeks, and I used to just catch up online, but the last two episodes haven’t been posted . . . any idea why?? Just curious . . . I love the show but I work [when it airs].” Liz4TreeHill2 exclaims, “I missed the last episode and am hating it!! GRRR!! [. .] It was supposed to be posted on The CW Site today to view and it’s still not there.” In response, tech-savvy girls serve as guides to frustrated ones, explaining how to access streams on the GG site or pointing them to other online areas, such as BitTorrent, sidereel.com, or even YouTube, where users can access the video for free. Multiple posts also recommend downloading episodes via iTunes, paying the $1.99 per episode charge. But not all girls are altering their viewing. Many posters lacked the patience to wait for The CW to post the episode, insisting that any “true fan” would watch it on Monday: In gossipgrl1110’s words, “if gossip girl is one of ur favorite shows then how can u miss it?” Some posters engage in a bit of fan activism, encouraging other bulletin board users to watch on Monday: “WATCH IT LIVE!!! It needs ratings!!!” (chuckblairfan). Interestingly, some girls watch both traditionally and alternatively. In response to the everpopular “You Know You’re Obsessed with Gossip Girl When . . .” thread, omgbrittsonxox offers, “you rush your mom home like crazy just so you don’t miss one minute of GG, even though you already pre-recorded it on your DVR.” Girls who lack broadband or streaming capability catch up through detailed episode recaps; some resort to watching an episode piecemeal via several YouTube clips. Viewed collectively, what I find most compelling about these posts is the girls’ technical flexibility and dexterity. Put differently, their persistence in consuming what they want, when they want it. While the subjects of Stacey’s study may have achieved a fuller sense of escapism, their options for such escape were somewhat limited: As accessible as the cinema was, it was still one fixed locale. There’s a reason why subscription cable has recently shifted to offering programming “on demand”: Today’s girls want to indulge their tele-visual obsessions, diving into the world of the Upper East Side, when and where they desire. That may be in front of the TV on a Monday night or on their desktop computers, but the key is the extent of their control over the experience. Whether it’s pausing the video stream to go to dinner or DVRing an episode for repeated viewing, escape is a click away. The discourse of

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escapism and spectatorship, made manifest on the boards, is one of control and immediate indulgence of desire, most often facilitated by digital technology. CONCLUSION Where does this leave us? In the age of New Media, it seems girls are reproducing traditional discourses of girlhood—they’re doing it digitally and in accordance with their own desires and demands. The rhetoric surrounding the renewal of the series, its “relative” success, and the need for the networks and Nielsen to change their way of judging a hit show all speaks to a sense of power. Instead of girls altering their habits to save a favorite show, the networks alter their means of measurement to better cater to their coveted demographic. A sense of power characterizes this generation of girls: their power to consume, to sway networks, to change the definition about what a “hit” means. Yet, it’s a peculiarly consumerist brand of power, tied to the notion of girls as a mass of status-obsessed shoppers. Discussing this project with my 50-something mother, I was reminded of recollections of “traditional” girl fandom. In her words, It is amazing to me that a process that used to happen by girls hanging around in someone’s bedroom reading a fan magazine or talking about a movie has moved to television and blogs. The former is a small group and based on a great deal of imagination—there were few details about pop star romances and all of the images were static. It was not anonymous; the comments a girl made were made as she hung out with friends and so it was risky. If it was a movie couple, rather than outside of the movies, there was no way to replay a scene other than to talk about it. And, expendable income was much less—teenagers largely did not have the money to recreate outfits like they do now. However, they could and did copy hairstyles and perhaps had a signature outfit that they paraded about.

In my mother’s recollection of the late 1960s and early 1970s, to be a devoted girl fan was to make a decision: to risk something, whether it be a week’s allowance or one’s standing in a social group. Fandom was also far more embodied—a girl demonstrated her fandom by “parading about” a hairstyle, recreating a scene, discussing the show out loud, or, as myriad accounts of Beatlemania attest, screaming and fainting.58 In contrast, today’s girl fandom manifests cerebrally and virtually. A keystroke brings community, episode recall, star gossip, and immediate consumption. The interface of the computer screen does not judge; the fellow fans one meets online know little to nothing of your life; no one, save perhaps your parents, has to know how many times you review a YouTube clip of a specific scene. One might speculate that obsession is easier, that passions are given

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room to proliferate, that the freedom to be a girl, whatever that might mean, has expanded exponentially with the rise of New Media. If I were writing this chapter in the early 1990s, I would agree with such statements. The utopian hopes for the early Internet extended to girls’ development, subjectivity, and identity formation, as is so clearly evidenced by Susan Murray’s 1995 findings on girls and fan bulletin boards. Since then, however, the ground-up construction of the World Wide Web has been coopted and homogenized from the top down. Massive corporations (including CBS and Time Warner, co-owners of The CW) now own and control the dominant forms of social networking, blogging platforms, and fan forums. In this way, any hopes for a substantial shift in the dominant discourses of girlhood are dying with the gradual but near-universal allocation of the Internet by a handful of immense media conglomerates. The future of TV, it seems, is the same as that of other media: consolidation, integration, and “cross-pollination” between business and art. Gossip Girl, like so much of today’s television, may be about innovation but certainly not of the artistic variety. Instead, through novel means of product placement, brand ubiquity, and creative online content, its producers adapt to and anticipate the changing topography of advertising. It’s not so much the show that’s young, hip, and sophisticated; rather, it’s the means of selling a product that is, and that’s what continues to draw sponsors. In this way, programming becomes a means to a necessary end, a filler around which a network may structure its ads. In 1975, Marshall McLuhan famously posited that “the medium is the message.” If such technological determinist philosophy holds, then a change in the medium of fandom and spectatorship should presumably change the “message” that girls receive and reproduce through their own New Media usage. I’m certainly not the first to call McLuhan’s catchphrase into question, but my findings on the CW Gossip Girl Bulletin board indicate, in no uncertain terms, that the medium has begun to change . . . yet, the message has not. Romantic individualism and consumption still characterize the way that society conceives of girls and the way that girls, in turn, conceive of themselves. As was the case in Classic Hollywood, fan communities continue to be constricted by corporate regulation and hegemonic notions of “proper” fan engagement. I want to believe that a girl watching a Gossip Girl episode on her iPod, and a network responding to that change, is somehow a gesture filled with feminist potential—a liberating gesture toward control of one’s media consumption. Then suddenly I recall that this same girl is negotiating the history of a male character’s sexual assault to make way for her appreciation of the diamond necklace he gave a new crush, and my thoughts turn markedly pessimistic. I do not intend to permanently debunk the potential of New Media to radically alter the discourses of girlhood. Girls like Youtube’s

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Lonelygirl15 have already fooled consumers and corporations alike with their performative media manipulation, and the fingerprints of girl activism, from Riot Grrl to angry, underrepresented girls on MySpace, still smudge the computer screen. Nevertheless, despite a flurry of contemporary rhetoric to the contrary, a change in medium does not, in the end, necessitate a substantive change in message. NOTES 1. The premiere drew 3.5 million viewers (according to traditional Nielsen ratings), a number that fell in subsequent weeks. See: John Consoli, “CW’s Key Demos Dating Other Nets,” MediaWeek 17.38 (2007): 4 –5; Gary Levin, “Viewers’ shifting habits redefine TV hit,” USA Today, October 24, 2007, http://www.usatoday.com/ life/television/news/2007–10–23-tv-hits_N.htm; Lacey Rose, “Q&A with CW Entertainment Chief Dawn Ostroff,” Forbes, November 1, 2007, http://www.forbes.com/ media/2007/11/01/television-cw-ostroff-biz-media-cx_lr_1101ostroff.html. 2. The codes of romantic individualism and fashion/beauty come from Angela McRobbie’s seminal work on the teen magazine Jackie; community is borrowed from Susan Murray’s study of girls and Internet bulletin boards; identification and escapism are taken from Stargazing, Jackie Stacey’s groundbreaking work in the field of female spectatorship. Using ads in various British magazines, Stacey solicited responses concerning viewing attitudes and practices. While the women of her study are middle-aged, their replies speak of their viewing practices during the 1940s and 1950s—when the women were girls and young adults. While I realize that a woman reflecting on her girlhood experiences is not the same as a girl’s immediate responses, I nevertheless find Stacey’s study a valuable tool in parsing out aspects of girl and young adult spectatorship. 3. Indeed, as Shayla Thiel Stern found in her investigation of instant messaging culture, girls in digital spaces may be reproducing the same hegemonic and patriarchal discourses of the “analog” world. See Shayla Thiel Stern, Instant Identity: Adolescent Girls and the World of Instant Messaging (New York: Peter Lang, 2007). 4. See Susan Murray, “Saving Our So-Called Lives: Girl Fandom, Adolescent Subjectivity and My So-Called Life,” in Kids’ Media Culture, ed. Marsha Kinder (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2001), 221. For more on historical girl spectatorship, see Moya Luckett, “Girl Watchers: Patty Duke and Teen TV,” in The Revolution Wasn’t Television: Sixties Television and Social Conflict, ed. Lynn Spiegel and Michael Curtin (New York: Routledge, 1997), 95–118. Girls’ studies is loosely defined as scholarship dealing with females from the age of 6 anywhere to the age of 20. The notion and boundaries of “girlhood” are dynamic and up for debate—for instance, the “girlpower” of the early ’90s applied equally to teens and twenty-somethings. 5. Melanie Lowe, “Colliding Feminisms: Britney Spears, ‘Tweens,’ and the Politics of Reception,” Popular Music and Society 26.2 (2003): 123. 6. Wolfgang Iser, “The Reading Process: A Phenomenological Approach,” in Reading Response Criticism: From Formalism to Post-Structuralism, ed. J. P. Tomkins (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1980), 106.

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7. Mary Celeste Kearney, “Coalescing: The Development of Girls’ Studies,” Currently in review for publication in NWSA Journal, 1. 8. See also Sherry Turkle, The Second Self: Computers and the Human Spirit (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1984). 9. Murray, 225. 10. Murray, 233. 11. Sharon R. Mazzarella, “Claiming a Space: The Cultural Economy of Teen Girl Fandom on the Web,” in GirlWideWeb, ed. Sharon R. Mazzarella (New York: Peter Lang, 2005), 143. 12. Christine Scodari, “You’re Sixteen, You’re Dutiful, You’re Online: ‘Fangirls’ and the Negotiation of Age and/or Gender Subjectivities in TV Newsgroups,” in GirlWideWeb, ed. Sharon R. Mazzarella (New York: Peter Lang, 2005), 119. 13. Mazzarella, 147. 14. Scodari, 107. 15. See Henry Jenkins, ed., Fans, Bloggers, and Gamers: Exploring Participatory Culture (New York: New York University Press, 2006); and Sonia Livingstone, “The Challenge of Engaging Youth Online,” European Journal of Communication Culture 22.2 (2007): 165–84. 16. Paul Agre, “Net Presence,” Computer-mediated communication magazine 1.4 (1994): 6. 17. Available at http://www.cwtv.com/shows/gossip-girl. 18. I included some comments from posts in which the profile did not include an age, but the post clearly indicated that the author was in high school or junior high. 19. Realizing the performative nature of the Internet, I acknowledge that boys or even adults could easily posture as girls on the bulletin board. With that said, one might consider such performance of girlhood of similar value to the online performance of actual girls. 20. Angela McRobbie, Feminism and Youth Culture: from Jackie to Just Seventeen (Houndmills: Macmillan, 1991): 83. 21. Ibid. 22. Ibid., 85. 23. See Mazzarella. 24. McRobbie, 85. 25. Ibid., 101, 26. Ibid., 103. 27. Jackie Stacey, Star Gazing: Hollywood Cinema and Female Spectatorship (New York: Routledge, 1994): 170. 28. See Mary Celeste Kearney, Girls Make Media (New York: Routledge, 2006). 29. See Jeanne Allen, “The film viewer as consumer,” Quarterly Review of Film Studies 5.4 (1980): 481–99. 30. Charles Eckert, “The Carole Lombard in Macy’s Window,” Quarterly Review of Film Studies 3.1 (1978): 1–21; Jane Gaines and Charlotte Herzog, eds., Fabrications: Costume and the Female Body (New York: Routledge, 1990); Maria La Place, “Producing and Consuming the Woman’s Film: Discursive Struggle in Now, Voyager,” in Home is Where the Heart Is, ed. Christine Gledhill (London: British Film Institute, 1987). 31. Farah Malik, “Mediated Consumption and Fashionable Selves: Tween Girls, Fashion Magazines, and Shopping,” in Seven Going on Seventeen: Tween Studies in the

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Culture of Girlhood, ed. Claudia Mitchell and Jacqueline Reid-Walsh (New York: Peter Lang, 2005), 258. See also Rachel Campbell, “Teenage Girls and Cellular Phones: Discourses of Independence, Safety, and ‘Rebellion,’ ” Journal of Youth Studies 9.9 (2006): 206. 32. Thiel Stern, 97. 33. Verizon phones now offer “Gossip Girl” content; Verizon hosts their own Gossip Girl Web site where users can download songs from the show onto their Verizon phones. See Brian Steinberg, “Verizon gets in on ‘Gossip Girl,” Advertising Age, October 22, 2007, 8. 34. “A Very ‘Gossip Girl’ Christmas,” New York Magazine Online, December 20, 2007, http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2007/12/a_very_gossip_girl_christmas.html. 35. Chad Gervich, “Marketing on Web Tangled,” Daily Variety, September 12, 2007, 1a. 36. Georganne Scheiner, “The Deanna Durbin Devotees,” in Generations of Youth: Youth Cultures and History in Twentieth-Century America, ed. Joe Austin and Michael Nevin Willard (New York: New York University Press, 1998), 81. 37. Siddhartha Menon, “A Participation Analysis of the Once and Again Internet Message Boards,” Television and New Media 8.4 (2007): 342. 38. Murray, 233. 39. Scheiner, 82. 40. According to Nielson/Netratings, after NBC and ABC began streaming programming in the Spring and Fall of 2006, their Web sites began drawing significantly larger traffic than those of CBS and Fox, who had yet to offer content online. From October through December 2006, ABC.com and NBC.com averaged 9.5 million unique visitors a month; yet, CBS averaged 5.2 million unique visitors and Fox only 2.8 million. See David Goetzl, “Networks Battling for Web Traffic on TV Sites, ABC Leads the Pack,” Media Daily News, January 18, 2007, http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=54089. For more information on the push to attract fans to network sites, see Cynthia Littleton, “Nets go on blitz for fan hits,” Daily Variety, June 11, 2007, 12. 41. See The CW Lounge Community Guidelines, available at http://lounge.cwtv. com/faq.php?faq=new_faq_item#faq_communityguideline_faq_item. Interestingly, The CW prohibits racist language but has no such policy concerning homophobic language, which presents itself several times in reference to Dan, who, in the Gossip Girl Books, inspires rumors of potential homosexuality. 42. McRobbie emphasizes, however, that “the complementary ways in which young girls interact among themselves and with each other to form a distinctive culture of their own” are “recognized by and catered to” by commercial media. McRobbie, 22. 43. To date, 384 users have posted questions, and over 40,000 have viewed the threads. 44. Stacey, 170. 45. Ibid., 90. 46. David Denby, “Big Pictures: Hollywood Looks For a Future,” The New Yorker, January 8, 2007, http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2007/01/08/070108 crat_atlarge_denby. 47. See http://pewresearch.org/pubs/621/parents-teens-and-technology. 48. Stacey, 95.

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49. Mazzarella, 56. 50. See Lynn Spigel, Make Room for TV: Television and The Family Ideal in Postwar America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992). 51. Lynn Schofield Clark, “The Constant Contact Generation: Exploring Teen Friendships Online,” in GirlWideWeb, ed. Sharon R. Mazzarella (New York: Peter Lang, 2005), 218. 52. See Ostroff, online. 53. Steve McClellan, “CW’s Unconventional Approach to Advertising,” Adweek.com, October 22, 2007, http://www.adweek.com/aw/magazine/article_display.jsp?vnu_ content_id=1003661100. 54. Levin, online. 55. Levin, online. 56. Jessica Shaw, “Gossip Girl: Psssst . . . Did You Hear?” Entertainment Weekly, November 16, 2007, http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,20160343_3,00.html. 57. Ostroff, online; Levin, online. 58. See Barbara Ehrenreich, Elizabeth Hess, and Gloria Jacobs, Re-making Love: The Feminization of Sex (Garden City, NY: Anchor Press, 1986).

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chapter 4

Why I Love The Office . . . and Hate NBC Sue J. Kim

I am so disappointed in NBC. They should realize that iTunes viewership saved The Office from extinction and have a bit more loyalty! —Angry iTunes User The U.S. version of The Office started out dealing with superficial forms of liberal multiculturalism and a somewhat source-less or obscure sense of worker ennui, primarily because it mimicked the British original. But in later seasons, the show has developed into a more complex critique of late capitalism and moved beyond surface terms of multiculturalism. It has become an astute critic of the economic logic that drives corporations and is, unfortunately, the dominant force in our world. The show was prescient in that the kinds of things The Office skewers are what informed NBC and other studios’ refusal to share with writers profits from new forms of media, particularly digital downloads. The studios’ stance resulted in the Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike that began in November 2007 and ended just weeks before the 2008 Oscar ceremony. In other words, in both its content (the episodes) and its form (its production and distribution), the show explores the small and large negotiations we make as mere human beings trying to survive in the age of late capitalism. The term late capitalism, also referred to as post-Fordism, denotes the changes in the global economy since the middle to late twentieth century.1 Fordism, an older mode of production named for the assembly-line innovations of Henry Ford, refers to the general conditions of industrial production, including production-focused, blue-collar jobs with security, unions,

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pensions, and benefits. But, as we all know, this model no longer describes the economies of most industrialized nations; for example, the U.S. economy focuses less on production, which is shipped overseas to cheaper labor markets, and more on service and white-collar work. In late capitalism, information is important in two ways: You have to have it, and it’s what you’ll be working with (instead of, say, raw materials). Therefore, today the primary form of capital—or value—is information and knowledge. Whereas once you just needed a lot of money or raw materials or a factory, today such straightforward profit strategies no longer apply. In order to compete in today’s economy, companies must have information, particularly highly technical or specialized kinds, and they must be fast, flexible, and mobile. For workers, labor itself has become impermanent and variable, and the principle of collective bargaining becomes difficult when workers and their jobs are parttime, mobile, and difficult to define. Older modes of production have not disappeared; rather, newer forms of production (e.g., software and Web site design; high finance) coexist with older modes of production (factories, large-scale farming). Dunder Mifflin, the mid-range paper supply company on The Office, has served as a kind of petri dish for observing these economic reactions and the ways that people respond to them. In addition, the relationship of late capitalism to issues of race is complex and inconsistent.2 While state and corporate institutions happily tout the rhetoric of multiculturalism, the flexibility of late capitalism enables racialized economic inequalities to be hidden in other countries or other neighborhoods. Like this discourse of multiculturalism, new languages of management emphasize what Tara Brabazon calls “corporate objectives, professional development, multi-skilling, generic competencies and strategic plans,” which actually suppress “the volatility and antagonism of employment relations” and perpetuate an “artificial consensus.”3 Rather than sweep things under the rug, The Office helps bring to light many of these suppressed antagonisms, both in its content and in its production and distribution. Let me be clear, however, that I am not claiming that The Office is some kind of progressive manifesto or Leftist roadmap; rather, the show makes its point not in broad strokes but in subtle touches that accumulate over time, in the process providing an astute analysis of the conditions of modern work. As Brabazon points out in her analysis of the original British Office, “sources of alternative information about work—outside of neo-liberal agendas—are difficult to find,” so “popular culture is as effective a fount for knowledge as any other.”4 Her argument that the British Office provides a more accurate account of modern workplace ennui resonates with the ways that other comedic and satiric programs, most pointedly The Daily Show and The Colbert Report provide more insight into political issues than actual news programs. By the same token, the fact that The Office offers useful insights does not necessarily mean that it is not complicit with some of the things it critiques;

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it is, after all, on a major network. But as Laura Kipnis notes in her analysis of Hustler, “counter-hegemonic,” or critical of the dominant order of things, does not necessarily equal “progressive” in usual political terms.5 In other words, elements of progressive insight and resistance can be found within power structures; indeed, it would be difficult to find any person or thing in the U.S. entertainment industry that is not part of a dominant structure. Unquestionably, The Office is a showcase product for media behemoth NBC Universal. The Office is one of the anchor shows on NBC’s heavily marketed “Must See TV” Thursday-night line-up, filling the void left by Seinfeld and Friends. And while The Office is innovative in many ways, its very departure from situation comedy conventions participates in a new trend. Like the British original, The Office is in faux documentary style; as various cast members and directors note, the camera is essentially another character.6 Furthermore, unlike sitcoms of the past, the show lacks a laugh track, mood music, and pointed didactic purpose. In this The Office is part of a new wave in sitcoms trail-blazed by Seinfeld; such shows—including other NBC hit shows such as Scrubs, My Name Is Earl, and 30 Rock—are self-conscious and ironic and feature dysfunctional, young, and single characters. The show has also helped pioneer the new trend of multimedia marketing, of which Lost is the vanguard. In addition, the show is an adaptation of a British program, like the hugely successful American Idol and the disastrous Coupling. The Americanization of the British original, however, has been successful—commercially, aesthetically, and, I argue, politically—in unique and unexpected ways. The original British Office, created by the great Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant and first airing on BBC Two in 2001, began inauspiciously but has become widely acclaimed.7 Painfully accurate and aesthetically innovative, the show explores threatened middle-manager masculinity, casual racism, superficial “sensitivity,” and, most of all, the grey purgatory of office work. But, as Brabazon argues, the British series, while certainly a brilliant slice of life, does not reference any larger structures or processes; she writes, “The Office cuts away public domain politics.”8 We see the challenges of pettiness, insecurity, and alienated work but little sense of where these come from. The company Werner Hogg foists regional manager David Brent, played by Ricky Gervais, on its employees, but it has not really created him. In fact, the corporate figures who do know how to play the game—David’s immediate superior Jennifer Taylor-Clark (played by Stirling Gallacher) and Neil Godwin (played by Patrick Baladi), another manager who becomes David’s supervisor— dislike David as much as his employees do and ultimately fire him. While I do not think an aesthetic product must necessarily provide the answers to the problems it may raise, Brabazon’s observation about how the British Office is not tied to the larger world brings to mind the Marxist literary critic George Lukács’s cranky view of modernism.9 Lukács disliked modernist works because, in his view, they elevate alienation and despair to

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a universal condition thereby making them seem inevitable and inescapable. Instead, he argued, modern alienation and despair come from something. While his analyses were not always accurate in regard to specific modernists such as Kafka and Joyce, Lukács nevertheless makes an important point. If we fail to understand the reasons for why things are the way they are, we risk naturalizing and perhaps even glorifying these conditions. In its exploration of deeper causes and reasons, the U.S. Office, for a variety of reasons, has been more successful than the original in providing insight into how the logic of capitalism shapes our lives. At first, the U.S. show closely followed the original series. The pilot episode was an almost scene-by-scene remake, and ensuing episodes from the first season also reflect the original series. Jim, Pam, and other secondary office workers—who have not yet developed into real characters—experience a generalized sense of ennui and alienation. The office workers hate their boss and their jobs, but they do not know why and neither do we. Dunder Mifflin is an amorphous corporate entity, personified by the ice-queen Jan LevinsonGould (Melora Hardin), whose hyperprofessional manner, hyphenated name, and exquisitely portrayed exasperation with Michael Scott (Steve Carell) are taken wholesale from the British show. We see examples of Michael’s bumbling racism; for example, he picks Stanley Hudson (played by Leslie David Baker) to play on the basketball team because he is black, while saving Oscar (played by Oscar Nuñez) for baseball season because he is Latino. But even from the beginning, the U.S. show was different for a number of reasons. First, as Greg Daniels notes, in meetings before production of the U.S. show started, Gervais and Merchant expressed regret that people had read David Brent as more of a malicious jerk than simply a buffoon.10 People hated David Brent—with good reason—but Gervais and Merchant had intended him less as an object of ire than of pity. So Michael Scott, although still fairly unbearable in the first season, becomes humanized. As TV critic Maureen Ryan puts it, “Michael is funnier when he seems like a real person, not an overwrought sitcom buffoon.”11 Furthermore, as we will see in later seasons, whereas David Brent is completely incompetent, Michael Scott proves to be a good salesman.12 Second, the U.S. show is meant for a very different audience. During the first season, I wondered if this was why Pam and Jim were more conventionally good-looking than the British show’s Dawn and Tim. Part of the appeal of the British show was its relentless drabness, but the U.S. show seemed to have two fairly conventional romantic lead actors, regardless of mussed hair or nondescript clothing. But again, the show’s development—including critiques of Pam (in season three) and Jim (in season four)—has complicated this situation. Likewise, the show could have made Michael too likeable, thereby excusing his flaws, but ultimately Michael succeeds in his humanity because we see the larger structures in and from which he gets his strange ideas.13

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The third reason for the differences is that the U.S. show has had a longer life (the British series ran for two seasons and had a two-part finale), allowing more time to develop plotlines and principal and secondary characters. It is in these later seasons that the show develops its deeper insights. While Brabazon points out that post-Fordist shifts in capitalism, such as globalization, the “paperless” office, flexibility, and even technology (computers, Internet) barely register in the original series,14 these elements of late capitalism have become increasingly important in the third and fourth seasons of the U.S. show. The show explores the dominance of large corporations and the implications of information as the primary mode of capital. Moreover, the show has moved beyond the basic terms of liberal multiculturalism, and it even subtly critiques patriarchal elements of corporate culture. “BUSINESS IS ALWAYS PERSONAL” The show’s critique of large corporations driving out smaller businesses is most obvious in its constant references to Staples and other such “box chains,” but it also makes other critiques of corporate logic. For example, in season three, although Dunder Mifflin has restructured their company to retain the Stamford manager Josh Porter (played by Charles Esten), he uses the position as leverage to gain “a senior management position at Staples.” Michael, for all his faults, is contrasted with the typical corporate executive; as Jim tells the camera, “Say what you will about Michael Scott, but he would never do that.”15 By the same token, when Dwight quits and must get a temporary job, the show takes us into the bowels of Staples to compare its working conditions with Dunder Mifflin’s. A large national chain store such as Staples gives the worker even less room for individuality, personal satisfaction, and connections with other human beings than is allowed at a mid-range market company such as Dunder Mifflin. In the episode, Dwight unnerves a customer by hovering too attentively near her. Employees of box stores should be nameless, faceless, and hidden until needed, whereas Dwight’s apparent faults—idiosyncrasy, total dedication, and a lack of alienation and irony—are his strengths in his position at the paper company.16 The show also pointedly demonstrates how, in late capitalism, information becomes the primary form of capital—more valuable than money, “human resources,” raw materials, or even a product (after all, Dunder Mifflin does not actually produce paper, it merely sells it). More than any other character on the show, Ryan (played by writer–producer B. J. Novak) demonstrates the value of knowledge and special expertise. In today’s economy, these are harder to obtain and worth more than money capital or other assets, such as experience. Thus Ryan, with his MBA and technological savvy (at least compared to Michael), rises meteorically from temporary worker to corporate executive.

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For example, in the season three episode “Business School,” Ryan, despite reservations, invites Michael to speak to his business class in order to gain a higher grade. Before Michael enters the room, Ryan explains to his class that Dunder Mifflin is doomed because it “can’t compete with the modern chains, and management is unwilling or unable to adapt.” Michael implodes in the class because he lacks the business and management training that these students are in the process of gaining and that Ryan will use to such effect in season four. When one student questions Michael about how a paper supply company can survive “in an increasingly paperless world,” Michael replies that while computers are fun for playing games, “real business is done on paper.” When he instructs the class to write that down, the camera pans to show all 50 or so students typing on their laptops. When another student asks if the company’s “Herfindahl Index,” a specialized economic indicator that Michael does not know, has declined since the branches merged, Michael responds with a petulant insult. When the students continue to challenge Michael about Dunder Mifflin’s impending obsolescence, using the language and logic of market forces—“But how can you compete with the resources of a nationwide chain?”—to drive him into a corner, Michael finally bursts out, “[Ryan] doesn’t know anything and neither do you. So, suck on that!” This scene works on several levels. Michael’s childishness, which is both his weakness and his strength, is on display here. The scene also mines some comedic gold in the disjunction between the students’ expectations and Michael’s “lecture.” But this scene also points to the way that late capitalism naturalizes itself as logic. More than ennui or alienation, Michaels’ angry outbursts pointedly demonstrate that modern workers and managers are stuck in situations about which an individual alone can do nothing; “market forces” are inexorable and inhuman. Highly sophisticated models, theories, and language naturalize the current economic system, and unless one is trained in economic-speak, there is no way to respond to or even describe it. In other words, to even describe and/or respond to information-age late capitalism requires specialized information. We may try to blame individual companies, such as Staples, but they too operate within the inexorable logic of a particular economic system. The episode further develops Ryan and Michael’s contrasting philosophies of business and life by twisting sitcom conventions. On the ride back to the office, Ryan tries to backtrack, telling Michael, “It wasn’t personal.” Michael replies, “Business is always personal. It’s the most personal thing in the world.” When they return to the office, they have a version of the sentimental “learning moment” in classic sitcoms, in which Ryan apologizes and admits he was wrong. But of course Ryan has not learned anything; he will say and do anything to get what he wants, and this is what makes him an excellent candidate for upper management. Rather, what we get is a “lesson” about opposing values in our world: profit versus people. Despite the

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ostensible multicultural and employee-centered rhetoric of corporations, it is the law of the market that drives companies, not any actual person or group of persons. For all of Michael’s faults, his genuine care for people and the personal contrasts starkly with the cold-blooded corporate logic embodied by Ryan. And that Michael is not always ineffective (he is a good salesman) speaks to the fact that, as Harvey points out, different models of capitalist accumulation coexist in our world.17 These seeds planted in season three bear fruit in the season four story arc that we might refer to as “the rise of Ryan.” Ryan, who arrived as a temporary worker in the pilot episode and failed completely as a salesperson in season three, has been promoted to a corporate executive, assuming Jan’s former position as Michael’s boss. The “wunderkind” Ryan undertakes the updating and streamlining of Dunder Mifflin. He foists on employees Blackberries and Power Point—neither of which Michael can use—and he helms the updating of the new Web site, “Dunder Mifflin Infinity.” In a series of talking heads, in which Ryan appears to be on amphetamines or at least highly caffeinated, he explains that the paper industry is getting faster and younger: Yeah, I created a website. Look, at the end of the day, apples to apples, flying at 30,000 feet, this is a paper company. And I don’t want us to get lost in the weeds or into a beauty contest . . . Convergence, viral marketing, we’re going guerrilla. We’re taking it to the streets, while keeping an eye on the street—Wall Street. I don’t want to reinvent the wheel here. In other words, it is what it is. Buying paper just became fun.18

Ryan epitomizes the ways in which, as David Harvey explains, in the postmodern age of late capitalism, everything is faster and more immediate.19 On the other hand, Michael continues not to understand information-age economics. In another season four episode, when an advertising creator tries to stop Michael’s nonsensical babbling by interjecting, “I can tell that your time is valuable,” Michael replies, “Actually, I don’t get paid by the hour anymore, thank you. I get paid by the year.”20 His statement indicates both his ignorance and his charm. He is oblivious to the idea that the ad men mean their time is valuable, and he is unaware that the shift from hourly wage to annual salary often means that one’s time is even more compressed, squeezing everincreasing productivity out of middle- and upper-management. Similarly, in another episode, we see Ryan tell Michael that he needs to learn to use something and will provide a tutor if necessary.21 It does not even matter what it is that Michael does not know how to use; Ryan’s command encapsulates their respective positions. Several other episodes in season four develop this conflict. In one episode, Michael decides to win back customers by personally presenting them gift

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baskets assembled by the office workers. He fails to win anyone back because, as one customer puts it, Dunder Mifflin simply cannot compete with the prices offered by the national (and international) retail chains. In reaction to rejection, Michael, in customary fashion, completely capitulates to the superiority of technology; he follows the directions of his rental car’s navigational system—ignoring what is visible through the front windshield—and drives directly into a lake.22 In another episode, Dwight competes against the Web site in sales, crying, “Woo hoo!! In your face, machines!” and wins by 52 reams.23 The same episode centers around the virtual launch party of the new Dunder Mifflin Web site; Michael, who has been excluded from Ryan’s exclusive party in New York, announces over the Web-cam to other Dunder Mifflin branches, “I just think you should know that one of my salesman beat your stupid computer,” followed by a bleeped out profanity referring to Ryan. When Michael goes to New York to crash Ryan’s party (and steal sushi plates), someone praises him for denouncing Ryan. The fourth season thus develops its anticorporate theme by making starker the contrast between the slick, heartless young Ryan and the bumbling but well-meaning Michael. But the show prevents Michael from being some kind of idealized anticorporate hero by continually foregrounding his buffoonery and his other weaknesses. THE EVOLUTION OF KELLY KAPOOR Just as the show has gone beyond office ennui to explore some of the pressures shaping the modern workplace, it has also gone beyond critiquing the basic terms of liberal multiculturalism and cultural “sensitivity,” including issues of gender and sexuality.24 Michael, like David Brent, incarnates the most superficial forms of corporate multiculturalism, and while the things he does and says may seem ridiculous, they all too accurately reflect the logic of corporate entities, educational institutions, and other large bureaucracies that want to be “cultural sensitive”—and avoid lawsuits—without actually changing anything. For example, in one episode, Michael refers to Stanley as “our key to the urban vibe”—to which Stanley responds, “I grew up in a small town. What about me seems urban to you?” In such ways, the show pokes fun at the multicultural euphemisms in common parlance within corporate, educational, and governmental institutions. But the development of three characters—two secondary and one principal— move beyond the relatively easy, although still worthy, critique of surface liberal multiculturalism. Although still secondary, Kelly Kapoor (played by Mindy Kaling, who is also a writer and producer) and Darryl Philbin (played by Craig Robinson) have developed into more significant characters. When they were simply foils for the bumbling Michael and points of reassuring identification for viewers, the show risked replicating the terms of multiculturalism it sought to satirize. But increasingly, the garrulous, air-headed

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Kelly and Darryl have agency and complexity. Furthermore, while Kelly and Darryl are obvious examples, an unexpected, delightful surprise has been the ways that Dwight helps explode the myth of the generic white person without a history. The show’s development in these aspects appears most pointedly in the evolution of Kelly Kapoor. In the first season, Kaling’s character is not yet the garrulous Kelly that fans of the show have come to know and love. She appears a few times essentially as background color, particularly in the “Diversity Day” episode, in which she slaps Michael for his inappropriate comments. She is dressed demurely and in dark colors; she is not really a character at all. But the real Kelly Kapoor blossoms in season two; she is a talkative, pop culture–obsessed sorority girl whose principal goal is to get married (specifically to Ryan), have babies, and drive an SUV. The sheer volume and speed of her discourse overwhelms her coworkers, and her romantic-pursuit-as-persecution of Ryan provides some of the show’s funniest, if fleeting, moments.25 This thread culminates at the beginning of season four, when Kelly tells Ryan that she is pregnant in order to regain his attentions—and then genuinely does not understand his anger when she admits that she was lying. The season three “Diwali” episode, penned by Kaling, shows that cultural differences can be explored without schmaltz and condescension. The episode begins as expected; when Michael makes fun of Ryan’s “dress,” Kelly points out that it’s a kurta. In fine form, Michael tells us that, “Tonight, one of our most ethnic co-workers, Kelly, has invited us all to a Diwali celebration put on by her community.” When Angela recommends people don’t go because “they eat monkey brains” (a nod to Indian Jones and the Temple of Doom), Michael objects: “That is offensive. Indians do not eat monkey brains.” Then, covering his bases, he adds, “And if they do, sign me up, because I am sure that they are very tasty and nutritional. It’s important that this company celebrates its diversity.” And because the people in the office “can be terribly, terribly ignorant about other cultures,” Michael convenes an “Indian cultural seminar.” Michael’s actions accurately reflect the logic of institutions that want to avoid litigation by being “cultural sensitive” but actually practice the most watered-down version of liberal multiculturalism, in which one’s “culture” determines one’s identity and the main cause of racism is “ignorance.” In contrast, what I like most about Kelly is what she does not know; instructed to tell the staff about the origins of Diwali, Kelly answers, “Oh, I don’t know. It’s really old, I think.”26 By the same token, while Darryl begins as simply one of the warehouse crew who helps highlight the difference of Pam’s fiancé, Roy (played by David Denman), from the office staff, in late season three but more so season four (when Robinson became a regular cast member), Darryl starts to become a real person. First, he takes joy at tweaking Michael’s naïve ideas about

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culture. In season three, Darryl encourages Michael to negotiate for a higher salary by teaching him specious “black man phrases” like “Pippety poppety, give me the zoppety.” Darryl says to the camera, barely containing his glee, “Yeah, I taught Mike some new phrases. I want him to get the raise. I just can’t help myself.” Similarly, in season four, Michael commissions Darryl, Kelly, Andy, Kevin, and Creed to come up with a jingle for Dunder Mifflin; he reacts to their upbeat a capella tune by saying he thought it would be more “rap.” Darryl responds, smothering a grin, “What’s rap?” Appalled, Michael responds, “Wow, Darryl, you need to learn a lot about your own culture.” Again, while Michael is ridiculous, his comments accurately reflect the assumption of liberal multiculturalism that there are discrete, racially signified cultures that all members of a group must know. And Darryl’s playful mocking of Michael indicates awareness of the bankruptcy of such forms of superficial “cultural awareness.”27 Furthermore, while we could hardly have expected such a development in season one, the more we learn about Dwight, the more he helps show that white people are not a group without race or culture or ethnicity—or rather, whose history and culture are assumed to be universal and not specific. Described by Rainn Wilson as a “fascist nerd,” Dwight is part product of his family’s German and Amish background and part product of sci-fi/fantasy. He lives on a beet farm with his cousin Mose (played by writer–producer Michael Schur), and he utterly lacks a sense of irony. Among the blandly neosuburban, middle-class office workers, Dwight is even more culturally misfit than any of the ethnic minorities in the office. The show even subtly critiques elements of patriarchy suffusing contemporary corporate culture, beyond Michael’s overt, bumbling sexism. Two story lines develop this critique: Jim’s effortless popularity and Jan’s fantastic decline. First, let us take a cold-eyed look at Jim. At first glance, Jim is the focal point of identification for the audience; he conspires with us by looking at the camera and laughing at other characters’ actions. But Jim shares with Michael a need to be liked—he simply does it better, wooing his audience (his coworkers and we the viewers) in more amenable terms. When the Stamford manager, Josh, has Jim supervise Karen Filippelli (played by Rashida Jones), Jim wins her over because he cannot stand being the bad guy.28 In a recent episode, Jim is excluded from “The Finer Things Club”—Pam, Oscar, and Toby’s highbrow book club—because, as Pam puts it, “some people think you monopolize the conversation by trying to be funny.”29 When Pam relents and lets Jim into the club, this critique proves accurate; Jim begins a discussion of Frank McCourt’s Angela’s Ashes by mimicking an exaggerated Irish accent and then, under questioning by Toby and Oscar, makes clear that he has not even read the book. Moreover, in the course of his heartbreak over Pam, he deeply hurts two women who genuinely love him—Katy (played by Amy Adams) and Karen— and he does not really care, shirking the consequences of his actions. In the

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second season, Jim takes out his heartache over Pam by unceremoniously dumping Katy.30 Karen, who calls out Michael’s casual sexism, forces Jim to talk about his feelings, and even mocks Jim’s constant reference to the camera, is also quickly dispatched. Later, Jim cannot face Karen, literally hiding by crouching down in a car. When they do meet, she recommends that he act “like an adult.”31 Jim’s cowardice calls to mind the numerous times Michael has tried to avoid facing the repercussions of his actions or even acknowledging responsibility. Along these lines, this season John Krasinksi is perfecting a hilariously scared, embarrassed facial expression that complicates his usual smug, conspiratorial relationship with the camera. Furthermore, we may ask: Why, after all, is slacker Jim so successful? Jim gets ahead casually, effortlessly, simply by being an athletic, heterosexual, “normal” guy; he seems less “peculiar” than Michael or Dwight because he embodies the naturalized norm of masculinity. At a cocktail party as his house, David Wallace, the chief financial officer (CFO) of Dunder Mifflin, invites Jim outside to shoot hoops. At the end of season three, when Jim interviews for the executive position (he eventually withdraws to stay in Scranton), it is implied that he will get the job.32 Jim does not have to even comb his hair to be promoted over everyone else in his office, while his soulmate Pam never moves beyond the reception desk, and Jan, in order to win Michael back, feels moved to get breast implants. In season four, the terms of Jim’s self-assured masculinity were pointedly examined. For example, in “Local Ad,” when Kevin and Andy fawn over Ryan’s newfound coolness (his job, his clothes, his apartment), Jim betrays subtle signs of insecurity. Despite Jim’s aura of imperturbability, he is irked by Kevin’s constant declarations that Ryan is “awesome” and can have “any girl he wants”—until, that is, Pam turns down Ryan’s offer of a date. The fact that Jim is reassured by the fact that Ryan cannot “have” Pam slyly points out the terms by which Jim’s masculinity is secured. The phenomenon of Jan, played by Melora Hardin, approaches the gender issues from different angles. The character Jan—initially Michael’s boss but now his laid-off, live-in girlfriend—has offered a vehicle for exploring the contradictions of the rise of corporate feminism, particularly through the events surrounding Jan’s firing from Dunder Mifflin. On one hand, if, as the CFO David Wallace claims, Jan has been a bad worker for two years, why has she seemed to embody the corporation for the last three seasons? On the DVD commentaries, Melora Hardin laughs at “the silly reasons [Wallace is] firing her,” suggesting that in her reading the company really is mistreating Jan. On the other hand, viewers also know that beyond her professional role, Jan is hardly a figure of stability and integrity. As Karen puts it, “she’s nuts.” But Jim does not agree with Karen’s assessment of Jan; as Rashida Jones notes, the moment is a good “Karen–Jim divide,” foretelling the different paths their characters will take. In the last new episode that aired before production shut down as a result of the writers’ strike, “The Deposition,”

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both Dunder Mifflin and Jan appear ruthless and vindictive. Jan sues the company for wrongful termination, and Michael must make a statement; he ultimately supports the company and sinks Jan’s lawsuit. While Jan and the company can be interpreted in different ways, the show raises all kinds of questions of what it means to be a human being who knows how to wield both the discourses of feminism and the corporation. Jan—like Dunder Mifflin itself—uses anticorporate rhetoric against the corporation when it suits her, and the issue of whether she is right or wrong does not lie in her identity but in the complexities of the situation.33 But even more than in its plotlines, the show moves beyond convention by letting its secondary characters blossom. As Hardin notes, she, Carrell, and Daniels had discussed the possibility of Jan and Michael pairing romantically even before the pilot episode, complicating things far beyond the British character. Likewise, in the DVD commentaries, Hardin talks about how much fun it is to play a flawed, complex character: I love that you’re just seeing little breaks of Jan, just little cracks in the armor, little by little. And it’s just starting to all snowball up. It’s one of my favorite things about her as a character, playing her. She’s just so wonderfully dimensional that way . . . The writers write me the greatest stuff. I mean, I am so thankful that I get to show her flaws. It’s no fun to just play a perfect person all the time.34

In other words, what is great about Jan is what is great about Kelly; they have moved beyond merely being foils for Michael and become flawed, multidimensional, and specific characters, whirling dervishes of comedy all on their own. The show’s strength in later seasons, involving such developments of secondary characters and complications of principal characters, stems in part from the conditions in which it is created. Many key people involved with the show wear multiple hats, including acting, writing, producing, and directing. The star of the show, Steve Carrell, also has credits as producer and has written two episodes. B. J. Novak and Mindy Kaling, who play the once-warring couple Ryan and Kelly, are on the writing team and receive producing credits. Michael Schur, another key writer, plays Dwight’s cousin Mose and is listed as co-executive producer. Greg Daniels, executive producer of the show, is also a writer and had directed several episodes; Daniels began as a writer on Saturday Night Live and The Simpsons and then cocreated King of the Hill. Furthermore, as made abundantly clear on the commentaries, many lines and even scenes are improvised, testifying to the various improv backgrounds of many actors on the show. As Novak has said, “It is a perfect creative environment.”35 This innovative approach to the show has produced the kind of complex material that appeals to the audiences who access the show via the

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Internet. Appropriately enough, then, this confluence has also meant that the creators of the show as well as viewers have had to consider issues raised within the show in contexts beyond the screen.

