Final FANtasy

I decided to try my hand at some slash fiction about the video game Final Fantasy VII. In the video game itself, there is a relationship that exists between Cloud and Tifa, but in my story, I propose that really there was a relationship between Cloud and Tifa's younger sister Marlene, almost as if his feelings for Tifa were just a cover-up. So here it goes...

After a long day of training to be a legitimate member of the revolutionary group "Avalanche", Cloud found himself following a familiar path to a place he knew he could relax: his friend Tifa's house. It was not Tifa that he wanted to see, however; little did Tifa know, it was her 6 year old sister Marlene that he wanted to see. Marlene greeted Cloud with a warm smile as he entered the door. After briefly greeting Tifa, Cloud proceeded to talk to Marlene, about how her day was. He stayed and talked, with both Tifa and Marlene, for hours, but finally left to go home and sleep. On his way out of the door, he grabbed Marlene's hand and gave her a gentle kiss on her cheek, a secret symbol between the two of them of their love for each other. 

Okay, so I'm really bad at writing this kind of stuff. And it really took me a long time to just sit down and write the blog for this week; it's definitely an exercise designed to make you jump out of your comfort zone. It seemed like an easy assignment, but when I actually sat down to do it, it took a lot more time than I expected - and my entry isn't even that long! It was a different kind of awkwardness though than writing the Wikipedia article, number one, because I decided not to post my entry on a public site. It was really awkward because it felt strange to use someone else's story/characters to make my own, and also the ways in which I had to use them (i.e. in a non-heteronormative way). Talking about it almost seems easier than writing it down - at least something in conversation you can possibly take back, but once you author and publish something, it becomes your own work, and you feel then like it's supposed to be a reflection of yourself. This makes it easy to understand then why some people felt uncomfortable with this assignment, because they may not personally agree with some of the kinds of relationships they were challenged to write about. 

Wiki-post

I was very hesitant participate in this week's exercise, mostly because I felt a lot of pressure to"get it right". Knowing that more people would likely come in contact with a wikipedia site than my blog here, I felt I had to be extra careful, not only about grammar, clarity of sentence structure, etc. but also about the accuracy of the information that I decided to publish. It makes me wonder whether or not other authors put as much thought behind the words they choose to publish on sites. It reminds me of Schiff's idea that the key thing on sites like wikipedia is to provide accurate information, whether it's a 15 year old or a college professor, even if this gives no privilege to the people who really know what they're talking about. And I started to think, well, maybe if there is something that I said that isn't 100% accurate, or can otherwise be put more eloquently, then surely someone will eventually come around and edit my post, right? I mean, looking at the history of the changes made to the site, there are hundreds of edits that have been made in the past year or so. It would seem logical then that with increased collaboration, there would also be increased accuracy, but what if that's not necessarily true? 

Authorless?

Are there some things that shouldn't have an author?
I feel like my response to this would be an extension of a previous post of mine, where it seemed like ownership should maybe not exist at all.. but again, that's probably too drastic a statement. Reading the article this week concerning the history of hip-hop, it almost seems unfair to put a price on some properties if there are individuals that want to use those properties to create something new. Yet, I don't think that individuals should be able to use whatever samples, etc. they want no matter what; I think there should still be a system where they would have to request permission of the author to rework their original work, but this would not necessarily be a process where money changes hands. Basically, I feel like they should be able to use whatever materials they feel necessary, but without having to pay for them. Which, I guess, creates a problematic situation where it's okay for certain things to be authored, but not okay to profit from them. Perhaps then there's a more reasonable price that can be put on certain properties to allow others to use them? Yet, how do you determine the worth of intellectual property? Would it be based on popularity, or maybe how much work was put into it? But back to the question at hand.. there seem to be some gray areas concerning some works and whether or not they should be considered to have an author. For example, I've seen people on Youtube that make mashups of video and audio clips explicitly state in the comments for their creation that they are not the owners of the material.. yet is it possible to have authorship without ownership? Obviously, most of these mashups are being created for pure entertainment value and not for profit, but even still, I don't think that makes them any less of an author. They may not be the owners of the materials that they use, but in a way they are the owners of the unique way in which they put the materials together.