THE OFFICE IS CLOSED Hollywood and the blogosphere are up in arms about the status of new media, particularly digital video. In August 2007, NBC decided to end their relationship with iTunes due to disagreements over pricing. On November 5, 2007, the Writers Guild of America went on strike, demanding a slightly larger share of DVD sales and compensation for online material. At the heart of both the NBC/Apple dispute and the writers’ strike is the issue of what constitutes “content,” or product, and what constitutes “promotional” material. Such categorizations are important because, while revenue from the nascent digital video market is still financially a minor consideration for the studios, the standard definitions that are established now will dictate who will reap potential future profits. Through season three of The Office viewers could download individual episodes from iTunes for $1.99. Younger viewers in particular tend to view the show on the Internet, and early popularity of show was fueled by digital video downloads.36 But when NBC and Apple’s negotiations fell apart in August 2007, NBC decided not to offer new fall season episodes of shows such as The Office, and in December 2007, when the companies’ contract completely expired, all NBC videos were removed from iTunes. The dispute arose because NBC Universal, once the top seller of digital video on iTunes (over 40% of downloads), wanted greater latitude in pricing and the ability to offer more expensive bundled deals.37 “Bundling” means, as Scott Gilbertson puts it, “buy a movie you want [at slightly higher cost] and get a free TV show you don’t care about”; he adds, “For some reason, NBC believes bundles are what consumers really want.”38 In a press release, Apple stated that negotiations had ended because “Apple declined to pay more than double the wholesale price for each NBC TV episode, which would have resulted in the retail price to consumers increasing to $4.99 per episode from the current $1.99.”39 NBC executive vice president of communications, Cory Shields, denied that the studio had requested a price increase; rather, Shields claimed, NBC merely wanted “flexibility in wholesale pricing.”40 This development has raised the ire of many viewers, as angry, disappointed posts on iTunes attest (these were posted as comments on season three of The Office before all NBC content was removed): This show is great. But, I am exceeding dissipointed [sic] in both Apple and NBC in their behavior towards making season 4 available to download

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on MAC systems. itunes, I speak for a lot of your customers when I say refusing to fulfill your contractual obligations is penalizing us. I love the Office—I would rather pay iTunes to download and watch on my iPod than sit through the ridiculously slow stream on NBC’s website for F8#! sake! I have downloaded every single Office episode from The Pilot to The Job. In total that’s about 102 dollars I’ve given to iTunes in order to watch my shows. But now it’s like I’ve bought a TV contract and all I have to air is re-runs. Why can’t there be any frresh [sic] shows? I understand the contract issues but right now NBC is being too greedy. They wanted $4.99 [per] episode. No way! NBC and Apple . . . You guys are pushing a large number of legal downloaders to steal the new episodes on torrent sites. I have every episode up to this season. I liked the consistency of quality I got with the digital episodes. I did NOT buy a season pass so you made a big profit off of me. Where do I get the new season? I don’t know . . . not on iTunes.41

Such comments, beyond expressing irritation and inconvenience, raise several points. First, NBC’s decision impacts primarily the younger demographic that uses Apple computers and watches The Office because episodes can be downloaded at NBC.com but only to PC computers. (This group, coincidentally, would also include the bulk of flexible, mobile information-age workers who are professionally more like Ryan but who identify with Jim and Pam.) Of course, anyone can watch full episodes online at NBC’s Web site, but as the comments note, the digital streaming is slow and of relatively poor quality, and brief video advertisements from sponsors such as State Farm, Target, and Blackberry are interspersed through the episode (you must watch them in order to see the show content). Furthermore, the removal of NBC material from iTunes may push users to illegally download material from “torrent sites,” such as Kazaa or Pirate Bay. Moreover, while the appeal of iTunes has been its convenience, its virtual monopoly over the digital sales (currently, iTunes is responsible for 76% of digital music sales) conflicts with the logic of free-market competition.42 In order to prevent Apple from dominating the digital video market as it has the digital music market, NBC, in conjunction with Fox, plans to launch Hulu.com, an online video provider similar to YouTube.43 All this seems to make clear that digital video is a product and that NBC wants to make more money from it. This view correlates to NBC’s charge that Apple deliberately underprices digital material in order to use it as promotion for its hardware. NBC executive Shields argues that “Apple’s retail pricing strategy for its iTunes service is designed to drive sales of Apple devices, at the expense of those who create the content that makes these devices worth buying.”44 Other entertainment companies have echoed the belief that “Apple underprices video and audio content as a way to propel sales

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of a much more significant profit center: iPods and related merchandise.”45 But the studios’ complaint that Apple sees digital downloads as primarily promotional contrasts starkly with their stance vis-à-vis the Writers Guild of America. The writers’ demands center on “new media,” particularly DVD sales and Internet revenues. Writers want a marginally bigger portion of DVD sales (eight cents per DVD instead of the current four cents), and they want to get paid for material available on the Internet. But because the studios consider online content “promotional,” they do not compensate writers for this material.46 That is, writers of shows such as The Office do not receive any revenues from digital video sales and advertisement revenue (such as ads you must watch in order to view shows on NBC.com). Furthermore, shows such as The Office have content exclusively available online for which the writers are not paid. For example, during season two, a series of 13 miniature Web episodes, or “Webisodes,” titled The Office: The Accountants, were made available exclusively through NBC.com. The storyline featured Kevin, Oscar, and Angela (played by, respectively, Brian Baumgartner, Oscar Nuñez, and Angela Kinsey) searching for $3,000 missing from the budget. The writers wrote scripts expressly for these Web episodes—which won a Daytime Emmy in 2007— but received no compensation for them because the studio refers to all online content as “promotional.” In the YouTube video “The Office Is Closed,” in which Daniels and other writers explain the reasons for the WGA Strike, writer-producer-actor Schur points out the irony of taking their demands to the public via a medium—the Internet—for which they get paid nothing because the studio insists on categorizing digital video and Internet material as “promotional.” In the video, Schur, Kaling, Novak, and Lieberstein have a good time riffing on this notion, referring to shows available online, such as Lost, as excellent “promos.”47 The Office was one of the first shows to shut down production because Steve Carrell and Rainn Wilson refused to cross picket lines.48 The executive producer of the show, Greg Daniels, who helmed the translation of the show into the U.S. version, also did not cross picket lines and expected to have his contract suspended without pay. As Daniels told Scribe Vibe, Variety’s blog, on the strike, “We’ve seen the future . . . ‘The Office’ has received 7 million downloads. It generates the most traffic at NBC.com. We received a Daytime Emmy for webisodes that no one was paid for. The future is very bright for these companies. The CPMs [cost per thousand impressions] on Internet ads is double what they are for TV.”49 Of course, some dispute has arisen about the class status of the writers and the validity of their demands. While many production crew workers have expressed solidarity despite being laid off, one sign testifies to another sentiment: “WGA AMPTP PLEASE NEGOTIATE” “SIGNED 100,000 OUT OF WORK CREW MEMBERS.”50 Studios have fired crew members

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as productions have shut down, although some production companies have stated they will not lay off nonwriting staff.51 The studios that do fire nonwriting staff thus exploit class divisions between upper- and middle-class writers and working-class crew members, just as they try to divide the more middle-class writers and wealthy producers, and just as multinational corporations exploit divisions between workers in industrialized and developing nations to corrode union power.52 As the local Teamsters union, which supports the WGA strike, points out, the principle of collective bargaining is important for all workers and must be defended against the divide-and-conquer tactics of the studios.53 It is important to remember that the real culprit here is NBC Universal, one of the largest entertainment conglomerates in the world. Although General Electric, which owns NBC, posted record profits in 2006, NBC itself was seen as struggling earlier in 2007, so its drive to maximize profits even further remains as strong as ever.54 Like privileged minorities who are surprised by racism, many of the Hollywood writers, particularly those who are also producers, may have been taken by surprise when the studios put profit over people. Like any modern corporation, Hollywood not only participates in the rhetoric of liberal multiculturalism, postfeminism, and new management styles, it also tries to repress the antagonistic relations between groups with fundamentally different goals. For example, some key corporate executives championed The Office, and its actors, writers, directors, and producers have acknowledged as much.55 Much like the original British show, the U.S. Office’s renewal for a second season was seen by some as an act of generosity and faith. Whereas the first season had a relatively small audience (average 5.4 million viewers), after the show won an Emmy in season two for best comedy and Carrell became a star with 40-Year-Old Virgin, by season three the show was ranked 13th in the key demographic of 18 to 34 year olds. 56 Ben Silverman, now cochair of NBC Entertainment, “brought The Office Stateside via his production company, Reveille.”57 But despite apparent and actual support of the show and the artists’ work, at the end of the day, the primary goal of a corporation is profit. That is not to say that all corporations or executives are evil; as the business school students point out to Michael, companies are not run by ethics or values but by market forces. Therefore, in the long run studios will do whatever they feel necessary in order to protect future market shares in digital video and prevent iTunes’ monopoly—in the business school student’s terms, studios run according to “the big picture.” The disjunction in purpose becomes most stark when entities critiqued by the show become studio sponsors, most notably Staples and Blackberry. Even for something that seems as trivial as television and the labor— manual and intellectual—that goes into it, the principles of solidarity and the critique of the logic of late capitalism are important. If anything, the strike provides a unique opportunity because in the United States, things like digital media and the Internet are at the center of young people’s lives. As

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the chapters in this volume demonstrate, entertainment is never just entertainment, and business is never “just business.” As Michael Scott, who like a child blurts out the truth only when pushed against the wall, says to Ryan, “Business is always personal.” The minor inconveniences caused for many iTunes users and television viewers can point the way toward larger issues of public culture and corporate control. As Greg Daniels puts it, I suppose the reason people should care about this is because the television networks get their broadcast licenses from the government. They are supposed to create public culture. Instead, they are taking the attitude of “We will crush you” toward the people who create their programming. They are talking of canceling scripted programming and replacing it with reality programs. I think that is not in the public interest.58

If The Office is successful as a satire, it is because the kind of heartless corporate drive evidenced by Ryan and the kind of willful hypocrisy and ignorance practiced by Michael are not only everywhere around us but also particularly embodied in NBC Universal. In this sense, The Office falls in the category of smart, insightful satires such as The Daily Show (on which Carrell used to be a “correspondent”) and The Colbert Report, which are more honest than supposedly serious media. This irony becomes even more pointed when comedians step out of their roles and speak truth in “legitimate” spaces, such as John Stewart on Crossfire in 2004, Stephen Colbert at the 2005 White House Press Correspondent’s Dinner, and The Office writer-producer-actors on the picket lines.59 So, while I’ve argued elsewhere that some productions, such as Lord of the Rings, are complicit with the problems of late capitalism, here I argue that the content of The Office and some elements of its production—particularly the freedom it gives its creative team—challenges the logic of the studios who fund and distribute the show.60 While NBC continues to act like the Michael Scott of the first season, the show has developed sophisticated critiques of the symptoms and causes of late capitalist frustration and anger. An example of the show’s development is encapsulated in a conversation between Michael and Jim at the end of a recent episode “Survivorman,” written by Carrell. Michael, who has been excluded from Ryan’s corporate wilderness retreat, tries to compensate for his disappointment by imitating survival reality shows such as Survivorman and Man vs. Wild, in which a professional “survivor” goes out into some remote, dangerous location and survives by his wits alone. While Michael flounders out in the Pennsylvania wilderness, he leaves the office in Jim’s charge. In order to decrease wasted time—and thereby maximize productivity—Jim consolidates all the birthday parties for the month into one party. Chaos and sniping ensue, as each of the birthday persons want a different cake and the benighted Toby, whose birthday is not even during that month, wants to be included because Michael had

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short-changed his actual birthday by planning it for 4:58 P.M. on a Friday afternoon . . . in the parking lot. Eventually Jim realizes the futility of his plan, and when Michael returns during the party—which is now only for the actual birthday person (the wonderfully weird Creed)—Jim ruefully recounts the tale to him. Michael laughs, informing Jim that he had also tried this before, to similar effect. When Michael reassures Jim that he will learn in 10 years, Jim replies that he does not plan to be there in 10 years. Michael laughs and says, “That’s what I said.” Then he leaps to his erstwhile catchphrase, “That’s what she said.” Jim laughs and asks, “that’s what who said?” Michael tells Jim that that’s simply something that he says to lighten things up in the office, “when things get hard,” to which Jim replies, “That’s what she said.” Since the first season, Michael has had to almost involuntarily interject “That’s what she said!” when a suitable occasion arises. The joke is an old one that turns an everyday phrase into a double-entendre. But the changing contexts in which that phrase appears testify to the evolution of the show. Initially, Michael was just an insufferable buffoon, a bad boss like David Brent, but increasingly, we see how he came to be that way. Granted, perhaps the demand of U.S. entertainment that the star be likeable plays a factor in such humanizations of Michael Scott. But in other respects, the show thrives on awkwardness and awfulness, and nothing could be more awful than the prospect of becoming Michael Scott. In the episode, Phyllis accidentally addresses Jim as “Michael,” and this scene in particular subtly references Star Wars, likening Jim to young Anakin Skywalker and Michael to Darth Vader. In other words, you can be a really good person and have the best intentions, and you can be smart and good looking and distance yourself from those who are “different,” and you can try to win over the audience constantly (as Jim does with both the viewing audience and the other characters on the show), but ultimately, the pressure of the historical situation in which you find yourself makes you the person that you are. The terms of the choices you make—such as Jim’s rejecting the professional opportunity of a corporate position for the security of his old job and a good woman waiting for him—are delineated by that situation. At its best, The Office shows us that we are the way we are for reasons, not special innate qualities or race or ethnicity or gender. In other words, as Marx put it, “[people] make their own history,” but “they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves.”61 I’d like to think that even the cantankerous Mr. Lukács would approve. NOTES I would like to thank Gina Caison, Dorothy Joo, and Daniel Siegel for their help in developing this chapter. 1. For further discussions, see David Harvey, The Condition of Postmodernity (Cambridge: Blackwell, 1990), particularly chapters 7–11; and Ernest Mandel, Late

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Capitalism, translated by Joris de Bres (London: Verso, 1972), particularly chapter 16, “Ideology in the Age of Late Capitalism.” 2. For a further discussion of what has also been called the “McDonaldization” of work and its links to race, see my essay, “The Business of Race in The Lord of the Rings Trilogy,” in The Business of Entertainment, vol. 1, edited by Robert Sickels (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2008). 3. Tara Brabazon, “ ‘What Have You Ever Done on the Telly?’: The Office, (Post) Reality Television and (Post) Work,” International Journal of Cultural Studies 8, no. 2 (2005), 108. 4. Brabazon, 108. See also The Office: Complete Series One & Two and the Special, DVD (2001–2003, BBC Video, 2004). 5. Laura Kipnis, “(Male) Desire and (Female) Disgust: Reading Hustler,” Cultural Studies, edited by Lawrence Grossberg et al. (New York: Routledge, 1992), 373–91. 6. “Episode commentary,” “The Dundies,” “Performance Review,” and “Christmas Party,” The Office: Season Two, DVD (2006, NBC). The ambiguous status of the camera in the U.S. Office calls for more extensive examination than is possible here. 7. For further discussions of the British show, see Brabazon and Ben Waters, The Office: A Critical Reading of the Series (London: British Film Institute, 2005). 8. Brabazon, 104. Mark Sinker concurs that “with the BBC happily hawking [the show] as a management-training manual and Gervais sticking to his anti-political pose, the Brent pathology comes across more as a comical personal failing than . . . a pervasive symptom of modern capitalism.” Mark Sinker, book review of The Office, by Ben Waters, Sight and Sound 16 (March 2006): 94. See also Yeoman, “Brent’s Secret Microsoft Office,” The Times Online (August 24, 2006). Available from: http:// entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/article617763.ece (accessed November 20, 2007). 9. George Lukács, “The Ideology of Modernism,” The Critical Tradition, 3rd edition, edited by David H. Richter (Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2007), 1217–32. 10. “Episode Commentary,” “Pilot,” The Office: Season One, DVD (NBC, 2005). 11. Maureen Ryan, “‘Scrubs,’ ‘The Office,’ and the Perils of Supersizing,” Chicago Tribune (October 24, 2007). Available from: http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/ entertainment_tv/2007/10/scrubs-the-offi.html (accessed November 2, 2007). 12. Brabazon writes that David “is able to deploy manager-speak with vacuous skill” (105), but in the first episode, he cannot even do that right. 13. To me, one of the most disturbing notes of the show is the Christmas episode from season three, in which Michael’s inability to distinguish two Asian waitresses seems to be excused. “A Benihana Christmas,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (NBC, 2007). 14. Brabazon, 109. 15. “Branch Closing,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (NBC, 2007). 16. “The Return,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (NBC, 2007). 17. Harvey, chapter 22. 18. “Launch Party,” The Office, Episode no. 403, first broadcast October 12, 2007 by NBC. 19. Harvey, chapters 12–18. 20. “Local Ad,” The Office, Episode no. 405, first broadcast October 25, 2007 by NBC.

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21. “The Deposition,” The Office, Episode no. 407, first broadcast November 16, 2007 by NBC. 22. “Dunder Mifflin Infinity,” The Office, Episode no. 402, first broadcast October 4, 2007 by NBC. 23. “Launch Party.” 24. One of the best lines in the entire show occurs at the very end of the first episode of season three, “Gay Witch Hunt.” In the episode, Oscar is outed by Michael, suffering discrimination, particularly from the conservative Angela, and general humiliation by the contrite but inept Michael. In exchange for his agreement not to sue the company, Jan gives Oscar a three-month paid vacation; after describing the trip to Europe he and his partner plan to take during that time, Oscar tells the camera, “Kids, sometimes it pays to be gay.” “Gay Witch Hunt,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (NBC, 2007). 25. For example, when Phyllis (played by Phyllis Smith) throws the bouquet at her wedding, Ryan lunges out of the crowd to block Kelly from catching it; the scene is less than a second in duration. “Phyllis’ Wedding,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (2007, NBC). 26. “Diwali,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (2007, NBC). 27. Promisingly, Kelly and Darryl have started dating in season four, with Darryl exhorting Kelly to “access [her] uncrazy side.” “Money,” Episode no. 404, first broadcast October 19, 2007 by NBC. 28. “Grief Counseling,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (2007, NBC). 29. “Branch Wars,” The Office, Episode no. 406, first broadcast November 2, 2007 by NBC. 30. “Booze Cruise,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (2007, NBC). 31. “Branch Wars.” 32. “Cocktails” and “The Job,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (2007, NBC). 33. For example, in “Local Ad,” Dunder Mifflin uses anticorporate rhetoric in the television advertisement that it is forcing all its branches to use. 34. “Episode commentary,” “The Job,” The Office: Season Three, DVD (2007, NBC). 35. Whitney Pastorek, “The Office: Working Overtime,” Entertainment Weekly, October 5, 2007, 33. 36. Pastorek, 33. 37. Brook Barnes, “NBC Will Not Renew iTunes Contract,” New York Times, August 31, 2007, section C, 1. 38. Scott Gilbertson, “NBC Universal Drops ITunes Downloads After Apple Refuses to Raise Prices,” Wired Blog Network (August 13, 2007). Available from: http://blog. wired.com/monkeybites/2007/08/nbc-universal-d.html (accessed November 10, 2007). 39. “iTunes Store to Stop Selling NBC Television Shows,” Apple (August 31, 2007). Available from: http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2007/08/31itunes.html (accessed November 15, 2007). 40. Gilbertson. 41. My personal favorite reads, “I would like to go on the record to say that if NBC does not renew its contract with apple, then people will not stand for it . . . including myself. Where as someone from Texas might go shooting up the local post office, I am from Utah. Therefore, I will pray for NBC and talk bad about them behind their back. Please renew, thank you!”

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42. Barnes. 43. See Barnes and Geoff Duncan, “NBC, Fox Launch Hulu Private Beta,” Digital Trends (October 29, 2007). Available from: http://news.digitaltrends.com/news/ story/14641/nbc_fox_launch_hulu_private_beta (accessed November 12, 2007). 44. qtd. in Gilbertson. 45. Barnes. 46. Patrick Goldstein, “Strike Reveals a Future Feared,” Los Angeles Times (November 17, 2007). Available from: http://www.calendarlive.com/tv/radio/cl-et-bigpicture 13nov13,0,7487231.story (accessed November 25, 2007); Jeffrey Ressner, “Writer’s Strike To Ripple Across Hollywood,” Politico.com (November 4, 2007). Available from: http:// www.politico.com/news/stories/1107/6692.html (accessed November 25, 2007); and Michael Hinman, “SciFi Channel Forced ‘Battlestar’ Webisodes,” Syfyportal (November 8, 2007). Available from: http://syfyportal.com/news424409.html (accessed November 25, 2007). 47. “The Office Is Closed,” YouTube (November 6, 2007). Available from: http:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6hqP0c0_gw (accessed November 7, 2007). 48. Brian Stelter, “Early Victim of Strike: ‘Office’ Originals End Next Week,” New York Times TV Decoder (November 7, 2007). Available from: http://tvdecoder.blogs. nytimes.com/2007/11/07/early-victim-of-strike-office-originals-end-next-week/ (accessed November 10, 2007). 49. Michael Schneider, “Greg Daniels: We’ve Seen the Future, and It Is Us,” Scribe Vibe: Variety’s WGA Strike Blog (November 7, 2007). Available from: http://weblogs.variety. com/wga_strike_blog/2007/11/greg-daniels-we.html (accessed November 10, 2007). 50. Michael Schneider, “And Now, A Word From Recently Laid-Off Production Crews,” Scribe Vibe: Variety’s WGA Strike Blog (November 16, 2007). Available from: http://weblogs.variety.com/wga_strike_blog/2007/11/and-now-a-word.html (accessed November 10, 2007). 51. Bill Carter, “Strike Prompts Layoffs at NBC,” New York Times, December 1, 2007, section C, 4. 52. Schneider, “Greg Daniels.” 53. Jim Hoffa, “Teamsters Support the Writers Guild in Fight for Fair Contract,” International Brotherhood of Teamsters (November 1, 2007). Available from: http:// www.hollywoodteamsters.org/ (accessed November 15, 2007). 54. “General Electric,” Fortune 500, CNN. Available from: http://money.cnn.com/ magazines/fortune/fortune500/2007/snapshots/561.html; John Christoffersen, “Record Profit at General Electric,” International Business Times (January 19, 2007). Available from: http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/20070119/general-electric-earnings. htm); Paul R. La Monica, “NBC: No Big Comeback,” CNNMoney.com (April 11, 2007). Available from: http://money.cnn.com/2007/04/11/news/companies/ge_nbc/index. htm (accessed November 15, 2007). 55. Josef Adalian, “Peacock’s New Kid in Town,” Variety, Sept. 17–23, 2007, 18–19. 56. Pastorek, 32. 57. Pastorek, 33. 58. Stelter. 59. “Jon Stewart’s America,” Crossfire, first broadcast October 14, 2004 by CNN; “Jon Stewart on Crossfire,” YouTube (January 16, 2006). Available from: http://www.

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youtube.com/watch?v=aFQFB5YpDZE; “Colbert Roasts President Bush—2006 White House Correspondents Dinner,” Google Video (April 29, 2006). Available from: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-869183917758574879 (accessed November 7, 2007). 60. Sue J. Kim, “Beyond Black and White: Race and Postmodernism in The Lord of the Rings Films,” Modern Fiction Studies 50, no. 4 (Winter 2004), 875–907. 61. Karl Marx, “The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte,” The Marx-Engels Reader, 2nd edition, edited by Robert C. Tucker (New York: W.W. Norton, 1978), 595.

chapter 5

Who Wins with NASCAR on ESPN? Wanda Little Fenimore

When ESPN was purchased by Walt Disney Company in 1995, the sports network inherited a genetic disorder—Disney’s penchant for marketing a product ten times every millisecond. —Michael Freeman, ESPN: The Uncensored History The first full-length broadcast of a NASCAR race was the Daytona 500 in 1979 on CBS. Interestingly, ESPN was also launched in 1979. I doubt anyone had an inkling of what the future held in store for both of them. In 1979, NASCAR was a regional sport hungry for exposure on national television, while ESPN was a fledgling cable network searching for programming. As they say, the rest is history: A lucrative relationship was borne with each partner using the other to build popularity and profits. For nearly 20 years, until 2000, ESPN was the home for NASCAR and has been widely credited for helping popularize the sport.1 Fox, NBC, and TNT took over televising Nextel Cup races in 2001 with a 6-year, $2.4 billion contract. During its absence, ESPN president George Bodenheimer repeated that the one TV-rights package he most wanted to obtain was NASCAR’s Nextel Cup races.2 When NBC declined to renew its contract, ESPN/ABC got its chance, for a mere $270 million! Beginning with the 2007 season, the 36 Nextel Cup races are split among Fox, TNT, and ESPN/ABC. The networks bought the rights for a combined $4.48 billion over 8 years; the deal boasts a 40 percent increase over the former contract.3 At this price, ESPN/ABC didn’t get the broadcast rights to all 36 races. ESPN/ABC will broadcast the last 17 races of the Nextel Cup season,

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including the final 10 races in the Chase for the Cup.4 NASCAR’s return to ESPN seems like a reunion between long-lost friends. However, being owned by Disney situates ESPN as another avenue for opportunistic marketing. NASCAR racing is definitely big business, but with NBC bowing out, why was ESPN/ABC willing to pay such an exorbitant amount of money? Second, how will it recoup this investment? And, most important, what does this new contract mean for fans watching every Sunday? THE MONEY There are several possible reasons why ESPN/ABC wanted the NASCAR broadcast rights. NASCAR touts itself as the number two spectator sport in the United States with over 75 million people identifying themselves as fans.5 That’s a lot of eyeballs and wallets tuned in for about three hours every Sunday. Sports programming is perceived as the best, and sometimes only, way to access the hard-to-reach male viewer. Having sports allows a network to approach advertisers who want to put their products in front of the elusive male. Susan Tyler Eastman and Gregory D. Newton state that, “With a seemingly endless proliferation of television channels, sport is seen as the programming that can best break through the clutter of channels and advertising and consistently produce a desirable audience for sale to advertisers.”6 As the self-proclaimed “worldwide leader in sports,” adding NASCAR to ESPN’s line-up fills a noticeable void previously filled by Fox, NBC, and TNT. Sports offer networks an opportunity to distinguish themselves from their competitors. For example, News Corporation’s acquisition of NFL rights put Fox on the map. Instead of being seen as an upstart, Fox became a significant contender among the Big Three (ABC, NBC, and CBS). Also, by acquiring NASCAR’s broadcast rights, ESPN and ABC eliminated their competitors. Although NBC turned down its option to renew with NASCAR, CBS and other cable networks, such as Comcast’s Outdoor Life Network, could have entered the picture if they were willing to put up the money. Finally, NASCAR offers an ideal promotional vehicle for programming: Tyler Eastman and Newton offer that “[b]ecause sports has such high visibility and popularity with both vocal fans and advertisers, the networks expend billions of dollars obtaining television rights, and one of their many justifications is the value of sporting events as a platform for promotion of prime-time programs.”7 ESPN and ABC have an opportunity during a Nextel Cup race to promote their other programming. Although several political, economic, and social changes have contributed to the process, deregulation opened the door to ESPN/ABC having access to the millions of dollars necessary to acquire broadcast rights. The political climate of the 1980s, along with an enduring atmosphere of deregulation in

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the 1990s, led to numerous media mergers and acquisitions.8 Disney, along with other companies, took full advantage of the opportunities afforded by this environment. As a consequence, media ownership in the United States is concentrated in a handful of companies; a small number control a large percentage of the media acquiring a monopoly over the content, form, and meaning of the images and news items disseminated to the public.9 With their extensive holdings and resources, these megamedia corporations dominate their competitors. While this may seem to be simply a business situation, it also affects media viewers because this concentration of ownership limits the sources and availability of programming, news, and information. Overall, it reduces the range of choices and increases uniformity. In 1984, ABC bought ESPN for $225 million and was then acquired by Capital Cities in 1985; Disney merged with Capital Cities/ABC in 1996, bringing ABC as well as ESPN into the Disney family.10 The Disney empire is the world’s second largest media conglomerate (behind Time Warner) and includes assets encompassing movies, music, publishing, radio, television, Internet, mobile communications, theme parks, and sports.11 ESPN may have been able to get NASCAR without being a part of Disney, but in 2000, it lost the broadcast rights to other networks who were willing to pay more. The current contract substantially increased the networks’ investments. Without the financial backing of Disney, ESPN may not have been able to take advantage of NBC’s bowing out. Disney is the epitome of deep pockets—it can purchase almost any entity or media property it sets it sights on thereby shutting out its competitors. THE STRATEGY First and foremost, media conglomerates, including Disney, have a single goal, which is to “dominate the markets in which they are engaged by attracting as much market share and revenues as possible, as well as engage in economies of scale and scope to improve efficiencies and lower the cost of operations.”12 Because media in the United States are not controlled or financed by the government, they are dependent on other sources for funding, notably advertising. With the structure of advertiser-supported media, ABC and ESPN make money with higher ratings that translate to advertising dollars. With high ratings, ESPN can sell commercial time at a premium to prospective advertisers. For example, in my local market, Roanoke-Lynchburg, Virginia, of approximately 30,000 households (cable subscribers), the rate for a 30-second commercial on ESPN Monday Night Football is $135.00, and the rate for Nextel Cup on TNT or ESPN is $65.00.13 For non–sports programming on other cable networks, for example, CNN, Food Network, Lifetime, Hallmark, and TBS, local commercial rates range from $3–$12 each.

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In order to consistently earn high ratings, Disney implements a strategy that takes advantage of all its media platforms, with each property an extension of other properties as well as a separate revenue stream.14 This strategy includes cross-promotion with multifaceted campaigns utilizing multiple forms of media. According to Adam Arvidsson, “When a particular media product (or ‘content’) can be promoted across different media channels and sold in different formats, what is marketed is not so much films or books, as ‘content brands’ that can travel between and provide a context for the consumption of a number of goods or media products.”15 Along with generating revenue from multiple sources, the company also has the opportunity to cross-promote. The process is very efficient because it decreases costs and increases profit. However, smaller companies without multiple media holdings cannot take advantage of it, thus, “[f]irms without this cross-selling and cross-promotional potential are simply incapable of competing in the global marketplace.”16 Synergy is the word often used to describe this process. Basically, synergy refers to components of a company working together to produce benefits that would be impossible for a single, separately owned unit of the company; the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.17 Synergy is effective when a company owns multiple media holdings because it involves promoting a single project across different platforms. For example, synergy becomes a force when a book develops into a movie, soundtrack, television series, and licensed merchandise because one entity owns publishing, motion picture, music, and broadcast holdings. The company then employs all these holdings to promote the project. Although parents may not term this process as synergy, they are cognizant of its effects. For example, when a Disney movie such as Shrek (Adamson & Jenson, 2001) is released, parents begin by taking their children to the theater. Buying continues with soundtracks, books, and cartoons, along with merchandised products such as lunch boxes, purses, clothing, stuffed animals, and so forth. The process continues with Shrek-themed McDonald’s Happy Meals. Once the theater run is over for the movie, the DVD is released, and not long after, the movie airs on Disney’s networks. In recent years, these platforms have expanded to include the Internet, video games, and ring tones. One of the major elements of synergy is cross-promotion. Cross-promotion also requires multiple media holdings because it involves promoting a single concept across various media.18 With television, a company that owns broadcast and cable networks can promote its programs in the most valuable time slots while at the same time bumping other advertisers. For example, News Corporation owns Fox and F/X and partners with Speed Channel. Viewers of programs on Fox will see promos for F/X’s programming. During Nextel Cup races, Fox will include promos for NASCAR-related programming on Speed Channel. At the same time, Speed will promote Fox’s

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coverage of the races. Though viewers may not call it cross-promotion, everyone sees it. Because it is “free,” networks commonly employ the device. Disney is the authority on branding; just consider the worldwide recognition of a certain mouse’s ears. Within the realm of media, branding involves exclusive distribution of proprietary symbols across multiple platforms. Branding develops a highly stable corporate product.19 It not only involves symbols but also “signature” events, especially sports programming such as the NFL, Olympics, MLB, and now NASCAR. Networks use these signature events to keep audiences aware of their other programming. David Rowe notes that “Leading sports and events (notably the Olympics) become the equivalent of well-recognized labels and logos in an increasingly ‘mediatized’ sports environment.”20 Along with differentiating itself from its competitors, acquiring sports programming associates the network with the sports’ values, another facet of branding. With NASCAR, this is a significant association because fans are steadfastly loyal. In his analysis of NASCAR from a business perspective, Robert G. Hagstrom observes that “No sport matches the unique relationship that exists in NASCAR between athletes and fans, or the depth of loyalty the fans feel.”21 Although other media corporations employ synergy, cross-promotion, and branding, Disney elevates the process to a capitalistic masterpiece. These practices directly impact what fans see on the races—a never-ending commercial for consumer products, ESPN and ABC programming, and NASCAR. THE RACES Does synergy really affect how races are televised and what viewers see on the television screen? To demonstrate that methods employed by megamedia corporations do affect the structure of televised spectator sports, I carefully watched and analyzed four races: Daytona 500 (February 18, 1979, Daytona International Speedway, CBS), referred to as 79 Daytona; Champion Spark Plug 400 (August 16, 1992, Michigan International Speedway, ESPN, rebroadcast on Mid-Atlantic Sports Network on October 26, 2007), referred to as Michigan; Sharpie 400 (August 27, 2007, Bristol Motor Speedway, ESPN), referred to as Bristol; and Ford 400 (November 18, 2007, Homestead-Miami Speedway, ABC), referred to as Homestead-Miami. In my analysis, I considered the races from the start to finish, green to checkered flags, and did not include any pre- or post-race coverage. Table 5.1 outlines the length of each race, including commercials; the time the actual race was on the screen; the number of breaks; the combined time of all the breaks; the average length of each break; as well as the number of network programming commercials. With advertising increasing across multiple venues in recent years, it is fairly safe to predict that the total commercial time would increase from 1979

Table 5.1: An Analysis of NASCAR Telecasts

Race

Green to Checkered Flags

On-air time of race

Number of Breaks

Total time of breaks

Average length of break

Programming commercials

Daytona 500 Daytona 1979 CBS

3 hrs 2 mins

2 hrs 40 mins

20

21 mins 55 secs

1 min 6 secs

8

Champion Spark Plug 400 Michigan 1992 ESPN (re-broadcast MASN 10-26-07)

2 hrs 17 mins

1 hr 59 mins

18

18 mins

1 min

unavailable

Sharpie 400 Bristol 2007 ESPN

2 hrs 58 mins

2 hrs 11 mins

22

47 mins 30 secs

2 mins 10 secs

11

Ford 400 Homestead-Miami 2007 ABC

3 hrs 2 mins

2 hrs 17 mins

18

44 mins 55 secs

2 mins 30 secs

15

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to 2007. What is a bit surprising is that the commercial time during the Homestead-Miami race was more than twice that during the 1992 Michigan race. By taking the total time of each race divided by the number of breaks, the 79 Daytona averaged a break about every 9 minutes, Michigan every 7½ minutes, Bristol every 8 minutes, and Homestead-Miami every 10 minutes. On the surface, this seems fairly consistent, except the breaks during the Homestead-Miami race, on average, were over twice as long as breaks in the 79 Daytona race, two and half minutes versus a little over a minute. More problematic than the amount of commercial time is the actual content of the commercials. During the 79 Daytona 500, 8 commercials totaling 2 minutes 25 seconds were allocated to CBS programming. The commercials were for other sports programming including the Glen Campbell Los Angeles Open (golf), Super Fight, a boxing event, Challenge of the Sexes, and NBA Regional Games. There were two promos each for the CBS Sunday Night Movie and CBS Tuesday Night Movie. The Bristol race on ESPN included 11 commercials, totaling 4 minutes 10 seconds, for programming on ESPN and ABC. The commercials included sports such as the IRL Grand Prix at Sonoma, the World Series of Poker, and Monday Night Football. Also included were ESPN Fantasy Football, The Bronx is Burning, and SportsCenter. However, the most number of commercials were for the Little League World Series being televised on ABC. The Homestead-Miami race included 15 commercials dedicated only to ABC programming. Featured programs were Pushing Daisies, Dirty Sexy Money, October Road, Samantha Who?, and Grey’s Anatomy along with onetime events such as the American Music Awards and Dancing with the Stars finale. None of the 15 programming commercials were for any sports or events on ESPN, but ABC did not disregard ESPN as we’ll see shortly. From a fan’s perspective, the increase in network programming commercials may not be significant. After all, a commercial is a commercial, right? If all I am interested in is watching the race, what difference does it make if ABC bumps a local advertiser in order to promote its programming? It makes a difference because it limits my choices. Instead of being offered products from a variety of sources, my options are restricted by ABC. This may seem to be far-fetched, but quite often we learn about local businesses through advertising. If local advertising is confined to off-hours because desirable time slots in premium programming are unavailable, it is less effective. The goal of advertising is to increase sales, and more than one business has closed down because of unsuccessful advertising campaigns and subsequent low sales. So far, I’ve discussed commercials promoting the networks’ programming. These are actual breaks during the race, and the programming commercials run adjacent to commercials for other products. At other times, the networks’ programming is also featured during the race without any break from the action on the track. It can appear as a supposed unobtrusive

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scroll across the bottom of the television screen, a pop-up in the corner, or an opaque logo. However, these devices are not only becoming more numerous, they are invading more of the viewing area. As a result, even though the race isn’t interrupted by a commercial, it is disrupted by graphics, logos, animation, and audio from the booth commentators. ESPN and ABC are not the only networks to implement this technique, but it is worse on them because of Disney’s philosophy of maximum exposure, prolonging and exacerbating the disruption. ESPN regularly features 18/58; at 18 and 58 minutes after the hour, a scroll appears across the bottom of the screen with news, scores, and of course, programming information. The appearance of the scroll is signaled by distinctive music, an ESPN trademark. During the Bristol race, the 18/58 scroll appeared six times, each time reminding viewers of SportsCenter coming up after the race. In addition, an orange programming scroll appeared across the bottom of the screen upon each return from a commercial break, a total of 19 times. This scroll included information about the current program as well as upcoming programs on ESPN, including SportsCenter and the following week’s race. If all that isn’t enough, another mechanism is SportsCenter’s 30 at 30 Update: 30 seconds of sports news and highlights on the half hour with a mention of SportsCenter after the race. During the nearly 3-hour Bristol race, 30 at 30 intruded 4 times. With the orange scroll, 18/58, and SportsCenter 30 at 30, SportsCenter was mentioned 31 times during the Bristol race. This translates to viewers being reminded about every six minutes to watch SportsCenter. For the Homestead-Miami race, let’s return to the intermixing of ESPN and ABC. Though referred to as sister networks, ESPN and ABC are really more like conjoined twins, especially during Nextel Cup races on ABC. Disney’s new branding formula is “ESPN on ABC,” although the race is seen on ABC. The ABC logo is in the lower right hand corner while the ESPN logo is in the upper right hand corner, so which one is it? The race looks as if it is on ESPN; instead of 18/58, “BottomLine” is used for sports scores, news, and of course, programming. The commentators and pit reporters are the same as ESPN. The SportsCenter Minute powered by Vizio replaces SportsCenter 30 at 30. The animated graphics after each break feature the ESPN logo or the “ESPN on ABC” logo, not the ABC logo by itself. I was watching a race on ABC that wasn’t included in this analysis, and I thought it was on ESPN. I didn’t realize it was ABC until I tried to change channels and realized where I was on the dial. What does Disney gain by televising a race on ABC but framing it as ESPN? Traditionally, advertising rates on broadcast networks are higher than cable networks. With programming like Nextel Cup racing, a network can charge premium advertising rates. Place the high-demand programming on a broadcast network and the rates are even higher. Locally, commercials in

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Nextel Cup races are $2,000 each on ABC and $1,200 each on Fox, compared to $65 on ESPN.22 Unlike the local cable system, the local ABC and Fox affiliates reach approximately 100,000 homes. While an advertiser is theoretically reaching many more homes, the increase in viewers is not proportionate to the increase in broadcast advertising rates. Also, as I mentioned before, sports programming offers an excellent opportunity to promote other programming. Typical ESPN viewers may not tolerate ABC programming promos as well as ABC viewers. Another reason may be that Disney, along with NASCAR, hopes to reach potential fans who don’t normally watch ESPN by placing the races on ABC. Though the set-up is subtle, it’s inarguably clever. The networks are not the only ones who take advantage of cross-promotional opportunities; NASCAR is very savvy about promoting races and its other ventures. During the Bristol race, NASCAR had commercials for the upcoming race at Lowe’s Motor Speedway featuring one of the most popular drivers, Dale Earnhardt, Jr., as well as promos for TrackPass, a paid interactive service offering fans an inside look at their favorite driver during the race. The Homestead-Miami race included four commercials for the nascar. com Superstore. Keep in mind that this race was November 18, 2007, during the holiday shopping season. NASCAR also developed an entertaining campaign of commercials promoting attendance at live races. Called “Go to a race. See things differently,” the commercials offer different vignettes of how going to a race changes your perspective. For example, a teenage son is in the bathroom shaving for the first time. His father steps in with model military plans, holding them above the son and making jet engine sounds. The reference is to the military jet fly-bys at every race during prerace ceremonies. All of the commercials are funny but probably only have meaning for fans who understand the experience of a live race. According to Jim Obermeyer, VP-brand and consumer marketing for NASCAR, “The spots are a wink and a nod to the NASCAR insider who understands the world through a NASCAR lens.”23 NASCAR’s investing in an advertising campaign to drive attendance at live races may be its recompense to track owners for taking over broadcast fee negotiations from the tracks. Until 2001, each track was permitted to negotiate its own broadcast deal for its races.24 The previous patchwork deal was worth about $100 million, but the fees went to the track owners, not NASCAR.25 While profitable for the tracks, the procedure resulted in a fragmented presence for NASCAR on national television. In 2001, Brian France, Chairman and CEO of NASCAR, approached the 20 track operators to consolidate the television package. France drove the deal by consolidating rights in a single package rather than permitting individual racetracks to negotiate rights. The owners agreed to France’s proposal, and the first consolidation television package in 2001 eliminated ESPN and divided the NASCAR

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schedule among Fox, NBC, and TNT. The track owners may have agreed to the proposal because it increased the total amount of the broadcast fees with their receiving the largest percentage: 65 percent, with the racing teams sharing 25 percent and NASCAR receiving the remaining 10 percent.26 However, the France family owns 35 percent of International Speedway Corporation (ISC) and controls 65 percent of the voting power within the corporation. ISC, in turn, owns 11 race tracks that host Nextel Cup races.27 According to France, “our new television lineup changed the sport. We instantly reached a broader audience. NASCAR went from a haphazard schedule of mostly cable broadcasts to a coordinated schedule that airs primarily on broadcast television.”28 While France asserts the new contract makes it easier for fans, or potential fans, to find the races on television, the schedule is still split among three networks instead of one. While NASCAR taking over the fees negotiation did substantially increase how much track owners receive, it also increased the networks’ investment that has to be recouped. Industry analyst Dennis McAlpine confirms the financial consequences of the investment, “The simple fact is the rights will be so expensive that whoever gets it will also have to spend a lot to promote it and try to get their money back,”29 hence, viewers of the Bristol race being reminded 31 times to watch SportsCenter after the race. Of course, the most obvious way to make a profit on their investment is for the networks to increase ratings of the races. Prior to the first race on ESPN, commercials celebrating NASCAR’s return aired on ESPN and ESPN2. With their resources as part of the Disney family, ABC and ESPN created original programming to expose potential viewers to NASCAR. ESPN and its outlets, including ESPN2, air approximately 66 hours of NASCAR-related programming a week, including “NASCAR: The Dirt,” “Race Wizard,” and “NASCAR Tonight.”30 Also, by virtue of its pseudojournalistic position, ESPN can emphasize NASCAR in its reporting, “like it’s a real sport.”31 There have been suggestions that prior to the broadcast deal, ESPN increased its coverage of NASCAR in its news programming to gain favor.32 With the contract, ESPN has even more reason to feature NASCAR instead of other sports in its reporting. With its news reporting, ESPN can tantalize viewers by dramatizing the action of NASCAR with specially selected highlights from races. ABC capitalized on the current reality TV craze by creating two original series, “Fast Cars & Superstars—Gillette Young Guns Celebrity Race” and “NASCAR in Primetime.” The first, “Fast Cars” built on Gillette’s advertising campaign featuring six young drivers: Ryan Newman, Carl Edwards, Jimmie Johnson, Kasey Kahne, Kurt Busch, and Jamie McMurray.33 The show featured 12 athletes and entertainers, such as John Elway, Tony Hawk, Jewel, William Shatner, and Bill Cowher, who after training and coaching by the drivers, competed on the track. “Fast Cars” premiered on June 7 and

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aired for seven weeks. ABC’s second NASCAR-themed show of the summer, “NASCAR in Primetime” aired for five weeks beginning August 8, on Wednesday nights at 10 P.M.34 This docu-reality show offered viewers the personal and professional stories of their favorite drivers. Presenting NASCAR in primetime was a very clever maneuver by ABC. These programs aired in the weeks preceding ESPN/ABC’s portion of the Nextel Cup schedule. By airing these programs in primetime, ABC exposed racing to viewers who may never have seen a race. “Fast Cars” and “NASCAR in Primetime” could reach non–sports viewers. The goal was surely to drive new viewers to the Nextel Cup races televised on ESPN and ABC. As far as actual ratings, ESPN and ABC have some work to do. The Daytona 500 historically scores a rating of 10–11.5; each ratings point equals 1 percent of U.S. households. The fall race at Lowe’s Motor Speedway in Charlotte, North Carolina, had a 5.1 and 4.7 rating in 2005 and 2006, respectively, when NBC broadcast the race.35 In 2007, on ABC, the race had a 4.2 rating.36 However, Game 2 of the MLB American League Championship Series was on NBC at the same time and scored a rating of 5.8. To put these numbers in perspective, for the week of October 8, 2007, the week of the fall Charlotte race, the highest-rated show was Dancing with the Stars with a 12.8 rating. The same week, NFL Sunday Night Football (New Orleans Saints v. Seattle Seahawks, NBC) scored 7.1, while the Cowboys and Bills on ESPN Monday Night Football scored a 9.6.37 Broadcast and cable networks along with advertisers are able to break the total number of households down into subgroups based on sex, age, race, and so forth. For example, although the Charlotte race on ABC seems to have a low rating, it may have scored higher with certain groups, such as men in the 18 to 34 age group. An advertiser such as Budweiser or Interstate Batteries will place its commercials based on the ratings for their potential customers, probably not the ratings for the total number of households. As for Disney’s coup in synergy: the movie, Cars (Lasseter 2006). The movie premiered in May 2006, at Lowe’s Motor Speedway in Charlotte, North Carolina, and was released in the United States on June 6, 2006. Cars was produced by Pixar (now owned by Disney), presented by Walt Disney, and distributed by Buena Vista Pictures Distribution (owned by Disney).38 The movie features Pixar’s signature computer-generated animation, in this case, anthropomorphic cars. The lead character is “Lightning McQueen,” a rising rookie in the Piston Cup.39 The voices of real race car drivers such as Richard Petty, Darrell Waltrip, and Dale Earnhardt, Jr., unmistakably link the movie with the Nextel Cup series. The movie was a box office hit grossing over $244 million, domestically.40 Although it was released one year prior to ESPN’s airing Nextel Cup races, the movie definitely reached potential viewers of the Sunday races. Without an insider confirming the fact, there is no definitive way of knowing if Disney was already in contract negotiations

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with NASCAR when Cars was in production. However, NBC informed NASCAR of its decision against renewing its contract in late summer 2005.41 It certainly is an interesting coincidence that Disney produced an animated movie with a racing theme and a year later begins televising races. Personally, as an enthusiastic fan who watches every week, I have to commend how ESPN and ABC use technology to improve my viewing experience. Television is definitely the best medium for sports, but the advances in technology really put the fan in the thick of the action. There are usually at least six cars in the race with in-car cameras; the cars are spread throughout the field ensuring coverage all over the track. Instead of just one camera, the cars usually have three: one inside the car, one on top, and one on the rear. Along with the in-car cameras, ESPN/ABC also place between 60 and 75 high-definition cameras around the track and in the pits.42 Having all these cameras really enhances the viewing experience with replays, close-ups, and different angles. However, on the flip-side, these cameras represent additional capital expenditure, not to mention employing all the crew members to operate them. Along with the broadcast fees, ESPN/ABC incur considerable expense in order to televise the races in innovative and creative ways to keep viewers engaged. Another technological advance that ESPN/ABC utilizes during the races is broadcasting the radio communications between the driver and his crew. Fans attending live races use scanners and select which driver they want to listen to, but in the past, fans at home haven’t been able to enjoy this insider perspective. ESPN/ABC selectively incorporate driver/crew chief communications, but they are most often included when a driver is having trouble with his car or has wrecked. Another exciting time viewers hear is during what ESPN calls, “Full Throttle.” During a restart after a caution, the commentators are silent so the only audio is the cars roaring past the start/finish line and the spotters telling the drivers to go, go, go, when the green flag waves. Although it doesn’t directly relate to the racing action, ESPN has created an animated (though it appears real) gigantic television screen that appears to be suspended at the very top of the grandstands at the races. It is not really there, and of course, fans at the race can’t see it, but for fans at home, it is fascinating and an amusing gadget. The screen does not show scenes from the race but promos for ESPN programming. When the promos are finished, the screen folds down like a laptop computer. Despite myself, I find myself paying attention to the promos because of the novelty of the television screen—probably the reason for it all along. THE IMPLICATIONS My intention is not to present Disney, ESPN, or ABC negatively. Disney’s capitalizing on marketing opportunities as well as creating its own

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opportunities is not unusual among megamedia corporations. Murdoch’s News Corporation, Viacom, and Time Warner practice the same methods, but as an enthusiastic Nextel Cup fan, I am more aware of how these practices manifest on ESPN and ABC. I think it’s a safe prediction that an analysis of most any televised professional spectator sport will consistently reveal the same techniques, no matter what network broadcasts the event. So really, what does all this mean for fans? As much as television viewers complain about commercials, privately owned media is a better alternative when compared to media controlled or financed by the government. However, having periodic commercial breaks for consumer products is vastly different from the current structure of races. Disney resourcefully integrates all its holdings to drive viewers to its programming. In the process, the races are disrupted and interrupted by graphics, promos, and audio above and beyond mere commercial breaks, effectively reducing the race to a commodified form.43 One can walk away or change the channel during an actual commercial break, but one can’t avoid the promos on ESPN and ABC because they are embedded in the race. Watching the race means being bombarding with the networks’ self-promotion. Looking beyond the races, the concentration of media ownership should be a concern for everyone because it limits the number and diversity of sources of information. This concentration of ownership is power—power to determine what is available for consumption or viewing. As Ben Bagdikian eloquently summarizes the dilemma, The threat does not lie in the commercial operation of the mass media. It is the best method there is and, with all its faults, it is not inherently bad. But narrow control, whether by the government or corporation, is inherently bad. In the end, no small group, certainly no group with as much uniformity of outlook and as concentrated in power as current media corporations, can be sufficiently open and flexible to reflect the full richness and diversity of society’s values and needs.44

Because ESPN and ABC had the money, by virtue of Disney, to contract with NASCAR, they determine what fans see on the screen, whether it is the actual race, advertised products, or promos for their programming. As a result, these networks, intentionally or accidentally, minimize our options. THE FUTURE With the current broadcast contract, ESPN and ABC, along with Fox and TNT, will be the home for NASCAR until 2014. If, upon the expiration of the current contract, NASCAR determines to keep the same arrangement for broadcasting races, then fans are in for more of the same, especially if the broadcast rights fees increase another 40 percent. As I stated before,

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programming promos during the races are more or less free for the networks. The networks have to recoup their investment some way. The most obvious method is by increasing ratings of the races as well as their other shows so they can raise advertising rates. Between now and 2014, NASCAR can assess the NFL Network’s model. Currently, the NFL Network is embattled with cable providers, and many subscribers do not have access to the games. The fewer homes that have access to games means the less the NFL Network can charge for advertising. Also, the NFL Network is not receiving the maximum amount of cable subscriber fees. Until it can resolve this issue, the NFL is not profiting from having its own network. However, if the NFL can negotiate with cable providers so that the NFL Network is part of basic cable packages, NASCAR will take a hard look. Having its own network will give NASCAR more control over programming. While it may seem that NASCAR would lose the broadcast rights by having its own network, it will gain subscriber fees from the cable providers as well as advertising revenue. ESPN earns one of the highest subscriber fees at $2.70 per subscriber and is in 85 million homes—that is a lot of money!45 For NASCAR to take this step, a couple of things have to happen. First, the NFL Network has to be profitable. Second, NASCAR has to be convinced that it has the clout to demand its network be included in most basic cable packages. Lastly, NASCAR has to be certain that it can command high subscriber fees and even higher advertising rates. Based on NASCAR’s power and popularity, these events are highly probable. Of course, NASCAR may partner with a successful network, such as ESPN. With a partnership, NASCAR can still retain control, along with the profits, while at the same time supplement its business savvy with the television experience of an established cable network. In that case, the NASCAR Network is not in the too distant future for race fans. What will races look like on the NASCAR Network? Much as they do on ESPN or ABC, maybe even worse. Like any other network, the potential NASCAR Network will not survive financially by only selling advertising during three races each week (Nextel/Sprint Cup, Busch/Nationwide Cup, and Craftsman Truck Series).46 It will have to drive viewers, and advertisers, to its other programming. The sport will become even more commodified because NASCAR will have to commercialize everything associated with the races—drivers, drivers’ personal lives, crew chiefs, sponsors, motors, engines, technology, tracks, and car manufacturers—under the guise of bringing fans closer to the action and offering “insider” information. The one-car team and less popular drivers will be ignored because they won’t raise as much money for NASCAR. Even some national companies will not be able to afford to advertise during races, much less local advertisers. But the biggest loss for fans will be that NASCAR will funnel and control all information about the sport.

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It will decide who to feature, what to report, and what makes good racing; unfortunately, I think its decisions will be based solely on potential profits, thereby limiting fans’ choices. NOTES 1. Larry Stewart, “NASCAR: On the road again.” Los Angeles Times, February 22, 2007, home edition, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel. roanoke.edu/ (accessed October 20, 2007). 2. John Consoli, “ESPN Kicks Nascar’s Tires.” MediaWeek 15, no. 38 (October 24, 2005): 6–8. Communication & Mass Media Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed November 29, 2007). 3. “NASCAR Revs Up Rights Fees.” Broadcasting & Cable 135, no. 53 (December 12, 2005): 23. Communication & Mass Media Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed October 3, 2007). 4. Drivers earn points toward the Nextel Cup championship based on their finishing position in a race and earn five bonus points for leading a lap or leading the most laps. After the first 26 races, the top 12 drivers in points are eligible to compete for the Nextel Cup Championship: The Chase for the Cup. 5. Mark Emmons, “It’s the season of change for NASCAR’s followers: series will feature foreign cars, driver.” San Jose Mercury New, February 18, 2007, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel.roanoke.edu/ (accessed May 4, 2007). 6. Robert V. Bellamy Jr., “The Evolving Television Sports Marketplace,” in MediaSport, ed L. A. Wenner (New York: Routledge, 1998), 73. 7. Susan Tyler Eastman and Gregory D. Newton, “Promoting prime-time programs in megasporting events.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 40, no. 3 (Summer 1996): 366. Communication & Mass Media Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed October 14, 2007). 8. For further discussion of the political climate and the 1996 Telecommunications Act, see John Allen Hendricks, “The Telecommunications Act of 1996: Its Impact on the Electronic Media of the 21st Century.” Communications & the Law 21, no. 2 (June 1999): 39; and Michele Hilmes, Only Connect: A Cultural History of Broadcasting in the United States (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Thomson Learning, 2002). 9. Barry D. McPherson, James E. Curtis, and John W. Loy, The Social Significance of Sport: An Introduction to the Sociology of Sport (Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics Books, 1989). 10. Stuart Evey with Irv Broughton, ESPN The No-Holds-Barred Story of Power, Ego, Money and Vision that Transformed a Culture (Chicago: Triumph Books, 2004). 11. Hoover’s Company Records, The Walt Disney Company, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel.roanoke.edu/ (accessed November 12, 2007). 12. Alan B. Albarran and Terry Moellinger, “The Top Six Communication Industry Firms: Structure, Performance and Strategy,” in Media Firms: Structures, Operations and Performance, ed. R. G. Picard (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Assoc., Inc., 2002), 103. 13. Comcast Spotlight, Lynchburg, Virginia office (rates are for the 2007 NFL and Nextel Cup seasons).

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14. Susan Tyler Eastman, Douglas A. Ferguson, and Robert A. Klein, eds. Media Promotion and Marketing for Broadcasting, Cable and the Internet, 5th edition (Burlington, MA: Focal Press, 2006), 15. 15. Adam Arvidsson, Brands: Meaning and Value in Media Culture (London, New York: Taylor & Francis, Routledge, 2006), 75. 16. Robert W. McChesney, “The Political Economy of Global Communication,” in Capitalism and the Information Age: The Political Economy of the Global Communication in Revolution, eds. R. W. McChesney, J. B. Foster, and E. M. Wood, (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1998), 1. 17. David Croteau and William Hoynes, The Business of Media: Corporate Media and the Public Interest (Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press, 2001), 74. 18. Ibid., 117. 19. Alan Law, Jean Harvey, and Stuart Kemp, “The Global Sport Mass Media Oligopoly: The three usual suspects and more.” International Review for the Sociology of Sport 37, no. 3–4 (2002): 279. 20. David Rowe, “The global love-match: sport and television,” Media, Culture & Society 18, no. 4 (October, 1996): 565. 21. Robert G. Hagstrom, The Business that Drives the Sport: The NASCAR Way (New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1998), 147. 22. Local ABC and Fox affiliates; Lynchburg/Roanoke DMA. 23. Richard Thomaselli, “How NASCAR plans to get back on the fast track,” Advertising Age 78, no. 7 (February 12, 2007): 3. Communication & Mass Media Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed September 5, 2007). 24. Brian France, “Bringing Racing into Prime Time,” Newsweek, June 11, 2007, U.S. edition, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel.roanoke. edu/ (accessed October 20, 2007). 25. Tedesco, “NASCAR in the driver’s seat.” Broadcasting & Cable 129, no. 47 (November 19, 1999): 7. Communication & Mass Media Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed February 2, 2008). 26. Michael Hiestand, “New TV Contract brings ABC, ESPN into NASCAR fold,” USA Today, December 8, 2005, final edition, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http:// 0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel.roanoke.edu/ (accessed October 20, 2007). 27. Hoover’s Company Records, International Speedway Corporation, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel.roanoke.edu/ (accessed November 12, 2007). 28. France, “Bringing Racing.” 29. Ben Grossman, “Lots of Networks Want a Piece of NASCAR.” Broadcasting & Cable 135, no. 39 (September 26, 2005): 18. Communication & Mass Media Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed October 3, 2007). 30. Michael Hiestand, “ESPN’s revolutionary graphics will show the unseen at NASCAR races,” USA Today, July 25, 2007, final edition, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel.roanoke.edu/ (accessed October 20, 2007). 31. Stewart, “NASCAR: On the Road again.” 32. Grossman, “Lots of Networks.” 33. Realty TV World, “ABC announces ‘Fast Cars & Superstars’ to premiere June 7,” http://www.realitytvworld.com/news/abc (accessed November 23, 2007).

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34. Reality TV World, “ABC’s ‘NASCAR in Primetime’ docu-reality series to premiere August 8,” http://www.realitytvworld.com/news/abc-nascar-in-primtime (accessed November 23, 2007). 35. Jim Peltz, “NASCAR: Caution Period,” Los Angeles Times, February 22, 2007, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel.roanoke.edu/ (accessed October 20, 2007). 36. “Nielsen Ratings,” Broadcasting & Cable 137, no. 42 (October 22, 2007): 20. Communication & Mass Media Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed January 30, 2008). 37. Ibid. 38. Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cars_(film) (accessed November 30, 2007). 39. From 1972–2002, R J Reynolds/Nabisco was the sponsor of NASCAR’s premier series, and it was called the Winston Cup. 40. Box Office Mojo, http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=cars.htm (accessed November 30, 2007). 41. Consoli, “ESPN Kicks NASCAR’s Tires.” 42. Kelly Dixon, “ESPN Back with a Vroom,” St. Petersburg Times, July 29, 2007, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel.roanoke.edu/ (accessed October 20, 2007). 43. Law et al., “The Global Sport Mass Media Oligopoly.” 44. Ben H. Bagdilian, The Media Monopoly, 3rd edition (Boston: Beacon Press, 1990), 223. 45. Michael Hiestand, “ESPN makes another Splash,” USA Today, October 19, 2005, final edition, Lexis-Nexis Academic, via http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.fintel.roanoke. edu/ (accessed October 20, 2007). 46. Beginning with the 2008 season, the Nextel Cup series will be called the Sprint Cup. Also, Nationwide is the sponsor for the former Busch series.

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chapter 6

Show Time: Sundance Meets Corporate America K. Alex Ilyasova

In the interest of full disclosure, let me state at the beginning that I at times suffer from self-diagnosed Chronic Heterosexual Fatigue Syndrome. The condition, like Chronic Whiteness Fatigue Syndrome, first announced and selfdiagnosed by Darrell Y. Hamamoto in his article How to Rob: Strong-Arming Our Way to Equity and Diversity, “has not yet made it into the psychiatric clinical literature nor is it found among the insurance-billable psychic maladies catalogued in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.”1 Following Hamamoto’s example, I will not go too deeply into the behavioral manifestations of this disorder. I will just say that its causes or origin owes itself to a lifetime of unrelenting exposure to a heterosexual-dominated universe multiplied many times over and intensified via the instruments of mass communication, such as television. Like Hamamoto, there are certain stop-gap measures I have devised to keep myself on just this side of a complete psychotic break: watching Desert Hearts for the um-teenth time (a lesbian cult classic), relaxing with the Logo Channel (gay and lesbian cable channel) or the Sundance Channel in the background, watching Ellen, reading the latest online spoilers for the next season of The L Word, and actively supporting queer cinema as an antidote to the toxic dominant hetero-media.2 And on particularly grim days, I fantasize about queer alternatives. I fantasize that one day queer people will have our own talk show like Oprah, our own sitcoms like Friends, and our own cable channels . . . like Logo! Oh wait, come to think of it, we do —Ellen and Will and Grace come to mind. Unlike Hamamoto’s semisarcastic point that

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“Asian Americans have failed to parlay our proud past and present criminal traditions into significant wealth and power,”3 which he argues is part of the cause and consequence of their “near-invisibility, marginalization, and continued disparagement on White-controlled TV,”4 queer culture today has market power on white heterosexual-controlled TV. The December 2003 issue of Vanity Fair stated it best: “Ten years ago American woke up to Willard Scott’s forecast; now it awakens to a pair of flaming-red leather pants.”5 In other words, queer culture or gay culture appears to have made it in terms of reaching the “mainstream” or the dominant heterosexual viewing audience. We’re there, daily, on your television screens. However, like the nearinvisible and marginalized Asian American, our presence in the mainstream is nonthreatening and thus void of any real power and effect. For example, there is desexualized, romantically challenged Will on Will and Grace or the caricatures of the consumer-obsessed, trend-setting, stereotypical (don’t forget nonthreatening) gay men in Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, and lastly, the don’t-ask-don’t-tell, approachable (and thus nonthreatening), dancing lesbian diva who never mentions it on television, Ellen. With all this mainstreaming of gay and lesbian culture on the major networks—ABC, CBS, NBC—it seems important to examine if there are any other places on television where viewers can see the lives of gays and lesbians represented in more complex ways.6 One place is on the cable networks. However, as media companies compete for both profits, and viewers, the content is often sacrificed for savings. And so, I look at the recent developments with regard to media conglomerates and how these events may affect the gay and lesbian content on cable networks. Specifically, I will discuss how one burgeoning relationship, the relationship between the media conglomerate Viacom and the independent (indie) film industry—an industry that continues to be influenced and shaped by the projects and talents of queer-identified filmmakers and directors—translates into the type of content viewers see on their televisions, particularly their cable networks such as Showtime and HBO. I’ll be completely honest here: When I first started thinking about the connection between media conglomerates, the indie film industry, and queer representation, I was suffering from another episode of Chronic Heterosexual Fatigue Syndrome. My initial argument was that the increasing relationship between Viacom and the indie film industry would have yet another mainstreaming effect on the few queer-focused cable shows that currently explore the lives of gay men and lesbians in a more complex way. I’m thinking specifically of Queer as Folk and some of the issues the show took on, such as living with HIV/AIDS, the anxiety and tensions that exist around aging, the practices and representation of safe sex, testicular cancer, and community activism. I’m also thinking specifically of The L Word and the fact that the show’s very existence signals for the first time the power and potential

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of the lesbian community. Although, I still think that the increasing relationship between the indie industry and the media giants has the potential to do more harm than good in terms of mainstreaming the content of a show such as The L Word on the cable networks, at the same time, it seems that the work of indie filmmakers who make it to the safe havens of financial security by working for big media companies also have the potential to change things as well. And so, in what follows, I discuss the relationship between large media conglomerates and the indie industry and how that has lead to gay and lesbian content on cable networks, and I use The L Word and its appearance and success on Showtime as my primary example. However, my main argument is that the potential for resisting mainstreaming effects does exist because of the increasing relationship between the indie industry and the media giants. I discuss this potential by first exploring some of the history with both the development of media conglomerates and the indie film industry. In particular, I look at some of the key legislation that has led to the concentration of media we currently have. I look at one of the largest media conglomerates, Viacom, and some of the financial holdings and subsidiaries that illustrate the extent of power these conglomerates wield. And, I trace how this one media conglomerate has established a relationship with the indie film industry—in this case, The Sundance Institute and The Sundance Film Festival. Lastly, to illustrate this potential change, I look at the relationship between the indie filmmakers that have made The L Word successful and a signature for Showtime; specifically, I look at some of the ways these filmmakers and directors have adapted the strategies used by media giants to create work that successfully stays on the air and continues to represent the more complex lives of the queer community. THE GROWTH OF MEDIA CONGLOMERATES At the end of 2006, Mother Jones magazine reported that there are eight giant media companies dominating the U.S. media:7 • • • • • • • •

Disney (market value: $72.8 billion) AOL-Time Warner (market value: $90.7 billion) Viacom (market value: $53.9 billion) General Electric (owner of NBC, market value: $390.6 billion) News Corporation (market value: $56.7 billion) Yahoo! (market value: $40.1 billion) Microsoft (market value: $306.8 billion) Google (market value: $154.6 billion)

This translates into the realization that most people are getting their news, information, and programming from eight giant media companies. These megamedia companies are considered the media elite —dominating on both

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the national and global media level. For the purposes of this article, I focus on the top five media corporations because of their longer histories and sustained dominance in the media market. Such a concentration of ownership by media corporations has not always been so integrated and unfathomably large, partly because TV and movie companies were the parent companies, at least until the 1970s. For example, according to Ben H. Bagdikian, a media critic and author of The Media Monopoly, “In 1983, fifty corporations dominated most of every mass medium and the biggest media merger in history was a $340 million deal.”8 However, in the 1980s, the unrelenting efforts of network lobbyists to overturn the Financial Interest and Syndication Rules, or Fin-Syn, reduced the number to 29 companies by 1987.9 According to The Museum of Broadcast Communication, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), “implemented the [Fin-Syn] rules in 1970, attempting to increase programming diversity and limit the market control of three broadcast television networks,”10 namely NBC, CBS, and ABC. The main objective of Fin-Syn was to limit the amount of “prime-time programming the networks could produce themselves,”11 or, in other words, keeping the means of production separate from distribution, much like what the Paramount Decree of 1948 had done for the movie industry. Fin-Syn attempted to do this by “taking away the long-term monetary rights to programs created by the networks, severely restricting their participation in syndication,”12 and by eliminating incentives for the networks to produce programs. After the collapse of Fin-Syn, which began in the early 1980s, the trend toward vertical integration—the control of production, distribution, and exhibition—opened the way for production organizations to merge with distribution organizations. Examples of production and distribution coming together were first seen with FOX Broadcasting, or more specifically Fox Pictures, and a Hollywood studio, then with Paramount and Warner Brothers, and by the mid-1990s, Disney purchasing one of the big networks, in this case ABC, instead of starting one from scratch.13 As Bagdikian goes to chronicle, [I]n 1990, the twenty-nine had shrunk to twenty three. . . . [I]n 1997, the biggest firms numbered ten and involved the $19 billion Disney-ABC deal, at the time the biggest media merger ever. . . . [In 2000] AOL Time Warner’s $350 billion merged corporation [was] more than 1,000 times larger [than the biggest deal of 1983].14

One of the results of such huge mergers is the consolidation of numerous media companies into media conglomerates who controlled both the means of production and distribution, a strategy that the FCC was attempting to prevent. These now larger-than-life media corporations own businesses across various industries, such as distribution networks, production companies,

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manufacturing of other related products such as toys, and retailing—this is vertical integration at its finest, the owning of everything up and down the production and distribution chain. Vertical integration arguably makes it easy to have horizontal help or cooperation across different divisions. For example, “Think of [a company] like Sony, which produce, distribute, and exhibit the Spiderman movies but also the DVDs and games which can be viewed/played on Sony DVD players and/or Playstations, [and] the soundtrack which is populated by Sony Music artists. [T]hey have vertical monopolies of different media which can cross-pollinate across their holdings horizontally.”15 As Anup Shah explains, author of Corporate Influence in the Media, this vertical integration “means that while this is good for their business, the diversity of opinions and issues we can see being discussed by them will be less well covered.”16 The wider ramifications include enhanced market power through cross-promotion and cross-selling, unrestrained ability to own and control the total process, and increased ability to seize the competition. Inherent in this business strategy is the enormous influence these corporations have in shaping mainstream media—nationally and globally. To play devil’s advocate for a moment, the idea of corporate media itself is not inherently bad. As Robert W. McChesney points out, “global conglomerates can at times have a progressive impact on culture, especially when they enter nations that had been tightly controlled by corrupt crony media (as in parts of Asia). The global commercial-media system is radical in that it will respect no tradition or custom, on balance, if it stands in the way of profits.”17 Additionally, on the surface, the idea that mainstream media is more corporate owned translates into the media feeling the same market pressures and drives that have affected and spurred competition among companies. Such competition in the past has fueled innovation, facilitated risk-taking (which is connected to innovation) and, with regard to news reporting and media in general, has pushed for better quality. However, the concern that has grown out of the media mergers and consolidation efforts of corporations is that such concentration of ownership by a handful of corporations is having the positive effects mentioned previously. For example, the idea of competition facilitating innovation and pushing for better quality has, with few exceptions, not materialized. I’m thinking of the reality shows on all the major networks and the lack of local news reporting that extends beyond the personal survival tale of a local resident. As a result, the enormous influence these media conglomerates have in shaping mainstream media is both their strength and their weakness. And in terms of competition, as is the heart of traditional capitalism, where free markets experiment to create better, more unique products, in the media market such capitalist intentions translate more into mutual aid and shared investments than outright competition. As Ben H. Bagdikian explains, to compete outright

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would mean offering differing kinds of programs that reflect the widely different tastes, backgrounds, and activities of the American population. To compete outright would mean unique products and the goal of a winner-take-all victory. Instead, the Big Five indulge in mutual aid and share investments in the same media products. They jointly conform to the periodic ratings that presume to show what kinds of programs have fractionally larger audiences, after which “the competitors” then imitate the winners and take slightly varying shares of the total points.18

One of the results of such cooperation, which is another business strategy employed by the media conglomerates, is that the thousands of media outlets then carry highly duplicative content—again, thinking of reality shows here. In addition to cooperation with each other, when it serves their business interests, the big five also have interlocking members on their boards of directors. Interlocking, the practice of one board member sitting on a board of another company, is yet another business strategy used by these media giants to sustain their status as major owners of all kinds of media. As Bagdikian reports, “According to a study by Aaron Moore in the March/April 2003 Columbia Journalism Review, News Corporation, Disney, Viacom, and Time Warner have forty-five interlocking directors.”19 As Ted Turner explains in a 2004 article for Washington Monthly titled, “My Big Beef with Big Media,” Unless we have a climate that will allow more independent media companies to survive, a dangerously high percentage of what we see —and what we don’t see —will be shaped by the profit motives and political interests of large, publicly traded conglomerates. [ . . . ] Let me be clear: As a business proposition, consolidation makes sense. The moguls behind the mergers are acting in their corporate interests and playing by the rules. We just shouldn’t have those rules.20

One of the rules that Ted Turner is referring to is the FCC restrictions on how many stations a company can own and what percentage of the audience they are allowed to reach, or audience-reach cap. In 1984, the FCC raised the number of stations one company can own from 7 to 12. A year later it revised this ruling to include an audience-reach cap of 25 percent, “meaning that media companies were prohibited from owning TV stations that together reached more than 25% of the national audience.”21 By 1996, the FCC did away with numerical caps and raised the audience-reach cap to 35 percent. And in the summer of 2003, it raised it again to 45 percent. Moreover, “the FCC also allowed corporations to own a newspaper and a TV station in the same market and permitted corporations to own three TV stations in the largest markets, up from two, and two stations in medium-sized markets, up from one.”22 More recently, in December of 2007, the FCC overturned

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a 32-year-old ruling banning the cross-ownership of newspapers and broadcasting. Essentially, the new ruling allows newspapers to own one television station or one radio station but only in the very largest markets.23 These rulings are important to mention because most citizens get their views and understandings of the world around them from mainstream media. Thus, the concern over the concentration of ownership has led many critics to the following points of contention: (1) very few media owners are influencing what issues and perspectives reach the masses; (2) large corporations that own television channels and/or newspaper/magazines would understandably not encourage information that criticizes the company; and (3) vertical integration, cooperation, and interlocking as business strategies have made competition difficult for smaller companies, forcing them out of business, making them prone to buy outs, or encouraging them to try and emulate the larger corporations. VIACOM AND THE INDIE INDUSTRY Viacom is a particularly useful media conglomerate to focus on for a number of reasons. First, Viacom is one of the top-tier media conglomerates, having financial interests in broadcast and cable television, radio, Internet, book publishing, and film production and distribution. As stated on their company Web site, “Viacom is a leading global media company [ . . . ] with programming that appeals to audiences in every demographic category across virtually all media, the company is a leading in the creation, promotion, and distribution of entertainment, news, sports, music, and comedy.”24 Second, the self-described interests of the company—“leading in the creation, promotion, and distribution”—illustrates clearly Viacom’s success in vertically integrating its businesses, and as you’ll read shortly, it has also often cooperated with its “competitors” when it is beneficial to do so. Some of the conglomerate’s highly recognizable properties include: • • • • •

CBS network: one of the oldest television networks MTV: most popular teen media outlet Simon and Schuster: one of the world’s largest book publishers Blockbuster: operates and franchises video stores around the world Paramount Pictures: producer and distributor of motion pictures25

Within this vertically integrated structure is the connection between Viacom and the indie film industry. Viacom owns the Showtime movie networks, which also manage the Sundance Channel. This is particularly relevant because Viacom’s ownership of Showtime, and, more recently, the Sundance Channel, establishes the connection and growing relationship it has to the indie industry. Let me explain this further: In 1990, Showtime

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began acquiring and premiering independent films directly for the channel. It started with some short-film anthologies and eventually expanded into the realm of feature-length films, one of the most recognized being Lolita, directed by Adrian Lyne. In 1996, in a joint venture with CBS Corporation (Showtime Networks are part of CBS Corporation as well), and in cooperation with Robert Redford and NBC Universal, the Sundance Channel was launched in order to show independent films on TV. As an interesting side note, a year earlier the Sundance Film Festival, the brainchild of Robert Redford and arguably now the world’s premiere forum and competitive marketplace for independent film, had a record-breaking year in terms of the number of feature films and short films presented, as well as sold-out attendance. Understandably, it was just a matter of time before Corporate America and the big five in particular took notice. But, I’m getting ahead of myself. Before I discuss this connection further, let me provide some background information about the indie film industry. THE INDIE FILM INDUSTRY It seems important to note the roots of this industry in order to understand what it is evolving into now or possibly what it has, at least partially, always been. Indie films have been thought of as typically low-budget, smallstudio-produced films. Additionally, indie films have often been identifiable by their content and style, which has resulted in their developing a reputation for representing more than their share of “art” films, foreign language films that larger studios refuse to make, and films that introduce and explore topics that are seen as too avant-garde or politically risky for mainstream producers. The underlying sentiment of the defenders of indie filmmaking is the maintenance, at all costs, of the writer’s or director’s personal, creative, and artistic vision for the film. As a result, “old school” indie filmmakers tend to be identified as ones that reject mainstream standards—including the business-minded approaches of production companies—and explore and create films that preserve the artistic nature and integrity of filmmaking. That’s arguably the idealistic version. The reality, with of course some exceptions, is that indie filmmakers have almost always existed alongside, and at times have worked directly with, the major film studios of the day. For example, around 1908 when Thomas A. Edison and his Motion Pictures Patent Company created a monopoly in the film industry by combining a number of film companies, and an oligopoly by holding most of the patents for film equipment, many indie filmmakers shunned the Edison Trust Corporation and moved west to California. These indie filmmakers moved as far away as possible in order to avoid Edison’s lawyers, to continue making their smaller, yet more creative films, and, ironically, to create the second oligopoly in Hollywood. As one article about the history of the independent

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film industry describes, “Louis B. Mayer, the Warner Brothers, and all the other pioneers of the original ‘big six’ studios who fought Thomas Edison over his film patents all started out as independent filmmakers, fighting the very thing they would become: corporate filmmakers trying to control the film market.”26 The 1920s, and later the 1930s, not only brought the pressures of the corporate film industry but also the emergence of “film societies” such as The London Film Society in England. Such societies brought together filmmakers passionate about the art of filmmaking. It provided a forum for them to share and develop ideas about film editing techniques (such as montage) and subject matter (such as alternative realities and interior thoughts of characters). Eventually, these film societies that started in Europe made their way to Hollywood “where the very thing these societies railed against (big film studios) lived and prospered.”27 It was arguably during this period where independent filmmakers made the types of films still often considered as true indie films today—films screened at little “art-house” theaters that were owned and operated on an independent level. Although the films did not have packed audiences, often filmmakers made enough to cover their expenses and even have a little profit because the films cost hardly anything to make. Skipping ahead a bit, past World War II, we hit the 1950s. According to some television history trivia, 1950–1959 was a particularly exciting time for the television industry. According to one source, “[i]n the USA, [black and white] television exploded onto the scene at the beginning of the decade, mid-decade saw electronic color television and remote controls launched, and at the end of the decade the public witnessed some interesting styling changes and the introduction of transistorized television.”28 What did this new technology in the television industry mean for big studios of the day? Namely, a noticeable downswing in their profits. And so, to lure people out of their living rooms and back into the movie theaters big Hollywood studios offered color films on a wide screen format.29 Meanwhile, as the big Hollywood studios grew, as McCarthyism played its part in censorship, film studios grew conservative in their film choices and imposed more artistic restrictions on filmmakers. As a result, some big-time directors sought other means (for example, ghost-directing) to create and be part of the films that allowed for artistic experimentation even in highly restricting times. For example, Howard Hawks, who made dozens of film classics including Scarface (1932), Only Angels Have Wings (1939) and To Have and Have Not (1944), directed The Thing From Another World (1951) without out receiving credit because it gave him a chance to use his strong “narrative style to the full extent with an emphasis on character motives and realistic dialogue.”30 And so, even in that time, people who had “made-it” still strived to be part of the indie film scene as a way to make movies without big Hollywood studio restrictions and commercialism.

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Coming almost to the end now, for our purposes, in terms of indie film history, are the 1960s and 1970s and the concept of film festivals. Although the concept of having contests among filmmakers, as well as promoting their films through such venues, has been around since the film industry itself, it wasn’t until the ’60s and ’70s that film festivals blossomed into full-fledged circuits. In 1978, what has become the Sundance Film Festival started in Salt Lake City, Utah. The guiding goal, at that time, was to showcase films made regionally outside the studio system. In 1985, Robert Redford, a local resident and a person who was involved in the festival from the beginning, took over the artistic management of the festival through his arts organization the Sundance Institute. By 1991, the film festival having gone through various name changes—“from the U.S. Film Festival to the Utah/U.S. Film Festival to the United States Film & Video Festival to the Sundance/United States Film Festival”31—finally settled on the Sundance International Film Festival. The success of Sundance, as the story goes, was spurred by Redford’s management of the festival, the move from Salt Lake City to Park City (a ski resort town in the mountains), and changing the festival date from September to January (making it the only film festival held at a ski resort during ski season). By 1992, Sundance had attracted the attention of American audiences who were increasingly being let down by the seemingly unending number of unadventurous, “lowest-common-denominator nature of Hollywood production films.”32 Throughout the 1990s, Sundance firmly established itself as the “place where you could see talent early,” launching the careers of independent filmmakers such as Kevin Smith (Clerks, 1994), Robert Rodriguez (El Mariachi, 1992), and Quentin Tarantino (Reservoir Dogs, 1992). Understandably, it was just a matter of time before Hollywood studios really took notice and became “invested.” As Kenneth Turan, a film critic and author of From Sundance to Sarajevo: Film Festivals and the World They Made, describes, by 1996, after the much-publicized fuss made over the film Shine, it was clear how and why Sundance has changed in its relatively short life. According to Turan, Ever since Redford’s Sundance Institute had taken over the festival, the putative specter of the evil empire of Hollywood and the movie establishment had hung over the event. Every year, agents and development executives [make] the trek to Park City in greater and greater numbers, paying up to $5,000 for coveted Fast Passes to the entire festival and prowling the occasionally snowy streets on a lonely mission to discover the Next New Thing.33

To put this into some monetary perspective and to quote Turan once again, Though [Sundance] still believes passionately in championing striving young filmmakers, Sundance itself, not immune to all the success that surrounded it, has become established and institutionalized enough to have an

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annual budget of $8.5 million. With a fleet of Mercedes M-Class vans as “official vehicles” and a catalog as fat and glossy as an issue of Architectural Digest, Sundance increasingly exudes the prosperity and success that go with its place in the film universe.34

Consequently, with such success it is no wonder that nowadays the film festival circuit no longer exists solely for the purpose of showcasing independent films and unknown independent filmmakers. The top five media conglomerates, who all now have a division for “independent films,” all aim to have a film in the race in every festival in order to meet their quotas of 10 to 17 percent of company grosses each year coming from these independent film divisions. The potential problem of the big studios increasingly investing in and cofinancing the projects of independent filmmakers and the smaller independent studios is that the business side of such investments tends to lead to conservative choices in cast and crew. Why is this a point of concern? It is a concern partly because the problem that the quotas and cofinancing create is the lack of opportunities for the “unknowns” in the indie industry to get their big break. As one article explains, “An unproven film director is almost never given the opportunity to get his or her big break with the studios unless he or she otherwise has significant industry experience in film or television. Films with ‘unknowns’ in the cast, particularly in lead roles, are also rarely produced by the Big Six.”35 As a result, big Hollywood stars these days not only dominate the film festival circuit but are also signing on to do more “art-house” type films with big Hollywood studios. Arguably, as the big studios gain more access to and attract the spotlight from indie filmmakers, the line between indie films and Hollywood will continue to blur. INFLUENCE IN INDIEWOOD: THE L WORD AND SHOWTIME The increasing relationship between media conglomerates, their film studio subsidiaries, and the indie industry no doubt has influence on what we see and don’t see on our cable networks. Up until this point, it may be all too clear that the influence over content on cable shows is similar to the network shows, that is, a one-way street, namely, from the media conglomerates to the networks, and driven by cooperation, and not necessarily competition, among the big five or six. However, in spite of this established pattern, the increasing relationship between media giants and indie film directors and filmmakers, in particular, does have the potential to push back and possibly influence this established standard in a variety of ways. To address this potential, I want to discuss briefly some of history that has led to such a possibility. I outline just a slice of lesbian history on television. In doing so, I am not presuming to encompass the entirety of lesbian history on television nor

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all of the other histories that engaged with it, instead, I just want to provide some context for what has contributed to The L Word’s emergence in 2004 and the potential influence of the indie industry on cable television. LESBIAN TV HISTORY Major networks had figured out by the early 1980s that there were ratings to be had by writing in shocking content during sweeps week—remember all those Dynasty episodes that ended with a fire, explosion, or a character being killed off ? It seemed that once every network adopted that strategy, something else had to be done. Arguably, prior to Ellen DeGeneres’s coming out of the closet in 1997, lesbians on network television were relegated to these sweep weeks as sweep boosting subplots—that is, temporary, titillating, and nonthreatening. Although gay men were present since Billy Crystal played one on Soap in 1977, the first lesbian kiss ever on network television did not occur until 1991 between CJ, a bisexual lawyer on L.A. Law played by Amanda Donohoe, and her female colleague. An even more controversial kiss occurred between two girls on Picket Fences in 1993, and in 1994, Roseanne Barr planted one on Mariel Hemingway on her sitcom Roseanne. By 1996, the first lesbian wedding was televised on Friends, between Ross’s ex-wife Carol and her lover, Susan. And that brings us back to 1997, and to Ellen DeGeneres. DeGeneres’s coming out in real life and on the show Ellen on April 30, 1997, the first day of May sweeps, was TV’s biggest lesbian moment. As Malinda Lo explains, “Ellen’s coming out on ‘The Puppy Episode’ was significant not only because it was the first time a leading primetime character was gay, but because the character was also played by an openly gay actor.”36 More importantly, although this episode occurred during sweeps week, it did not adhere to the established pattern of temporary sweep boosting subplots. Instead, that episode made front and center the life of one semifictional primetime character/actor, and that was threatening. As Lo goes on to explain, The right-wing group Media Research took out a full-page ad on the back cover of Variety on April 17 claiming that ABC and Disney were “promoting homosexuality to America’s families.” Pat Robertson, Phyllis Schafly, Rev. Donald Wildmon, and Rev. Jerry Falwell joined a group of antigay right-wingers to sign a scathing letting characterizing “The Puppy Episode” as “a slap in the face to America’s families.”37

Despite “The Puppy Episode” winning an Emmy for Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series in 1997, as well as a GLAAD Media Award and a Peabody Award in 1998, the show was cancelled at the end of the next season. In all fairness, the show did have low ratings coming into its fourth

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season. Although it started off strong, ranking at one point at 13th on the top ratings chart, the lack of a love life for the main character, Ellen, seemed frustrating for both the producers and viewers of the show. “The Puppy Episode” was the result of various negotiations to try and address this issue. The episode pulled in approximately 42 million viewers. In spite of this initial peak, the show continued to have low ratings into its fifth season, leading to its cancellation. However, as Stephen Tropiano, author of The Prime Time Closet, notes, “Instead of simply stating that the show was canceled due to low ratings, [Stuart Bloomberg, chairman of ABC entertainment] claim[ed] that because the material was more politicized (translation: gay) and issue-oriented (translation: gay), it became less funny (translation: too gay).” Obviously, no straight TV shows are ever criticized for being “too straight.”38 In the wake of Congress passing the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in 1996, the mainstream media did not appear willing to make any waves. Consequently, DeGeneres soon felt the backlash of media personally. Both the Washington Post and the New York Times criticized her for “being too openly affectionate with Anne Heche at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Although DeGeneres and Heche claimed that they weren’t doing anything that a straight couple would do, the New York Times characterized their behavior as an ‘ostentatious display of affection,’ thereby teaching all future lesbian couples that they should do no more than hold hands in public.”39 Not surprisingly, there was a dry spell on network television in terms of lesbians kissing for a number of years. It wasn’t until 1999 that viewers saw the return of sweeps boosting lesbian kissing—for example, on Ally McBeal between Calista Flockhart and Lucy Lui, and on Party of Five with Neve Campbell’s character. Somewhat ironically, in the fall of 1998, less than a year after “The Puppy Episode” controversy, NBC premiered Will and Grace —a show featuring a straight-acting gay man (Eric McCormack), his straight female friend (Deborah Messing), and their hyper-flamboyant stereotypical gay male friend, Jack (Sean Hayes). The show went on to win 13 Emmy Awards in its eight seasons on the air. In contrast to the relegating of lesbians to sweep weeks and the success of the desexualized show Will and Grace, HBO premiered, that same year, Sex and the City. Sex and the City focused on a group of sexually charged (straight) women who were not only shown having sex but also discussing it constantly. Prior to Sex and the City, the only show on network or cable television that made a group of women the focus, without the main lens being their jobs, was The Golden Girls. Although it would be a stretch to credit the coming-out of DeGeneres as the sole contributing factor to the premier of not only Will and Grace but also Sex and the City, it may be reasonable to consider that her coming-out and the furor that followed paved the way for other primetime and cable shows to include gay characters and address (at least straight women’s) sexual habits.

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QUEER CINEMA At this point it might be unclear just where the indie industry fits in. The reality is that the emergence of this new cinematic force, and I’m thinking particularly of the indie film movement “polemically known as ‘queer cinema,’ ” is directly related to Hollywood’s (and thus to the media conglomerates’) marketing and abuse of queer culture and the “abandonment of serious, issue-oriented, provocative films” and content.40 As Emanual Levy notes in Cinema of Outsiders: The Rise of American Independent Film, “In an attempt to be inclusive, mainstream Hollywood has always held to a naïve belief in America as a melting pot. The strategy that followed ignored gender, racial, and sexual distinctions in search of a common, unifying cultural denominator that would be acceptable to all and offensive to none.”41 By the early 1990s, in the wake of the AIDS catastrophe of the ’80s and continued abuse by Hollywood of employing homosexuality to either get an easy laugh or to inspire fear by condemning this “deviant lifestyle,” gay and lesbian audiences began to express more aggressively their discontent with how they were shown and began to demand fairer treatment. As Levy explains, “In 1991 alone, four major films (JFK, Basic Instinct, The Prince of Tides, and The Silence of the Lambs) came under fire for their onesided distorted portrayal of gay characters. Hollywood’s well-intentioned but flaccid efforts to be sensitive about gay issues, from Personal Best and Making Love in 1982 to Philadelphia in 1993, have only reinforced the idea that gay filmmakers must create their own cinema.”42 Such an idea began to coalesce between 1991 and 1992 with the appearance of Todd Haynes’s Poison, Gus Van Sant’s My Own Private Idaho, Jennie Livingston’s Paris is Burning, Tom Kalin’s Swoon, Christopher Munch’s The Hours and Times, and Gregg Araki’s The Living End. By the mid-1990s, gay visibility and queer cinema finally got the attention of Hollywood. New voices challenged the old stigmas and stereotypes, and the fight was on for more realistic representation. As Levy explains, “The queer cycle reached its maturity at the 1994 Sundance Festival, when the director Rose Troche (one of the writers/directors on The L Word) and her cast stormed Park City with Go Fish, their edgy lesbian romantic comedy. Industry suits suddenly began to think about gay and lesbian spending power.”43 However, Hollywood, and particularly network television, is slow to change. Although the spending power and market potential of gays and lesbians began to be understood as a result of the success of these new voices in the indie/queer cinema industry, it would be a while yet, six years to be exact, before television took on serious, issue-oriented, and provocative gay and lesbian content—and then only on cable networks. The idea of gay and lesbian filmmakers that had to create their own cinema in order to see the kind of complex and complete representations of themselves that they

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wanted to see is the same idea that brought to the small screen Queer as Folk and, particularly, The L Word. In 1999, HBO came out with another hit in the form of The Sopranos. That same year Ilene Chaiken pitched the idea of The L Word to Showtime. “After writing a magazine article about same-sex couples with children, she pitched a drama based on her life as a lesbian mother in Los Angeles.”44 As Chaiken explains, “There wasn’t a shred of receptivity.”45 Nobody took the possibility seriously. Meanwhile, the all-woman cast of Sex and the City and the stars on Will and Grace were reveling in their success. By 2000, the competition between premium cable channels HBO and Showtime appeared to define HBO as the winner. In December 2000, Showtime premiered Queer as Folk. That same year, Chaiken’s movie Dirty Pictures aired on Showtime as well. The movie was about the Cincinnati museum director, played by James Woods, who went on trial in 1990 for exhibiting sadomasochistic photographs taken by Robert Mapplethorpe. In 2001, Queer as Folk was well on its way to becoming Showtime’s signature show, and Chaiken’s Dirty Pictures won the Golden Globe for best TV movie. There is, I think, a certain amount of strategic thinking and timing involved in these events. Chaiken, whether consciously or not, made use of this propitious moment—namely, the competition between major networks, her work and success with Dirty Pictures, and the viewers’ readiness—to experience more challenging, more complex, and serious content. Perhaps the most profound change that occurred here is the same one that was affected by queer cinema—the realization by Corporate America that “money isn’t homophobic.”46 One characteristic then that some of the HBO and Showtime shows in particular have shared in common was the use of indie filmmakers and directors. According to the Village Voice, HBO and Showtime in particular remade themselves as the “natural habitat” for adventurous filmmakers, offering them freedom from the stresses of financing and distribution that besets any indie filmmaker.47 HBO arguably “prepared the ground for the indie-fication of TV.”48 Showtime quickly followed in order to compete for ratings, viewers, and dollars. For example, The L Word premiered on Showtime in 2004 with filmmaker Rose Troche, of Go-Fish and Six Feet Under, as co-executive producer; Guinever Turner, also of Go Fish and American Psycho, as one of the writers; and Steve Golin of Being John Malkovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind as an executive producer. For the second season, “The slate of directors on board [read] like a Sundance festival of Who’s Who —Neil LaBute of The Shape of Things, Lisa Cholodenko of Laurel Canyon, Burr Steers of Igby Goes Down, and Alison Maclean of Jesus’ Son.”49 With the show in its fifth season, the presence and influence of indie filmmakers and directors cannot be denied. Arguably, what is happening is what happened when queer-identified indie filmmakers and directors created queer cinema—in order to see the kinds of representations on television they

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want to see, they have to create them themselves. And that is, I would argue, what they are doing on The L Word. SHOW TIME: I’LL SHOW YOU MINE, IF YOU SHOW ME YOURS Three of the most effective strategies employed by the indie producers and writers of The L Word are the use of celebrities in every season, the producers’ and writers’ willingness to continue to work within, as opposed to against, the system that employs them, and what I refer to as horizontal integration—expanding the show beyond cable television. As I explained earlier, the indie film festivals are now places where the presence and participation of celebrities in recent years has attracted additional attention—from both Corporate America and from the average American—making the film festivals something almost everyone pays at least a little attention to now. Such celebrity presence and appeal is, I would argue, one of the ways The L Word crafted itself into something more than just a lesbian soap opera. Some of the celebrities that have made an appearance on The L Word include Snoop Dogg (Season 1), Lolita Davidovich (Season 1), Sandra Bernhard (Season 2), Tony Goldwyn (Season 2), Gloria Steinem (Season 2), Kelly Lynch (Season 1 and 2), Ossie Davis (Season 1 and 2), Jane Lynch (Season 2, 3, and 4), Alan Cumming (Season 3), Rosanna Arquette (Season 1, 2, 3, and 4), and Heather Matarazzo (Season 4). Others celebrities that have had a more lasting role include Cybill Shepherd, Marlee Matlin, Jane Lynch, and Kristanna Loken. Unlike the 1990s, when the sigma of playing a gay or lesbian character, and thus being perceived as homosexual, kept almost all celebrities away from gay and lesbian roles, appearing on The L Word seems almost chic now. One of the reasons celebrities seem to flock to The L Word may have to do with the indie filmmakers and directors that are working in the television industry and thus shaping the content of cable television series. As Christine Vachon, one of the well-established indie filmmakers, explains “Up until a couple of years ago, if you went to direct TV, you didn’t tell anyone because there was such a stigma attached to it [ . . . ] But now some of the HBO and Showtime series show more provocative things than we can get into movie theaters.”50 Additionally, as film and TV director Barry Levinson states, “Movies these days are less and less about characters and behavior. All that’s gone out the window. It’s television that’s taken over the role of capturing the small moments of human behavior—a role that’s been abdicated by theatrical films.”51 If the comments by Vachon and Levinson are true, it’s not surprising that celebrities follow indie filmmakers and directors to TV. As a result, shows like The L Word make use of the caliber of writing and directing that indie filmmakers and directors bring, including a certain art-house aesthetic that brings the “edgy” aspects of indie films, as well as high-profile celebrities,

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into our living rooms. The potential result for viewers is a deeper understanding and affection for television characters that is built over a number years instead of a couple hours, which makes for a more intense experience that keeps viewers coming back for more. The presence of celebrities and the edgy work of the indie folks on the show does not address or solve all of my concerns about the growing relationship between indie folks who are writing and directing The L Word and the media giant Viacom, Inc. Ultimately, when profits or ratings are at stake, it is the media giant or its executives who will make the final decision—which is often reflective of their conservative, white, male, and heterosexual values and privileges. But wait. Some of you might be thinking (and rightly so) that, if a show is not making money, then canceling it is not necessarily reflective of white, male patriarchy. It’s simply smart business. And in some cases it is. Arguably though, not all decisions in response to shifting ratings and profits need to be addressed in the usual and expected way. One of the benefits of having indie directors and filmmakers as a part of the larger media industry is their ability to think differently. Consequently, what if there are other ways to address the issue of ratings and profits? Such a moment came at the end of season one. Apparently, the ways that the perfectly nice women leading pleasant, more or less realistic lives on The L Word were represented did not attract the attention of the mainstream audience —meaning the white, heterosexual male. According to the demographic breakdowns from audience polls, although the first two episodes of season one “generated four times the Showtime prime-time average rating, pulling in a strong audience in spite of the fact that the second installment aired opposite the powerful Golden Globes telecast,”52 and led the executives to renew the show for a second and third season, it did not in the course of the first season hook the “broader,” or heterosexual male, audience media executives had hoped for. As Stacey D’Erasmo explains, “Visibility is a tricky thing; is someone visible when you can point her out in a crowd, or when you understand what her life feels like to her?”53 With regard to The L Word, visibility meant, at least by big media standards, having cross-over appeal to not only the Sex and the City crowd—women and gay men between the ages of 18–39—but to the white heterosexual men as well. Apparently, Tim (played by Eric Mabius), the one main, straight male character from season one, did not provide the executives with what they had hoped for—a guy the male audience can relate to and straight women can desire. And so, my concerns seem to have materialized when news broke at the end of season one that Showtime’s top executive Bob Greenblatt had specifically requested that the cast of season two add a straight male character so that “the male audience . . . have a guy they could relate to.”54 The result of this request is, in the fourth episode of season two, Mark (played by Eric Lively)—an amateur filmmaker and future roommate to Shane and

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Jenny. His newest project, after meeting Jenny and particularly Shane, is to “ ‘put his finger’ on how lesbians work, particularly in the bedroom, centering on his two new roommates and their lesbian friends . . . through nine ‘strategically and respectfully placed’ cameras (i.e., placed everywhere but the bathrooms) Mark becomes fixated with Shane’s bedroom practices and develops a form of ‘non-penis’ envy for her ability to seduce and shag every girl in sight.”55 As the season progressed with this storyline, the message boards on Showtime’s online posting area, particularly from lesbian viewers, reflected the opinion that they were not thrilled with Mark’s character. Lesbian viewers especially noted that they found the storyline distasteful. They noted that they get to hear guys being sleazy assholes in real life and are not interested in examining this issue on their favorite show.56 Although the dissatisfaction that lesbian viewers, in particular, experienced is important, what is important here is why the writers and directors chose to write such a storyline in the first place. One possible explanation maybe have to do with how Ilene Chaiken, the creator and executive director, and her team of indie writers and directors are able to negotiate the system they are working in—balancing the realities of profits and ratings with meaningful content and artistic control. Arguably, the Mark storyline allowed them to do both, as well as to make a “tactical” point that may ultimately create a space for change.57 Let me explain. The request by top exec Bob Greenblatt to add a straight male character to the show could have been handled in a variety of ways—for example, a straight, attractive, metrosexual male with no porn-based assumptions about lesbians’ sex lives. Instead, the writers chose to create the character of Mark—“an awful stereotype of the straight male population that may be based on a certain amount of truth, as stereotypes can be.”58 In the process, Ilene Chaiken and her indie writers and directors took a major risk. They risked alienating their main audience —lesbian viewers. They risked decreased ratings in their second season, which did materialize —ratings for the second season were considerably lower—and they risked that the third season could be their last. However, I would argue that the Mark storyline had more positive longterm effects than the short-term consequences let on. First and foremost, Chaiken and her group fulfilled the request by the top media exec to add a straight male character. In the process, they directly took on the issue of the voyeuristic straight male audience (a point of criticism among viewers from season one) who tunes in to the show to “get off ” on the depictions of lesbian sex. And, they tactically asserted themselves as the ones in control of content in a media system designed to co-opt anything that makes a profit. As a result, Bob Greenblatt has yet to make another request with regard to content, although he does weigh in on casting decisions. Additionally, ratings came back up in season three, and the show got renewed for a fourth and then a fifth season.

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Lastly, I’d like to address the strategy of horizontal integration. Unlike vertical integration—the owning by media conglomerates of everything up and down the production and distribution chain—horizontal integration is the extension of a show beyond the boundaries of television. In terms of The L Word, horizontal integration means exporting parts of the show to the Internet. For example, in season one, the character of Alice introduced viewers to her chart of lesbian hook-ups. The chart became both a symbol of how the lesbian community is often connected to each other as well as the overarching theme of the show. By season four, Alice’s chart expanded into real-time —the creation of an actual online social networking site for “lesbians, dykes, queer girls, gay women, high femmes, butches, drag kings, bois, transwomen and transmen—however we define ourselves,”59 known as OurChart.com. Additionally, the show’s popularity has also launched the creation, by Showtime, of various avatars—a 3-D virtual world that is designed to imitate the show’s environment. Participants can customize their own avatars to allow them to throw parties, interact with characters from the show, have coffee at The Planet, watch episodes of the show, and more. What these two developments point toward is the potential for change. The expansion of the show beyond the borders of television comes with some potential perks (and yes, some drawbacks). The Internet has long been touted as having limitless potential when it comes to media. As Robert W. McChesney explains, “After all, the cost of launching a website is minimal, there are millions and millions of websites, and people have access to a range of information and ideas that was simply unfathomable as recently as ten or fifteen years ago.”60 Although it remains to be seen just how the Internet will reshape the media system, it has already became evident that the Internet has the ability to subvert and undermine some of the established practices of big media.61 With regard to The L Word, and at least in terms of content, the Internet has the potential to influence what viewers and consumers have access to online and potentially how that translates into what they see on their small-screens. Arguably, as the popularity of the show gains more currency on the Internet—garnering a larger and more loyal audience and fan base —I would contend that Ilene Chaiken and her group of writers and directors would have the ability to exert more control over the content and issues raised by the show. This is, I’ll admit, a double-edged sword at times because of the expectations and feedback of those fans that Chaiken and her group will then have to negotiate. Together, these three strategies have had the effect of at least changing how The L Word does business. The indie filmmakers and directors have continued to be one of the most creative, at times the most outspoken, and inspiring groups in the media culture. It is not surprising that as the indie folks get recruited by media conglomerates to direct television their inherent skills of addressing taboo subjects, tackling marginalized issues, and representing serious content affects what we as viewers and consumers see on

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the television screen. Ultimately, the indie filmmakers presence in directing television is one of the main antidotes to Chronic Heterosexual Fatigue Syndrome. But is this a blip? Or, is this the beginning of a continued viable (i.e., profitable) presence of queer-themed media? In the moments in which I am not under the influence of Chronic Heterosexual Fatigue Syndrome, I tend to think that the presence of queer-themed media is here to stay and is quite profitable. In what form and with what consequences to queer communities, I think, are the real questions. Queer cinema, for example, has tended to be way ahead of the mainstream in how they deal with and represent gay and lesbian characters. And as Levy explains, “in the late 1990s, Hollywood finally began to take notice of the new gay [and lesbian] lifestyles, which resulted in movies that propagated a revised gay [and lesbian] image.”62 For example, gay and lesbian characters are rarely now portrayed as “tortured perverts” or “diseased victims,” and films, at least, have moved further and further away from “swishy queen humor” to more complex and substantive dramas.63 At present, representations of gay, and to a lesser extent lesbian, characters on network television tend to be cast as charming, loveable, emotionally accessible, playful, at times vulnerable, and often unapologetic—or in other words, still quite nonthreatening to mainstream expectations. Arguably the unstated justification for the various representations of gays and lesbians on network television comes down to the phrase: “It’s business, not politics.” As Katherine Sender explains with regard to gay marketing, “With the claim that gay marketing is a matter of ‘business, not politics,’ marketers have attempted to establish a commonsense idea that the business of gay marketing can be considered independently of the politics of gay rights, identity, and visibility, [a view that shows like Queer as Folk and The L Word clearly contest].”64 Understandably, media conglomerates are counting on this mantra to apply to television content as well. By separating business from politics, media companies can appeal to an economic model in which financial decisions can be made free from political motivations and ramifications, and most importantly, where networks can reach new consumers and generate increased profits independently of any impact this activity might have on social relations or cultural politics.65 But the reality is that there is no escape from politics. Consequently, as the trite saying goes, only time will tell, with regard to how much politics make it into our living rooms in the near future. But for my money, the amount of politics the media companies have already allowed and the amount of politics indie filmmakers and directors have incorporated has already shifted. And this shift could not have happened without the success of cable shows such as Sex and the City, Queer as Folk, and The L Word and the increasing influence of indie filmmakers and directors on the content and business of television.

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NOTES 1. Darrell Y. Hamamoto, “How to Rob: Strong-Arming Our Way to Equity and Diversity,” Critical Studies in Media Communication (2001) 18:109–115. 2. Queer is used in this chapter as a sort of shorthand to include and refer to all members of the LGBT community. I use the term whenever I refer to the entire queer community instead of using the more cumbersome acronym LGBT (which is limiting as well because it fails to include allies, intersex, and questioning individuals, making the acronym LGBTIQA). 3. Hamamoto, 2001, 112. 4. Ibid. 5. Ned Zeman, “Gay-per-view TV: With Will and Grace, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, and Boy Meets Boy, Prime Time Has Come Out,” Vanity Fair, December 2003, 325. 6. Gay and lesbian is used specifically to refer to gay men and lesbians and not the entire queer community. I acknowledge that this is not inclusive of all queer individuals, however, for the purposes of this article, which focuses on television content, it is the gay and lesbian culture that is currently being mainstreamed and marketed. Consequently, I will not be discussing the issues present over the lack of representation for transgender and bisexual identified individuals, for example. 7. Eric Klinenberg, “Breaking the News,” Mother Jones magazine, March/April 2007, retrieved October 6, 2007, http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2007/03/ breaking-the-news.html. 8. Ben H. Bagdikian, The Media Monopoly. Boston: Beacon Press, 2004, xx–xxi. 9. Ibid., xx. 10. Matthew McAllister, “U.S. Broadcasting Regulations,” The Museum of Broadcast Communication, retrieved October 22, 2007, http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/ F/htmlF/financialint/financialint.htm. 11. Ibid. 12. Ibid. 13. Although the term Hollywood is often connoted to mean the movie industry exclusively, Hollywood in this essay encompasses the TV industry as well. 14. Anup Shah, “Corporate Influence in the Media: Conglomerates, Mergers, Concentration of Ownership,” Global Issues, April 29, 2007, 3. http://globalissues.org/ HumanRights/Media/Corporations/Owners.asp. 15. Personal communication with Robert Sickels, Associate Professor of Film and Popular Culture, January 8, 2007. 16. Shah, 2007, 5. 17. Robert W. McChesney, “The New Global Media,” The Nation, November 11, 1999, 4. http://www.thenation.com/doc/19991129/mcchesney. 18. Bagdikian, 2004, 6. 19. Ibid., 9. 20. Ted Turner, “My Beef With Big Media,” Washington Monthly, July/August 2004. http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2004/0407_turner.html. 21. Ibid., 4. 22. Ibid., 5. 23. Mary Diamond, “Chairman Kevin J. Martin Proposes Revision to the Newspaper/Broadcast Cross-Ownership Rule,” Federal Communications Commission News,

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November 13, 2007. http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC278113A1.pdf. 24. “About Viacom,” Viacom, 2007. http://www.viacom.com/ABOUT%20VIACOM/ default.aspx. 25. “Who Owns What,” Columbia Journalism Review, June 12, 2007. http://www.cjr. org/resources/. 26. “When Was the Independent Film Industry Born,” Make Independent Films, 2007. http://www.makeindependentfilms.com/history.htm. 27. Ibid. 28. “1950–1959,” Television History: The First 75 Years, 2006. http://www.tvhistory. tv/1950–1959.htm. 29. “When Was the Independent Film Industry Born,” 2007. 30. Ibid. 31. Kenneth Turan, Sundance to Sarajevo: Film Festivals and the World They Made. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 2002, 36. 32. Ibid., 37. 33. Ibid., 41. 34. Ibid., 42. 35. “Independent Film,” Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, October 25, 2007. http://en. wikipedia.org/wiki/independent_film. 36. Malinda Lo, “Back in the Day: Coming Out with Ellen,” AfterEllen.com, April 2005. http://afterellen.com/archive/ellen/column/2005/4/backintheday.html. 37. Ibid., 3. 38. Ibid., 4. 39. Ibid. 40. Emanuel Levy, Cinema of Outsiders: The Rise of American Independent Film. New York: NYU Press, 2001, 21. 41. Ibid., 459. 42. Ibid., 463. 43. Ibid., 460. 44. Alison Glock, “She Likes to Watch,” The New York Times, February 6, 2005. http://nytimes.com/2005/02/06/arts/television/09gloc.html. 45. Ibid. 46. Levy, 2001, 463. 47. Joy Press, “Out of the Box: Indie film directors invade the TV screen,” Village Voice, August 11–17, 2004. http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0432,press,55810,1. html. 48. Ibid. 49. Ibid. 50. Ibid. 51. Ibid. 52. “News: The L-Word Renewed,” ragingwind.net/web, January 24, 2004. http:// ragingwind.net/web/renewed.html. 53. Stacey D’Erasmo, “Lesbians on Television: It’s not easy being seen,” The New York Times, January, 11, 2004. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/11/arts/ television/11DERA.html.

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54. Candace Moore, “Through Mark’s Lenses,” AfterEllen.com, April 6, 2005. http:// www.afterellen.com/archive/ellen/TV/2005/4/mark.html. 55. Ibid. 56. Ibid. 57. In Michel DeCerteau’s The Practice of Everyday Life, he explains that strategies are employed by those in power and tactic by those without power by way of timing and opportunity. 58. Moore, 2005. 59. “About the Chart,” Our Chart: Are you on it? 2007. http://www.ourchart.com/ about_the_chart. 60. Robert W. McChesney, The Problem of the Media: U.S. communication politics in the 21st century. New York: Monthly Review Press, 2004, 217. 61. For example, “the ease of copying and sharing digital music files has proven nightmarish for music industry executives [ . . . ]. The music industry is in a desperate jam, because one of the main factors that explained their domination of the global market was that it required massive networks to distribute music. With digital distribution, much of the industry’s raison d’etre is gone” (McChesney, 2004, 222). 62. Levy, 2001, 487. 63. Ibid. 64. Katherine Sender, Business, Not Politics: The Making of the Gay Market. New York: Columbia University Press, 2004, 3. 65. Ibid.

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chapter 7

Temporary Resistance: Strategies of Freelance Workers in American Network Television News Kathleen M. Ryan

Media researchers face a difficult problem: Research about newsroom workers is scant at best. From the famous “Mr. Gates” study of the 1950s to Jeremy Tunstall’s 1971 analysis of “specialist correspondents,” researchers historically have failed to get at the heart of newsroom working conditions.1 Warren Breed’s analysis of why newsroom staffers conform to corporate policies assumes reporters and editors are the employees of a publisher with a loyalty to that single publication.2 At the time of the study (1955), many of its assumptions about newsroom staffers may have been true. Fifty-plus years later, however, the nature of the newsroom has changed. Freelance and per diem work is commonplace in both print and broadcast journalism.3 Modern media workers may be employed by several competing organizations at once. Even so-called media-centric approaches prefer to look at how news is stacked rather than how news coverage is staffed. Matthew R. Kerbel dissects network and local news choices, addressing issues such as story selection, writing, and placement.4 Likewise, Richard Campbell concentrates on how story formulas contribute to the success of 60 Minutes.5 Other researchers look at story coverage, newsroom professionalism, or even the gatekeeping role of the faux news program The Daily Show.6 When workers are considered, it is in more traditional arenas such as hiring practices, gender equity, or newsroom competition.7 Matthew Erlich tied satisfaction to “winning”

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the daily local news battle. Employment status is a given in his study and not even worthy of mention.8 However, as the 2007/2008 Writers Guild (WGA) strike illustrates, employment status is an important issue for consideration. One of the key sticking points in negotiations with WGA East and both CBS and ABC in the strike was the status and pay rates of daily hire freelance workers;9 similar negotiations have been seen in other network union contracts. Current union contracts provide for up to two-thirds of the union workforce to be daily hires; with nonunion positions the wage is likely quite higher. Worker adaptive strategies are especially helpful in understanding how employees react to temporary or per diem labor patterns in American network television news.10 Documentary data gathered from broadcast industry trade publications such as Broadcasting and Cable and News Photographer is useful in order to understand the freelance mindset. A census of the magazines revealed a total of 11 articles published over a 5-year period (2000–2005); all reported freelancing to be overall beneficial for the temporary worker. But speaking directly to freelancers can also be revealing. This chapter includes a discourse analysis of interviews conducted with a small (10) group of industry executives and freelancers. The group was found through personal contacts. I worked at the network level for 11 years (3 years as an executive, 8 years as a freelance writer and producer); as a result, I personally know many freelancers and news executives. I asked people I know to talk with me and asked them to recommend others for interviews. Ten people agreed to participate in interviews; they were both union represented and nonunion freelancers. The experiences of this group of workers may not reflect that of nonnetwork or nonbroadcast freelancers but rather represents an elite corps of television workers, the “best of the best.” Nonetheless, they offer valuable insights into what to date has been a relatively hidden workforce. Network freelancers represent a new breed of resistant worker who sees self-employment as a way to maintain control and job security in a shifting and unpredictable labor market. Networks use freelancers in three different ways: in union regulated jobs, as per diem workers, and in contract jobs known in the industry as “permalancers.” Given current trends, freelancing is becoming the dominant mode of network news work. By exploring how networks employ these three different types of workers, we can understand not only the economic benefits freelancing offers the networks but also how freelancing has the potential to benefit workers. Instead of longing for full-time work, American television news freelancers report relative job satisfaction and a sense of control over their working conditions and jobs. This attitude challenges traditional assumptions about employment and television news labor.

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THE APPEAL OF ITINERANT LABOR Approaching news media through the concepts of political economy, the move to freelance labor is seen as driven by capitalistic concerns. The search for profits, ratings domination, and a maintenance of network hegemony would outweigh the needs of individual workers. Much research begins with this assumption, and, as a result, comes to the conclusion that freelancing is detrimental to the worker. Studies of freelance European media workers have looked at psychological stress, job uncertainty, and how freelancing harms working mothers.11 Gillian Ursell began tracking British freelance news workers in 1997 and found experience was devalued in order to maximize corporate profit. She describes commercial television production as a “vampire, ingesting youngsters at low prices from a large pool provided by the education system, working newcomers and established hands remorselessly, and discarding the older and less accommodating at will.”12 However, the political economy approach, that temporary hires benefit the network at the expense of the workers, fails to take into account the workers’ own reactions to itinerant jobs. Even when looking at working conditions, it views workers as ultimately being subordinated to the needs of the employer. As a result, the agency of individual workers has been obscured. In 1999, Tom Goldstein, Dean of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, said a “culture of freelance” was dominant in the United States. He saw contingent work as becoming the norm rather than the exception.13 The government defines “contingent” work as temporary, contract, or other types of nonstandard work arrangements, generally without benefits. A 2000 report by the U.S. General Accounting Office estimated 30 percent of the U.S. workforce engaged in some type of contingent labor, including consultants, self-employed workers, part-timers, and temporary or on-call workers.14 In the meantime, the nature of what may be perceived as “traditional” fulltime work is changing as well. Jill Andresky Fraser called corporate work a “white collar sweatshop,” and described a bleak world of 24/7 overwork, reduced salaries and benefits, and job insecurity. She asks, “Is there a way out of our contemporary business culture of overwork, stress, insecurity, and under-reward—both for . . . individuals and the nation at large?”15 In a 2005 report on freelancer workers, the New York-based group Freelancers Union noted job insecurity isn’t limited to temporary hires: A number of respondents noted that the difference between freelancing—in terms of benefits and economic security—and traditional work are fast eroding. Freelancing “seems no less secure than having a ‘real job’ which is no guarantee,” said one respondent . . . Many observers point to increased insecurity among all workers and on all rungs of the economic ladder . . . that now plagues the middle class as well as the working poor.16

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This perception of the instability of permanent work, as Vicki Smith notes, may not have any empirical or statistical validity.17 Nonetheless, freelancers use it as part of an arsenal of adaptive strategies to normalize their own employment risk. These strategies have been found in a variety of itinerant workers, from migrant farmworkers to Silicon Valley technology professionals.18 Freelancers socially construct perceptions of individual job security while employed in a manner that unquestionably lacks security. The perceived “risks” of freelancing are thus turned into assets. An unstable or uncertain job offers perks such as scheduling flexibility, individual autonomy, the ability to reject assignments, and greater pay. Freelance salaries vary depending upon the work involved. Per diem producers and bookers make as little as $300 per day without any overtime, benefits, or any other perks (some are able to negotiate higher day rates). By contrast, union represented freelancers earn a minimum day rate (up to $600 for 8 hours of work in current contracts, depending upon experience in the job and job category), plus extra pay for missed meals, overtime, holiday work, and additional benefits. Freelance camera and sound crews also receive a daily rental fee for the use of their personally owned equipment, which is often higher than the daily base rate. Permalancers earn a set daily rate and no overtime, but they receive benefits from the employer such as a 401K plan, health insurance, and paid vacation. They also qualify for annual raises. Permalancer pay rates are generally equivalent to staff employees in a similar position. But despite this pay variance, freelancers in all job categories embrace the belief that they can always obtain the desired amount of freelance work. They behave in many ways as a distinct class of workers, in that they have positioned themselves “against other(s) . . . whose interest(s) are different from (and usually opposed to) theirs.”19 Freelancers describe their interests and identity as different from those of staffers. But network television freelancers’ satisfaction may stem from another important aspect: They choose to work freelance over the stability of a staff job. In other words, their nontraditional job status is voluntary. Business/ economics researchers have looked at the impact of voluntary versus involuntary temporary/part-time employment for workers.20 Alec Levenson argues, “Some of the long-run changes in part-time and temporary employment may be caused by labor supply responses to other changes in the labor market . . . not all changes in part-time and temporary employment are forced on workers” (emphasis added).21 Network freelancers epitomize this line of thought; they have looked at the labor market and decided they are better off as itinerant labor. John W. Jordan categorizes these adaptive strategies as part of “the rhetoric of performativity (which) provides individual temps with a positive way to rethink and enact their workplace identity.”22 This is a provocative way of rereading the actions of temporary workers to provide them agency or

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a sense of acting rather than being acted upon. Jordan bases his concept of performativity on Judith Butler’s theories of gender identity. He says it allows temps to utilize a persona more fitting to their own needs rather than allowing the economic environment to assign them a place and a value based on negative and generic assumptions. Just as “gender proves to be performative —that is, constituting the identity it is purported to be,” . . . performative temping enables the individual to negotiate oppressive economic relationships without being consumed by ideologies that seek to define personal value through job status.23

This concept helps explain the satisfaction television freelancers derive from this sort of work, and why they seek it out as opposed to a full-time job. THE CHANGING NATURE OF NEWS GATHERING The widespread use of television news freelancers began with the explosion of cable television in the 1980s. Previously, television networks employed full-time workers for the bulk of their staff.24 The traditional newsroom structure was described by Gaye Tuchman as a “news net.”25 The idea is that news is “caught” much like fish. Big stories are followed by staff reporters and wire services, while “stringers” (aka freelancers) pick up on the smaller stories that slip through the main “net.” But in the late 1980s, the television map was radically redrawn. Cable offered competition to the “big three” networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC). In 1970, 5 percent of homes had cable; by 1990, that number was 60 percent.26 As a result, each network had new management, driven by profits rather than a consideration of news and the networks as a public trust.27 Each underwent painful (and public) downsizing and budget cuts. Radical new programs emerged, including the lauded late-night discussion program Nightline, which evolved from a series of special reports during the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis.28 But news for the first time was also expected to make, or at least not lose, money.29 Management looked at the biggest cost factor in news: labor. Employment in network television has been traditionally tied to union membership. Unions fought hard and long for well-compensated, secure jobs with an impressive package of benefits.30 But by 1987, unions allowed the freelancer, or “daily hire,” to be written into the union contract, as long as numbers remained less than 10 percent of the union work force.31 Gradually, networks increased freelance staffing; current union contracts allow for about twothirds of members at a given network to be freelance. Recent network and union negotiations have focused on both economic protections for freelancers as well as the roles and compensation union workers will receive from emerging media platforms.32

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These negotiations acknowledge that American television viewing patterns have shifted, from the traditional over-the-air network dominance to today’s multichannel/multiplatform world. In 2005, 60 percent of American households had cable television, with another 27 percent subscribing to satellite TV.33 While news viewership is declining overall, network newscasts still dominate their cable competition in terms of the all-important ratings numbers. In 2005, for instance, CBS averaged 6.6 million viewers for its nightly newscast. That number may seem paltry, but it was three times that of the top show on Fox Newschannel, the highest rated cable news outlet.34 The traditional networks not only draw more viewers than their cable competitors, they also are considered more prestigious workplaces for broadcast journalists. The conditions are more hospitable; rather than the multi– live shots of the cable universe, network reporters or producers may work on a nonbreaking news story for several days. In-depth investigative reporting is featured on news magazine programs such as 20/20 or 60 Minutes.35 Mainstream media (print, cable, Web, and broadcast) reinforce this notion of the network as something elite; witness the intense scrutiny in 2006–2007 over the perceived successes and failures of Charles Gibson (ABC), Katie Couric (CBS), and Brian Williams (NBC) as successors to long-time news anchors Peter Jennings, Dan Rather, and Tom Brokaw, respectively. The New York Times cited the Couric-anchored CBS Evening News as one of the most important shows debuting in the fall 2006 television season.36 Broadcast networks, 24-hour news channels, and local affiliates use freelancers in different ways. The 24-hour channels, because of an insatiable appetite for news, rely on freelancers to make up their staff. For instance, Cablevision’s News 12 franchise regularly advertises to fill freelance slots for its New York metro-area cablecasts.37 While the bigger outlets, such as MSNBC, Fox Newschannel, or Cable News Network (CNN), do hire people for full-time positions, that staff is supplemented by a large contingent of freelancers.38 Likewise, local broadcast stations hire freelancers on a regular basis, often “trying out” for staff jobs. By contrasts, freelancers at the networks are generally called in to fill specific positions at specific times, either on a long- or short-term basis.39 They break out into three general categories: the worker protected by union contracts, the nonunion daily hire, and freelancers hired for long-term projects. Union Protections High-skilled network television news jobs, such as photographers, editors, sound engineers, remote engineers, directors, and newswriters, have an advantage over most temporary workers. These positions are represented by a handful of trade unions: The Directors Guild of America (DGA), the Writers

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Guild of America (WGA-East), the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians/Communication Workers of America (NABETCWA), and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW). At one point, union positions were staff jobs. Now, especially after cutbacks and increased competition following deregulation, skilled freelancers find themselves in high demand. “Photographers, they’re limited. The networks don’t want the overhead. As these guys retire they’re not being replaced,” says one network executive.40 Freelance photographer Isaac Rodriguez says union membership gives him a bargaining chip when dealing with other clients: I think the union is great. It guarantees that we’re going to be paid a fair wage. You’ve got to pay for it (in dues) but so what? . . . I get calls all the time from people who want to pay me crap. When I work for networks the pay is going to be great. If you want to hire me this is what it’s going to cost.41

Nelson Navarro, a freelance lighting and remote location engineer, agrees that the unions help establish a pay base, “It maintains salaries,” he says. “There’s a certain level salaries will not go under. I try to get as much as I can, of course. But when working for the networks, it’s what they (the unions) set.”42 Lori M. Gossett’s description of the three-pronged relationship between temporary workers, employment agencies, and employers is quite applicable to the union/network/freelancer relationship in television. The union worker operates in what Gossett describes as “the space between” two organizations: the network employer and the union. She notes: In situations where there is not a clear hierarchy between the different organizational systems (both are mutually relevant), identification with the interests of one firm may be seen as a legitimate way to escape the demands of the other. In this way, organizational identification might be used as a method of member resistance rather than a mechanism of managerial control.43

In the case of the union freelancer, the union offers a means of escape from the demands of the network. Hiring flexibility only increases that demand: Workers know union membership guarantees them a minimum wage no matter where they work. Freelance union benefits also include a paid lunch hour and overtime provisions; nights and holidays earn higher pay rates. The company provides insurance reimbursement ($55 per shift for NABET-CWA members) and, if a freelancer works enough days, guarantees paid personal time. The daily hire is also protected against short turnarounds or canceled shifts.44

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Despite these union-negotiated perks, the freelancer still lacks protection from retribution by a capricious or unreasonable boss. NABET-CWA’s Taylor notes: Most daily hire employees on the job operate with absolute fear of offending any management person and fear of not getting any current work . . . they absolutely resist filing a grievance over most issues. I have spoken to daily hires that have made $90,000 one year and have had a minor argument with management or made an error and they are now only making about $7,000 from the same company.45

He fears these “economic whips” may ultimately diminish the bargaining power of NABET and other unions. But if Gossett’s theory is true, the “whips” would actually increase worker identification with the union. Freelancer resistance would be directed toward the punitive network. Each of the union freelancers I spoke with knew that it was because of the union’s collective bargaining that they were able to leave a staff job in favor of per diem work. “It seemed like a better deal than working staff because of the money. I knew I could make better money working freelance than staff, and staff has office politics,” Navarro says. Now he works for all three networks as well as the cable sports outlet ESPN. “You can do different things every day . . . Sometimes I get worried, but there’s always something else. Someone will hire you.”46 Union writer Carla Brittain works on average two to three days a week for ABC. With Writers Guild protections, she makes a good living: “This past year I made $70,000 . . . I don’t think that’s chump money.” She’s single, owns an apartment in New York and a rental in San Francisco, and has been the regular freelance “call” for the morning news division for the last nine years. Brittain turned down a staff job offer for the flexibility of freelancing. “Within reason, I can schedule myself how I want to,” she says. “Once I realized I could feed my face and be all right, I never looked for full-time work again.”47 Likewise, photographer Rodriguez isn’t looking for a staff job: “Never. It’s a quality of life issue. I enjoy having the freedom of dictating my schedule. I’m fortunate enough to be in a situation where I can do that financially as well.”48 If he held a staff job, Rodriguez would lose his scheduling freedom. He would also be prohibited from working for other television or corporate clients. Jordan describes this desire for freedom, for an identity outside of the workplace, as being characteristic of performativity: Rather than reducing an individual to his or her occupation, a performative view generates a more expansive articulation of work as only one of several possible means for self-articulation. Temping is redefined as a role a

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person can perform without being consumed by it. Expressed another way, temp performativity says “I temp” rather than “I am a temp.”49

For the union freelancer, temporary work becomes the only logical way to adjust to an uncertain and fluid workplace. Temping allows the worker a sense of control over his or her own destiny. Per Diem Producers At the other end of the freelance spectrum are nonunion producers and bookers. These workers are key to a network’s ability to move quickly on a story. Even before a reporter, camera crew, or satellite truck arrive on the scene, a local freelancer can develop contacts, research the story, and obtain exclusive interviews. It makes the network more effective at news gathering. Giselle Lamarre played up her local expertise when she first began freelancing for the networks as a field producer. She had worked in New York for the now-defunct Fox news magazine Front Page. When it was canceled, she moved to the Pacific Northwest. Rather than work for a local affiliate, the married mother of two decided to freelance for the networks: It would be really hard for me to be a parent of small children and have a staff job. I hate to insult anybody who’s doing this but I think it’s impossible to do it, if you’re a producer and there’s a breaking news story for several days or more and they expect you to go away for several days or more.50

Other freelancers use their nonpermanent status to their advantage; one tells clients she’s “booked” on days when she doesn’t want to or can’t work because of family obligations, without fear of being professionally penalized. The network never knows if the booking is another job or a school talent show. The freelancer cites the 2007 tiger mauling in San Francisco as an example. The story was unfolding on Christmas and the days following. On New Year’s Eve, all freelancers were “booked” with family commitments; a network staffer ended up covering the story that day.51 Freelancers told me they have the ability to “fire” their boss, rejecting assignments for particularly difficult supervisors in favor of more reasonable employers. They can also, if offered more than one assignment at the same time, play competing networks, or even shows within the same network, against one another. During Michael Jackson’s 2004 arrest on child molestation charges, one in-demand freelancer was observed negotiating assignments with competing networks, based upon how long a network would guarantee work. It’s important to remember that these temps don’t have the backing of a union and so are those with the least potential power. Their jobs are easily

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filled by the network. So even these small feints at resistance offer the potential for worker liberation. Jordan says Butler’s concept of performativity is especially useful in these sorts of situations because it provides: a basis for understanding how performed compliance potentially troubles the dichotomous and rigid boundaries of worker identities that are predicated on employer, peer, and social assessments of worth, and which always position temps at the bottom of power and value hierarchies that ask temps to invest more in their work roles than they will get in return.52

The ability to play one potential employer against another or to tell an employer one is “booked” (even when one is not) gives workers an alternative mode of resistance. As a result, the freelance producers and bookers I spoke with prefer their itinerant work status over the security of staff jobs. Tristan McAllister was a full-time student at the University of Oregon when he began freelancing for GMA in 2004. He started with the network as a summer intern in New York. When he returned to school, he became part of the show’s Rolodex of regular freelancers. “I’m lucky I live in the Northwest. If I lived on the East Coast I wouldn’t get any work,” he says. “I can walk up to a family and say ‘I have roots in the Northwest. I go to school in Eugene.’ It’s worked to my advantage to be here.”53 As a freelancer, McAllister’s pay rate is set by the network; at ABC that is $350 per day with no benefits or overtime. Per diem producers and bookers may work 12-hour (or longer) days during a breaking news story. Without union protections, freelance producers and bookers lack the collective clout to bargain for higher salaries. And they lack the customary cost of living increases a staffer might receive. All of this is a source of worker discontent. “In general, freelance producers have not gotten rate increases that the camera crews have or as the people who work staff jobs have,” says one nonunion freelancer, “I bet everyone at the network has gotten pay raises over the past 10 years.”54 But for freelancers, the rate has changed little since 1993, when it was $300 per day. A student like McAllister makes the same as a producer with 10 or 20 years experience. Former ABC executive Shelley Lewis notes of producers and bookers, “There are so many freelancers out there that the marketplace doesn’t support high salaries. You’re better off if you can be staff than freelance, financially at least.”55 So nonunion freelancers resort to passive-aggressive techniques to balance out the economic scales: For the networks a day’s a day. If it’s for an hour or 15 hours it’s the same rate. And really, I have to say I think it balances out well. I think relative to what everybody else has, we don’t get paid as well, but producers get paid well for what we do, for the skills we have. It’s not like we go to medical school or something. I think we make a decent wage.56

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This approach illustrates what Jordan describes as “oppositional” tactics temporary workers take in unsatisfactory job situations. He writes, oppositional positioning “offers a momentary means of resistance for frustrated temps but ultimately reinforces the system of domination through complicit acceptance of the categories and effects of the manager/temp relationship.”57 In this case, the resistance is the position that “a day’s a day,” regardless of how many hours one works. The freelancers can’t do anything to increase their salary, so they rationalize the work as “a decent wage” and convince themselves that the ratio of overtime to short shifts “balances out well.” But what happens if the freelancer only works for that network in breaking news situations, when 12+ hour days are the norm? In that case, the scale remains tipped in favor of the employer. Meanwhile, the system of unpaid overtime and a static day rate remains intact, ultimately unchallenged by the frustrated worker. Permalancers Perhaps the most interesting development in the freelance work force is the trend toward what in the industry is known as permalancers: long-term project workers, some with contracts, who work for select clients.58 Permalancers often receive benefits comparable to that of a staff employee: health and disability insurance, a 401K plan, and stock options. But a permalancer has no guarantee of work beyond the current project. One network executive says outside permalancers are a common hire on many projects, and they often get special perks: Each company has its own guidelines that it follows. If you were going to be there more than 30 weeks you got benefits. Once you find people who are good and work well and you trust you try to keep them. You’d even keep people for a few weeks on salary (between projects). You want to keep them on.59

This executive put people on hiatus between projects, keeping them eligible for the full benefit package while being temporarily unemployed and unpaid. Two or three weeks later, when the next project starts up, the permalancer would be back on the job and eligible for staff perks such as raises, vacations, and unemployment insurance. Valerie Antcliff notes that as media organizations are changing, the power to shape working conditions is also changing: It moves from the media conglomeration to the producers in charge of the show or project.60 Executives talk of doing small things to keep individuals happy, such as continuing benefits until the end of the calendar month if a worker was between projects. For the network, it’s a win–win situation. The freelancer is happy because the

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work is being recognized and rewarded. In addition, the worker can freelance for other organizations. The network gets the advantage of using a worker as projects develop without paying for excess staff during down times. Lewis agrees permalancers benefit both the network and the freelancer: Obviously it helps not just morale. It’s a question that if you have people you really like you work for the best for them. Everybody works the system the best they can for the benefit of the persons and their project. If you can bend the rules a little or make the rules a little more generous than you have to be it’s good business.61

Another network executive also uses permalancers for long-term projects and then, as she notes, “all bets are off.” But as other projects develop, the cycle repeats: “I work with people who have worked before because they know the ropes. Hence you get producers and associate producers who have benefits because they’ve worked several shows.” Some of her permalancers have worked with her for years. She doesn’t see her actions as anything extraordinary. “I think its humane . . . I think its the only decent thing to do given that the freelancer’s life is pretty unpredictable.”62 In this case, the workers are using few, if any, resistance tactics to generate improved conditions or cope with the precariousness of freelancing. It is the executive producers with traditional full-time employment who are lobbying in favor of improved freelancer conditions. Antcliff observes, “Casualization of the employment relationship in the television industry has permitted widespread discretionary decision-making on the part of (executive) producers in the organization of work.”63 Executives who hire permalancers are acknowledging the economic reality of the modern media conglomerate, while at the same time creating the illusion of full-time employment for their workers. By looking out for their own best interests (an on-call reliable work force), they have eliminated the need for performativity tactics by their workers. THE FREELANCE LIFE FOR ME? Each of the freelancers was interviewed in December 2005 and January 2006, and each confided a similar refrain: Freelancing isn’t right for everyone. It was their unique circumstances and unique employability that made freelancing viable: a college student (McAllister); a working mother needing flexible hours (Lamarre); an overbooked, highly trained, in-demand professional (Rodriguez, Navarro, Brittain). By fall 2006, only McAllister opted to leave freelancing. When he graduated from college, he accepted a reporter position at an Oregon television station.64 So, is McAllister the only freelancer to be honest about a precarious job status, and are the rest of the (economically successfully) freelancers

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engaging in a false construction of job security and satisfaction? I would argue no, given the present economic structure of television news. The October 2006 announcement of 700 job cuts at NBC, including the news division, highlights the uncertain nature of network employment.65 The freelancers I spoke with all acknowledge the problems of traditional staff employment: office politics, the expectation of always being available for a job, or the risk that a new boss will come in and “clean house,” leaving them unemployed. These freelancers all, directly or indirectly, mention an important aspect of their job status: they chose to work freelance. None had been unwillingly thrust into their temp status by corporate downsizing. By voluntarily choosing itinerant employment, these network freelancers, by extension, control their employment status. By knowing that a given job only lasts a day or a week or six months, the freelance worker doesn’t suffer from the worry that the job could go away tomorrow. Working for a variety of employers leaves them “better at managing stress because they don’t emotionally belong to the firm.”66 Those issues, combined with the ability to say no to an assignment, are incredibly empowering for a worker. David R. Roediger described race as a way low-wage, white workers positioned themselves as different from their black counterparts and argues racism is a response to “a fear of dependency on wage labor and to the necessities of capitalist work discipline.”67 Freelancers, by positioning themselves as “different” from staff employees, engage in a similar construct. Many survived network television downsizing, opted to leave full-time work at a network or local affiliate, and see no security in staff employment. They feel their position is “better” than that of a staffer, regardless of its economic benefits for the employer. However, this analysis comes with a caveat. The freelancers interviewed represent only a small elite segment of the freelance network television work force. The interviews were conducted before NBC’s recent job reductions and the WGA West strike. The concerns that led to these two events (an increasingly fragmented audience for traditional television and cable programming, networks’ search for alternative revenue sources, the need for cheaper programming) will likely continue to intensify as additional media platforms emerge. Freelancers, especially those unprotected by union contracts, could be caught in an economic crunch as cash-strapped networks seek to further pare costs. This could result in lower salaries, fewer benefits, or a combination of the two. The 2006 Freelancer Union Report says that access to affordable health insurance “is one of the most difficult challenges independent works face.”68 Cable television has already seen permalancer protests at the MTV networks over eroding benefits and an intervention by the Producer’s Guild on the behalf of members working at the E! cable channel, which is not a signatory to Guild contracts.69 Similar actions could take place at the network news divisions if freelancer interests aren’t protected.

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To get an idea of the future of network television news, it is instructive to look at how modern motion picture studios and production companies operate. Few creative and technical workers are full-time employees; most are hired for the duration of a given film’s production (or for the length of time that their skills are needed in the production process). The networks seem to be heading down a similar path. Virtually none of the photography and sound crews the networks employ are full-time staffers. While staff reporters and producers do exist, freelancers are found in these jobs as well, more frequently than in the past.70 To succeed, the freelancer adapts less to the culture of a corporation and more to the culture of the individual. Television news workers, freelance or staff, have little control over the types of stories that are covered by networks. So, instead of being forced to cover “non-news” (celebrity rap sheets, missing white girls, etc.), freelancers instead reject or accept work depending upon mood, availability, or need for money. The desire for celebrity coverage, especially in the morning news programs such as the ever-expanding Today show (4+ hours at the time of writing), means networks will inevitably turn to more freelancers for work. The Michael Jackson trial in 2005, for example, provided work for a virtual army of freelancers hired only for the duration of the trial; extras were brought in for “important” days, such as the arraignment or when the verdict was to be read. Freelancers also are vital during the short-term breaking news stories that increasingly make up the bulk of news coverage, such as the 2007 California wildfires or Hurricane Katrina. However, because of the time commitment and expense needed to pursue a story, long-term investigative pieces may fall by the wayside in the freelance-dominated newsworld. Networks may be unwilling to hire a worker to investigate a story with no guarantee of a final product. The use of freelancers, rather than the individual freelancer, may contribute to the increasing trivialization in news. Does this signal the decline and fall of network news? Not necessarily; instead, it would appear that freelancers reflect a shifting type of news gathering. Rather than the traditional bureau set-up, with permanent workers on call waiting to travel to a story’s location, the freelance model gives a network a collection of people around the globe. It offers the flexibility to quickly move to a developing news story or to cover a feature piece without the expense of flying a network crew to a location. However, as the anecdotes from MTV and E! illustrate, without national universal health coverage/benefits or benevolent employers, union protections may be the best way to protect the freelance worker. Drawing from the film industry model, where studios hire unionized workers at negotiated minimum rates, union contracts offer a bit of additional stability for a worker holding a precarious job status. It levels the playing field for workers. The freelance worker occupies an interesting role. On the one hand, freelancers work at the whim of the media. On the other, freelancers hold

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immense power. Without freelancers, networks would be unable to cover news stories in a competitive manner. A network that doesn’t react quickly in a breaking news situation could lose qualified help to a competitor. Worse, it could lose the respect of the viewers, who may tune to a news source offering more comprehensive coverage of an event. Networks should treat freelancers as valued resources, through strong union contracts, improved pay for nonunion per diems, and maintenance of permalancer benefits. As Jordan notes: The performativity of temp workers may be instrumental in enabling others to think reflexively and critically about what it means to perform and negotiate identity in the myriad dynamic situations encountered on a daily basis. Performed compliance certainly entails risks and does not lead to a utopian existence, but it is an effective means for individuals to survive and even subvert contingent situations.71

Successful freelancers seem to relish the power their jobs provide. The adaptive techniques they use to cope with job uncertainty allow them to find fulfillment in nontraditional and unstable career paths. NOTES 1. See David Manning White, “The Gatekeeper: A Case Study in the Selection of News,” Journalism Quarterly 27 (1950): 383–390; Jeremy Tunstall, “Specialist Correspondents: Goals, Careers, Roles,” in Approaches to Media, a Reader, ed. Oliver BoydBennett and Chris Newbold (London: Arnold Publishers, 1993), 287–293. 2. Warren Breed, “Social Control in the Newsroom: A Functional Analysis,” in Boyd-Bennett and Newbold, 277–282. 3. Growing numbers of freelance print, online, and broadcast newsworkers led the Society of Professional Journalists to establish the National Freelance Committee in May of 2004, see Wendy Hoke, “We Hear You and We Like What You’re Saying,” Quill 92– 4 (2004): 38–39. 4. Matthew R. Kerbel, If It Bleeds, It Leads: An Anatomy of Television News (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2000). 5. Richard Campbell, “Securing the Middle Ground: Reporter Formulas in “60 Minutes,” in Television: The Critical View, ed. Horace Newcomb (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), 303–321. 6. See Stephen Hess, “Media Mavens,” Culture and Society, March/April (1996): 70–78; Matthew Cecil, “Bad Apples: Paradigm Overhaul and the CNN/Time ‘Tailwind’ Story,” Journal of Communication Inquiry, 26–1 (2002): 46–59; Candy Crowley and Deborah Potter, “An Experiment Changed: TV Coverage of the 2004 Campaign,” Journalism Studies 6–2 (2005): 233–236; Daniel C. Hallin, “Commercialism and Professionalism in the American News Media,” in Mass Media and Society, ed. James Curran and Michael Gurevitch (London: Arnold Publishers, 2000), 218–237; Aaron McKain, “Not Necessarily the News: Gatekeeping, Remediation and ‘The Daily Show,’ ” Journal of American Culture, 28– 4 (2005): 415– 430.

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7. See C. A. Hollifield, “Organization vs. Professional Culture in the Newsroom: Television News Directors and Newspaper Editors’ Hiring Decisions,” Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media 45–1(2001): 92–118; IWMF, “Media Report to Women,” Voices of Women Media Leaders 33–2 (2005): 4; Matthew C. Erlich, “The Competitive Ethos in Television Newswork,” Critical Studies in Mass Communication, 12 (1995): 196–212. 8. Erlich, “The Competitive Ethos.” 9. “WGAE-ABC News Employees Approve New Contract,” Writers Guild of America East, http://www.wgaeast.org/index.php/articles/article/1186# (2007). 10. This chapter’s focus on network television news, rather than cable news outlet or local stations, is a conscious decision. Cable networks and local stations reach limited markets (those who subscribe to cable/satellite services and those within reach of a station’s broadcast signal, respectively). By comparison, the three traditional broadcast networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC, are the only ones offering several hours of daily news programming over the airwaves to the entire nation (PBS news coverage is much more limited, in terms of both hours aired and audience). 11. See Michael Ertel and others, “Adverse Pyschosocial Working Conditions and Subjective Health in Freelance Media Workers, Work and Stress, 19–3 (2005): 293– 299; Shirley Dex and others, “Freelance Workers and Contract Uncertainty: The Effects of Contractual Changes in the Television Industry,” Work, Employment and Society, 14 –2 (2000): 283–305; Lizzie Thynne, “Women in Television in the Multichannel Age,” Feminist Review, 64 Spring (2000): 65–82. 12. Gillian Ursell, “Creating Value and Valuing Creation in Contemporary UK Television: Or ‘Dumbing Down’ the Workforce,” Journalism Studies, 4 –1 (2003): 38. 13. Tom Goldstein, “Speech to the Society of American Travel Writers,” in O’Dwyer’s PR Services Report, December, 4 (1999). 14. General Accounting Office, “Contingent Workers’ Incomes and Benefits Lag Behind Those of the Rest of the Workforce” (Washington, D.C.: GAO, 2000). 15. Jill Andresky Fraser, White Collar Sweat-Shop: The Deterioration of Work and its Rewards in Corporate America (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2001), 16. 16. Freelancers Union, Working Today: The Rise of the Freelance Class (New York: Freelancers Union, 2005), 8. 17. Vicki Smith, “New Forms of Work Organization,” Annual Review of Sociology, 23 (1997): 331. 18. See Gretchen Purser, “Curbside Contenders: Dignity and Distancing Among Immigrant Day Laborers,” American Sociological Association Annual Meeting (Philadelphia, August 12, 2005); Jonathan Isler, “Normalizing Risk and Uncertainty: Web Workers Adapt to Employment Instability and Insecurity in the New Economy,” American Sociological Association Annual Meeting (Philadelphia, August 11, 2005). 19. Edward P. Tompson, Making of the English Working Class (New York: Vintage Books, 1966), 10. 20. See Alec R. Levenson, “Long-run Trends in Part-Time and Temporary Employment: Toward an Understanding,” in On the Job: Is Long-Term Employment a Thing of the Past?, ed. David Neumark (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2000), 335–397; Henry S. Farber, “Alternative and Part-Time Employment: Arrangement as a Response to Job Loss,” in On the Job, 398– 426.

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21. Levenson, “Long-run Trends,” 336. 22. John W. Jordan, “Sabotage or Performed Compliance: Rhetorics of Resistance in Temp Worker Discourse,” Quarterly Journal of Speech, 80–1 (2003): 24. 23. Jordan, “Sabotage or Performed Compliance,” 35. 24. See Ken Auletta, Three Blind Mice: How the TV Networks Lost Their Way (New York: Vintage Books, 1992); Edward Bliss, Jr., Now the News: The Story of Broadcast Journalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1991). 25. Gaye Tuchman, Making News: A Study in the Construction of Reality (New York: Free Press, 1978). 26. Bliss, Now the News, 435. 27. Auletta, Three Blind Mice. 28. Bliss, Now the News. 29. Auletta, Three Blind Mice. 30. Janet Wasko, “Trade Unions and Broadcasting: A Case Study of the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians,” in The Critical Communications Review Volume I: Labor, the Working Class and the Media, ed. Vincent Mosco and Janet Wasko (New Jersey: Ablex Publishing Corporation, 1983), 85–113. 31. Ray Taylor, e-mail correspondence with author (2005). 32. See Dave McNary, “CBS, IBEW Extend Contract, Daily Variety, January 24 (2007): 6; “WGAE-ABC News Employees Approve New Contract,” Writer’s Guild of America East, http://www.wgaeast.org/index.php/articles/article/1186# (2007); Michael Cieply, “Both Sides in Writer’s Strike See New-Media Future at Stake,” New York Times November 30 (2007): C1. 33. J. D. Power & Associates, 2005 Residential Cable/Satellite TV Satisfaction Study, (Westlake Village, CA: J.D. Power & Associates, 2005). 34. Michele Greppi, “ ‘NBC Nightly News’ Big 3’s Most Seen,” Television Week, October 10 (2005), 43. 35. Bliss, Now the News. 36. Bill Carter, “Chimps, Capers and Charming Serial Killers: The New Season— Television,” New York Times, Section 2, September 10 (2006): 98. 37. A February 16, 2006, Cablevision posting on the industry Web site http://www. tvspy.com featured these freelance listings: Traffic & Weather Reporter, Graphic Artist, and freelance Associate Producers (two). 38. Cable World and Broadcasting and Cable regularly track freelance and staff movement at cable news outlets as well as local stations. 39. See New York Post, David Buckman, June 1 (2005), “Judgment Day Planned to Avoid a Media Riot at the Jackson Verdict,” p. 76; Marin Independent Journal, Paul Liberatore, April 5 (2005), “Lion Tamer of the Jackson Media Circus,” Lexis/Nexis Academic Universe Search 11/17/05; Hadass Sheffer, “The Risks and Rewards of Freelance Careers in Media,” The Chronicle of Higher Education Chronicle Careers, http://chronicle.com/jobs/news/ (2001). 40. Network news executive (name withheld), telephone interview by author (New York, December 21, 2005). 41. Issac Rodriguez, telephone interview by author (Los Angeles, CA, December 15, 2005). 42. Nelson Navarro, telephone interview by author (Ardsley, NY, December 26, 2005).

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43. Lori M. Gossett, “Falling Between the Cracks: Control and Communication Challenges of a Temporary Workforce,” Management Communication Quarterly 19–3 (2006): 410. 44. National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians, NABET-CWA/ NBC Master Agreement 2002–2006 (2006), 277–282. 45. Taylor, e-mail. 46. Navarro, telephone interview. 47. Carla Brittain, telephone interview by author (New York, January 12, 2006). 48. Rodriguez, telephone interview. 49. Jordan, “Sabotage or Performed Compliance,” 31. 50. Gisele Lamare, telephone interview by author (Portland, OR, December 21, 2005). 51. Producer (name withheld), telephone interview by author (Eugene, OR, January 15, 2008). 52. Jordan, “Sabotage or Performed Compliance,” 30. 53. Tristan McAllister, Interview by Author (Eugene, OR, December 7, 2005). 54. Producer (name withheld), Telephone Interview by Author (Eugene, OR, December 21, 2005). 55. Shelley Lewis, Telephone Interview by Author (New York, December 20, 2005). 56. Producer (name withheld), telephone interview. 57. Jordan, “Sabotage or Performed Compliance,” 35. 58. Fraser noted the growth of “permatemps” in some industries; these workers are often contracted by a temporary employment agency and typically receive no insurance or benefits. 59. Network news executive (name withheld), telephone interview. 60. Valerie Antcliff, “Broadcasting in the 1990s: Competition, Choice and Inequality?” Media, Culture & Society, 27–6 (2005): 841–859. 61. Lewis, telephone interview. 62. Network Executive (name withheld), telephone interview by author (Eugene, OR, December 21, 2005). 63. Antcliff, “Broadcasting in the 1990s,” 857. 64. By the time of publication, McAllister had left his full-time job and returned to freelance work. 65. See Atlanta Journal Constitution, David Ho, October 20 (2006), “Prime-time Laggard NBC to Cut Jobs; Savings Will be Invested in Internet,” p. 66. 66. Richard Sennett, The Culture of the New Capitalism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006), 53. 67. David R. Roediger, The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class (London: Verso, 1991), 13. 68. Working Today, New Unionism and the Next Social Safety Net (New York: Freelancer’s Union, 2006). 69. See Brian Stelter, “MTV to Let Freelancers Stay on Its Insurance,” New York Times, December 13 (2007): C8; Richard Verrier, “E! Brings Healthcare into the Picture for Freelance Producers,” Los Angeles Times, October 2 (2007): C1. 70. Freelance workers, as mentioned earlier, are also used frequently in both local stations and cable news and entertainment news outlets. Similar concerns could also be raised for these sectors of the news industry. However, often these jobs are unrepresented by union contracts, see Stetler and Verrier. 71. Jordan, “Sabotage or Performed Compliance,” 36.

chapter 8

The Economic and Business Realities of Reality Television Richard Crew

In early 2003, as American Idol, The Bachelorette, and Joe Millionaire were racking up impressive ratings, executives at the major broadcast television networks made bold predictions about the future of reality television. “The world as we knew it is over . . . I think people will be ordering fewer dramatic pilots,” predicted Les Moonves, president of CBS Television. “The audience is never wrong. They have a huge appetite for this, and we’ve got a responsibility to satisfy that appetite,” proclaimed Sandy Grushow, the chairman of the Fox Entertainment Group.1 Then, amazingly, four months later while presenting their upcoming fall schedules to advertisers, network executives “put down reality shows as no better than schedule fillers, bad for the image of a network, bad for the business in general.”2 Fast-forward 18 months to the key November 2004 rating period, and bad news arrived for the broadcast networks: For the first time in television history, the rival cable networks attracted more viewers than the traditional networks during the primetime viewing hours.3 And during the same rating period, some very telling developments: Younger audience demographics, the ones advertisers cherish, were growing for reality shows, while older adult viewers were continuing to watch scripted comedy and drama series. Specifically, reality programs on television’s broadcast channels received top ratings among adults ages 18–49 in six of the top 10 and 11 of the top 20 shows.4 So, although cable programming now had more total primetime viewers than the major networks, reality television was drawing young viewers back to the broadcast television. This was the “audience that had been drifting away to cable channels before reality came along.”5

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There is business logic behind the foregoing statistics and executive tactics, and that will be examined later in this essay. But first, simply put, the broadcast networks had three significant problems early in the new millennium. They needed to lure back younger audiences because viewers under 35 had turned away from comedies.6 Next, the networks had to shed overhead because the expense of producing comedy and dramatic shows was increasing up to 10 percent each year.7 And as always, the networks needed to make a profit, and the trend was not positive. NBC, for example, once the king of network comedy, saw its 2005–2006 season ad sales fall by $800 million from the previous year.8 The networks found a silver bullet—one change they hoped would solve their three problems: reality television. During the 2005–2006 television season, broadcasters added 51 reality programs to their schedules and lower cost, unscripted television programming became the life-blood of free TV in the United States.9 Ted Magder, who studies the international trade in media products, concludes, “Reality TV may have captured the attention of audiences, but it also looks good on the books and balance sheets of those whose business is television.”10 This chapter examines reality television from an economic and business perspective. It tracks the business reasons for the initiation of reality television in the 1950s, the economic reasons for its growth and success from the 1980s forward, and finally the reason there is an international element in almost every new reality program today. The chapter concludes that television is moving toward a two-tiered system: In the near future the broadcast and cable networks will primarily offer lower-cost reality shows, sports, and game shows, while premium pay services such as HBO will continue to become the home of scripted drama and comedy. REALITY PROGRAMS NECESSARY FOR TELEVISION’S EARLY GROWTH From the 1950s—when the NBC, CBS, and ABC oligopoly emerged—and into the 1980s, there were two dominant program forms: the sitcom and the drama.11 Modest innovations occurred from time to time, as when the sitcom stretched the definition of family (such as Three’s Company and Will & Grace), and the drama added serial elements (Hill Street Blues, Grey’s Anatomy). But Harvard Professor Emeritus Richard Caves, who examines entertainment economics, explains that this overall sameness in broadcast network schedules occurs because “nobody knows.” Caves borrows the phrase from the screenwriter William Goldman, suggesting that television industry executives know “a great deal about what has succeeded and failed in the past,” but their future predictions are no better than a roll of the dice.12 Therefore, as

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long as tried-and-true formats continue to work, there is little incentive to try anything totally new. Particularly when there were only three networks for viewers to choose from and only 22 hours of primetime per week, broadcasters enjoyed “demand premium” as the U.S. economy grew concurrent with the number of advertisers. Fixed supply and growing demand equaled higher advertising prices.13 The origins of reality television go back to the late 1940s when broadcasters needed to attract viewers willing and able to purchase TV sets that averaged $800 in post–World War II dollars.14 Reality-based programming filled time until network shows were accessible to larger audiences.15 Candid Camera (1948) and Truth or Consequences, starting in 1950, used hidden cameras and artificial realities to capture the reactions of ordinary people. What’s My Line? in 1940, I’ve Got a Secret in 1952, and To Tell the Truth in 1956 brought real people into the broadcast studio.16 Most of these programs were either owned or invested in by advertisers during the 1940s and 1950s. In the late 1970s, Evening Magazine and PM Magazine (the same series using different titles in different television markets) utilized newly developed portable tape equipment to create a daily video magazine featuring “ordinary people doing extraordinary things and extraordinary people doing ordinary things.”17 PM and Evening Magazine also fulfilled a business objective: to program the primetime access period at local stations, while providing enough public affairs material to satisfy the FCC’s requirement for renewing the licenses of broadcast stations.18 REALITY SHOWS LAUNCH A NETWORK In the late 1980s, the “first recognizable wave of reality-based series” emerged.19 “Fox redefined U.S. network practices by producing cheap reality programming, which could compete in a competitive environment of network, cable and independent broadcasting.”20 Fox first introduced America’s Most Wanted in 1988, a program similar to the successful British series Crimewatch UK.21 The ride-along reality series Cops followed in 1989. The cost of producing each was less than half that of scripted programs, according to Richard Kurlander, a former vice president of station programming for Petry Television. Each used the fast-evolving, portable videotape technology pioneered by Sony, did not employ professional actors, and hired nonunion “story shapers” rather than script writers.22 These reality shows got extra traction with viewers when a 22-week Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike in 1988 shut down all other scripted comedies and dramatic programs.23 As a result, network ratings for NBC, CBS, and ABC were down 9 percent, and it was estimated that the strike cost a half billion dollars in lost revenues and wages. When an agreement was finally reached 22 weeks later, it looked similar to a deal that could have been brokered before the walkout

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began.24 The fledgling Fox network gained viewers during the five-month strike primarily because of the unscripted America’s Most Wanted.25 The WGA strike was only the tip of an economic restructuring taking place in U.S. television in the late 1980s. With the growth of cable television, home video recorders, the new Fox network, and additional independent television stations going on the air, the existing television audience began to fragment. With advertising revenues spread over a larger number of distributors, the networks needed to cut programming costs. And two more business developments in the industry added to the pressure on programming overhead. Each of the big-three networks was sold in the mid-1980s, resulting in large amounts of corporate debt. Simultaneously, changes in audience measurement techniques were implemented to identify specific market segments, resulting in lower ratings for the broadcast networks.26 Reality television became a viable economic option in the 1990s.27 By putting some reality shows in their programming mix, broadcast networks could average down the cost of programming across the entire primetime schedule. The networks could keep ordering the higher priced and more popular comedies and dramas but still contain overall program costs.28 IMPORTS, HYBRIDS, AND AMATEURS America’s Funniest Home Videos premiered on U.S. television in 1990. While production expenses were kept moderate through the use of viewer-provided video, more significantly, the series was inspired by the Japanese variety show Fun Television with Kato-chan and Ken-chan. Starting with America’s Most Wanted, continuing with America’s Funniest Home Videos, and soon to follow with The Real World and then with Survivor, these “fresh” U.S. reality TV programs were “actually the result of an increased international circulation and recirculation of products through globalized media markets.”29 This reality programming trend would become more obvious from the year 2000 on, and its economic significance will be discussed later in this chapter. Nummer 28 aired on Dutch television in 1991, the first show to put strangers together in the same environment for an extended period of time while taping the resulting drama.30 One year later, The Real World debuted on the MTV cable network. As of 2008, The Real World is the longest continuously running reality television series in the United States. The landmark series combines (seemingly) hidden cameras with contrived situations (all pioneered by Candid Camera), while adding the personal revelations of What’s My Line?, the videotape techniques of PM and Evening Magazine, and the voyeuristic appeal of Cops. “The combination of techniques resulted in a format that is more structured and crafted than any that had come before.”31 It also fits reality television scholar Annette Hill’s astutely critical observation

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that television creates fresh programming by cannibalizing itself.32 The modest expense of creating a controlled environment in which young, nonactors experience living on their own together made the series affordable to MTV, which was venturing into nonmusic video programming. Over the years, the talent show, another form of reality television, has been a highly popular format, perhaps because viewers can witness a seemingly average person become a star. The first TV talent show, The Original Amateur Hour, moved from radio to TV in 1948 and “discovered” Pat Boone and Gladys Knight. Starting in 1983, Star Search “found” such stars as Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake.33 By 2008, American Idol, modeled on the British series Pop Idol, had added Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood among others to the popular music scene. Idol incorporated a twist to the talent show format by including the audition process—although this idea had been used before on Chuck Barris’s series The Gong Show, which aired from 1976 to 1978. From a business perspective, talent shows with amateur performances have significantly less overhead than ones totally scripted and acted by professionals. RESOURCE PRICES INFLUENCE PROGRAMMING If you teach a parrot to say “demand and supply,” the old joke goes, you will have trained an economist. And textbooks on economics would probably agree because the tools of demand and supply are key to understanding economic issues. In the case of television programs, demand and supply determinants help to explain the significance and impact of reality television.34 Costs, particularly resource prices, are a major factor affecting the supply of a product. When costs change, it will affect the supply of a product. In virtually every expense line of a reality television show’s production budget—from game, reality/game, talent/audition shows, to newsmagazine, talk, cooking, and home makeover shows—resource prices are lower than traditional scripted programming. Fictional programs such as comedies and dramas require highly talented writers, actors, sets, studios, and specialized production personnel. By comparison, nonfiction reality shows use smaller crews, have fewer paid performers, and require less studio and set time. In 2008 dollars, a scripted one-hour network program can cost $3 million per episode, compared to $1.5 to $2 million for a one-hour reality show.35 Cable network episode costs are moderately lower (they generally reach smaller audiences than the broadcast networks), but the differentials between scripted and reality programming are similar. Following economic theory, lower resource prices reduce production costs and increase profits—in this case, for the television networks when they buy or produce reality programming. But while the economic advantage offered by nonscripted shows is obvious, until the end of the 1990s, reality programs

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were not consistently drawing large numbers of viewers or advertiserfriendly demographics.36 REALITY TAKES OFF Spooked by the chance of another devastating writers’ strike, in 1999 CBS ordered two unscripted, strike-proof shows: Survivor, based on the Swedish show Expedition Robinson; and Big Brother, a series already a success in the United Kingdom. When the strike was averted, CBS aired both series anyway in the summer of 2000.37 Survivor was an immediate success. Drawing 51 million viewers for the final August episode, it was the second most-watched program that year. A whopping 59 percent of the advertiser-attractive adult demographic ages 18–49 were tuned to Survivor. With a first season cost of $700,000 per episode, advertisers were charged $600,000 for each commercial during the final show—twice the rate charged at the beginning of the Survivor season.38 While Big Brother had a slower start that summer, it gained popularity in subsequent seasons. One year later, with the possibility of both writers’ and actors’ strikes, CBS, Fox, and ABC execs moved more reality series into production.39 NBC, however, decided to emphasize comedy programming because it had a strong track record with shows such as Frasier, Seinfeld, and Friends.40 But even NBC, which touted 16 half-hour comedies in the late 1990s, had shrunk its comedy lineup to just four by the 2004 –2005 season.41 Perhaps because NBC had not moved aggressively enough from comedy to reality, as previously noted, its 2005–2006 ad sales were down $800 million from the previous year.42 Many important advertisers were slow in warming to reality television programming. The reality genre’s excesses in the 1990s were unattractive to prestige advertisers because shows such as Fox’s When Good Pets Go Bad tarnished the image of reality shows. The gross-out stunts on NBC’s Fear Factor, which began airing in 2001 following the success of Survivor, made it an unfavorable buy as well. And reality series prior to 2003 demonstrated they attracted lower-income audiences and didn’t score significant numbers of 18–49-year-old viewers.43 But big reality hits such as American Idol and Joe Millionaire turned that around, pulling in both large numbers of upscale and younger viewers.44 In the winter of 2003, Joe Millionaire and American Idol gave the Fox network its first February ratings victory ever for the key 18– 49-year-old demographic.45 When season two of Idol debuted on January 21, 2003, drawing 26.5 million viewers, it gave Fox its highest ratings ever except for a sporting event.46 Then the finale of Joe Millionaire on February 17, 2003, drew 34.6 million people to Fox, the highest rating in the network’s 17-year history.47

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Coming off these amazing performances, why then, as described earlier, did network executives belittle their upcoming reality shows as “schedule fillers” and “bad for the business” in May 2004?48 REALITY TV HURTS VERTICALLY INTEGRATED COMPANIES This brings us to the elephant in the boardroom. Each of the major broadcast networks is part of a larger production studio that seeks to control the production, distribution, and exhibition of their products. This is vertical integration. And these studios have historically depended on scripted dramatic and comedy series to make their operations profitable. In May 2004, network executives needed strong sales during the “upfront” selling season because the traditional fall lineup of comedies and dramas had always brought higher ad rates than reality shows.49 So, intentionally deemphasizing the rising popularity of reality shows, the network executives continued to push their scripted product. From a business perspective, reality television shows on a network schedule can actually hurt companies that are vertically integrated. The large conglomerates that own the broadcast networks depend upon scripted programs to provide long-term profits once a program series reaches 90 to 100 episodes. That’s the point when backend sales to individual TV stations (known as “syndication”), cable networks, and international markets generate secondary profits. In addition, tertiary profits could come from music, books, and other merchandising tie-ins, video games, Internet exploitation, and even theme park attractions.50 Scripted shows such as Seinfeld and Friends, for example, had billion-dollar back-end revenue. One Wall Street analyst calls this “the huge lollipop at the end of the rainbow.”51 By contrast, reality shows garner less revenue from advertisers, and even the most popular series don’t repeat well. Reality burns out much more quickly than conventional series, so reruns don’t sell well to cable or in syndication.52 Additionally, the overseas market for fully produced reality programs is small because countries that purchase nonfiction series prefer to purchase formats and produce their own culturally specific versions.53 With the networks generally resistant to reality television programming, how did it finally come to dominate primetime schedules? And why do cable networks such as MTV and Bravo build their original program lineups around reality programs? The abundance of reality programming today is best understood by looking at the determinants of demand, classically put forward by economists Alfred Marshall and Paul Samuelson.54 Two demand determinants in particular deserve examination: tastes/preferences and the availability of substitutes.

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YOUNG VIEWERS’ CHANGING TASTES AND PREFERENCES Economic theory posits that all markets are shaped by collective and individual tastes and preferences. These patterns are partly determined by culture and partly influenced by information and knowledge of products and services (including advertising).55 MTV has studied the under 25-year-old audience and dubs them “mediaactives” because “they have never known a world of limited options and forced choices: therefore they take an active role in their media experience.”56 In 2003, Betsy Frank, MTV Networks’ executive vice president of research and planning, suggested that reality television is a preview of the impact these younger audiences will have on television. Events since 2003 support her point. For example, a 2006 Nielsen Media Research report on the top 10 regularly scheduled broadcast television programs revealed that 60 percent were “unscripted.” This shows that the popularity of scripted television— sitcoms and dramas—has been declining, and reality television shows are taking their place.57 MTV discovered that relevance is everything to the “media actives.” They are the first generation to grow up with cable, particularly channels created just for them such as Nickelodeon, Disney, and MTV. Videogames have given them their own reality. And the Internet has customized a world with specific relevance for their interests. Frank suggests “anything irrelevant will not be on their media menu for long.”58 By example, MTV discovered that most of their best shows only last two or three seasons. While The Real World is an exception, the location and the cast still change every year to keep it fresh.59 TV historian Tim Brooks comments that the MTV’s program schedule is purposely slapdash. “For them to imitate the structure of a traditional network would be negative,” he observed. “That would remind teens that the network is really run by grownups.”60 These teens are bringing their media-active habits into adulthood. A 2003 study by the media research company Bolt, Inc. found that 80 percent of 12–24 year-olds say they are often online while watching television.61 Reality television capitalizes on this interest by creating Web sites that offer their viewers online experiences—some interactive —both before and after episodes appear on television. Today’s viewers under 35 are bored with the network comedy format pioneered by Lucy and Ricky that features the setup and joke sequence.62 Networks have tried tweaking the format in various ways, with only limited results. The most recent assortment of sitcom failures was the Friends spinoffs “featuring young single people quipping sardonically to one another.”63 Traditional television drama has also declined in popularity with younger viewers. This chapter’s author discovered the discontent viewers ages

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23 to 38 have with actors and scripted series when he moderated several focus groups of Survivor viewers in 2003. Expressing the opinion of most group members, one participant said Survivor is, way more interesting than a committee of writers, trying to write a show . . . If somebody wrote that a woman Boy Scout leader would decide a guy is so annoying (that) she’s not only going to deprive him of $100,000, but is willing to lose $900,000 in order to keep him from having that, it would be hard to believe . . . in a sitcom or drama.

When the group participants were asked, “What do you like about Survivor?” more anecdotes like the previous one were offered. In this research study, multiple young adult viewers clearly stated they were tired of predictable, scripted shows with actors that conveniently resolve at the end of each episode.64 In economic terms then, the tastes and preferences of television consumers under 35 have increased the demand for reality product. And a corresponding decrease in this group’s taste/preference for traditional sitcoms and drama has decreased demand for scripted programming. AVAILABILITY OF PROGRAM SUBSTITUTES Consumption choices are influenced by the alternative options facing users in the relevant marketplace. Prior to the mid-1980s, television distribution channels were scarce. Then, as the number of cable and satellite subscribers grew, the audience for the major broadcast networks grew smaller. According to Harvard economist Richard Caves, the decrease in the share of broadcast viewing has been in direct proportion to the gain in audiences by basic cable networks. The broadcast networks’ response was to reduce the cost of their programming and, thereby, the quality. At the same time, cable was upgrading their programs to serve an expanded audience.65 Three overlapping distribution systems—broadcasting, cable, and satellite TV—define television networking in 2008. And six multimedia transnational corporations actually own a majority of the important network properties across all three of these industrial sectors. With this consolidation in networking, television’s newest business model no longer favors the major broadcast networks.66 None of the broadcast networks attract more than 20 percent of the primetime audience today.67 The cable networks alone have several advantages over broadcast networks: They deliver higher quality signals (vs. over-the-air signals), they have two revenue streams—subscription and advertising vs. advertising-only for broadcast, and “they target smaller niche audiences, program and promote their brand identities to viewers all year long, and aggressively cater 24/7 to consumer needs across a wide array of programming choices.”68

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With the availability of these attractive alternative goods, the demand for the major broadcast networks’ programs continues to decrease. In 2004, broadcasters began to actually repeat episodes of popular programs within the same week, usually on Saturdays, the lowest-rated night of the week.69 At the end of 2007, NBC announced it would purchase a block of realitytype programming—up to three consecutive hours—from a well-known cable show reality producer to be telecast one evening in primetime each week.70 Another reason reality television has become attractive to the broadcast networks is that it permits the scheduling of new, inexpensive programming year-round. The cable networks had successfully counter-programmed them for many years by premiering new shows and offering new episodes of continuing programs during the summer. Most of the broadcast networks now use reality television to level the playing field in the summer, so that they also schedule new programs year-round.71 It appears that in the future, the broadcast networks will look more like the larger cable networks and vice versa, and an abundance of modest-priced reality television programs will continue to appear on all of them. NETWORK TRENDS FOR REALITY, COMEDY, AND DRAMA There are now signs that the habits of the Tivo culture —those viewers with digital video recorders (DVRs)—are working against scripted programming. As previously noted, Nielsen Media Research reported in 2006 that 6 of the top 10 regularly scheduled TV programs were unscripted (reality shows, game shows, and football). Nielsen has added another category as well: the top 10 “time-shifted” primetime TV programs. Scripted programming may be slowly disappearing from the most popular program list, but 9 out of the top 10 Tivo-ed shows that year were scripted comedies or dramas. This suggests that viewers with DVRs watch reality and game shows “live,” as they do with sporting events, while recording scripted shows for later viewing.72 Networks and advertisers must now be concerned that, in addition to low ratings for scripted fare, commercials in certain shows are being skipped as well. If audiences for unscripted shows watch “live,” they have a better chance of seeing the commercials. And the future will probably get worse for scripted programming on the broadcast networks. Nielsen is now also reporting the top 10 broadcast programs for product placement—that is, commercial mentions or visuals of products purposely integrated into program content. Nine of the 10 shows receiving the highest number of “product mentions” were reality and game shows.73 This additional benefit that unscripted programs can offer to their sponsors may help win over any previously dubious advertisers.

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Meanwhile, premium cable channels such as HBO and Showtime are freed of the need to please advertisers because their economic model is based on monthly fees. Unique and distinctive scripted programs are appearing regularly on these networks because there is less pressure to generate nightly ratings. Some of these programs have shown they can reach significant numbers of viewers. In 1999, for example, HBO was the first cable channel to develop a series that received larger audiences than the leading series on the broadcast networks. The same series—The Sopranos—outpaced network competition many Sundays in adults ages 28 to 49 during its eight-year run. This is an extraordinary achievement because HBO is only seen in one-fourth to one-third of American homes.74 These channels attract creative writers and producers by offering greater freedom to go beyond traditional broadcast concepts.75 HBO in particular has developed a strong counter-programming strategy to fill some of the openings for scripted shows that the broadcast networks have created. HBO “has offered its subscribers The Larry Sanders Show, Sex and the City, and Curb Your Enthusiasm, which, like The Mary Tyler Moore Show, All in the Family, and Seinfeld, are comic commentaries on contemporary American manners and culture.”76 The network regularly creates made-forTV films that rival the quality and scope of those normally shown in movie theaters, and its high-quality dramas, such as The Sopranos and The Wire, receive praise from critics and subscribers alike. From his study of HBO’s programming, Al Auster concludes, “there seems little doubt that along with dominating the Emmy Awards each year, HBO will continue to be the venue where the must-see shows will be found.”77 While one current programming trend is the production of high-quality, scripted programming on the premium cable services, another is the import of proven reality television formats from international markets. When a reality series is successful in one country, sometimes the cultural aspects can be stripped out, the template sold to the United States, and the product can be made to look like any other U.S. production. From an economic perspective, this helps mitigate the “nobody knows” conundrum: reducing uncertainty and increasing the probability of success. In comparing U.S. and international media products, Magder found that four out of five original U.S. productions fail after one season or less, whereas three out of four imported formats succeed here.78 Two of the large international syndicators of reality television to the United States are Freemantle and Endemol. Freemantle Media, the U.K. company that brought Pop Idol to the United States as American Idol, operates in foreign markets the same way as the U.S. fast food giant McDonald’s. It has subsidiaries in some countries and franchise-holders that produce local versions of product in others.79 The Dutch company Endemol has sold reality formats to many countries, including Big Brother, Survivor, and Fear Factor to the United States. Magder describes Endemol as crafting a television

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format to become “an international brand with distinctive and carefully modulated local variations—the formula tweaked from country to country, like the sugar content in Coca-Cola.”80 These companies will continue to bring overseas products to the United States because the problems of new reality series can frequently be avoided by purchasing a program format that has already been successful in another culture. ADDING IT ALL UP It is conceivable that reality television could eventually go the way of the western, a TV genre hardly seen anywhere today, even here in its country of origin. But right now the economics of television favor inexpensive programming—and today’s advertiser-prized audience of adults 18– 49 doesn’t seem to mind the less costly looking shows. They say they are getting original stories and seeing original characters that professional writers can’t dream up. The quality of scripted programs on television’s premium services such as HBO suggests television may be moving toward a two-tiered system for programs. The broadcast networks, and even cable services, may continue to primarily offer lower-cost reality shows, sports, and game shows, while the premium cable services become the places that viewers can consistently find high-quality, scripted TV drama and comedy. With reality television programs elbowing scripted shows out of TV’s schedules, the Hollywood studios will not reap the large rewards that scripted TV brings with its potential for multiyear back-end sales. Because vertically integrated companies owning broadcast television networks makes less sense when the amount of scripted programming declines, one or more of the major networks could eventually be sold. But a veteran media financial analyst doesn’t believe that long-term media values will diminish significantly because the syndication business is just one of the many assets that contribute to studio profits.81 The economic and business realities point to reality programming being much more than a fad. Compared to traditional scripted programming, reality television is regularly delivering shows that appeal to younger, more upscale audiences. At the same time, reality TV can cost about half as much to produce. As far as what may someday do a better job of reaching the next young generation and meet future business and economic realities, “nobody knows.” But all signs point to reality television having a very long and dominant run on broadcast and cable networks in the United States. NOTES 1. Bill Carter, “Reality Shows Alter the Way TV Does Business,” The New York Times, January 25, 2003, 1.

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2. Bill Carter, “Even as Executives Scorn the Genre, TV Networks Still Rely on Reality,” The New York Times, May 19, 2003, Business. 3. Denise Martin, “Cable’s Neat Sweep Claims First Primetime Win Over Broadcasters,” Variety, December 8, 2004. 4. Eric Schmuckler, “Facing Reality,” Mediaweek, May 31, 2004, 32. 5. Carter, “Reality Shows Alter,” 1. 6. Bill Carter, “The Laughter is Fading in Sitcomland; Reality Shows, Costs, and Innovative Comedy Threaten a TV Staple,” The New York Times, May 24, 2004, Arts. 7. Richard E. Caves, Switching Channels: Organization and Change in TV Broadcasting (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005), 12. 8. Lynette Rice, “The Incredible Shrinking Network,” Entertainment Weekly, November 3, 2006. 9. Gary Levin, “Simple Economics,” USA Today, October 20, 2007, 3d. 10. Ted Magder, “The End of TV 101: Reality Programs, Formats, and the New Business of Television,” in Reality TV: Remaking Television Culture, ed. Susan Murray and Laurie Ouelette (New York: New York University Press, 2004), 138. 11. Gary R. Edgerton and Kyle Nicholas, “I Want My Niche TV: Genre as a Networking Strategy in the Digital Era,” in Thinking Outside the Box: A Contemporary Television Genre Reader, ed. Gary R. Edgerton and Brian G. Rose (Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky, 2005), 249. 12. Caves, Switching Channels, 5. 13. Ibid., 113. 14. Tom Genova, “TV Selling Prices,” Television History —The First 75 Years, 2006, http://www.tvhistory.tv/tv-prices.htm (January 4, 2008). 15. Claudine Morgan, “Reality Bites: The Truth Behind Reality TV,” Xpress Magazine, April 17, 2007. 16. Charles B. Slocum, “The Real History of Reality TV or, How Alan Funt Won the Cold War,” The Writers Guild of America West, http://wga.org/organizesub. aspx?id=1099 (November 20, 2007). 17. Richard Crew, “PM Magazine: A Missing Link in the Evolution of Reality Television,” Film & History, 37.2 (2007): 30. 18. Richard Kurlander, interview by author, November 13, 2007. 19. Slocum, “The Real History.” 20. Annette Hill, Reality TV: Audiences and Popular Factual Television (New York: Routledge, 2005), 17. 21. Chad Raphael, “The Political Economic Origins of Reali-TV,” in Reality TV: Remaking Television Culture, ed. Susan Murray and Laurie Ouelette (New York: New York University Press, 2004), 131. 22. Kurlander, interview. 23. Jose Adalian and Michael Schneider, “Writers’ Strike: Reality Sets In,” Variety, October 30, 2007. 24. James Surowiecki, “Striking Out,” The New Yorker, November 19, 2007, 42. 25. Jim Rutenberg, “Reality Shows May Undercut Writers’ Strike,” The New York Times, April 23, 2001, Movies. 26. Raphael, “The Political Economic Origins,” 121. 27. Hill, Reality TV, 39.

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28. Slocum, “The Real History.” 29. Raphael, “The Political Economic Origins,” 131. 30. Morgan, “Reality Bites.” 31. Slocum, “The Real History.” 32. Hill, Reality TV, 192. 33. Slocum, “The Real History.” 34. Campbell R. McConnell and Stanley L. Brue, Microeconomics (McGraw-Hill/ Irwin, 2005), 39, 46. 35. Bill Carter, “NBC to Pay Outsiders for Blocks of Programs,” The New York Times, December 3, 2007, Technology. 36. Raphael, “The Political Economic Origins,” 123. 37. Morgan, “Reality Bites.” 38. Lori Reese, “Big, Top Attraction,” Entertainment Weekly, August 24, 2000. 39. Matthew J. Smith and Andrew F. Wood, Survivor Lessons: Essays on Communication and Reality Television (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2003), 6. 40. Joe Flint, “How NBC, Out of Sync With Viewer’s Tastes, Lost Top Ratings Perch,” The Wall Street Journal, October 24, 2000, eastern edition, 1. 41. Carter, “The Laughter is Fading.” 42. Rice, “The Incredible Shrinking Network.” 43. Paul Farhi, “TV’s New Reality: Hit Shows Are Here Today, Gone Tomorrow,” The Washington Post, February 17, 2003, A section. 44. Bill Carter, “Even as Executives Scorn the Genre, TV Networks Still Rely on Reality,” The New York Times, May 19, 2003. 45. Wayne Friedman, “Sweeps Victory Whets Fox’s Appetite,” Advertising Age, February 24, 2003, 1. 46. Wade Paulsen, “American Idol Ratings Rocking the Television Industry,” Reality TV World, January 25, 2003. 47. Gary Susman, “Evan Sent,” Entertainment Weekly, February 19, 2003, TV 48. Carter, “Even as Executives Scorn.” 49. Caves, Switching Channels, 117–118. 50. Jody Simon and Arnold Peter, “Facing Reality: A New Era of Deal Making Requires Strong Negotiating Pressure by Attorneys Representing Talent in the Television Industry,” Los Angeles Lawyer, 44 (2005): 11. 51. Schmuckler, “Facing Reality,” 35. 52. Farhi, “TV’s New Reality.” 53. Caves, Switching Channels, 73. 54. Chris Rodda, “Determinants of Demand,” Economics for International Students, 2001, http://www.cr1.dircon.co.uk/TB/1/determinantsdemand.htm (December 3, 2007). 55. McConnell and Brue, Microeconomics, 43. 56. Betsy Frank, “Check Out Why Young Viewers Like Reality Programming,” Broadcasting & Cable, July 7, 2003, 7. 57. Stephen Speicher, “Tivo and TV Programming,” Core Economics, 31 December 2006, http://www.economics.com.au/?p=567 (November 20, 2007). 58. Frank, “Check Out,” 7.

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59. Allison Romano, “MTV Operating Without a Net,” Broadcasting & Cable, May 27, 2002, 22. 60. Ibid., 23. 61. Bettina Fabos, Christopher R. Martin, Richard Campbell, and Anny Rey, Media & Culture 5: An Introduction to Mass Communication, Instructor’s Resource Manual (Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2006), 73. 62. Carter, “The Laughter is Fading.” 63. Flint, “How NBC,” 1. 64. Richard E. Crew, “Viewer Interpretations of Reality Television: How Real Is Survivor for Its Viewers?” in How Real is Reality TV: Essays on Representation and Truth, ed. David S. Escoffery (Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company, Inc., 2006), 67– 68. 65. Caves, Switching Channels, 12. 66. Edgerton and Nicholas, “I Want My Niche TV,” 248. 67. Raphael, “The Political Economic Origins,” 122. 68. Edgerton and Nicholas, “I Want My Niche TV,” 248. 69. Caves, Switching Channels, 110. 70. Carter, “NBC to Pay.” 71. Schmuckler, “Facing Reality,” 32. 72. Speicher, “Tivo and TV Programming.” 73. Ibid. 74. Gary Levin, “Sopranos Muscles in,” USA Today, March 10, 2004, 3d. 75. Walter Cummins and George Gordon, Programming Our Lives: Television and American Identity (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2006), 168. 76. Al Auster, “HBO’s Approach to Generic Transformation,” in Thinking Outside the Box: A Contemporary Television Genre Reader, ed. Gary R. Edgerton and Brian G. Rose (Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2005), 245. 77. Ibid., 245. 78. Magder, “The End of TV 101,” 147. 79. Raphael, “The Political Economic Origins,” 130. 80. Magder, “The End of TV 101,” 147. 81. Schmuckler, “Facing Reality,” 35.

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chapter 9

Reality Television: The Business of Mediating (Extra)Ordinary Life Valerie Palmer-Mehta and Alina Haliliuc

It is commonplace to assert that television exists to bring audiences to advertising. There is a symbiotic relationship between the two, as popular programming produces a higher level of engagement with advertising, while poor television content negatively affects an audience’s perception of ads.1 Consequently, both television and advertising executives closely monitor ratings information and actively try to predict and capitalize on growing trends within the industry. Although some argue that demography is a poor predictor of behavior,2 this has not deterred networks and commercial leaders from attempting to reach the most sought after demographic today, 18 to 49 year olds. Currently one of the most successful ways to connect with this age group is through reality television. Once considered revolutionary, reality television has become a staple in television programming. Although the inception of the medium may be traced back to 1948 with the introduction of Allen Funt’s hidden camera show Candid Camera, and it achieved contemporaneous esteem in the late 1980s and early 1990s with shows such as Cops, America’s Most Wanted, and Real World, the recent upsurge in reality television was prompted by the hit CBS television show Survivor: Borneo (2000). The program amassed 27 million viewers, and its last three episodes garnered $50 million in advertising revenue.3 Without heavy-hitting stars or unionized writers to remunerate, CBS enjoyed a financial windfall at a time of economic difficulty in the industry and served as a model for other networks to emulate. The industry has since successfully capitalized off of spinning generic conventions in new ways, of

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which Annette Hill states, “Reality programming is an extraordinary success story, an example of television’s ability to cannibalize itself in order to survive in a commercially uncertain media environment.”4 Reality television is now traditional fare on both broadcast and subscription networks, and it regularly traverses international borders. For example, a program such as Big Brother, developed for Dutch television, has been licensed in 18 countries and is a hit in the United States and Britain. The hit British reality show Pop Idol was translated into American Idol, which has been a ratings juggernaut in the United States. The content of reality television vacillates between information and entertainment as unscripted nonstars are filmed in various contexts, such as shows involving eliminations (e.g., Survivor, Flavor of Love, Dancing with the Stars, The Apprentice, American Idol, So You Want to be a Superhero), makeovers (e.g., The Swan, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, The Pickup Artist, Beauty and the Geek, Dr. 90210), and docu-soaps (e.g., Real World, Miami Ink, American Chopper, Sunset Tan). Ironically, the success of reality television shows featuring nonstars spurred the creation of reality programming starring celebrities, referred to as celebreality. The celebrities featured, however, are typically what one would refer to as C-list; that is, those whose fame has faded or those who are seeking to boost a fledgling career. No station capitalized on this trend as much as VH1, which has significantly increased its viewership with its celebreality offerings.5 Reality television has proven to be a force in the television industry. But how long can this genre maintain its position in the market? What does the future hold for reality television? In order to make sense of what lies ahead, the contemporary state of reality television must be assessed. In what follows, we provide an overview of the most pervasive subgenres of reality programming: elimination shows, makeover shows, docu-soaps, and celebreality shows.6 We address their form and content, ratings information, and revenue generating capacity to provide a foundation for discussing the future of the genre. ELIMINATION SHOWS The elimination show is one of the most persistent and provocative forms of reality programming, from Big Brother to The Pickup Artist to America’s Next Top Model. Each program has its own unique niche, but the focus is on defeating one’s competitors and surviving stress inducing environments in order to win the competition. Often, significant prizes are attached to triumphing over one’s competitors. A winner of America’s Next Top Model, for example, receives a modeling contract and the opportunity to be featured in a nationally circulated magazine or advertisement. The elimination shows that have had the broadest impact on the subgenre to date in the United States are Survivor and American Idol. Both programs generated substantial ratings

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and advertising revenues and have served as major assets to their respective networks. The unexpected breakout success of the first season of Survivor (Survivor: Borneo) was the rock that started the avalanche of reality programming in the United States. As Bob Francis states, “Survivor demonstrated the broadcast networks were still alive, kicking, and drawing audiences. And it generated something CBS hadn’t seen in some time: buzz.”7 The first season of Survivor was scheduled to air during the summer months (May–August 2000) when scripted television was running repeats. However, after the program proved successful, its air time was moved more closely to the time frame of the traditional television season, which runs from September to April, with one exception: a new Survivor season is introduced each fall (September) and winter (January), resulting in the production of two seasons of Survivor per one season of traditional programming.8 In its fifteenth season, running from September to December 2007, Survivor: China looked similar to other Survivor seasons produced by reality television guru Mark Burnett. Sixteen cast members from different walks of life are dropped into an undeveloped and isolated location where they must forage for food and build shelters in order to “survive” the elements and each other in hopes of winning $1 million in prize money. They are given challenges through which they may achieve immunity from elimination at the tribal council, at which time cast mates vote each other off until two people are remaining. A final vote determines the winner of the competition. Rather than being a test of leadership, strength, or character, those who are deemed the most viable are often voted off quickly because they are seen to pose the greatest threat to winning. Cast mates essentially remain on the program based on their abilities to scheme and make alliances; this approach gave birth to the Survivor mantra, “Outwit. Outplay. Outlast.” This “survival of the cunning” perspective, or what some have called “Machiavellian backstabbing,” provides the program with the drama necessary to give force to the competition narrative and draws viewers in droves.9 The program was, from the start, a marketing experiment. According to Anne O’Grady, Senior Vice President of Marketing and Events for CBS, “we were more involved in Survivor than any other show launched at the network. It was a marketing project from the beginning.”10 Mark Burnett, executive producer and co-owner of the show with CBS, took an active role in pitching the show to nine sponsors before the show aired and earned a portion of the advertising revenue,11 establishing a new business model for television. Marketing strategies included enticing advertisers with the prospect of product and logo placement in on-air promotions, a desirable option in a cluttered media environment where the traditional commercial can be easily turned off. For example, Dr. Scholl’s insoles were the prize of one challenge, and first-season winner Richard Hatch was seen driving away in the newly

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launched Pontiac Aztek. Early advertisers were paid off for their faith in the potential of the program. Buzz for the first season was so great that the twohour season finale was the eleventh most-watched network broadcast of all time, and new advertisers were asked for as much as $600,000 for a 30-second spot.12 The ratings eclipsed every show on television that year except for the Superbowl.13 In 2006, the program’s top 50 sponsors spent $80.7 million in advertising.14 However, the fifteenth season of the program is seeing a decline in audience and advertising interest, although it continues to generate impressive ratings. The premiere of Survivor: China experienced a 25 percent decrease in audience from the thirteenth season (Cook Island, 2006) and a 15 percent decline from the fourteenth season (Fiji, February 2007), making it the weakest premiere in the show’s history. Yet, it still garnered over 15 million viewers and was the highest rated program of the evening, an amazing feat for a program in its fifteenth season.15 Similar to Survivor, American Idol has been enormously successful with U.S. audiences. And, like Survivor, audiences have started to show signs of fatigue with the series even as it continues to outperform competing programming. The show features everyday Americans trying out for a spot on the show using their singing ability and star quality. They are subjected to the verbal barbs of judges Randy Jackson, Paula Abdul, and Simon Cowell, which is perhaps the most interest-generating portion of the show. Unlike Survivor, this time it is viewers who get to decide who will remain on the program through a vote they cast via phone or text messaging after the judges have made the initial cuts. Those who win the competition earn a recording contract, but a popular runner-up may also be presented with a contract from a record label unaffiliated with the show. Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood, winners of season one and season four respectively, have achieved significant commercial success and artistic recognition, winning Grammy, Billboard, and American Music Awards and selling millions of records. Debuting in the summer of 2002, the initial success of American Idol was attributed to its positioning in the off-season, as other networks ran repeats of their standard programming. When the ratings of the second season exceeded the first during the regular season schedule, the television industry was rocked. The second season finale on May 21, 2003, drew over 34 million viewers. Industry insiders predicted the program could not retain its popularity over the seasons, but the ratings continued to increase, peaking with the fifth season finale, which on May 24, 2006, drew over 36 million viewers and 63 million votes, the largest in the show’s history.16 The program runs in a nontraditional format, taking up several hours on multiple nights during the week while maintaining its juggernaut ratings. As a result of its unprecedented popularity, NBC Universal Chief Executive Jeff Zucker has stated, “ ‘Idol’ is the most impactful show in television history.”17 In terms of revenue, this assertion is supported. Mike Brunker

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reports that the show’s franchise is valued at $2.5 billion, with the program earning $500 million a year in television advertising.18 Product placement is a central component of the program’s advertising business. On July 17, 2006, Mediaweek reported that the program featured 3,052 occurrences of product placement, which is three times as many placements as the second leading show with regards to such placement, NBC’s The Biggest Loser.19 Less than a year later, Nielsen Media Research reported that product placement on the show increased to 4,086 spots.20 While the sixth season witnessed a decline in ratings, the show is not likely to go away in a hurry; in its decline it still drew over 30 million viewers. Additionally, the program has been renewed up to and including a ninth season. The popularity of the Survivor and American Idol series was a surprise to most in the television industry, even their sponsoring networks. These and other similar programs have achieved success in part through casting interesting, accessible characters that are able to cultivate a sense of intimacy with audiences. Regarding the centrality of casting to reality programming, Ron Simon states, “casting is the most crucial element in the success of a reality series. In fact, reality producers refer to their cast as characters, not real people.”21 Producers go to great lengths to select just the right assortment of people. Failure to do so can result in declining ratings. Indeed, some have argued that the decline in American Idol ’s ratings in the sixth season was the result of a stale, lackluster cast. In addition to selecting captivating cast members to whom audience members can relate, intimacy with audiences is cultivated through self-disclosure in the form of the “confessional,” where cast members are asked to share how they are feeling about recent events on the program.22 Audience members become further involved in the program and begin to root for their favorite character when emotion is promoted through rapport-building events such as the confessional. In programs such as American Idol, this intimacy can be translated into votes. For instance, in the fifth and highest-rated season of American Idol, 500 million votes were cast in the duration of the season.23 The interactive nature of the program allows viewers to influence the outcome of the program, a novel concept in U.S. television, which is often beset by the norms of genre that can produce insipid and predictable programming. Audiences have demonstrated an affinity for shows whose ends cannot be predicted and for influencing the outcomes of their favorite programs. Television executives make full use of contemporary technology in promoting interest in their programs and in generating revenue for partners. Fans of American Idol, for example, are able to text message their vote, rather than simply making a call, if they are customers of Cingular Wireless, which has exclusive rights with Fox. In the fourth season, 41.5 million votes were cast using text messaging, and the total climbed to 64.5 million in the fifth season. Customers who call may utilize a toll-free number, however, those who text

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message a vote are charged applicable fees. In March of 2006, Vice President of Marketing at Cingular, John Burbank, had this to say about Cingular’s alliance with the program: “Our expectations for a record-breaking year with ‘American Idol’ is not based solely on high hopes; it is grounded in actual results that we’ve realized so far. Since we first launched much of our ‘Idol’themed content six weeks ago, Cingular has realized a significant increase in messaging results.”24 The fact that the industry has found a way to create revenue through interactive television formats, such as voting, suggests that this facet of reality programming will proliferate until it is no longer profitable. One can only expect that the partnerships between television and related industries will continue to expand, with or without American Idol and Survivor. These programs have demonstrated that audiences are interested in unpredictable and fresh programs whose endings are not already set by the norms of a genre. The very fact that such programming has achieved success by being “fresh” suggests that eventually these programs must fade away in favor of new ideas and innovative approaches to programming. Yet, this does not mean that competition-based reality programs will go away; however, they will need to be continually reinvented to remain relevant. Reinvention also will assist in generating syndication value. The ratings success of programs such as American Idol Rewind, a repackaged version of earlier seasons of American Idol, suggests that reality television programming might have appeal in syndication if updated to include such things as previously unseen footage, new interviews, and fresh behind-the-scenes information. MAKEOVER SHOWS The makeover show is a versatile subgenre powered by a strong value in the American mythos: the desire for reinvention or, at least, improvement.25 The range of transformations that viewers can witness is impressive: from individual, to family, home, and even neighborhood makeovers. In shows such as Extreme Makeover, The Biggest Loser, The Swan, Starting Over, What Not to Wear, or Ambush Makeover the body is transformed through more or less intrusive techniques ranging from haircuts and makeup, through diet and exercise, to cosmetic surgery. For example, in Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, one of the earliest and most successful style makeover shows, the target is one’s style as visible in one’s clothing and grooming, knowledge of food and wine, or apartment decoration. Released on July 24, 2003, on Bravo, at that moment a recent NBC acquisition, the show gathered record-breaking ratings for the station (3.34 million viewers at its peak in September),26 won Emmy, GLAAD, and PGA awards,27 and brought NBC over $15 million from the initial sale of the show.28 The show features in each hour-long episode a self-proclaimed heterosexual male whose apartment is in chaos, who does not groom or dress himself properly, and who cannot cook or entertain a

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culturally sophisticated conversation. All these aspects of his “style” are critiqued and then changed by a team of five gay men “who specialize in fashion, food & wine, grooming, culture, and interior design.”29 What adds to the success of the show, besides the audiences’ penchant for witnessing transformations, is the charm of the permanent cast whose members win hearts through their “genuineness.” As Adam B. Vary comments, “simply by being themselves—openly gay men who are commanding, funny, whipsmart, and disarmingly personable,” the “Fab 5” enter American homes as friends who help straight men help themselves.30 The business potential of the “Fab 5,” and that of makeover shows in general, is particularly high. Product placement is not only easy but is required by the transformation process, especially when it comes to style. Jon Lafayette, for instance, notes how such things as Crest White Strips, Bosch appliances, Target Stores, and the Denali SUV are incorporated into episodes.31 For the 2005 Australian version of the show, companies such as 3 mobile, Volvo, and David Jones paid an estimated A$800,000 each to be “associated with the program.”32 Being a subgenre that capitalizes on advice, there is also room for a “spillover” of the show into other media, such as the publication of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy: The Fab 5’s Guide to Looking Better, Cooking Better, Dressing Better, Behaving Better, and Living Better.33 The various hosts also have published books focusing on their particular specialty. Ted Allen, for example, has capitalized on his role as the program’s food specialist by publishing a recipe book.34 The limited run of the twin show, Queer Eye for the Straight Girl, during the 2005 season suggests that, although there is room for success with style makeover shows, there is also room for failure. The latter was credited to the insufficient variation from the “parent-show,” as well as to a cast whose charisma does not parallel the “Fab 5.” People magazine, for instance, states, “[Robbie] Laughlin appears ticketed for the chief quipster’s role, though he lacks the waspish wit of Straight Guy’s Carson Kressley . . . The cast is adequate, but the show comes off as a calculated Queer Eye brand extension.”35 Such comments suggest that, as in elimination shows, the charm and genuineness of the cast is crucial for the show’s continuing success. It also points to the importance of the shock value in a show, ensured in our first example by the general project: a show featuring a gay cast advising heterosexual men how to be more heterosexually desirable. Makeover shows that do not run short of shock value are those regarding bodily transformation through cosmetic surgery. Extreme Makeover, The Swan, or I Want a Famous Face all use surgeries to transform chosen “patients” into physically improved versions of themselves, beauty-pageant material, or an alias of a particular celebrity. The shock in these shows is ensured not only by the radical transformation of its participants but also by scenes of the actual surgeries. In Extreme Makeover, for example, an “Extreme Team”

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of doctors (dermatologists, eye and plastic surgeons, cosmetic dentists); fashion, hair, and makeup stylists; and personal trainers present to the viewers a shortened version of a lengthy (sometimes around six months) process of bodily transformation. The experience of “Jim,” a 35-year-old groom featured on episode four of the fourth season, demonstrates the extensive nature of the typical makeover. The ABC Web site for the program, which lists the procedures Jim endured, does not hesitate to incorporate product placement when possible: “Upper and lower eyelid lift, rhinoplasty, brow lift, hernia repair and lipo[suction] on face, abdomen, waist and love handles, LASIK eye surgery, laser hair removal, skin tag removal, 14 porcelain da Vinci crowns and veneers, gum repositioning and Zoom whitening, hair transplant and hair restoration.”36 But while the shock value may be what attracts viewers in the first place, it does not seem to do the job of maintaining their interest, as the short life of these shows testifies. Extreme Makeover ran for four seasons (2002–2005), The Swan for two, and MTV’s I Want a Famous Face only for one (2004).37 For advertisers, the appeal of this type of makeover show is also limited both in terms of opportunities for product placement and because, due to the potentially disturbing content of the program, the age range of the audience is reduced. Perhaps this is why makeover shows that feature plastic surgery, such as Dr. 90210, are turning their spotlight toward the doctor’s personal life and the pleasant outcomes of cosmetic reconstruction and do not show the struggles patients endure in the long, drawn-out process of recovering from major surgery. The drawbacks of product placement and audience age range do not exist, however, for shows that have expanded their focus from the individual person to the couple (The Beauty and the Geek), the whole family (Wife Swap, Supernanny, Nanny 911), their household (Extreme Makeover: Home Edition), and even the neighborhood (Extreme Neighborhood Makeover). Most of these shows have maintained and, in some case, even increased their popularity. Maybe the most instructive example of the business resourcefulness of makeover shows is Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. Running continuously since 2003 with an average of 15.8 million viewers per episode,38 this Emmy-award-winning show tapped into the remodeling trend fueled by cable networks such as HGTV (Home and Garden Television) and TLC (The Learning Channel) and by “a hunger for security in the post–September 11 era [combined with] a growing middle class sense of entitlement.”39 Rather than doing partial home makeovers, the show engages in a full transformation. Aided by construction firms that volunteer products and a workforce, the house of a “desperate and deserving” family, as Denise Cramsay, the show’s executive producer explains, is torn down and a new, fully furnished one is built in its stead.40 The emotional appeal of this show is ensured by the heart-wrenching family story provided in the beginning of the show and by the family’s reactions to their transformed home.

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But while emotions run high, so does the pragmatism of viewers, producers, and volunteers. As Shabnam Mogharabi notes, the show not only taps into the public’s interest in home improvement but also fuels it, remodeling not only houses but the remodeling industry itself. Coordinating producer of the show, Diane Korman, states, “the first year that Sears was with us, their business went up 35 percent. . . . We featured a company that makes misting cacti, and they had more calls than they could fulfill. Craftmaid Cabinets literally shuts down their factories for one week to make our kitchens.”41 Examples are numerous of how the volunteer companies profit financially from the exposure that the show offers them. A more enduring profit that they make, though, comes in a less quantifiable, yet financially relevant form: corporate citizenship. Whether the volunteering firms really are good corporate citizens for their communities, we do not know. But according to the program, they are our good neighbors and, as any public relations professional knows, such ethos has long-term financial value. The show’s long-term business value becomes even more evident if we consider that, unlike HGTV and TLC do-it-yourself niche programs, Home Edition targets a broader audience by focusing “on the drama of doing a four-month gutting overhaul of a rundown home in just seven days,” while families take a trip away from the construction site, sometimes to Disneyland.42 The show’s openness to younger audiences increases the possibility for diverse product placement (such as the Disney park) as well as for building brand fidelity among its young viewers, while maintaining the interest of middle-class, middle-aged audiences. In connecting with its middle-class buying audiences, the Home Edition is taking the first steps toward an interactive approach that starts to approximate a “platform” marketing strategy.43 Thus, one can go to the show’s Web site in order to find what and how a company contributed to the show and how it can be contacted. More room for interaction remains, nevertheless. Similarly, the show has started to create merchandise tie-ins, selling on its Web page a few T-shirts and mugs, but again, this also remains an avenue to be further explored. The considerable number of makeover shows, even if they do not all survive, indicates that the fascination with the topos of reinvention (whether we consider it as an American or universal one) is powerful and that shows that know how to tap into it will continue to air and to make a profit for television stations and advertising businesses alike. The previous analysis has indicated that, once again, the cast is a crucial component for success, ensuring theatricality and the emotional–humane appeal of the show. For advertising companies, the makeover shows can be oases for product-placement and firm exposure, and the openness to broader audiences only increases the business possibility for brand fidelity. What has remained relatively unexplored in makeover shows so far are the merchandise tie-ins, as well as an interactive approach to audiences.

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DOCU-SOAPS The characterization of the documentary soap opera is not uncontroversial and allows for an understanding of the genre as a locus of change rather than one of stability.44 While the issue of line-drawing remains alive for each individual show, it is generally accepted that a docu-soap draws on its documentary and soap opera parents when it comes to filming and editing, respectively. The shows combine the documentary shooting techniques of direct cinema (unsteady shots and unharmonious composition with a focus on mundane activities) with the editing techniques of soap operas (“short narrative sequences, intercuts of multiple plot lines . . . the use of musical sound track, and a focus on character personality”), which emphasize the entertaining potential of the show.45 Susan Murray and Stella Bruzzi point out that it is the entertainment versus the educational binary that best serves as a criterion for genre classification, rather than the “naturalness” of the settings, for example.46 This criterion allows us to include in the docu-soap category not only the British classics Vets in Practice and Driving School, which document the life of people in their usual settings, but it also enables the genre cohabitation of U.S. classics such as MTV’s Real World, documenting the life of a few ordinary people brought to live together, and An American Love Story, following the daily life of an African American family as it unfolds in different locations in the early 1970s.47 Real World is the uncontested champion of the docu-soap subgenre and, arguably, a pioneer of today’s conception of reality television as a whole. In the words of Marc Peyser, “Would ‘Survivor’ or ‘The Mole’ have made it on the air if ‘The Real World’ hadn’t proved that turning a camera on a bunch of nonactors without a script could be as entertaining as many sitcoms and dramas?”48 Launched on May 21, 1992, MTV’s Real World has aired 18 seasons, has the nineteenth in production and is casting already for its twentieth.49 Over the first decade, the show’s popularity has increased steadily so as to triple in 2001.50 The shows longevity seems to be attributable to the diverse character traits of the cast, which serve as the feeding ground for compelling stories. Although the show’s creators, Mary-Ellis Bunim and Jonathan Murray, deny any attempt at choosing particularly controversial demographics,51 the audiences have seen gay weddings, women going through abortions, racial mini-wars, touching stories of a cast member’s death,52 struggles with substance abuse, and a cast member living with HIV.53 While the age requirement, which is 18 to 24 years, prevents the program from attracting an even more diverse cast, it also ensures that youth-filled antics maintain ratings. As in the other previously discussed subgenres, the cast seems to be the cornerstone for the success of the docu-soaps, in this case, a cast with strong potential for the confessional and the dramatic. Such potential is missing in docu-soaps such as Sunset Tan, The Hills, or Nashville. Nashville, produced in

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2007 by Fox, builds on the format of the other two in following the daily life of white, rich, young people who, this time, try to make their way into the country music industry rather than work in a tanning salon or intern for Teen Vogue (as in Sunset Tan and The Hills, respectively). But audiences seem to have gotten enough of “cast members [who] sit around and complain about their problems despite being absurdly wealthy, [who have] forced, awkward, pausefilled dialogues.”54 After the show’s premiere broadcast finished in last place in its 9:00 P.M. (ET/PT) time period, averaging only 2.72 million viewers, and did not take off in the following two weeks, Fox decided to put the show on hiatus a couple of weeks earlier than originally intended.55 The lack of drama beyond the usual breakups and crushes, which did not bring anything else new to what The Hills, for instance, was already offering viewers through a more charismatic cast, was not enough to keep the audiences watching. In search of more original dramatic content, A&E (Arts and Entertainment) and the Discovery-owned TLC turned to “ink docu-soaps.” Inked and Miami Ink are these networks’ respective products, dueling in similar content for audiences. Both shows bring audiences into the relatively unknown life of tattoo parlors situated either inside a major Las Vegas casino or on Miami’s South Beach. The attraction comes from more than fulfilling our voyeuristic desires. In Miami Ink, Ami James and three world-class tattoo artists face the challenges of running their own business, while Inked also delights the viewers with the mounting tensions among the saloon’s “colorful” staff members. Furthermore, the drama in these shows is ensured by the client’s stories. Many see tattoos as modes of self-expression, and consequently, “people don’t get tattoos for no reason,” as Matt Gould, Miami Ink’s executive producer comments.56 There is a story behind each tattoo, and these docu-soaps capitalize on the drama in these stories. Chris Garver, senior tattooist at Miami Ink, tells how “Yesterday I had the most incredible experience. A father came in with his family and he had a 9-year-old daughter who beat cancer. He wanted to commemorate that she’s alive.”57 The tattoo artists not only give clients the desired souvenir but also a compassionate ear, transforming the salon into a place of healing through intimate confession. As the producer Matt Gould notes: “To be a tattoo artist, you not only have to have technical skills, but you have to be imaginative and be a psychiatrist as well.”58 As the clients of Miami Ink range from celebrities to tourists and regular people, the range of stories to be told and confessions to be heard have the potential to keep alive audiences’ interest in this unusual show. Although Miami Ink was blamed for damaging Discovery’s “erudite” brand identity with its sensationalism, the show is well and alive.59 Its producers are also capitalizing on the dynamism of its audiences by using a Web page to keep them involved in the show: One can submit their own tattoos, rank existing ones, take tattoo IQ tests, or write their comments on the message boards.60 Beside an increased interactivity, the lesson that the “tattoo TV”

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has to teach the docu-soap is important for the survival of the subgenre: A multilayered drama is key. A well-chosen permanent cast, the value of which Real World has proven, is crucial in providing good drama. But when the interactions between members of the permanent cast cannot hold viewers’ interest, such as in Nashville, the temporary cast, the tattoo clients in this case, can enliven the show and keep alive the audience’s curiosity. CELEBREALITY The celebreality subgenre moves away from the everyday person to feature faded or C-list celebrities seeking to jump-start their careers. This kind of programming is based on the notion that a faded celebrity can still generate interest among their fans, who are curious to see how the celebrity has fared through the years as well as how they act in supposedly nonscripted situations. Lesser-known, current celebrities can generate interest as well, if their programs are engaging, such as Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey’s Newlyweds, which focused on the couple trying to adjust to married life. A successful program will not only generate interest among an established fan base, it will ultimately create new fans. Some of the programs are heavily planned, as is the case with a program such as Scott Baio is 45 and Single, whereas other programs, such as Shooting Sizemore, which features a substance abusing Tim Sizemore, are tragically real and unpredictable. Celebreality programming has given new life to struggling networks because it is relatively inexpensive and quick to produce, while it generates meaningful ratings. Although many networks produce reality shows that feature celebrities, VH1 has done much to make this type of programming their signature style. In 2004, VH1’s ratings had reached a low point. The success of The Osbournes on sister station MTV prompted a change of approach. In 2005, VH1 offered three celebreality programs: Hogan Knows Best, Breaking Bonaduce, and Surreal Life. The experiment was successful, and the station increased its viewership by 20 percent.61 In 2006, the ratings continued to climb, increasing 14 percent from 2005.62 VH1’s performance in 2006 marked the network’s most-watched year ever. Christopher Rocchio reports, “Due to the success of its ‘Celebreality’ reality programming lineup, VH1 now ranks in the top five basic cable networks in primetime on Sundays.”63 Motivated by the success of their celebreality experiment, parent company Viacom International requested trademark status for the word “celebreality” and started using the word to refer to its block of programming featuring C-level celebrities. VH1 later expanded its offerings to include such shows as Celebrity Fit Club, Strangelove, My Fair Brady, Flavor of Love, I Love New York, Charm School, Rock of Love, Scott Baio is 45 and Single, and America’s Most Smartest Model. The network even has aired the program 20 Greatest Celebreality Moments, which features comedians commenting on clips from VH1 celebreality shows.

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When a celebreality program is successful, there is an effort to reproduce its success to commercial exhaustion. The commodification of Flavor Flav, hype man of the rap group Public Enemy, demonstrates this notion. In 2004, Flavor Flav was one of the celebrities featured in the VH1 celebreality program Surreal Life 3. His relationship with Brigitte Nielsen on the program generated so much interest that the network scheduled them both to appear in Strangelove, a 2005 show that focused on the couple trying to integrate into each other’s very different lives. Flavor Flav’s appeal continued to be so strong that the network next decided to have him star in his own dating show, similar to the reality program The Bachelor, in which one man has a bevy of women vying to be selected as his potential mate. The program was named Flavor of Love and, at first, critics evinced disparaging comments about the program. One reality television magazine referred to the program as, “the first reality tv vomit of the year.”64 However, fans were not deterred. The season finale became the highest rated program in VH1’s history at the time, drawing nearly 6 million viewers, and it was ranked first in basic cable programming in the highly desired 18 to 49 age group demographic.65 Attempting to capitalize on the popularity of the program, the network showed Flavor Flav being dumped in the reunion program by the woman he selected in season one, creating space for a second season of Flavor of Love. The finale of the second season drew even more viewers, nearly 7.5 million, again making ratings history for the network.66 Not surprisingly, a third season and various spin-offs were subsequently developed. The short-lived series Charm School featured rejects from Flavor of Love being schooled in etiquette and manners by the comedienne Mo’Nique. The multiseason series I Love New York features Tiffany Pollard, who was given the nickname “New York” by Flavor Flav in season one, looking to find love on her own reality dating program. The relentless “spinning off ” of new programs derived from other popular shows demonstrates the network’s almost desperate attempt to capitalize off of the trend of the moment. The spin-off phenomenon suggests that celebreality programming can be invigorating for fledgling networks, but it also is helpful in restarting a forgotten celebrity’s career or recouping a famous person’s marred image. Even stars whose careers peaked more than 30 years ago have been shown to provoke interest, such as Christopher Knight, the middle son from The Brady Bunch, who appeared on Surreal Life 4. His romance with first-season winner of America’s Next Top Model, Adrianne Curry, peaked sufficient fan interest that two seasons of the subsequent program featuring Knight and Curry, My Fair Brady, were produced. The example of Adrianne Curry shows that an unknown person can develop into a celebrity through, and have their fame based entirely on, reality television. The MTV program The Newlyweds essentially gave life to the careers of Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey, even as it showed their nascent marriage falling apart. Heather Mills, who was

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demonized upon her divorce with Paul McCartney, used her role on Dancing with the Stars in an effort to recoup her embattled image. The celebreality genre feeds into a viewer’s voyeuristic desire to peer into the lives of celebrities, seeing how they live their day-to-day lives or how they have fallen apart through the years. Although this type of programming can produce record-breaking ratings, it also can be difficult to sustain because once the shock value of the program has worn off, audiences can become easily bored. One approach television producers have employed to address this problem is featuring a rotating cast. Rotating cast members who appear in similar situations breathe new life into a potentially stale situation. Dancing with the Stars, for example, features different stars every season trying to win a dancing competition, thus keeping the interest level higher. Even the popularity of such commercially viable celebreality stars as Flavor Flav will eventually lose luster. Anticipating that fans will eventually tire of this character, the network introduced Rock of Love, which features Bret Michaels, lead singer of the band Poison, in a similar reality dating show situation. One can only imagine that yet another faded star will follow as audiences tire of the person featured. As celebreality stars become overexposed and passé, as their antics become predictable and their situations mundane, they must be replaced with the next star of the moment in a setting that provides variety and novelty. THE FUTURE OF REALITY TELEVISION Many have predicted the demise of reality television. As this analysis indicates, it is no doubt difficult for individual programs, as well as entire genres, to maintain a high degree of interest among media-savvy consumers in a competitive environment filled with choices. Yet, economic interests drive the market. As long as the production of reality television remains attractive to investors and inexpensive, easy, and quick to manufacture, there will be an important place for the genre in the industry. Crucial elements for investors include keeping the genre appealing and innovative so that it continues to attract a broad cross section of the American public and keeping costs down while generating ample advertising revenue. There is no doubt that the reality television genre has been profitable for networks and those who have chosen to advertise with them. The ability of reality television to draw in diverse audiences is unusual in today’s media environment. The growth of cable offerings in the 1980s fragmented audiences, making it more difficult to reach a wide range of consumers. Additionally, the increasing pluralism of the United States has meant that advertisers have to be strategic in connecting with diverse populations. Distinct cable channels have been developed to address particular demographics (e.g., Spike for men, Oxygen for women, Logo for the gay and lesbian community, BET for the black community) or particular kinds of interests (HGTV and the Food

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Network for home and garden, and food, enthusiasts, respectively). The only programming that has been able to consistently attract a broad cross section of viewers is sports. The 2007 Super Bowl, for example, drew an average of 93 million people, and 139 million people either watched all or part of the game.67 These kinds of numbers enabled CBS to charge up to $2.6 million for a 30-second commercial spot.68 The surge of reality television, while profitable and interest generating, still pales in comparison to the ratings and revenue of sports. However, it has been “the next best thing” at this time. What the most popular reality television shows have in common with sports is the ability to draw a broad cross section of people. Survivor and American Idol have themes that are interesting to people across gender, race, sexuality, and age; thus, they attract a diverse audience and achieve high ratings. Reality programs that are able to draw on universal themes, or at least themes that appeal to a nation-state’s entrenched cultural values, will be successful in the future. Reality television is well-suited to making the changes necessary to remain appealing over time because the content or form can be poached from other genres, such as drama and comedy, while simply “reinventing” it using real people in real places in real time. This relates to Hill’s comment in the introduction that reality television demonstrates television’s ability to cannibalize itself. Reality television simply takes forms that television, film, and literature have already produced countless times and situates “real” people in “real” places parroting essentially the same themes. Survivor is ultimately a derivation of the story of Gilligan’s Island (1964 –1967), Castaway (2000), and Robinson Crusoe or The Swiss Family Robinson (there are countless film and television adaptations of these literary works), but it features everyday people who have chosen to live in such an environment for a finite amount of time. This age-old story is alluring because it speaks to our desire for adventure and Americans’ desire to control (or survive) nature. The Bachelor is simply The Dating Game (1965–1973) with people living in a house for a couple of weeks instead of on a stage in a chair for half an hour. The love story theme, while perhaps not as universal as the desire for adventure, still resonates with broad audiences. Consequently, the possibilities are endless for reality television. It is the creative capacity of television writers and producers to excavate the essentially endless mine of ideas that already exist, and perhaps add a few of their own, that will ultimately determine the genre’s ability to remain engaging for audiences. The form itself is attractive to people in the industry because it provides ample opportunity for advertising revenue, while it is comparatively inexpensive to develop and produce. Advertisers desperately seek to reach consumers in a media environment filled with clutter. The remote control combined with countless network and on-demand options enables viewers to easily tune out ads, while technology such as DVR recorders, TiVo, and downloadable programming can completely eliminate the traditional commercial.

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Product placement opportunities on reality television enable alternatives to the traditional ad. The potential advertising profit for television networks is appreciable because reality television can be relatively easy and inexpensive to produce, particularly because popular personalities do not have to be remunerated. A one-hour drama such as 24, for example, costs approximately $2 million to produce, while at the same time a show like Real World costs only $300,000.69 Additionally, because reality television writers are nonunionized at this time, reality television programming can provide filler while unionized writers are on strike, thus solidifying its place in a market driven by financial interests. Previously, a drawback to reality television was its lack of appeal in syndication. Because it thrives on shock value and unpredictability, it makes sense that once the show has been aired and the audience knows the ending, it is not as enticing to watch in reruns as a program such as Seinfeld, whose comedy continually draws laughs. Executives have been strategic in finding ways to create value for reality shows in syndication by repackaging the programs. Including new narration and interviews as well as unseen footage generates fresh interest in old programs. Programs such as American Idol Rewind are demonstrating that with some retooling, repeats of favorite shows may draw impressive ratings. Even programs that have not been altered are finding a place in syndication. America’s Next Top Model, for example, has gone into syndication in its original form, and while the program is not in daily syndication, it is used in television marathons. One can only expect that television executives will become even more creative in adapting reality programs to syndication. Long term, whether reality television production will be able to keep costs down while also maintaining interest in the genre, is another matter. Grainger David points out, “Though reality began its assault on network television as the poor man’s sitcom—shows were generally thought to cost about $300,000 for a half-hour, vs. one million dollars for a scripted show—that gap has narrowed, if not disappeared.”70 Of course, cost depends to a certain degree on who is producing the program and is relative to how much revenue the show is expected to generate. Mark Burnett, who has been responsible for producing such hits as Survivor and The Apprentice, can command higher revenues to produce his programs because his track record has been so successful. However, when the margin between the cost and revenue begins to close, the genre, the producer, and the various facets of the show will have to be re-examined. Benchmarking and reassessment are essential for the success of any product, process, or company. Consequently, we should expect industry leaders and television critics to continually question the efficacy and endurance of television programs, producers, and networks. But, is it realistic to suggest the demise of the reality television genre itself ? Would one predict the end of the action adventure genre? The crime drama? The comedy? All genres ebb and flow according to the conventions established by their generic form,

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the creative capacity of those who seek to use it as a vehicle for their ideas, and the willingness of audiences to accept changes to the generic forms to which they have become accustomed. We predict that the reality television genre is here to stay, and it will be subjected to the same struggles that other generic forms face, the most pressing of which is the ability to remain relevant, imaginative, and interesting. Because the reality television genre can poach other generic forms, we predict that the genre has the ability to have a greater shelf life than others if its creative potential is exploited. The reality television genre continues to draw record number audiences, even as individual shows may fade. Each season there are winners and losers, shows that surge and shows that fade, yet, the genre itself remains intact. It is dubious that reality television will disappear, but in order to retain the ratings this genre has enjoyed, industry leaders will need to grapple with the challenge that vexes every artist: the ability to remain a creative force. NOTES 1. Todd Cunningham, Amy Shea Hall, and Charles Young, “The Advertising Magnifier Effect: An MTV Study,” Journal of Advertising Research 46 (2006): 369–80; Carl D. Marci, “A Biologically Based Measure of Emotional Engagement: Context Matters,” Journal of Advertising Research 46 (2006): 381–87. Cunningham et al. report that emotional engagement with television programs positively influences audiences’ liking of strong advertising. In other words, if advertising is strong, it receives an extra boost from popular programs; this is referred to as the magnifying effect. However, weak advertising does not experience a boost even if it is shown within the context of a popular show (378–79). Marci similarly found that commercials experience higher levels of engagement when shown in the context of successful television shows. 2. Ted D’Amico, “You Can Teach an Old Dog New Tricks: Strategies for Including Older Consumers When Selecting Media Vehicles,” Journal of Advertising Research 47 (2007): 109. 3. Annette Hill, Reality TV: Factual Entertainment and Television Audience (New York: Routledge, 2005), 3. 4. Hill, Reality TV, 39. 5. Gary Levin, “VH1 turns C-Listers into Retro-Cool Reality,” USA Today, March 20, 2005, http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2005–03–28-vh1-realityshows_x.htm. 6. Although there is obvious overlap between the subgenres, it is important to group the programs to study them further. 7. Bob Francis, “CBS’ Survivor: Immunity Champion,” Brandweek, March 12, 2001, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0BDW/is_11_42/ai_71766811. 8. For example, the second season ran from January to May 2001, the third ran October to January 2001, the fourth season aired between February and May 2002, and the fifth during September and December 2002. 9. Francis, “CBS.” 10. Francis, “CBS.” 11. Bill Carter, “ ‘Survivor’ Puts CBS in Land of Superlatives,” New York Times, August 25, 2000.

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12. Francis, “CBS.” 13. Carter, “ ‘Survivor’ Puts CBS.” 14. Edward Wyatt and Stuart Elliott, “G.M. Drops ‘Survivor’ but Says Racial Format Isn’t the Reason,” New York Times: Media and Advertising, August 31, 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/31/business/media/31adco.html. 15. Paul J. Gough, “ ‘Survivor: China’ Works Wonders for CBS,” The Hollywood Reporter, September 22, 2007, http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_dis play/news/e3i5a8c311e231b3e885325163c46ce445d. 16. Mark Sweney, “American Idol Outvotes President,” The Guardian International, May 26, 2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,1783339,00.html. 17. Bill Carter, “For Fox’s Rivals, ‘American Idol’ Remains a ‘Schoolyard Bully,’ ” New York Times. February 20, 2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/20/arts/ television/20idol.html. 18. Mike Brunker, “ ‘Idol’ Empire Conquers New Multimedia Worlds,” MSNBC. com, January 15, 2007, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16580677/. 19. Katy Bachman, “Media Ad Revenue Up 5.6% in 1Q,” Mediaweek, July 17, 2006, http://www.mediaweek.com/mw/news/recent_display.jsp?vnu_content_ id=1002840287. 20. Brunker, “ ‘Idol.’ ” 21. Ron Simon, “The Changing Definition of Reality Television,” in Thinking Outside the Box: A Contemporary Television Genre Reader, ed. Gary Edgerton and Brian G. Rose (Lexington: The University of Kentucky Press, 2005), 191. 22. The confessional can take various forms. For example, some programs provide a specific, private room where the cast mate reveals his/her feelings about happenings on the show, whereas other shows will feature a person (usually a host) asking the cast mate questions backstage in a less private setting. 23. CNN, “Underwood the New ‘American Idol,’ ” CNN.com Entertainment, May 27, 2005, http://www.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/TV/05/25/american.idol/. 24. United Press International, “Text Messaging Partners Mobile and TV,” Physorg. com, May 25, 2006, http://www.physorg.com/news67784572.html. 25. Jack Z. Bratich, “Programming Reality,” in Makeover Television. Realities Remodelled, ed. Dana Heller (New York: I.B. Tauris, 2007), 6–22. 26. Adam B. Vary, “Pride, Patriotism and Queer Eye,” The Advocate, June 22, 2004, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1589/is_2004_June_22/ai_n6146743. 27. The show won an Emmy and a GLAAD Award for Outstanding Reality Program in 2004 and 2005, respectively, as well as a Television Producer of the Year PGA Award in 2005. The Internet Movie Database (IMDB), http://www.imdb.com/ title/tt0358332/awards (accessed October 10, 2007). 28. Chris Pursell, James Hibberd, and Grego Meliss, “Fab Five’s Fortunes Rise,” Television Week, September 29, 2003. 29. IMDB.com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0358332/plotsummary (accessed October 10, 2007). 30. Vary, “Pride, Patriotism and Queer Eye.” 31. Jon Lafayette, “Bravo Tying In Products,” Television Week, November 29, 2004. 32. Andrea Sophocleous, “TV sponsors fork it out,” Australasian Business Intelligence, February 2005, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb4692/is_200502/ai_ n17494267.

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33. Ted Allen, Kyan Douglas, Thom Filicia, Carson Kressley, and Jai Rodriguez, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy: The Fab 5’s Guide to Looking Better, Cooking Better, Dressing Better, Behaving Better, and Living Better (New York: Clarkson Potter, 2004). Also available on CD and cassette. 34. Ted Allen, The Food You Want to Eat: 100 Smart, Simple Recipes (New York: Clarkson Potter, 2005). 35. People Magazine, “Queer Eye For The Straight Girl,” People, January 17, 2005. Robbie Laughlin is “The Look” specialist for the program, assisting women with the way they look from head to toe. Carson Kressley assists the men on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy with their wardrobe. His vivacious personality is often cited as a cornerstone of the program. 36. Patient biographies from the Extreme Makeover Web site. http://abc.go.com/ primetime/extrememakeover/bios/127047.html (accessed October 9, 2007). 37. Information drawn from the Internet Movie Database available at IMDB.com. 38. Shabnam Mogharabi, “Going to Extremes: The Remodeling Industry Is Abuzz with Activity, and ABC’s ‘Extreme Makeover: Home Edition’ Leads the Charge,” Pool & Spa News, October 31, 2005. 39. Dana Heller, “Reading the Makeover,” in Makeover Television: Realities Remodelled, ed. Dana Heller (New York: I.B. Tauris, 2007), 1–5. 40. Andy Dehnart, “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition Returns; ‘[Desperate] and Deserving’ Families Are Chosen,” Reality Blurred, September 30, 2007, http://www. realityblurred.com/realitytv/archives/extreme_makeover_home_edition/2007_ Sep_30_fifth_season. 41. Quoted in Mogharabi, “Going to Extremes.” 42. “A House Becomes a Home Makeover,” USA Today, February 12, 2004, http:// web.ebscohost.com/ehost/search?vid=2&hid=4&sid=47fede79-b173–4bff-873c 92ee1d78b5e6%40SRCSM1. 43. Ted Magder uses the concept of “platform” to refer to the marketing strategy used by the European Corporation Endemol in promoting the Big Diet reality show together with a Diet Magazine and an interactive Web site. Ted Magder, “The End of TV 101: Reality Programs, Formats, and the New Business of Television,” in Reality TV: Remaking Television Culture, ed. Susan Murray and Laurie Ouellette (New York: New York University Press, 2004), 137–56. 44. Susan Murray, for example, maps out the difficulties of drawing the line between documentary and docu-soaps in “I Think We Need a New Name for It. The Meeting of Documentary and Reality TV,” in Reality TV. Remaking Television Culture, ed. Susan Murray and Laurie Ouellette (New York: New York University Press, 2004), 40 –56. 45. Ibid., 42. See also Jonathan Bignell, Big Brother: Reality TV in the Twenty-First Century (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005). 46. Susan Murray, “I Think We Need a New Name”; Stella Bruzzi, New Documentary: A Critical Introduction (New York: Routledge, 2000). 47. An American Love Story aired in 1972. 48. Marc Peyser, “ ‘Real World’ After All,” Newsweek, July 2, 2001, http://web.ebsco host.com/ehost/search. 49. Andy Dehnart, “The Real World’s 15th Anniversary Is Today,” Reality Blurred, May 21, 2007, http://www.realityblurred.com/realitytv/archives/the_real_world/ 2007_May_21_15th_anniversary.

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50. Peyser. “ ‘Real World’ After All.” 51. Ibid. 52. Christopher Rocchio, “ ‘The Real World: San Diego’ Cast Reflects on Frankie Abernathy’s Death,” RealityTVWorld, June 15, 2007, http://www.realitytvworld. com/therealworld/. 53. Peyser. “ ‘Real World’ After All.” 54. Andy Dehnart, “FOX debuts docu-soap Nashville tonight,” Reality Blurred, September 14, 2007, http://www.realityblurred.com/realitytv/archives/other_shows/2007_ Sep_14_fox_nashville. 55. Christopher Rocchio, “Fox Gives ‘Nashville’ an Early Hiatus. Series to Return at a ‘Later Date,’” RealityTVWorld, September 26, 2007, http://www.realitytvworld.com/ news/fox-gives-nashville-an-early-hiatus-series-return-at-later-date-5830.php. 56. “Tattoo parlors: Indelible reality TV?” USA Today, July 19, 2005, http://web. ebscohost.com/ehost/search. 57. Quoted in “Tattoo parlors: Indelible reality TV?” 58. Quoted in “Tattoo parlors: Indelible reality TV?” 59. Abbey Klaassen, “This is the Discovery We’ve Been Looking For,” Advertising Age, October 16, 2006, http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/search. 60. Miami Ink Web site, http://tlc.discovery.com/fansites/miami-ink/miami-ink. html (accessed October 12, 2007). 61. Levin, “VH1 turns C-Listers,” paragraph 2. 62. Christopher Rocchio, “Reality TV Shows Power VH1 to its Best Ratings Year Ever,” RealityTVWorld.com, January 2, 2007, http://www.realitytvworld.com/news/ reality-tv-shows-power-vh1-its-best-ratings-year-ever-4496.php. 63. Ibid. 64. Joe Reality, “Flavor of Love Offers Up First Reality TV Vomit of the Year,” Reality TV Magazine. January 2, 2006, http://www.realitytvmagazine.com/blog/2006/01/ flavor_of_love_.html. 65. Joe Reality, “Flavor of Love Finale was VH-1’s Fighest Rated Show Ever,” Reality TV Magazine, March 14, 2006, http://www.realitytvmagazine.com/blog/2006/03/ flavor_of_love__1.html. 66. Teresa Wiltz, “Love Him, or Leave Him? Flavor Flav’s Popular Show Sets Off Passionate Debate on Comedy and Race,” Washington Post, November 2, 2006, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/01/ AR2006110103414.html. 67. Paul R. La Monica, “CBS Scores with Super Bowl Ratings,” CNN Money.com. February 5, 2007, http://money.cnn.com/2007/02/05/news/companies/super bowl_ratings/index.htm. 68. Paul R. La Monica, “Super Bowl Ads, Like the Game, Disappoint,” CNN Money. com, February 5, 2007, http://money.cnn.com/2007/02/05/news/companies/super bowlads/index.htm. 69. Magder, “The End of TV 101,” 140. 70. Grainger David, “Hollywood Hitman Reality-TV Czar Mark Burnett has Changed Television for Good—the Business Model, that is,” CNN Money.com, August 23, 2004, http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2004/ 08/23/379373/index.htm.

chapter 10

“The Way of the Gay”: Bravo TV, Lifestyle Consumption, and Promotional Culture Amy M. Corey

“The way of the gay,” a phrase commonly used in Bravo TV’s Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, refers to a sense of style and a sense of humor that gay men are thought to possess. Playful, witty, and clever, their lifestyles are both polished and fashion forward. Here, “the way of the gay” does not explicitly refer to sexuality but instead to a way of stylizing life. “The way” is not limited to a specific sexual practice but is also a way of describing more urban and refined tastes. Such tastes are commonly referred to as a metrosexual style in which “men are now encouraged to use a whole set of beauty and body care products that were traditionally associated with women.”1 Here, “straight men explore their inner girlie guy” through more sophisticated practices and products.2 Spa treatments and scents, manscaping and manicures, as well as fashion and food create a style of life through a style of consumption. However, just as gay men are commonly regarded as more polished, straight men are commonly regarded as style deficient. They must be initiated into “the way of the gay” in order to upgrade their lifestyles. In need of guidance in both product and practice, straight men are trained in the art of consumption in order to cultivate a lifestyle. Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and other Bravo TV programming, such as Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style, Top Chef, Project Runway, and Work Out center on creating a stylized life. This chapter first explores how consumption in these reality-based television programs is situated within the televisual landscape and then through the lens of lifestyle manuals. Second, some of the problems

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that arise from lifestyle consumption, including ideology and stereotyping, are addressed. Finally, Bravo TV programming is placed in the context of a larger promotional culture. REALITY-BASED TELEVISION PROGRAMMING While “casual observers and critics alike were prone to dismiss” realitybased television as banal and a passing fad, “the fad has not passed. To the contrary, reality TV—or unscripted drama, as it is sometimes called—has become an accepted program genre for prime-time network TV.”3 Although reality-based television has a pervasive presence within the televisual landscape, it occupies a precarious position in television culture. Celebrated by some as more democratic and authentic television,4 it is more often criticized— even reviled—by others who regard it as thoroughly commercial and thus debased and contrived.5 Remaining hotly contested in both the academic and popular imaginations, there is no consensus on the value or function of the programs. While consensus regarding the merit of reality-based television programming may not be possible, or even desirable, these programs clearly have a tremendous impact on television culture and culture at large. In fact, such programming is an important site for negotiating meanings and values in contemporary culture. However, these programs are not simply sites for generating ideology and identity but also sites for generating considerable revenue. In this way, reality-based programs herald significant changes in subjective, consumptive, and promotional practices. With this in mind, reality-based television programming is an extremely complicated genre. At base, its programs are hybrid, borrowing from established genres such as documentary, drama, soap opera, and game show. Within the genre itself, there are also a series of often overlapping subgenres such as game-doc, docu-soap, dating programs, and lifestyle programs. Here, the lifestyle subgenre holds particular importance because it is a significant, yet contested, site of culture, consumption, and identity. Included here are Bravo TV programs such as Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style, Top Chef, Project Runway, and of course, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. As these programs borrow generic conventions, they can also be situated within larger webs of promotional culture and cultures of self-help. The defining feature of lifestyle programs is that they are dedicated to cultivating a style of life. However, not just any style of life will do—in order to be “proper” a lifestyle must be healthful, refined, and cultured. In order to achieve the proper lifestyle through these programs, experts impart wisdom and dole out advice for every area of life. From diet and exercise to grooming and hygiene, from fashion to etiquette and to even interior design, these programs provide training in order to help individuals cultivate a “proper” self. Here, it is also important to recognize that lifestyle refers to much more than simple

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attitudes or tastes but also to specific habits and chosen practices. In this way, lifestyle specifically refers to the exercises and procedures that go into constructing an artful life. Not simply individual programs but also entire networks are devoted to lifestyle programming. For example, The Food Network, DIY, and Style Network each dedicate their programming to lifestyle through the elements of food, fashion, and design. As well, Bravo TV devotes its programming to the elements of lifestyle. “For a network that began life more than twentyfive years ago as a pay channel devoted to performing arts programming, Bravo has come a long way.”6 Bravo’s original programming now includes popular competitions such as Top Chef and Project Runway; docu-soaps such as Work Out and Flipping Out; and makeover shows such as Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style. The competitions, docu-soaps, and makeover programs all focus on the art of lifestyle. From how to get physically fit (Work Out), what to wear (Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style), what to eat (Top Chef ), how to live and even how to bathe (Queer Eye for the Straight Guy) they provide representations, motivations, and instructions toward a properly cultivated style of life. LIFESTYLE MAKEOVERS: PROPER LIVING THROUGH PROPER CONSUMPTION “Bravo’s rise from an artsy pay channel to a network of the hip and smart” was achieved by marketing a distinct style of life.7 As Bravo TV’s flagship program, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy has been credited for Bravo TV’s success.8 In fact, “Queer Eye changed the network from head to toe,” says Amy Introcaso-Davis, Bravo VP of Production and Development.9 Debuting in 2003, “in the first quarter, it’s prime time audience climbed 75%”10 and turned a critical hit into a cultural phenomenon.11 As a cultural phenomenon, Queer Eye binds proper living and proper consumption in ways that have had significant impact on promotional and consumptive practices. For instance, in its early stages, Bravo TV began “experimenting with alternate advertising deals, such as corporate sponsorships, ad exclusivity and cross-promotions with other media.”12 Queer Eye itself was “launched with small product placement deals . . . along with small salons and restaurants that don’t normally advertise on TV.”13 This kind of product placement and small business sponsorship opened new markets for lifestyle consumption, new sources of revenue for Bravo, and new potentials for sponsored product sales. In addition to being touted as the “textbook study in product placement,”14 Bravo TV was also among the first television networks to shift online content from a cost center to a revenues generator.15 These factors mark Bravo’s place in the vanguard of lifestyle promotion with Queer Eye at the forefront. According to Queer Eye’s micro site on BravoTV.com,

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They call themselves the Fab Five. They are: An interior designer, a fashion stylist, a chef, a beauty guru and someone we like to call the “concierge of cool”—who is responsible for all things hip, including music and pop culture. All five are talented, they’re gay and they’re determined to clue in the cluttered, clumsy straight men of the world. With help from family and friends, the Fab Five treat each new guy as a head-to-toe project. Soon, the straight man is educated on everything from hair products to Prada and Feng Shui to foreign films. At the end of every fashion-packed, fun-filled lifestyle makeover, a freshly scrubbed, newly enlightened guy emerges—complete with that “new man” smell! “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” is a one-hour guide to “building a better straight man”—a “make better” series designed for guys who want to get the girl, the job or just the look. With the expertise and support of “The Fab Five”—Ted Allen, Kyan Douglas, Thom Filicia, Carson Kressley and Jai Rodriguez—the makeover unfolds with a playful deconstruction of the subject’s current lifestyle and continues on as a savagely funny showcase for the hottest styles and trends in fashion, home design, grooming, food and wine, and culture.

Queer Eye provides “style upgrades” for straight men. Life-styling involves detailed attention and is motivated by “the care of the self.” In other words, the “guys” are guided through a variety of practices in order to learn how to “take care” of themselves as they are trained to use an assortment of lifestyling products. In this way, such programming can be considered among manuals for proper living. While reality-based television programming is a fairly recent phenomenon, guides concerning lifestyle and the care of the self have quite a long history. In fact, “the idea that one ought to attend to oneself, care for oneself (heautou epimeliesthai ), was actually a very ancient theme in Greek culture.”16 For instance, Greco-Roman philosophers such as Seneca (4 B.C.E.– 65 C.E.), Epectitetus (55 C.E.–135 C.E.), Marcus Aurelius (121 C.E.–180 C.E.), and Athenaeus (c. 190 C.E.) were rather preoccupied with the proper care of the self. Each focused diligent attention on all aspects of life in ways that helped to “define, in the form of knowledge and rules, a way of living, a reflective mode of relation to oneself, one’s body, to food, to wakefulness and sleep, to the various activities, and to the environment.”17 Here, a style of life is cultivated through attention to and care of oneself. In discussing Greco-Roman modes of living, Foucault identifies “technologies of the self.”18 Technologies of the self are the activities and practices that individuals choose to perform; individuals select certain practices over others in an effort to cultivate a certain body, a certain identity, a certain lifestyle. Even during Greco-Roman times, technologies of lifestyle manifested in regimes for diet, exercise, grooming, sexuality, meditation, sleep, and so

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forth. In this way, technologies of the self are technologies of lifestyle in which taking care of the self is paramount. Cultivating a lifestyle involves both training and expert advice. First, lifestyle “implies certain modes of training and modification . . . [in which] . . . every technique of production requires modification of individual conduct—not only skills but also attitudes.”19 In order to ensure proper conduct, skills, and attitudes, individuals are in need of the advice of experts. For instance, Athenaeus stated that “whether we are walking or sitting, whether we are oiling our body or taking a bath, whether we are eating, drinking—in a word, whatever we may do, during the whole course of life . . . we have need of advice for an employment of this life that is worthwhile.”20 With the guidance of experts, individuals develop a careful regimen to support the art of living in which “technologies of the self, which permit individuals to effect by their own means, or with the help of others, a certain number of operations on their own bodies and souls, thoughts, conduct, and way of being, so as to transform themselves in order to maintain a certain state of happiness, purity, wisdom, perfection, or immortality.”21 Although Greco-Roman and contemporary systems both operate on a principle of the care of the self through lifestyle training, they differ greatly in terms of the ethics at work. For instance, Greco-Roman lifestyle regimens operated on an ethic of moderation. In other words, a proper lifestyle was a moderate lifestyle.22 Individuals should be careful not to over indulge in any area of life: food, drink, rest, activity, sexual practice, and so forth. Here the choice of a moderate lifestyle formed a “state of happiness, purity, wisdom, perfection, or immortality.”23 In contrast, contemporary lifestyle manuals operate on an ethic of excess in which a proper lifestyle is developed through the purchase and use of consumer products. The choice of certain hair products over others, certain fashion designers over others, certain foods or beverages over others are what form this “state of happiness, purity, wisdom, perfection, or immortality.” In this way, contemporary manuals for proper living are actually manuals for proper consumption in which individuals must carefully select from an excess of consumer products. In sum, current lifestyle manuals differ from historical lifestyle manuals by employing an ethic of excess instead of an ethic of moderation. They comprise manuals for proper consumption rather than manuals for proper temperance. Herein lies the implication that consumer choice, rather than individual restraint, is the proper way to care for oneself and thus the path to happiness. It is also significant in that contemporary lifestyle consumption is intimately bound to contemporary television programming. At base a commercial medium, television culture is itself a culture of consumption. Viewers consume programming in ways that link programming choices to lifestyle choices. The relationships between program consumption and

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lifestyle consumption, as well as the relationships between product placement, ideology, and narrative content, set the stage for this discussion of promotional culture. QUEER EYE: A MANUAL FOR LIVING, A MANUAL FOR CONSUMPTION While the Fab Five may not be considered among the great philosophers of our time, they effectively serve as the experts who guide hapless straight men to the art of living through the art of consumption. More than a simple “male makeover,” participants undergo a transformation of requiring the “modification of individual conduct—not only skills but also attitudes” surrounding their consumptive practices.24 Consider BravoTV.com’s description of Vincent’s Queer Eye makeover, titled “For Better and For Verse: Sweet Music” (episode 106): Vincent is a studio manager by day, keyboard player and back-up vocalist for The Cleftones by night. In his heart, Vincent yearns to step out of the shadows and into the spotlight as a solo vocalist. He’ll need a little help in the areas of grooming, fashion and performance technique to get there, and along the way he hopes to surprise his wife with a less-cluttered, more livable home decor. The Fab Five’s mission: bring enough order to the chaos and polish to the performance to earn Vincent a standing ovation. Vincent is ready to break through the clutter of his apartment, enhance his fashion sense and go from back-up singer to solo star. All he needed was the help of five talented, smartly dressed queers—and honey, I ain’t talking about the Village People.

The Fab Five arrive at Vincent’s home to assess their mission. Immediately revealed is a dirty, messy, cluttered apartment. They describe his home as “pretty filthy” a “pig sty,” “a disaster,” “tragic,” and Carson even asks “have you ever seen such a clutter-fest in your life!?”25 Clearly, the “clutter-fest” supplies ample evidence of Vincent’s consumption. From unemptied trash bins to stacks of CDs, from children’s toys strewn about the floor to unwashed dishes in the sink, from closets bulging with outmoded clothes to spoiled food in the refrigerator, Vincent’s consumption is carefully displayed for the viewer. However, while Vincent is already a consumer, it is clear that he does not consume properly. As the Fab Five playfully critique all areas of Vincent’s lifestyle, they assess the food he eats, his shaving habits and grooming, his home environment, and his design sense. The Fab Five set out on their mission to transform Vincent from a clueless consumer to a cultivated one. The transformation focuses on training Vincent in new consumptive practices. Each member of the Fab Five has a specialty to “educate” Vincent.

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Queer Eye’s micro site on BravoTV.com lists Kyan Douglas as the “grooming guru,” Thom Filicia as the “design doctor,” Jai Rodriguez as the “culture vulture,” Carson Kressley as the “fashion savant,” and Ted Allen as the “food and wine connoisseur.” Also according to Queer Eye’s micro site on BravoTV. com, Vincent begins his transformation with Kyan on grooming: Another straight guy, another first-ever trip to the spa. There, Vincent gets his head professionally shaved and his scalp treated with an essentialoil mask. Aloe for the eyes, mud for the face and an impeccable manicure complete the treatment. Back home, Kyan alters his usual shave-aftershowering advice to a shave-while-showering strategy for Vincent so that his head and beard remain their softest.

Kyan brings Vincent to Paul Labrecque, a posh day spa in Manhattan. During the course of his treatments, he is taught to use various products for proper grooming. As Kyan names the benefits they provide, he is also careful to name the product itself. Not simply incorporating product placement into the program but specific product use into the narrative, Queer Eye became the “perfect vehicle for retailers.”26 Intensifying traditional notions of brand integration, “Bravo’s research and ad-sales team . . . weave advertisers’ brands within the fabric of the show.”27 Throughout Vincent’s makeover, the product content of the program is indistinguishable from the narrative content of the program. Also keeping “their involvement going during commercial breaks” through traditional advertising spots, this form of promotional storytelling is the height of brand integration.28 This move is also significant in that it transforms the relationships between promotion, advertising, and questions of control over creative content because, quite simply in Queer Eye, promotional content is narrative content. Queer Eye continues promotional storytelling as Vincent continues his transformation. According to BravoTV.com, Ted and Jai take Vincent to T Salon in search of a brew that might calm his nerves and soothe his throat. Added heat therapy comes in the form of a personal steamer, frequently used by professional singers to clear up congestion, and all-natural lozenge.

Following, we join the boys at T Salon, an upscale Manhattan tea house. Here, Vincent learns about teas to soothe the throat before a performance as well as the differences between black teas, rooibos, tisane, and more. They go to a posh sitting room for a tea tasting, complete with individual tea pots, delicate cups, and saucers. Ted and Jai also present Vincent with a selection of T Salon’s throat-soothing teas, Thayer’s Slippery Elm lozenges, and a Sharper Image personal steamer for singers. Again, product content and narrative content are clearly coupled on Queer Eye. In this relationship, Bravo

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and sponsors such as The Sharper Image engage in mutual exchange. Bravo exchanges its audience to generate not only revenue but also to receive product and thus material for its narrative content. In exchange, Bravo sells its audience to the advertisers. Such sponsorships are coveted relationships in which “lots of marketers with products in interior decorating, makeover and clothing showed interest” in “getting a piece of the ‘Eye,’ ” thus the promise of generating sales for the carefully placed products.29 On his journey, Vincent moves from spa to salon. As he does so, he receives several “hip tips.” These are guidelines such as “bag the bag, loose tea is best” and are designed to provide advice for future consumption for Vincent as well as viewers.30 With a trip to Bed Bath & Beyond, Thom imparts another hip tip: “lampshades: mix and match to customize.”31 He then helps Vincent with the task of decorating his home. According to BravoTV.com, A trip to the store yields new sheets, lamps for the bedroom plus towels, table settings and a new teapot. Back at the apartment, Thom demonstrates the “less is more” principle by boxing up huge amounts of accumulated junk and putting them into storage. New paint, wall sconces and well-framed photos decorate the walls, and a mirrored headboard is the centerpiece of Vincent’s redesigned bedroom.

Under Thom’s artful eye, Vincent shops for everything a home could need: pillows, sheets, towels, area rugs, china, flatware, and lamp lighting. While it is significant that generic language is used in the previous description, both visual and verbal narration specifically refer to Bed Bath & Beyond during the episode itself. As well, the named products are listed for each individual episode on Bravo’s Web guide to shopping. All the while, Carson has been busy shopping for fashions to complete Vincent’s “new look.” BravoTV.com describes Vincent’s next steps as Carson presents Vincent with a selection of styles including both everyday looks (with a focus on slimming vertical stripes) and a few sparkly selections for his on-stage wardrobe. The latter options feature bolder colors and embroidery or flocking to provide eye-catching detail. An extremely elegant black-and-white ensemble mixing some of his own clothing with new items hand-picked by Carson is chosen for Vincent’s big solo debut.

Vincent joins Carson at the shop of designer Beau Goss. Carson picks out a variety of fashions and teaches Vincent about each piece of clothing. Carson completely redresses Vincent and teaches him what is fashionable, what is not, and most importantly, how to know the difference. Upon arriving at home Carson bursts in exclaiming, “let’s have a fashion show!” The Fab Five then pile on Vincent’s bed as he displays his new wardrobe. As he does so, Carson explains his fashion choices via brand names such as Beau Goss,

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Express, and Hagar. In addition to comprising the narrative content in promotional storytelling, sharing names can also be used as a symbolic system to communicate with others and to express status along the path of lifestyle consumption.32 Throughout his transformation, Vincent was trained in a better lifestyle through better consumption. His instruction concerned which products were superior to others and how to use those products in order to create a superior style. During the makeover, product placement was both careful and deliberate. As each expert guided Vincent through the world of life-styling, they essentially provided him with a series of product pitches. Comprising the central part of the narrative, “you have experts on the show who are recommending products. These experts are anointing brands.”33 In this way, Queer Eye satisfies a primary concern for lifestyle manuals, the “need of advice for an employment of this life that is worthwhile.”34 Most significantly, Vincent learned the art of living through the art of consuming. From general products such as loose-leaf teas and mix-matched lampshades to named products such as Thayer’s, Beau Goss, and Bed Bath & Beyond, Vincent styles his life by styling his consumption. GENDER, SEXUALITY, AND CONSUMPTION At work in Queer Eye are assumptions regarding gender and sexuality that complicate traditional notions of consumption. Consumption itself has long been associated with femininity.35 However, “gayness, femininity, and consumption are conjoined concepts in contemporary culture.”36 Such definition fuels the notion that the “gay male market . . . is assumed to have an inherent access to greater degrees of refinement and taste than straight men.”37 While these are widespread cultural assumptions, they are problematic because they stem from stereotypes. Although “TV is comfortable with stereotypes because nuance is too difficult to explain to tens of millions of viewers,”38 stereotyping is a dangerous cultural practice. Stereotyping functions by reducing an individual or group to a few, limited qualities. They fundamentally constrain the range and complexity of a given identity. Stereotypes are also problematic because they work to essentialize identity. In other words, they function to make these qualities appear natural (i.e., a result of an innate “essence” or natural biology) rather than socially constructed (i.e., a result of cultural creation). According to the representations in Queer Eye, gay men must “care about domestic detail— colour schemes, furniture, the thread count of their linens, etc.”39 They also dash about town “snapping off witty, snotty little quips.”40 Through these stereotypes, viewers are presented with only one picture of gay masculinity when, in fact, there exists a vast range of gay masculinities. Because Queer Eye’s stereotypes “never stray too far from what non-gays expect them to be,”41 the progressive potential of representing gay masculinity is curtailed.

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However, the practice of stereotyping is not limited to marginalized groups. Ironically, this is “score one for equality. The men on both sides of the sexual divide are presented as stereotypes on this show.”42 Dominant groups, straight men in the case of Queer Eye, are also stereotyped. Here, they are represented as slovenly, unkempt, and unrefined. According to these stereotypes, to be a straight man is to be unable to match a shirt to a pair of pants, match the color of a wine to the appropriate cuisine, or match a shampoo to a shower gel. Also according to these stereotypes, gay and straight men seem to live in different worlds. Queer Eye, however, appears to bridge this gap. Looking past pure stereotypes, this program features “non violent, mutually respectful, cooperative relations between openly homosexual and heterosexual men.”43 Herein lies the potential to displace traditional stereotypes surrounding masculinity and improve the relational and political situations for gay citizens. This potential, however, is not realized. While television is at its base a commercial medium, it is important to engage its content and function at the intersection of economy and ideology. In addition to generating profits, television is also a potentially democratic medium through which to educate, inform, and foster dialogue.44 Even if falling short of its altruistic potentials, television programming is a primary source for the production and circulation of values and ideas. Here, the gap between progressive social possibilities and economic gains should, at the least, be acknowledged. Ultimately, however, it is clear that displacing gendered stereotypes and generating revenue are incompatible aims for Queer Eye. In fact, rather than working to improve hetero/homo relations, Queer Eye effectively disciplines them. While constructs of masculinity are clearly called into question, its traditional definitions are carefully recovered. On one hand, Queer Eye teases gendered stereotypes by representing men who engage in traditionally feminine cultural competencies. Exemplifying another play on gender, Vincent is held accountable for the disarray in his domestic setting, while his wife is absolved of responsibility. On the other hand, the uncertainty surrounding in/appropriate gender is easily resolved because “Queer Eye ensures that the masculinity of the men being made over is emphasized through their choice of ‘projects.’ ”45 Recall that the makeover projects focus on “building a better straight man” for “guys who want to get the girl [and] get the job.” In other words, the projects featured on Queer Eye center on heterosexual romance and career advancement, which are two very traditionally masculine ideals. In this way, homosexuality is represented for the purpose of recovering and reinforcing heterosexuality. Recall that Vincent’s goals are to “surprise his wife” and “go from back up singer to solo star.” During his transformation BravoTV.com states that Broadway pro Jai gives Vincent a few performance pointers, including the recommendation that before he take the stage Vincent find a place to relax,

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tune out all distractions and focus—if necessary in the bathroom, if that’s the only private spot he can find. Their plan is to bring his wife out on stage at the start of the song, “I’m So In Love With You,” and for Vincent to insert a little dedication speech to her into the chorus.

Jai, a seasoned performer, brings Vincent to the nightclub where he will be performing his first solo. Here he focuses on Vincent’s career advancement by teaching him to build confidence for his performance. Jai also coaches Vincent on how to court his wife by bringing her on stage and dedicating a song to her. Jai focuses on teaching Vincent the art of romance by centering the heterosexual standard. The recovery of heterosexual masculinity is complete as BravoTv.com describes Vincent’s “reveal:” The Event Vincent’s wife Vivia is floored by the transformation in their apartment. So floored, in fact, she doesn’t even notice his natty new attire until after no fewer than eighteen “oh my god”s (we counted) and two thumbs up for the paint in the hallway. After a few more compliments, the two hurry out to the club for a Cleftones performance and Vincent’s solo surprise. At Jimmy’s Uptown Cafe, the Cleftones express their enthusiasm for the Vincent’s appearances. After the first set, Vincent changes into his black and white outfit and confidently strides out on stage for his special solo number. His touching performance brings the crowd to their feet and tears to Vivia’s eyes. The Results Vincent is a guy with a great heart and good intentions who was in need of a nudge in the right direction. All of his efforts at self-improvement were geared to making a better life for the two of them. Rather than use his time on stage as a means to glorify himself and hog the spotlight, he chose to share the moment with Vivia. The whole makeover process, from “shock and awe” start to standing-o finish, was really about their love, not his ego.

With a focus on heterosexual romance and career advancement, hegemonic definitions of masculinity are centered and rendered normal. Pushing homosexuality further into the margins, it is also extremely significant that the Fab Five are not present for Vincent’s reveal. Instead, they view it via CCTV from their stylishly decorated New York loft. Hetero and homo alike return to their separate spheres, leaving the gap between their worlds intact. Queer Eye may appear progressive through the representation of marginalized identities and a focus on gay expertise. However, it is not simply lifestyle products but also gay cultural competencies that are consumed during the makeovers. While initially blurred, the lines surrounding gender, sexuality, and consumption are again drawn along the straight and narrow.

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PROMOTIONAL CULTURE Lifestyle consumption can be situated within a larger promotional culture. Promotional culture describes contemporary forms of consumption and commerce as they infiltrate other, noneconomic, spheres of life. In this way, “all our contemporary discourse . . . is saturated in the rhetoric of promotion, which now exists as a generalized social category.”46 Promotion is a condition; it is an “all pervasive and unstable force,”47 for which “the world of goods and their principles of structuration are central to the understanding of contemporary society.”48 We not only make sense of the world in which we live through the products we consume, but promotion becomes the principle for other symbolic forms of meaning. Elements of commerce and consumption have influenced other spheres of life, most clearly the development of life-style. Furthermore, where advertising, public relations, marketing, branding, and so on were once considered to be separate spheres of commercial relations,49 they can now be thought of as layers of a singular promotional culture. In this way, “promotion crosses the line between advertising, packaging, and design, and is applicable, as well, to activities beyond the immediately commercial.”50 Regarding Queer Eye, as well as other Bravo TV programs, the most prominent layers of promotional culture lie in (1) branded entertainment and product placement as promotional storytelling; (2) sponsored online services such as broadband episodes, pod casts, and product shopping guides; and (3) lifestyle promotion as self-promotion. In this way, Bravo TV’s lifestyle programs engage in “a process of layering techniques and strategies, culminating in a versatile, multi-dimensional armory” for promotional culture.51 In these programs, it is most significant to remember that the “non-advertising content of such media can be considered . . . as an extension of their ads.”52 One of the most striking features of Queer Eye is, of course, product placement. Recall that throughout Vincent’s makeover, the Fab Five were careful to identify individual products and retail sponsors in ways inseparable from the narrative content of the episode. From Bed Bath & Beyond to T Salon and Paul Labrecque, clothing from Express to Beau Goss and even throat lozenges from Thayer’s, no placed product is left unnamed. On Bravo TV, named products are coupled with commercial advertising spots in ways that “allow the network to plug a show, as well as the marketer’s involvement.”53 Other layers of promotional culture can be found on Queer Eye’s microsite on BravoTV.com. For instance, comprehensive systems of ad-sponsored links to the placed products are available through their Web services along with broadband episodes and shopping guides. Additionally, Bravo is “also offering sponsorable podcasts of Fab Five ‘Hip Tips.’ ”54 In this way, promotional culture is thoroughly bound to lifestyle consumption as commercial sponsors “take their message from the 30-second spot to something that’s directly actionable on the web.”55

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While Queer Eye has been called “the single most shameless corporate tramp on TV,”56 this program is not alone. In fact, Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style operates similarly. According to BravoTV.com, In each episode of “Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style,” Gunn uses his unmatched counseling skills, to turn the fashion weary into polished individuals. While Gunn focuses on the big picture of each subject’s transformation, [Veronica] Webb guides the women through shopping the Tim Gunn way, by steering their choices and listening to their concerns and offering solutions. The series utilizes several tools to help a diverse set of women make themselves over, including a list of various “fashion icons” the subjects pick from to determine who inspires their style . . . Then, when building their signature looks, the subjects use Gunn’s “essential shopping list,” which includes 10 basic pieces that no closet should be without. Armed with Gunn’s rules . . . Gunn calls on his friends and colleagues to put the finishing touches on the women, including hair and make-up.

Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style is also a makeover program that focuses on transformation through lifestyle consumption. Employing taste and style, Gunn’s makeover candidates are also instructed in the art of fashion as an art of lifestyle. Not surprisingly, products are carefully placed throughout the makeover. For example, makeover candidates invariably go on a shopping trip to Macy’s and meet top fashion designers. Likewise, Gunn’s microsite on BravoTV.com provides instructions to “Get the Look” by using hair products by Garnier Fructis and makeup by Maybelline. Gunn also features a library of “Video Tips” for more detailed lifestyle instructions. Project Runway differs because it is a competition rather than a makeover program. However, it also exemplifies lifestyle consumption with a focus on high fashion, taste, and style within promotional culture. According to Project Runway’s microsite on BravoTV.com, “Project Runway” features host supermodel Heidi Klum and a panel of industry luminaries, including judges Michael Kors, top women’s and men’s wear designer and Nina Garcia, ELLE magazine fashion director, as they decide who is “in” and who is “out.” The 15 “Project Runway” contestants will be whittled down to the finalists who will show their own line in front of an audience of fashion industry movers and shakers at New York Fashion Week. As part of the winner’s prize package, an editorial feature on the winning designer will run in an issue of ELLE, the winner will walk away with a cash prize of $100,000 from TRESemmé professional hair care to start their own line, and will have the opportunity to sell a fashion line on Bluefly.com. Saturn will award the winner a 2008 Saturn Astra.

Project Runway is also peppered with placements for products such as Elle, Saturn, TREsemme, and Bluefly as well as frequent trips to Manhattan’s

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Mood fabric store. Again, this exemplifies the condition of promotional culture in which even nonadvertising content is blended into the narrative in order to function promotionally. However, Project Runway moves away from purely instructional lifestyle consumption. Rather, Project Runway also belongs to promotional culture via the art of self-promotion. Self-promotion refers to the ways in which individuals create and present themselves in order to market themselves to others. Project Runway is a vehicle through which aspiring fashion designers promote their skills, designs, and most importantly, themselves. Participants in Project Runway may in fact be more engaged in self-promotion than they are in sewing garments. Here, the designer becomes an integrated line and a brand. In selling one’s designs as oneself, identity and commodity overlap. In this way, winning the competition means more than winning a cash prize; it also means winning an endorsed identity. Top Chef, also a competition program, functions similarly. Instead of couture, however, Top Chef focuses on cuisine. According to its microsite on BravoTV.com, “Top Chef 3 Miami” features 15 of the country’s most impressive rising chefs–all packed in a house in beautiful Miami Beach—where the sun is hot and the competition is hotter. “Queer Eye” ’s culinary expert Ted Allen brings his expertise to the judges table this season, joining cookbook author, actress and host Padma Lakshmi; Tom Colicchio, celebrated culinary figure and co-founder of Craft Restaurants; and returning judge Gail Simmons of Food & Wine. The 15 contestants will reside in the luxurious beachfront Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach, where the season’s production activity will be centered.

In addition to featuring well-placed products such as Glad, Top Chef ’s microsite is complete with product guides, recipes, and Video Tips. Where Project Runway features appearances by top designers such as Vera Wang and Donna Karan, Top Chef features appearances by celebrity chefs such as Sirio Maccioni and Rocco diSpirito. In this way, both programs capitalize on already branded personalities while also assisting others in developing an endorsed identity. Finally, Bravo’s most blatantly self-promotional program is Work Out. Work Out is neither a makeover nor competition program but instead is a docu-soap. According to Work Out’s microsite on BravoTV.com, “Work Out,” returns to follow the professional and personal life of Jackie Warner, elite trainer and owner of Sky Sport & Spa in Beverly Hills, CA. Everything inside of her leading penthouse fitness facility is visually impressive, including the state-of-the-art equipment and the most attractive staff of trainers in the city. “Work Out” examines how these people work and play together, inside and outside the gym.

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First and foremost, Work Out promotes lifestyle consumption by focusing on the development of a healthful way of life. From Jackie’s morning health shake to exercise boot camps, Work Out promotes the elements of a “fit” lifestyle. As a docu-soap, viewers also follow Jackie as she designs and promotes Sky Sport, as she designs and promotes Sky Spa, and as she designs and promotes her line of fitness apparel. Here, there is no distinction between Jackie Warner herself and the practices and products she sells. For example, the success of Sky Sport is solely dependent on successful self-promotion. Crossing the lines between persona and product as well as consumption and culture, these multiple forms of promotion interlock. Also significant in Work Out is the attention paid to Jackie’s same-sex love life. The docu-soap follows her through a tumultuous relationship and subsequent breakup with her girlfriend during season one. Jackie then begins a scandalous relationship with one of her female trainers at Sky Sport during season two. Unlike Queer Eye, same-sex relationships on Work Out are highly sexualized.57 However, “the way of the gay” on both programs focuses on appropriate living through health and style. Within promotional culture, gay cultural competence is exploited as a means of cultivating a style of life. These Bravo TV programs function as lifestyle manuals and operate on an ethic of consumption. While promotion may be an accepted element of commercial television, it is also an endemic cultural condition. Consumption and self-promotion are simply daily activities. For instance, “from dating and clothing shopping to attending a job interview, virtually everyone is involved in the self promotionalism which overlays such practices.”58 However, while promotional culture may be endemic, it is not democratic. Promotional culture describes a contemporary consumer condition, and attention should be paid to the inequalities produced through its forms. First, while lifestyle consumption may acknowledge gay cultural competence, it also marginalizes those identities by continuing to rely on stereotypes. Additionally, the ability to consume is not equally accorded to all. In fact, some may be trapped by lifestyle consumption while others are simply excluded from it. In this way, cultivating a style of life remains a complicated set of practices within layers of promotional culture. Furthermore, it is unlikely that commercial television will attend to such complications as long as they remain unprofitable. In fact, television networks will likely continue to develop forms of promotional storytelling because they are a lucrative means to increase an advertised product’s reach into the lifestyle practices of viewers. Bravo TV has achieved this not simply by incorporating product placement into its programs but specific product use into its narratives. This is a significant layer of promotional culture in which the product content of Bravo’s programs is indistinguishable from the narrative content of its programs. Deeply layered in the stratum of

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promotional culture, Bravo TV has successfully expanded sponsorship from the traditional 30-second ad spot through the program’s narrative to actionable online content. As lifestyle manuals, Bravo TV’s programs specifically provide the expert advice necessary to help viewers select from the excess of consumer products available. In a promotional culture, the synergistic relationships between sponsors and networks give way to synergy with consumers in which Bravo TV offers its viewers lifestyle training through the art of consumption. For Better or For Verse,59 this describes the social and economic conditions of life itself as commercially styled and thoroughly embedded within layers of promotion. NOTES 1. Federico Boni, “Framing Media Masculinity: Men’s Lifestyle Magazines and the Biopolitics of the Male Body,” European Journal of Communication 17 (2002): 474. 2. Ibid. 3. Ted Madger, “The End of TV 101: Reality Programs, Formats and the New Business of Television,” in Reality TV: Remaking Television Culture, ed. Susan Murray and Laurie Oulette (New York: New York University Press, 2004), 137. 4. Phillip Auslander, Liveness: Performance in Mediatized Culture (New York: Routledge, 1999); Ellis Goddard, “Reel Life: The Social Geometry of Reality Shows,” in Survivor Lessons: Essays on Communication and Reality Television, ed. Matthew J. Smith and Andrew F. Wood (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 2003), 73–96. 5. Neil Gabler, Life: The Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality (New York: Vintage Press, 1998); Richard Kilborn, Staging the Real: Factual TV Programming in the Age of Big Brother (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2003). 6. Anne Becker, “The In Crowd: Bravo’s Rise From Artsy Pay Channel to Network of the Hip and Smart,” Broadcasting & Cable, October 2, 2006, 17. 7. Ibid. 8. Allison Romano, “Upfront Buys from the Bravo Guys,” Broadcasting & Cable, April 12, 2004, 6; George Winslow, “The Brand is King,” Broadcasting & Cable, June 11, 2007, A6. 9. Anne Becker, “The In Crowd: Bravo’s Rise From Artsy Pay Channel to Network of the Hip and Smart,” Broadcasting & Cable, October 2, 2006, 17. 10. Allison Romano, “Upfront Buys from the Bravo Guys,” Broadcasting & Cable, April 12, 2004, 6. 11. Anne Becker, “The In Crowd: Bravo’s Rise From Artsy Pay Channel to Network of the Hip and Smart,” Broadcasting & Cable, October 2, 2006, 17. 12. Jim McConville, “Cable Tinkers with Ad Time Setups,” Advertising Age, October 20, 1997, 62. 13. Jeff Nack, Wayne Friedman, and Richard Lynnett, “Getting a Piece of the ‘Eye,’ ” Advertising Age, August 4, 2003, 4. 14. Clare Atkinson and T. L. Stanley, “Marketers in Fab Five Lovefest,” Advertising Age, September 29, 2003, 3. 15. Dan Oullette, “Broadband as Plan B,” Media Week, June 5, 2006, 16–20.

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16. Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality vol. III: the Care of the Self. trans. R. Hurley (New York: Random House, 1988), 43. 17. Ibid., 100. 18. Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality vol. III: the Care of the Self. trans. R. Hurley (New York: Random House, 1988); Michel Foucault, “Technologies of the Self,” in Ethics, Subjectivity and Truth, ed. Paul Rabinow (New York: the New Press, 1994). 19. Michel Foucault, “Technologies of the Self,” in Ethics, Subjectivity and Truth, ed. Paul Rabinow (New York: the New Press, 1994), 225. 20. Ibid., 100. 21. Ibid., 225. 22. Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality vol. III: the Care of the Self. trans. R. Hurley (New York: Random House, 1988). 23. Ibid., 225. 24. Ibid. 25. David Collins, Michael Williams, and David Meltzer, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, Scout Productions, Episode 106, “For Better or For Verse: Sweet Music.” 26. Jack Neff, Wayne Friedman, and Richard Linnett, “Getting a Piece of the ‘Eye,’ ” Advertising Age, August 4, 2003, 4. 27. Andrew Hampp, “Why Brands Win in Reality Competitions,” Advertising Age, January 7, 2008, 4. 28. Ibid. 29. Jack Neff, Wayne Friedman, and Richard Linnett, “Getting a Piece of the ‘Eye,’ ” Advertising Age, August 4, 2003, 4. 30. David Collins, Michael Williams, and David Meltzer, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, Scout Productions, Episode 106, “For Better or For Verse: Sweet Music.” 31. Ibid. 32. Mary Douglas and Baron Isherwood, World of Goods (New York: Basic Books, 1979), p. 75; Joan Kron, “The semiotics of Home Décor,” in Signs of Life in the USA: Readings on Popular Culture for Writers, ed. Sonia Maasik and Jack Solomon (New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2006), 111. 33. Jack Neff, Wayne Friedman, and Richard Linnett, “Getting a Piece of the ‘Eye,’ ” Advertising Age, August 4, 2003, 4. 34. Michel Foucault, “Technologies of the Self,” in Ethics, Subjectivity and Truth, ed. Paul Rabinow (New York: the New Press, 1994), 225. 35. This association rests on basic binary distinctions as a primary means of sense making. A binary consists of two terms that are defined in opposition. For instance, man/woman, mind/body, production/consumption, heterosexual/homosexual are binaries. They function in two ways: (1) via hierarchy and (2) via linking. Functioning hierarchically means that of the two oppositional terms, one will be devalued and the other will be devalued. As a function of linking, all terms on one side of the binary become associated. In this way, woman, body, consumption, and homosexual are linked (and devalued). Likewise, masculinity, mind, production, and heterosexual are also linked (and valued). 36. Jay Clarkson, “Masculinity’s Makeover: Queer Eye, Consumer Masculinity and ‘Straight Acting’ Gays,” Journal of Communication Inquiry 29 (2005): 236, emphasis added.

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37. Ibid., 235. 38. P. J. Bednarski, “Get into a Closet: Queer Eye Message to Heterosexuals,” Broadcasting & Cable, July 21, 2003, 47. 39. Liz Morrish and Kathleen O’Mara, “Confounding Masculinity,” Feminist Media Studies 4, 3 (2004): 351. 40. P. J. Bednarski, “Get into a Closet: Queer Eye Message to Heterosexuals,” Broadcasting & Cable, July 21, 2003, 47. 41. Ibid. 42. Ibid. 43. Dana Heller, “Taking the Nation from Drab to Fab: Queer Eye for the Straight Guy,” Feminist Media Studies 4, 3 (2004): 348. 44. Jonathan Bignell, An Introduction to Television Studies (New York, Routledge, 2004) 16–19; Bernadette Casey, Neil Casey, Ben Calvert, Liam French, and Justin Lewis, “Access,” in Television Studies: The Key Concepts (New York: Routledge, 2002), 1–3. 45. Michele Ramsey and Gladys Santiago, “The Conflation of Male Homosexuality and Femininity in Queer Eye,” Feminist Media Studies 4, 3 (2004): 353. 46. Martyn Lee, introduction to Wernick, “The Promotional Condition of Contemporary Culture,” in The Consumer Society Reader, ed. Martyn Lee (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2000), 300. 47. Ibid. 48. Mike Featherstone, “Lifestyle and Consumer Culture,” in The Consumer Society Reader, ed. Martyn Lee (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2000), 94. 49. William Leiss, Stephen Kline, and Sut Jhally, “The Bonding of Media and Advertising,” in The Consumer Society Reader, ed. Martyn Lee (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2000), 92–105. 50. Andrew Wernick, “The Promotional Condition of Contemporary Culture,” in The Consumer Society Reader, ed. Martyn Lee (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2000), 301. 51. William Leiss, Stephen Kline, and Sut Jhally, “The Bonding of Media and Advertising,” in The Consumer Society Reader, ed. Martyn Lee (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2000), 249. 52. Andrew Wernick, “The Promotional Condition of Contemporary Culture,” in The Consumer Society Reader, ed. Martyn Lee (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2000), 302. 53. Andrew Hampp, “Why Brands Win in Reality Competitions,” Advertising Age, January 7, 2008, 4. 54. Abbey Klaassen, “Cashing in on Their Good Name,” Advertising Age, June 6, 2005, 2. 55. Ibid. 56. Katherine Sender, “Queens for a Day: Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and the Neoliberal Project,” Critical Studies in Media Communication 23, 2 (2006): 131–151. 57. Ibid. 58. Andrew Wernick, “The Promotional Condition of Contemporary Culture,” in The Consumer Society Reader, ed. Martyn Lee (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2000), 312. 59. David Collins, Michael Williams, and David Meltzer, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, Scout Productions, Episode 106, “For Better or For Verse: Sweet Music.”

chapter 11

The “Real” O.C.: Laguna Beach, MTV, and the Business of Reality Star Production Anne H. Petersen

In 2004, the reality craze appeared to be slowly winding down. While still popular, teens were tiring of The Real World and Road Rules. The O.C. had just enjoyed runaway success as a summer filler on Fox, highlighting the lavish lifestyles of Orange County’s rich and incestuous social scene. MTV wanted a show that would function as a hybrid of The O.C. and MTV’s reliable reality format but recognized the need for participants who looked like teens—unlike those on Beverly Hills, 90210 or The O.C., these kids could look sophisticated, but they had to be believable. In Laguna Beach, a small, insulated town an hour south of Los Angeles, MTV found their ideal: a group of teens wealthy enough to make their lives appear different, interesting, and desirable, yet living in a small enough town that gossip would run wild. These teens were raw star material, primed for production as the newest in a long line of MTV stars. The success of MTV’s Laguna Beach hinges on its incorporation of reality television codes with those of melodrama. Establishing Laguna Beach as “real”—each episode begins with an assurance that “the people, the locations, and the drama . . . are real”—makes it palatable to MTV’s key demographic, an age-group that, as Richard Siklos emphasizes, is “endlessly fascinated with watching themselves.”1 In so doing, MTV has prolonged its remarkable track record with the famously fickle teen market, redefining yet again what it takes to cater to and succeed with the coveted 12 to 34 demographic. The show revolves around signs (the first day of school; the lead-up to Prom) that

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form a code readily decipherable as “high school.” MTV further captivates its viewers by running its raw footage through the sifter of melodrama, a genre reliable for its potential for star production. Placing emphasis on the hyperbolic, the spectacular, and the extravagant, evident in methods of character typeage, backdrop, costuming, and plot manipulation, Laguna Beach produces the newest generation of MTV stars, ensuring future consumption and network devotion. MTV’s employment of melodramatic characterization and narrative devices emerges as an effective, if not entirely subtle, method of star production and commodification, as well as the root of Laguna Beach’s sensational success. Ultimately, MTV’s trajectory may be traced into New Media forms, with the potential for sustained star production as a new generation of MTV viewers moves from the living room couch to the personal computer. Since its inception, MTV has repeatedly redefined the teen market. Even after 25 years, it remains both arbiter and merchant of cool, titles that it wields prominently and powerfully within the business of entertainment. When MTV launched into the American consciousness in August of 1981, its first video declared “Video Killed the Radio Star.” Twenty-five years later, with MTV’s programming schedule dominated by My Super Sweet Sixteen, Made, Pimp My Ride, and the current jewel of its reality crown, Laguna Beach, “reality” has effectively killed the video star. MTV’s transformation may be traced to the early 1990s, when the network introduced a number of programs that focused more on youth behavior than pure music videos. In order to cope with coming-of-age, teens no longer simply needed music. Instead, they demand images that instruct how to live, how to construct their lifestyle, where to go on spring break, how to dance, what to ridicule, and so forth. Starting with the premiere of The Real World in 1992, MTV began its evolutionary transformation. MTV’s new focus was not simply on music, nor exclusively on behavior—instead, it concentrated on a hybrid of the two, both interwoven with a bold capitalist thread. This hybrid manifests most succinctly in the form of the reality show, itself filled with heavy musical soundtracks and depictions of lifestyle. These shows exemplify the notion of melodrama—melos, the Greek for song, combined with drama; while so many complain that MTV no longer plays music videos, in truth, it’s simply begun to make their own, coupling songs with dramatic reality footage. While reality television has proliferated across networks and genres, MTV pioneered the concept, collecting the “real stories” of young American adults comingof-age in a group scenario. The crux of MTV’s overall success may be found in its creation of demand and subsequent fulfillment of that demand. With The Real World, MTV created the demand for reality television. Ten years later, with Laguna Beach, it continues to fulfill that demand, particularly for the teenage market. More than any movie studio, MTV is in the business of star production: cultivating popular identities for audience consumption. Instead of looking

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to past successes in the teen market, MTV thoroughly examines current teen society, carefully crafting new stars for whom they can predict success. Historically, the star represents an economic paradox. Stars serve as the most reliable determination of audience consumption, yet, they also unpredictably rise and fall from audience graces. In light of such unpredictability, MTV bypasses established stars, choosing instead to produce stars of its own. As was the case with the traditional star system, in which studios relied on masses of starry-eyed hopefuls to cheaply fuel an abundance of films, MTV depends on hordes of fame-hungry teens. Whether they’re musicians or simply willing to sell the story of their sixteenth birthday, these kids are willing to shape themselves into whatever MTV wants them to be. Plus, they’re free: Why pay for stars when you have droves of young, desperate, wannabe star material? MTV thus exemplifies the practice of reality star production: hand picking its own stars, molding and directing them in “real” life situations, then profiting from the resultant fame. With no real middleman, the profits are nearly entirely theirs. Stars communicate significant messages concerning specific societal ethos: On the level of the subconscious, innate contradictions of society may be reconciled through the existence of one shining star.2 MTV focuses on the contradictions of a particular teen era, producing stars that similarly “smooth over” the holes in the social fabric of teen existence. Watching a star successfully navigate society helps a teen to feel less anxiety about his own struggles. Whether Beavis and Butthead or Johnny Knoxville, Daria or Martha Quinn, each star was produced by MTV to embody and reconcile the contradictions of a specific moment in teen history. Stars don’t last long on MTV—as soon as the cultural moment passes, the star no longer functions as intended. MTV simply replaces the star with a new construction fit to embody the contradictions of the new cultural moment. In the late 2000s, Laguna Beach filled that role. MELODRAMA Bob Pittman, cofounder of MTV, has repeatedly articulated the appeal of his network to teen audiences. In his words, for “TV babies who grew up on rock and roll . . . the strongest appeal you can make (to them) is emotional. If you can get their emotions going (and make them forget logic), you’ve got them.”3 As MTV first discovered with the music video, and continues to exploit with the reality television show, the best way to “get their emotions going” is through melodrama. While Laguna Beach is ostensibly a piece of reality television, MTV structures its raw footage using melodramatic codes. Image, tableaux, and excess of expression construct and fortify recognizable character types. The stronger the type, the more readily she may be marketed as a star: Static identities sustain consumption. Audiences are thus

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encouraged to emulate such types, constructing identity through consumption in order to recreate the Laguna social scene. IMAGE AND TABLEAUX In Laguna Beach, characters are “turned inside out” and displayed in lavish homes, breathtaking ocean vistas, and trips to Cabo San Lucas. Thomas Elsaesser has suggested that in melodrama, “what is inexpressible in the narrative overflows into the more absorbent, purely aesthetic vehicles where it assumes an antithetical relation to the action . . . emotion is exteriorized in the lush mise-en-scene, almost as though characters are turned inside out and their interiority displayed (in coded form) in the décor.”4 As columnist Bill Keveney points out, throughout Laguna, “bonds are formed over bonfires on the beach, tested while foraging for $250 jeans, and broken in a steamy jacuzzi with hillside views that extent to Pacific horizons.”5 The on-screen image simultaneously emboldens and reflects character conflict. As a rule, pivotal discussions take place on the beach: As a couple or enemies hash out their relationship, the tumultuous ocean serves as a metaphor for teenage romance, while the sight and sound of the ocean aggravates the disagreement. Interiority is likewise displayed in visual tableaux, whose motive Peter Brooks defines as a means to “give the spectator the opportunity to see meanings represented, emotions and moral states rendered in clear visible signs.”6 The fast pace and cutting style of Laguna Beach distance it from traditional tableaux vivants, in which characters would stand still for hours at a time to communicate, like a painting, a singular idea. Yet, Laguna Beach periodically pauses to create the MTV iteration of the tableaux, in which the pop/rock soundtrack overwhelms the diegetic sound. In these moments, the audience is meant to contemplate the significance of the scene, the words of the melos amplifying the drama. The female protagonist stands looking toward the beach after saying goodbye to her exboyfriend, the waves crashing, the sun setting. The words and tone of the song communicate the wistful and bittersweet emotion of the scene; music usurps speech, rendering characters effectively mute. Peter Brooks explains that in melodrama mutes may “represent extreme moral and emotional conditions . . . [their] very physical presence evokes the extremism and hyperbole of ethical conflict and manichaeistic struggle.”7 The mute thus resorts to teenage gestural vocabulary—meaningful looks, hand-holds, the middle-finger—to convey her moral and emotional condition. Editing and camerawork contribute to this effect, seeking out and isolating moments of wordless communication. These images—the sea, the beach, the mute—fashion a giant iconic tapestry that, when read collectively, communicates overarching thematic concerns. In the case of Laguna Beach, we repeatedly receive the intensely high school theme

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of coming-of-age and leaving home. The extravagant ocean backdrop serves to amplify the protagonist’s mental state: She is gleefully leaving Laguna for college, yet sad to leave her long-time boyfriend and hometown. Like the tide, her emotions ebb and flow; like the setting sun, she is primed to begin a new portion of her life. The cast’s yearly trip to Cabo San Lucas serves a similar function. As one cast member explains, Cabo is “partying non-stop, sleeping about four hours a day.”8 The heightened exoticism of the Mexican coast aggravates emotional tensions, bringing already volatile conflicts to a boiling point. Extreme emotions are externalized in the extreme beauty of their surroundings: This ocean is bluer than that of Laguna, the sky clearer, the sand more pristine. Cabo is an intensified version of Laguna, and the emotions escalate accordingly. EXCESS OF EXPRESSION High-flown sentiment exemplifies melodrama and permeates Laguna Beach, functioning to further solidify established character types. Being teenagers, the cast of Laguna often struggle to articulate themselves, straining to straddle the divide between their child and adult selves. Similarly, Gledhill observes that melodramatic characters “faced with the decentered self ” and “the evasiveness of language,” respond with declamatory speech and spectacular sentiment.9 Granted, hyperbolic emotion and expression are no novelty to anyone acquainted with actual teens, yet the manner in which Laguna edits and replays the drama presents it as constant and definitive. Alcohol compounds teen speech habits, refining characters and attitudes through reiteration: A party is either “so fun” or “super lame”; a boy is either “way hot” or “stupid”; a girl is either “a super bitch” or “so sweet.” In reality, these teens likely discuss, at least to some extent, issues divergent from parties, boys, and other girls, and perhaps do so in a less definitive manner. In “reality,” however, at least in its Laguna manifestation, editing creates the illusion of repetitive near-histrionic speech, brimming with the sensational sentiment of melodrama. MTV exploits the melodramatic tropes of image, tableaux, and declamatory speech as means of creating static, maximized character types, prime for stardom and fan emulation. Melodrama makes types; types make stars—this is a tried and true formula long-practiced in Hollywood and deftly translated to the twenty-first century in Laguna Beach. This formula for reality star production, first developed with The Real World, now permeates the network: From My Super Sweet Sixteen to I Love New York, from Made to Life of Ryan, MTV has capitalized on the format. And, as testified by the success of shows as various as Dancing with the Stars and America’s Next Top Model, the model continues to spread. Large networks and specialized cable channels have personalized the model for their own uses, relying on relatively small production budgets to spark massive ratings. It’s the

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twenty-first-century equivalent of the variety show: Hone in on a market, hire a genial host, and let the cheap talent do the work. MAXIMIZED CHARACTER TYPES Star production has long hinged on the ability to produce and reproduce recognizable character types. Dyer defines the type as “a shared, recognisable, easily grasped image of how people are in society.”10 A star is made significant, and thus successful, for his or her ability to embody such a type. In melodrama, the type is hyperbolized and emboldened, a process that facilitates audience recognition and an actor’s consequent rise to stardom. Melodramatic types are made to embody “maximum states of age, beauty, strength, revenge, or whatever.”11 Such personification allows individual characters to represent greater social forces—goodness, evil, change, innovation, and so forth—that will function as “clear psychic and moral identities” amidst the drama.12 Devoid of complexity, the melodramatic star embodies a singular sentiment: In the eyes of the audience, she becomes goodness, embodies change, personifies evil, and so forth. She is transparent, easily digestible, readily placed within the social sphere, and, as a result, immensely popular. In the 1950s, types included The Rebel, The Good Joe, The Pin-Up, The Independent Woman, The Tough Guy, amongst others. Paul McDonald points to the manner in which types transcend decades, as The Rebel, once embodied by Marlon Brando and James Dean, was personified in the 1980s and ’90s by Christian Slater and Sean Penn.13 For Laguna Beach, MTV has created new, twenty-first-century types, readily recognizable for teens navigating the landscape of high school. The Alpha Girl, The Sweetheart, The Slut, The Diva, The Player, The Rebel, and The Hottie represent the new teen typeage, in which cliques and their corresponding hierarchy dictate social interactions. Laguna Beach asserts and amplifies these types using myriad methods, especially print PR campaigns and features on its online component, MTV Overdrive. The term Alpha Girl, interchangeable with Queen Bee, first became part of the vernacular following Rosalind Wiseman’s 2002 book Queen Bees and Wannabes, a contemporary update of Reviving Ophelia. Wiseman breaks down the cliques, gossip, and social hierarchy of the girl world, in which a Queen Bee/Alpha Girl commands a group of Wannabes/Beta Girls. The Sweetheart, similar to the Alpha Girl but lacking in powers of charismatic manipulation, functions as the social enemy. She generally lacks the malice and social know-how of the Queen Bee; plainly put, she’s a nice girl who’d much rather everyone simply get along. Yet, opposition is as essential to the Queen Bee as lip-gloss—if the Sweetheart doesn’t exist, the Queen Bee will invent one, if only to demonstrate her rule. Beta Girls/Wannabes function in accordance with their titles. Less beautiful, less charismatic, less persuasive, and thus

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unqualified to fulfill the role of Queen, these girls are insecure and chronic gossips, calculating their actions and words to gain approval from their leader. On the other side of the gender line, boys participate in these cliques as pure objects to be won or lost, functioning as little more than pawns in the elaborate social game. In each season of Laguna Beach, the show centers on this exact social set-up, with a Queen Bee as the primary catalyst for action. THE ALPHA GIRL/QUEEN BEE In seasons one and two, Kristin fills the Alpha Girl role. A blond-haired and flippant arbiter of cool, Kristin dictates the interaction between her small army of Beta girls and the other dominant group of girls. On Overdrive, Kristin’s “cast info” description distills her Alpha Girl status, allowing her to become the will to party and dominate the social sphere: No one has more fun than Kristin. Last year she was in the shadow of the seniors, but this year it’s her turn to rule the school. All she wants to do is party and leave behind the drama from last year. [ . . . ] Parties, bonfires, ski trips, and another hot spring break getaway—this is Kristin’s year . . . When Stephen comes home from college, how will she feel? And with so many other boys interested, including the always charming Talan, it’s all up to Kristin. Who will she choose?

The language emphasizes her status as superlative: “no one” has more fun. The use of possessives is equally suggestive—“this is Kristin’s year”; it’s “her turn” to rule the school. The language also streamlines Kristin’s desires and emphasizes her agency: All she wants to do is party and go on trips; it’s all up to her. Such construction is further facilitated through the use of supporting characters. Each main Laguna type has a corresponding best friend to drive the narrative and elucidate types. Like the literary foil character, the best friend serves as the backdrop from which the maximized type may distinguish herself. Kristin and her best friend, Alex H., are both snarky, obsessed with the same boys, and devoted to heavy black eyeliner and blond highlights. Yet, Kristin is clearly the maximization of the type visible in Alex H.— whenever Alex appears on screen, she is labeled, narratively and literally, as “Kristin’s Friend.” The supporting character likewise drives narrative discovery of the maximized type, beginning each scene with a leading question— “Did you have fun last night?” “Do you still like Talan?” “What do you think about Stephen?” and so forth. Such probing questions allow the Alpha Girl to express and disseminate her opinions and schemes for the future. Embodying the type of the Alpha Girl, Kristin’s role in the melodrama is firmly established and predictable. In essence, MTV has produced and stabilized her star—Kristin is now easily marketable through reiteration in other

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MTV productions, most clearly in her season three replica, Kyndra. Reporting on the premiere of the third season of Laguna Beach, columnist Verna Gay declares “what’s amazing, if entirely predictable, is that MTV has fashioned a near-perfect carbon copy of seasons one and two.”14 The season three cast indeed reincarnates the roles of the past two seasons, with Kyndra filling the role of Alpha Girl/Queen Bee vacated by Kristin. Kyndra has been described as “a mean girl of the highest order, with a Joan Collins manner that would seem to belong to someone twice her age.”15 Her profile in People asserts “people like her, people are scared of her.”16 Entertainment Weekly captions her “The Queen of Snide” who “does not have . . . what do you call them? Oh, yes, feelings.”17 When Tessa introduces her in the voiceover at the beginning of season three, she is described as the “Queen of Mean.” Here it becomes obvious that Kyndra not only fulfills the Queen Bee type, but exemplifies, even overfills, it—she is all that Kristin was in terms of manipulation, but while Kristin possessed some semblance of emotional rooting, Kyndra is portrayed as feckless and cold, utterly one-dimensional. Her Overdrive bio declares “With the best party house, the right clothes and tons of money to spend, Kyndra is the reigning queen of Laguna.” Her character is a sum of pretty and conniving parts that combine as a driving force of evil in the show. Costume further reinforces Kyndra’s type. In Laguna Beach, despite the fact that the teens dress themselves, clothing takes on immense significance. In her work on melodramatic costume, Jane Gaines has asserted that costume detail “[stands], again and again, for the same thing, and could be counted on to provide basic information about a character for the spectator, that is, typified.”18 Similar to classic cinema, where costume details were “fixed,” Laguna Beach expresses essential aspects of a character through clothing, overcoming the teenage communication barrier through “storytelling wardrobes.”19 In the publicity shots for season three, Kyndra wears a satiny green top that hugs her body, gathering at her chest to accentuate her figure. Her neck is wrapped with gold chains and necklaces that match her golden skin tone and highlights. The sumptuous silk of Kyndra’s top simulates skin and renders a notion of emotional hypersensitivity that further expresses her capricious nature. Her jewelry connotes an abundance of wealth; her tan and highlights speak to a life of leisure. Taken collectively, the end effect of Kyndra’s outfit is one of sumptuous luxury, a key aspect of Kyndra’s typeage as Alpha Girl/Queen Bee. THE SWEETHEART Kristin and Kyndra function as the counterpart to The Sweetheart, embodied by Tessa in season three. Tessa is “super nice to everyone,” and although she and Kyndra used to be friends, she’s no longer part of the “cool girls” she identifies with in the first episode.20 Tessa is soft-spoken and registers

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every emotion on her face; with a long mane of black hair, she is physically differentiated from the Alpha Girls of past and present. Indeed, for prom, “Sweetheart” Tessa sews her own dress, creating a piece of costume that distinguishes her from the popular/mean girls. While the rival girls all wear short, flirty dresses, hers is full-length, sleek, and elegant. Tessa accessorizes with minimal jewelry and wears her long hair down, further distancing her look from those of the rival clique. Her delicate emotions are externalized in the fine construction of the dress; its floor length signifying her guarded heart. However, two long slits reveal Tessa’s legs—she may be covering herself emotionally but nevertheless remains susceptible to romantic/sexual appeal, as manifested by her destructive flirtation with an ex-boyfriend at episode’s end. Her “photobook,” available at MTV Overdrive, reaffirms her typed identity through a series of posed glamour shots. In all but one, Tessa smiles wide, her eyes kind and welcoming. Her set of photos creates a stark contrast with those of Kyndra and her “deputies,” Lexi and Cami, whose photobooks are dominated by shots of each girl looking alternately scornful and full of mirth. In the one picture in which Tessa’s smile falters, she looks sideways at the camera, her face in profile against a bamboo backdrop. In this photo, Tessa’s face emanates a flash of vulnerability and tenderness that only further supports her type. Her Overdrive bio explains that “during her junior year, Tessa just wants to find the right boy,” communicating a harmless desire for companionship and affection. Tessa’s character is structured as a force for good—in terms that an MTV viewer can understand, her heart, like her skin, is clean and pure. As mentioned previously, through the process of melodramatic characterization, types come to “embody ethical forces” present in the melodrama— Kyndra becomes a force of meanness, Tessa becomes a force of goodness.21 Characters are “essentially whole”—but as Robert Heilman emphasizes, such wholeness “implies neither greatness nor moral perfection, but rather an absence of basic inner conflict that, if it is present, must inevitably claim our primary attention.”22 Put differently, these melodramatic characters are utterly without internal psychic conflict. There is no psychology to melodrama— conflict does not occur within the character but between a character and an external force: another person, a group, an event, or nature. In this way, melodrama presents everyday life as a theater of Manichean struggles where the world becomes morally legible. Historically, as the social hierarchy ceased to be the measure of all things, the traditional values and ethics that had given society its particular cohesion were either lost or loosened. Melodramatic forms developed as a response to such “loosening”: “infus[ing] human actions with ethical consequences and therefore with significance.”23 For Laguna’s teen audience, authoritative forces (church, parental control) have loosened or muddled their attempts at moral guidance, creating confusion and ambivalence. Laguna Beach, however, offers

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a narrative in which forces of right/wrong and good/evil are clearly delineated. Such moral legibility proves naturally attractive—while adults and other authorities, school, media, or otherwise, attempt to trivialize teen experiences, Laguna privileges events as ostensibly meaningless as a social snub, allowing them to take on significant ethical consequences. Laguna Beach infuses the teen experience with moral significance, thus allowing audience members to imbue their own experiences in similar fashion. Such has always been the brilliance of MTV within the entertainment world—its understanding that teens oftentimes simply want media, like their elders, to acknowledge and validate their interests. Disney and Nickelodeon follow the same formula, only for younger teens and ’tweens; The CW has attempted a similar structure, centering their schedule around Gossip Girl, One Tree Hill, and Gilmore Girls to moderate success. MTV, however, retains its dominion over the teen landscape, profiting off of the emotional and moral needs of its teen audience. Laguna’s conflict may be morally rooted, but it nevertheless exists purely on the level f the exterior: Mean Girls are mean to Nice Girls, The Player plays the Love-Crazy, and so forth. In Laguna Beach, characters remain static, maintaining a loyalty to their types, evidencing both wholeness and absence of inner psychology. Kristin begins and ends as an Alpha Girl; Tessa never deviates from her Sweetheart type. In the majority of reality shows, each character regularly enters into a private “confessional” to confide their inner thoughts, a trope first established by MTV’s Real World. Laguna Beach, however, offers no window into the soul—whatever souls these characters are meant to possess are externally manifested. The reasoning behind this superficial characterization is simple: Externalized personality allows for a commodified personality. If a character is the sum of her external parts, each of those parts may be readily packaged and sold for audience consumption. We witness the culmination of MTV’s melodramatic characterization in commercial components of Laguna Beach’s Overdrive site: complete commodification of the type. MTV and its advertisers capitalize on these types, insinuating that audience members can replicate Laguna characters (and participate in their subculture) through consumption. The process is facilitated through Laguna’s Overdrive component, whose hypertexutality and heavy imagery encourages quick linking to easy purchases. In Overdrive Segment “Celeb Picks: Laguna Beach,” season three types of Kyndra (Queen Bee) and Chase (The Rebel) are blatantly reduced to their product preferences. The sidebar explains that “here, Chase, the hardrockin’ lead singer of Open Air Stereo, and Kyndra, the reigning queen of Laguna, dish on what keeps them hot and sexy.” In the accompanying interactive display, commodities surround the image of Chase and Kyndra. When a particular commodity rotates to the front—a Land Rover, Kiehl’s soap, and so forth—a comment from one of the characters endorses it. “I love Rock and

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Republic jeans,” Kyndra explains, followed by, “I’m so obsessed with my Sidekick 3!” Rock and Republic Jeans are priced between $200–$300; the Sidekick 3 sells for between $300–$400. Yet again, Kyndra is typified through the possession and endorsement of luxury items. As Aufderheide emphasizes, “pop culture commodities express personal taste, even identity and identification with a subculture.”24 Kyndra is thus defined by her Sidekick 3 and Rock and Republic jeans, rendering such commodities necessary accessories for audience identification with the subculture of Laguna Beach. Type is further commodified through style segment “Get the Laguna Look,” also accessible through Overdrive. In the slideshow, sponsored by L’Oreal, Tessa’s type is disassembled and made available for purchase in the form of L’Oreal products. The sidebar questions: Think Leading Laguna Lady Tessa is the only one that can master the classic girl-next-door look? Think again. With tips to boost your makeup regimen and accent your wardrobe with crisp accessories, you’ll give the popular, polished ladies in class a run for their money . . . Think all Laguna beauties were blessed with flawless skin and an envious flush? Nope. The magic is in the makeup. Enlist the help of L’Oreal Paris to get this look.

The comments are paired with a picture of a teen with Tessa-style makeup, proving that you, too, can use make-up to resemble the girl-next-door style embodied in Tessa. However, as the ad proclaims, the “magic is in the makeup”—only through consumption can Tessa’s type truly be duplicated. The business benefits of such commodity typage are obvious. Granted, the “Celeb Picks” page does not go so far as to directly link to the T-Mobile (creator of the Sidekick 3) Web site. But T-Mobile certainly advertises with MTV and other subsidiaries of Viacom, MTV’s parent company. In this way, Kyndra’s endorsement of the Sidekick 3 works as a thank-you card to TMobile, encouraging continued business. This sort of integrated advertising, product placement, and “courtesy copy” characterizes MTV productions, including its stable of reality programs, films, Total Request Live, and extensive online content. Realizing that teens hate to be told what to buy, MTV infuses its products with implicit suggestion. While MTV certainly does not shy from traditional commercials and advertising, its untraditional, integrated, teenspecific approach serves as yet another facet of its sustained success. CONCLUSIONS: HERMETICALLY SEALED Laguna’s success hinges on its hermetic closure from the world: These teens seem utterly disengaged from world events, social troubles, or class concerns. As Heffernan supports in her review, “the innovation of Laguna Beach has been to present hermetic court intrigue with its own logic, sidelining

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entirely the scullery maids and pageboys who have no chance at the upper ranks. Leave it to someone else to tell their story.”25 In Laguna Beach, money is not an issue, simply a means to an end. The show is stuck in a holding pattern— its characters may leave Laguna, but a new set of teens will re-enter and replay their selfsame drama on screen, refilling their roles, re-enacting their fights. If Laguna Beach is indeed a bellwether of programming to come, should we view such a holding pattern with disdain? Can we trace MTV’s trajectory past Laguna and sketch the future of MTV programming? In his article on the Beavis and Butthead generation, Robert Kellner questions if there is indeed “no future for post-modern youth.” In Kellner’s conception, postmodern youth, “conceived in the sights and sounds of media culture, possibly weaned on it, and socialized by the glass teat of television used as a pacifier, baby sitter, and educator by a generation of parents for whom media culture, especially television, was a natural background and constitutive part of everyday life.”26 Kellner further asserts that Beavis and Butthead “depicts the dissolution of a rational subject,” potentially signaling “the end of Enlightenment in today’s media culture.”27 Kellner wrote those words in 1995, meaning that today, in the late 2000s, the end days should be upon us. I would argue, however, that for all of MTV’s melodramatic manipulation, despite its blatant star production and commodification, its audience has become more enlightened. They have proven increasingly cognizant, if perhaps not critical, of how the network fosters consumption. Contrary to Kellner’s conclusion, these postmodern youth, along with their audience, most definitely do have a future, even if it is one overwhelmingly characterized by conspicuous consumption and surveillance. They acknowledge and encourage such surveillance, reproducing the typed and melodramatic teenage behaviors normalized through MTV. When Beavis and Butthead were popular, these teens were but six years old, arguably out of reach of the pair’s destructive nihilism. What they have watched, however, are reality shows. When Survivor began its domination of the ratings in 2000, Laguna teens were 11 years old, beginning their truly formative “tween” years. Their generation has internalized the notion of surveillance as “a form of entertainment and self-expression” that effectively democratizes celebrity.28 In short, these kids like to be watched. Not only do they like it, but they’re savvy as to how best to conduct themselves in order to further their own celebrity. They’ve been conditioned by a decade of reality television as to what makes a star: fights, deception, tears, devastation, triumph. In a word, melodrama. The excess of expression, declamatory speech, characterization as type . . . while MTV edits to amplify these elements, they were undoubtedly present in the raw footage. Teenagers are innately dramatic, no question, but the teens of Laguna feed into the expected and successful melodramatic formula.

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Heather Havrilesky puts a fine point on this phenomenon, especially in reference to season three, asking “are the girls really that sketchy, or are they much smarter than they look, smart enough to know that the producers and audiences at home want a catfight more than anything else, perpetuating that age-old story about how women are nasty and merciless to each other?”29 A Los Angeles Times interview with Kami and Kyndra highlights this behavior: “the current Laguna Beach kids are conscious of the template provided by their predecessors.” Cami “is aware that hyperbole makes for better television”; Kyndra is quoted defending her bitchy character, explaining “if everyone played the nice little girl, then no one’s gonna watch the show . . . so I’d rather draw people into watching the show.”30 Having watched and internalized seasons one and two, Kyndra and the rest of the season three cast have come to naturally recreate the roles that MTV previously produced via edits and plot manipulation. The Laguna generation has been raised on television but are increasingly exposed to New Media: the Internet, the cell phone, the iPod, Google. Andrejevic claims that surveillance, as normalized through reality television, “train[s] viewers and consumers for their role in the ‘interactive’ economy.”31 Watching reality television introduces the viewer to the reality of constant surveillance, exchanging fearful notions of Orwell’s “Big Brother” for the “softer, kinder gaze” of surveillance displayed in reality television. With surveillance thus normalized, the viewer may feel more at ease in surrendering his vital information through online transactions. Instead of feeling paranoid at the prospect of corporate omniscience, the consumer is made to feel grateful, his needs better served through tailorization. The reality show not only normalizes surveillance and online consumption but makes all other forms look obsolete, a theory maximized in MTV’s newest foray into youth culture, Virtual Laguna Beach. A marriage between Laguna and the online role-playing game Second Life, Virtual Laguna Beach allows participants to adopt an avatar, create a matching personality, and “live” in the virtual Laguna Beach community, exchanging actual currency for virtual “MTV dollars,” which may then be used to purchase virtual commodities. Richard Siklos elaborates on VLB’s advertising potential: “visitors might buy a digital outfit for parties using currency they earned watching an infomercial or checking out a new product for an MTV advertiser. Then, they might decide that they would like to by the same outfit for their offline selves, and, with a few clicks of the mouse and some real dollars, have on shipped to their home.”32 VLB is a risky venture, and despite an initial enrollment of thousands, questions remain as to its potential for sustained success. While it fails to draw nearly the audience or participation as the actual show or MTV Overdrive, it does present a significant step forward into the world of interactive New Media. If an MTV audience in Laguna Beach, California, were cognizant enough of the melodramatic self-typage

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necessary to render them stars, then who’s to say that another MTV audience, this one spread throughout cyberspace, won’t prove similarly savvy? Do virtual worlds serve as the next theater for MTV, melodrama, and star production? This seems to be the future of the formerly future-less: coming-of-age online, where commodities and surveillance are king. In this amorphous existence, where identity becomes fluid (albeit based on consumption), teens can be whoever they’d like, acquiring whatever body, face, or demeanor they choose. They becomes stars of their own worlds; writers of their own star texts. In essence, Virtual Laguna Beach allows teens to revert to childhood, playing dress-up and make-believe all over again. In a candid moment during season three, while the camera focuses on various couples walking to prom, Kyndra and Cami appear in the periphery of the shot, posing to take a quick self-portrait. They smile and quickly flip the camera to regard their digital image: “oh my GOD!” they scream, “who ARE we?” One might say they’re whoever MTV wants them to be. But, perhaps more optimistically, they’re whoever they want to be, so long as it allows them to achieve their goals. That, like the best melodrama, speaks to the moral issues of our times: they’re trying on roles, figuring out how best to be adults. Melodrama, like stars, evolves with the times—and in an era characterized by its reliance on digitization, surveillance, and consumerism, Laguna Beach and its stars indeed provide, for better or worse, a salve for the twenty-first-century teenage psyche. NOTES 1. Richard Siklos, “Not in the Real World Anymore,” The New York Times Online, September 18, 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/18/business/media/ 18avatar.html. 2. See Richard Dyer, Stars (London: BFI, 1998). 3. John K. Hartman, “I Want My AD-TV,” Popular Music and Society 11.2 (1987): 17–23, 21. 4. Quoted in Jane Gaines, “Costume and Narrative,” in Fabrications: Costume and The Female Body, ed. Jane Gaines and Charlotte Herzog (New York: Routeledge, 1990), 204. 5. Bill Keveney, “New teens, tension on Laguna Beach,” USA Today, August 11 2006, 17D. 6. Peter Brooks, The Melodramatic Imagination (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976), 62. 7. Brooks, 56. 8. “Season Three After the Show: Cabo.” Available through MTV Overdrive: Laguna Beach. 9. Christine Gledhill, “Signs of Melodrama,” in Stardom: Industry of Desire, ed. Christine Gledhill (New York: Routledge, 1991), 211.

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10. Dyer, 47. 11. Gledhill, 211. 12. Ibid. 13. Paul McDonald, The Star System (London: Wallflower, 2000), 12. 14. Vernie Gay, “Laguna Rides Wave of Cliques,” Newsday Online, August 16, 2006, http://www.newsday.com/entertainment/tv/ny-etlaguna4851904aug16,0,1589125 story?coll=ny-television-headlines. 15. Virginia Heffernan, “That Narrator in the Third Season of ‘Laguna Beach’ Is, Like, So Lame,” New York Times Online, August 16, 2006, http://www.nytimes. com/2006/08/16/arts/television/16lagu.html?ex1313380800&en74ab532ea3a284 c9&ei5088. 16. “Back to the Beach!” People, 66.8 (2006): 110–111. 17. Jennifer Armstrong, “Chicks with Cliques,” EW Online, August 17, 2006, http:// www.ew.com/ew/article/commentary/0,6115,1228149_3||321057|0_0_,00.html. 18. Gaines, 187. 19. Ibid., 203. 20. “Back to the Beach!” 21. Gledhill, 210. 22. Robert Heilman, Tragedy and Melodrama: Versions of Experience (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1968), 79. 23. Gledhill, 209. 24. Pat Aufderheide, “Music Videos: The Look of Sound,” Journal of Communication 36 (1986): 60. 25. Heffernan, online. 26. Douglas Kellner, “Beavis and Butthead: No Future for Post-Modern Youth,” in Television: The Critical View, ed. Horace Newcomb (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 319. 27. Ibid. 28. Mark Andrejevic, “The Kinder, Gentler Gaze of Big Brother,” New Media and Society 4 (2002): 251. 29. Heather Havrilesky, “I Like to Watch,” Salon.com, August 13, 2006, http://www. salon.com/ ent/tv/iltw/. 30. Robin Abcarian, “The Not-So Sunny Side,” The Los Angeles Times Online, October 29, 2006, http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-ca-laguna29oct29,1, 3027589.story. 31. Andrejevic, 251. 32. Siklos, C2.

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About the Editor and Contributors

EDITOR

Robert C. Sickels is Associate Professor of American Film and Popular Culture at Whitman College. He has made several short films that have played nationally at festivals around the country. In addition to publishing numerous journal articles and book chapters, he is also the author of American Popular Culture Through History: The 1940s (Greenwood, 2004) and American Film in the Digital Age (Praeger 2009).

CONTRIBUTORS

Amy M. Corey is a visiting assistant professor at Whitman College. She holds a PhD in Communication Studies from the University of Denver. She conducts research in the area of culture and communication with a focus on representation and identity as constructed and contested in media and culture industries. Richard Crew is an associate professor and the chair of the Communications Department at Misericordia University in Dallas, Pennsylvania. Before entering the academy, he was a documentary television producer, a television manager, and the national executive producer for the nonfiction television series PM Magazine. He writes regularly on reality and nonfiction television.

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Alina Haliliuc is a doctoral student in the Communication Studies program at the University of Iowa. Her primary research interests include rhetorical criticism and cultural-critical studies. Her current work focuses on analyzing popular discourses of “Europeanness” as formulated in varying media spaces of Eastern European and Balkan states. K. Alex Ilyasova is an assistant professor and the director of the Professional and Technical Writing Program at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. Her interests and research include composition theory, identity and literacy studies, and more recently popular culture. Sue J. Kim is an assistant professor of English at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where she teaches cultural studies and literary theory. Her essays have appeared in Modern Fiction Studies, the Journal of Asian American Studies, and Narrative. Wanda Little Fenimore is a graduate student in the Master of Arts in Liberal Studies program at Hollins University. Along with the political economy of sports, her research interests include popular culture, gender studies, and fandom. Beth Mauldin received her PhD in Romance Languages from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is currently working on a book about constructions of America in French cinema after May 1968. Caryn Murphy is a PhD candidate in Media and Cultural Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Her dissertation examines contemporary feminism and teen girls’ popular culture, focusing on the commodification of young women’s empowerment. Her article, “ ‘It Only Got Teenage Girls’: Narrative Strategies and the Teenage Perspective of My So-Called Life” appears in the anthology Dear Angela (2007). Valerie Palmer-Mehta is an assistant professor of communication in the Department of Rhetoric, Communication, and Journalism at Oakland University. Her research has been published in such journals and books as Text and Performance Quarterly, Journal of American Culture, Reading the Sopranos: Hit TV on HBO, The Oprah Phenomenon, Black Women’s Intellectual Traditions, and Critical Readings: Violence and the Media. Anne H. Petersen is a PhD student in the Department of Radio-Television-Film at the University of Texas–Austin, where she focuses on the

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intersections of celebrity culture and New Media. She currently serves as coeditor of the online journal FlowTV, available at http://www.flowtv.org. Kathleen M. Ryan is a broadcast news and documentary professional, spending 20 years as a journalist working in long- and short-form programming. She also earned a PhD from the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication. She is currently an associate professor in the Journalism Program and Department of Communication at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Patricia Ventura is an assistant professor of English at Spelman College in Atlanta, GA. Her areas of research are American Cultural Studies, Media Studies, and Visual Culture. Among other publications, she has guest edited and contributed to a special double issue of Genre titled Circulating “America.” She is currently at work on a manuscript titled Neoliberal Cultures of the US 1990s.

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Index

ABC, 85, 90 – 91, 134. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC Advertising: American Idol, 163; CW Television Network, 26– 28; ESPN, 85; integrated, 28, 207; MTV Networks, 207; NASCAR on ESPN/ABC, 87–89, 90 – 91; ratings and, 159; reality television, 173–74; Super Bowl, 173; Survivor, 161– 62. See also Product placement African American programming, 24 – 25 Alexander, Jesse, 12 Alex H. (Laguna Beach cast member), 203 Aliens in America, 25, 29 Allen, Ted, 165, 185 Alpha Girl/Queen Bee (character type), 202, 203– 4. See also Laguna Beach Alternate Reality Games (ARGs), 10 American Idol: British origins, 153, 160; as elimination show, 162– 64; impact, 160 – 61; product placement, 7, 163; ratings, 148; repackaging of, 164, 174; talent shows, 147; universal themes, 173 American Idol Rewind, 164, 174 America’s Funniest Home Videos, 146 America’s Most Wanted, 145, 146, 159

America’s Next Top Model: advertising and, 27– 28; Curry, Adrianne, 171; CW Television Network and, 21; as elimination show, 160; MySpace and, 5; renewal of, 25– 26; syndication, 174; UPN and, 21 Antcliff, Valerie, 135, 136 Apple, 61, 73–75 ARGs (Alternate Reality Games), 10 “Art in the Age of Franchising” (Heffernan), 12–13 Arvidsson, Adam, 86 Askwith, Ivan, 8 Athanaeus, 183 Avatars, 4 Bachelor, The, 173 Back-end revenue. See Syndication Bagdikian, Ben, 95, 104, 105– 6 Beauty and the Geek, 5, 26 Beavis and Butthead, 208 Bed Bath & Beyond, 186 Bedford, Robert, 108, 110 Big Brother, 6, 148, 153, 160 Blogs, 3– 4 Bostwick, Matt, 8 boyd, danah, 4

218

Index

Brabazon, Tara, 62, 63, 65 Branding, 22– 24, 45, 87 Bravo TV, 179 – 94; gender, sexuality, and consumption, 187–89; lifestyle makeovers, 181–84; promotional culture, 190 – 94; reality programming, 164 – 65, 179 –81. See also specific programs Breaking Up America ( Turow), 26 Bristol NASCAR race (2007), 87, 89, 90, 91. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC Brittain, Carla, 132, 136 Broadcast Era, 7 Brooks, Peter, 200 Bundling, 73 Burnett, Mark, 161, 174 “Business School” episode (The Office), 66– 67 Butler, Judith, 129, 134 Cabo San Lucas, 201 Cami (Laguna Beach cast member), 209, 210 Candid Camera, 145, 146, 159 Cars, 93– 94 Caves, Richard, 144, 151 CBS, 7, 17–18, 29 –30, 130, 148. See also CW Television Network, The CBS Records, 30 Celebreality, 170 –72 Celebrities on The L Word, 116–17 Chaiken, Ilene, 115, 118, 119 Champion Spark Plug 400 NASCAR race (1992), 87, 89. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC Charm School, 170 Cingular Wireless, 163– 64 Clark, Lynn, 52 Coke, 7 Colbert Report, The, 62, 77 Commercials. See Advertising “Confessional” creation, 206 Consumption, 187–89, 206–7 Content wraps, 27, 30 Convergence culture, 10 –11 Cooperation strategy, 106 Cops, 145, 146, 159 Cosmetic surgery, 165– 66 Couric, Katie, 130 Cross-promotion, 86–87

Crowned, 26 CSI: NY, 9 –10 Curry, Adrianne, 171 Curtin, Michael, 18, 25 CW Lounges, 23 CW Now, 26, 27 CW Television Network, The, 17–31; advertisers and, 26–28; branding, 22–24, 45; corporate synergy and young viewers, 28–31, 206; creation of, 17–18; environmental awareness, 23–24; “Free to Be” promotion, 22–23; launch, 19, 21–22; lessons from UPN and WB, 21–22; MySpace and, 4–5, 23; programming, 24–26; reality programming, 25–26; social networking and, 4–5. See also Gossip Girl Daily Show, The, 62, 77 Dancing with the Stars, 171–72 Daniels, Greg, 64, 72, 75, 77 Daytona 500 NASCAR race (1979), 87, 89. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC DC Comics, 30 DeGeneres, Ellen, 112–13 Denby, David, 51 “Deposition” episode (The Office), 71–72 Deregulation, 84 –85 Dirty Pictures, 115 Disney. See Walt Disney Company “Diwali” episode (The Office), 69 Docu-soaps, 168–70 Douglas, Kyan, 185 E! cable channel, 137, 138 Edgar & Ellen, 11 Edison, Thomas A., 108– 9 Elimination shows, 160 – 64 Ellen, 102, 112–13 Endemol, 153–54 Engagement television, 7–8 Environmental awareness, 23– 24 Escapism, 50 –54 ESPN, 83, 85, 90 – 91. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC Evening Magazine, 145, 146 Everybody Hates Chris, 22, 25 Extreme Makeover, 165– 66 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, 166– 67

Index Fan labor, 11–12 FanLib, 3– 4 Fans, 1–13; content and, 8– 9; convergence culture and fan labor, 10 –13; engagement television and, 7–8; transmedia and, 9 –10; Web 2.0 and, 2– 6 Farmer Wants a Wife, 26 Fast Cars & Superstars, 92– 93 Fear Factor, 148, 153 Federal Communications Commission (FCC), 104, 106–7 Feminist reception theory, 36 Filicia, Thom, 185, 186 Film festivals, 103, 108, 110 –11, 116 Film societies, 109 Financial Interest and Syndication Rules (Fin-Syn), 104 Flavor Flav, 170, 172 Flavor of Love, 170 “For Better and For Verse” episode (Queer Eye for the Straight Guy), 184 –87, 188–89, 190 Fordism, 61– 62 Ford 400 NASCAR race (2007), 87, 89, 90, 91. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC Fox, 20, 145– 46, 148 Fox Newschannel, 130 France, Brian, 91– 92 Fraser, Jill Andresky, 127 Freelance television news workers, 125–39; adaptive strategies, 127– 29; appeal of itinerant labor, 127– 29; job insecurity, 127– 28; oppositional tactics, 134 –35; pay, 128, 131, 132, 134; per diem producers, 133–35; permalancers, 135–36; protests, 137; unions and, 126, 130 –33, 138; voluntary nature of work, 128, 137 Freemantle Media, 153 “Free to Be” promotion, 22– 23 Friday Night Lights, 12–13 Friends, 148, 149 Game, The, 24, 25 Gay TV history, 112–13. See also L Word, The Gervais, Ricky, 63, 64 Gilmore Girls, 22, 24

219

Girls, 36–38. See also Gossip Girl; Youth market Gitlin, Todd, 18 GMA (Good Morning America), 134 Go Fish, 114, 115 Goldstein, Tom, 127 Gong Show, The, 147 Good Morning America (GMA), 134 Gossett, Lori M., 131, 132 Gossip Girl, 35–56; community, 46– 48; edginess, 25; escapism, 50 –54; fashion/beauty, 42– 46; girls and fandom, 36–37; girls on the Internet, 37–38; identification, 48–50; New Media and, 35–36, 54 –56; ratings, 30 –31; romantic individualism, 39 – 42; viewing patterns, 52–53; Web site and online bulletin board, 38–39 Gould, Matt, 169 Greco-Roman lifestyle regimens, 182–83 Greenblatt, Bob, 117, 118 Gunn, Tim, 191 Halpert, Jim (character on The Office), 70 –71 Hamamoto, Darrell Y., 101– 2 Hardin, Melora, 71, 72 Haskins, Rick, 21, 22, 45 Hawks, Howard, 109 HBO, 115, 153 Heche, Anne, 113 Heffernan, Virginia, 12–13 Heroes, 10 Hill, Annette, 146– 47, 159 – 60, 173 Hills, The, 168– 69 Hilmes, Michele, 20 – 21 Homestead-Miami NASCAR race (2007), 87, 89, 90, 91. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC Horizontal integration, 119 Howard, Ryan (character on The Office), 65– 67 I Love New York, 170 Indie film industry: film festivals, 103, 108, 110 –11, 116; HBO and, 115; history, 108–11; Showtime/Viacom and, 107–8 Individualism, romantic, 39 – 42

220

Index

Inked, 169 Inside Prime Time (Gitlin), 18 Integrated advertising, 28, 207 Interlocking strategy, 106 Internet. See Web sites Islandoo, 6 iTunes, 61, 73–75 I Want a Famous Face, 165, 166 Jackie, 40, 42 Jackson, Michael, 133, 138 Jenkins, Henry, 10 –11 Joe Millionaire, 148 Jordan, John W., 128– 29, 132–33, 134, 135, 139 Kapoor, Kelly (character on The Office), 68– 69 Keds sneakers, 27– 28 Kellner, Jamie, 20 Kellner, Robert, 208 Knight, Christopher, 171 Kressley, Carson, 185, 186 Kristin (Laguna Beach cast member), 203– 4, 206 Kyndra (Laguna Beach cast member), 204, 205, 206–7, 209 Labor unions, 126, 130 –33, 138 Lachey, Nick, 170, 171 Laguna Beach, 197– 210; Alpha Girl/ Queen Bee (character type), 202, 203– 4; character types, 202–3; consumption and, 206–7; excess of expression, 201– 2; image and tableaux, 200 – 201; melodrama, 199 – 200, 201, 202, 205; Sweetheart (character type), 204 – 6; Web site, 206–7 Lamarre, Giselle, 133, 136 Late capitalism, 61– 62, 65 Lesbian TV history, 112–13. See also L Word, The Levinson-Gould, Jan (character on The Office), 64, 71–72 Levy, Emanual, 114, 120 Lewis, Shelley, 134, 136 Life is Wild, 25, 31 Lifestyle programming, 180 –81 Lo, Malinda, 112

“Local Ad” episode ( The Office), 71 L’Oreal, 207 Lost, 1, 10, 63 Lukács, George, 63– 64 L Word, The: celebrities on, 116–17; fans and, 3– 4; horizontal integration and, 119; mainstreaming of queer culture, 102–3; OurChart.com, 5– 6, 119; queer cinema and, 115–16; straight male characters on, 117–18; Web site, 5– 6, 119 Magder, Ted, 144, 153–54 Makeover shows, 164 – 67, 181–84 Mazzarella, Sharon, 37, 38, 41, 51–52 McAllister, Tristan, 134, 136 McChesney, Robert W., 18–19, 105, 119 McLuhan, Marshall, 55 Media actives, 150 Media conglomerates, 103–7 Melodrama, 198, 199 – 200, 201, 202, 205 Merchant, Stephen, 63, 64 Meyer, Barry, 19 Miami Ink, 169 –70 Michaels, Bret, 170 Michigan NASCAR race (1992), 87, 89. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC Mills, Heather, 171–72 Modernism, 63– 64 Moonves, Leslie, 17, 18, 143 MTV Networks: advertising on, 207; freelancers and, 137, 138; reality television, 146– 47, 150, 198; star production, 198– 99; teens and, 206; virtual communities for fans, 8. See also specific programs Multimedia strategy, 86–87 Murray, Susan, 37, 46, 55, 168 Myers, Jack, 5 My Fair Brady, 171 MyNBC, 5. See also NBC My So-Called Life, 37, 46 MySpace, 4 –5, 23 NASCAR in Primetime, 93 NASCAR on ESPN/ABC, 83– 97; broadcast fee negotiations, 91– 92; commercials during races, 87–89, 90 – 91; deregulation and, 84 –85;

Index future, 95– 97; implications, 94 – 95; motivation for acquiring broadcast rights, 84; NASCAR broadcast history, 83–84; races, 87– 94; ratings, 93; scrolling during races, 89 – 90; strategy, 85–87; technology used in broadcasting, 94 Nashville, 168– 69, 170 Navarro, Nelson, 131, 132, 136 NBC: ad sales, 144, 148; comedy programming, 148; iTunes and, 61, 73–75; job cuts, 137; reality television, 152, 164 – 65; social networking site, 5. See also specific programs Newlyweds, The, 170, 171 New Media, 35–36, 54 –56 News freelancers. See Freelance television news workers Newton, Gregory D., 84 Nextel Cup races. See NASCAR on ESPN/ABC NFL Network, 96 Nielsen, Brigitte, 170 Nightline, 129 Novak, B. J., 72 O.C., The, 35, 197 Office, The (American television program), 61–78; “Business School” episode, 66– 67; compared to British original, 64 – 65; “Deposition” episode, 71–72; “Diwali” episode, 69; “Local Ad” episode, 71; “Survivorman” episode, 77–78; Web episodes, 75; Writer’s Guild of America strike and, 75–77 Office (British television program), 62, 63– 64, 65, 76 OfficeMax, 28 One Tree Hill, 26, 30 Online Nation, 26, 31 O’Reilly, Tim, 2, 3, 6 Original Amateur Hour, The, 147 Ostroff, Dawn, 21, 24, 25, 28 OurChart.com, 5– 6, 119. See also L Word, The Ownership restrictions, 106–7 Paramount Network Television, 19 – 20 Per diem producers, 133–35

221

Performativity, 128– 29, 132–33, 134, 139 Permalancers, 135–36 Philbin, Darryl (character on The Office), 68–70 PM Magazine, 145, 146 Pop Idol, 153, 160. See also American Idol Post-Fordism, 61– 62, 65 Production costs, 147, 174 Product placement: American Idol, 7, 163; CW Television Network, 27– 28; makeover shows, 165, 166, 167; MTV Networks, 207; Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, 165, 181, 185–87; reality television, 174; Survivor, 161– 62. See also Advertising Programming: African American, 24 – 25; CW Television Network, The, 24 – 26; lifestyle, 180 –81; sports, 162, 173. See also Reality television Project Runway, 191– 92 Promotional culture, 190 – 94 “Puppy Episode, The” (Ellen), 112–13 Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll, 25– 26 Queen Bee (character type), 202, 203– 4. See also Laguna Beach Queer as Folk, 102, 115 Queer cinema, 114 –16 Queer culture, 102–3 Queer Eye for the Straight Girl, 165 Queer Eye for the Straight Guy: “For Better and For Verse” episode, 184 –87, 188–89, 190; gender, sexuality, and consumption, 187–89; lifestyle promotion, 181–82; mainstreaming of queer culture, 102; as makeover show, 164 – 65; product placement, 165, 181, 185–87; promotional culture, 190 – 91; stereotypes, 187–88; Web site, 184, 185, 186, 188– 90, 190 Queer-themed media, 120 Ratings: advertising and, 159; American Idol, 148; Gossip Girl, 30 –31; NASCAR on ESPN/ABC, 93; UPN, 25 Reality television, 143– 210; advertising, 173–74; Bravo TV, 164 – 65, 179 –81; celebreality, 170 –72; CW Television

222

Index

Network, 25– 26; docu-soaps, 168–70; elimination shows, 160 – 64; future of, 172–75; history, 145– 48; impact, 180; live viewing of, 152; makeover shows, 164 – 67, 181–84; MTV Networks, 146– 47, 150, 198; production costs, 147, 174; product placement, 174; syndicators, international, 153–54, 160; talent shows, 147; universal themes in, 173; vertical integration and, 149; Web sites, 150; youth market and, 143, 144, 150 –51. See also specific programs Real World, The: “confessional” creation, 206; as docu-soap, 168, 170; as hybrid, 146– 47; production costs, 174; reality television creation and, 159, 198; viewership, 197; youth market and, 150 Reaper, 25, 29, 31 Reception theory, 36 Redstone, Sumner, 17 Reverse compensation model, 21 Rich Media, Poor Democracy (McChesney), 18–19 Rock and Republic jeans, 206–7 Rock of Love, 170 Rodriguez, Isaac, 131, 132, 136 Rodriguez, Jai, 185, 188–89 Romantic individualism, 39 – 42 Rosen, Jay, 2 Salhany, Lucie, 20 Schooled, 28 Schrute, Dwight (character on The Office), 65, 68, 70 Schwartz, Josh, 35 Scodari, Christine, 38 Scott, Michael (character on The Office), 64, 65, 66– 68 Scott Baio Is 45 and Single, 170 Second Life, 9 –10, 209 Seinfeld, 63, 148, 149, 153, 174 7th Heaven, 24 Sex and the City, 113, 115 Sharper Image, 185–86 Sharpie 400 NASCAR race (2007), 87, 89, 90, 91. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC Shields, Cory, 73, 74

Shipwrecked, 6 Shooting Sizemore, 170 Showtime Networks, 107–8. See also L Word, The Shrek, 86 Sidekick 3, 207 Simpson, Jessica, 170, 171 Sizemore, Tom, 170 Smallville, 22– 23, 25, 30, 31 Smith, Kevin, 25, 29 Social networking, 4 –5 Sony, 105 Sopranos, The, 153 Sports programming, 162, 173 Star production, 198– 99 Star Search, 147 Stereotypes, 187–88 Streamed episodes, 28 Sundance Channel, 108 Sundance Film Festival, 103, 108, 110 –11, 114 Sunset Tan, 168– 69 Super Bowl, 162, 173 Supernatural, 5, 22– 23, 23, 25 Surreal Life, 170 Survivor: as elimination show, 160 – 62; international syndicator, 153; success of, 148; universal themes, 173; viewers and advertising revenue, 159; youth market and, 151 “Survivorman” episode ( The Office), 77–78 Swan, The, 165, 166 Sweetheart (character type), 204 – 6. See also Laguna Beach Syndication, 149, 153–54, 160, 174 Synergy, 28–31, 86–87 Talent shows, 147 Technologies of the self, 182–83 Tessa (Laguna Beach cast member), 204–5, 206, 207 Thayer’s, 185, 187 Thomas, Rob, 24 Time-shifting, 152 Time Warner, 17–18, 29 –30. See also CW Television Network, The Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style, 191 Tivo culture, 152 T-Mobile, 207

Index Top Chef, 192 Toyota Yaris, 30 Transmedia, 9 –10 Troche, Rose, 114, 115 T Salon, 185 Turnan, Kenneth, 110 –11 Turner, Ted, 106 Turow, Joseph, 26 TV Without Pity, 47 Tyler Eastman, Susan, 84 Unions, labor, 126, 130 –33, 138 UPN, 18, 20 – 21, 24 – 25. See also CW Television Network, The Ursell, Gillian, 127 Verizon Wireless, 39, 45 Veronica Mars, 24 Vertical integration, 104 –5, 149 VH1, 170 –71 Viacom, 17, 107–8 Victoria’s Secret, 39, 43, 45 Virtual Laguna Beach, 209 –10 Virtual role-playing, 8, 9 –10, 209 –10 Walt Disney Company, 83, 85, 86–87, 90, 206. See also NASCAR on ESPN/ABC

223

Warner, Jackie, 192– 93 Warner Bros. Television, 19 – 20, 29, 30 Warner Music Group, 30 WB Television Network, 18, 20 – 21, 25. See also CW Television Network, The Web 2.0, 1, 2– 6 Web sites: Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, 167; Gossip Girl, 38–39; Laguna Beach, 206–7; The L Word, 5– 6, 119; Miami Ink, 169; Project Runway, 191; Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, 184, 185, 186, 188– 90, 190; reality television, 150; streamed episodes, 28; Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style, 191; Top Chef, 192; Work Out, 192 WGA. See Writers Guild of America What’s My Line?, 145, 146 When Good Pets Go Bad, 148 Will and Grace, 102, 113 Work Out, 192– 93 Writers Guild of America (WGA): 1988 strike, 145– 46; 2007-2008 strike, 35, 61, 73, 75–77, 126 Youth market, 143, 144, 150 –51, 206. See also CW Television Network, The; Girls