Authorship and ownership (since all of my titles seem to start with A or T, I think I'll stay with this trend..)

After going through the readings for this week, especially McLeod, it's almost tempting for me to say that ownership should not rest with anyone, but perhaps that too drastic of a conclusion to come to. It seems that there should be a line drawn somewhere as to what should or should not be eligible for ownership, but where would we even begin to compile a list of criteria of what qualifies for ownership or not? Also, on one hand while it seems simpler to allow corporations to own rights to multiple properties, as opposed to individuals, it seems to then create a system whereby access to certain materials is limited to a minority elite, who get to decide what to do with these properties. I suppose this is just a consequence though of the intermingling of capitalism and economics with cultural production, a complication that was due to arise. The issue I seem to grapple with is that it does not seem so absurd a notion that someone should be able to receive monetary compensation for their creations, but that the laws that protect individuals and their works in order to regulate the flow of monetary compensation to the creator seem to put certain limitations on the actual creative process. So once again, I feel like I don't really have a solid position on where ownership should lie, since there are obvious advantages and disadvantages on both ends. It would be easy to say that ownership should not lie anywhere if people admit that creative works are building off of previous existing works, and so ownership should rest in community, not in particular individuals and especially not in a corporation. But since the infusion of ideas about capitalism into the arena of cultural production, I feel like ownership will continue to be consolidated into fewer and fewer hands, which can be seen as counteractive to the creation of new works. 

Ads and Authorship

There are a few things that I think are important to keep in mind when considering whether advertisements are "authored" in any way. First of all, it is certainly true that advertisements have creators (something can't just come out of nothing), but are they really authors? I think it would be useful to think of advertisers in terms of certain "criteria" of what constitutes an author. For example, if you define an author as a person who has a considerable amount of creative control over their work, then I would not categorize advertisers as authors. They are there to do a job and are given direction of what to do (kind of like Amy, was that her name?). They may be creative in the sense that they have some room to decide what kinds of marketing strategies to use, but ultimately, if what they create is not to the liking of the corporation they are working for, it may be rejected, or else edited. This leads to another point to be made, namely about collaborative authorship. If anything, I would tend to think of advertisers as part of a process. Therefore, if you define authorship as attributed to a "sole creator", then advertisers would not qualify as authors here either. Although one person may have the original idea of how to market a product, many people ultimately are involved in the development of that idea, not to mention that these ideas are essentially constrained by the task at hand, the whims of whatever corporation they are working for. If anything, I may attribute the work of advertisers as "collective authorship". In fact, collective authorship may be too strong of a term; maybe something more like "collective production" or "collective work" would be more suitable, because it is really a stretch for me to say that advertisers really author anything at all - in many ways, they can be categorized as what Negus calls "cultural intermediaries". They are more involved with the translation and facilitation of ideas from author to consumer. From this perspective, they are simply relaying a message, and moreover, they are relaying it in a way that must be approved by the author themselves. In other words, I see advertisers as more of the telephone than the speaker, as merely an instrument.

AMV Hell

http://youtube.com/watch?v=3aTgINExt2w

What I have chosen to analyze for this assignment is essentially a montage of AMVs entitled "AMV Hell 3", which runs almost an hour long (and can be seen at above link). For those who don't know, AMV stands for "Anime Music Video" and usually is a series of clips from a particular show set to a song/songs and edited in such a way that it seems that the characters are performing the song. This particular example is a compilation of hundreds of these kinds of clips, usually about 5-20 seconds long set to popular songs or audio bytes from movies, etc. The illusion of flipping channels and almost an overload of information is created through certain editing techniques, and it is clearly evident that a lot of work went into the creation of this "film" (or maybe I should say exposition?).

Before even going through the readings for this week, I knew that whatever I chose for this assignment would probably be based on my own tastes and what I have had exposure to, and based on what I think others would enjoy as well. As Curran points out, however, what people (literary editors in particular) perceive as being popular or well received may not always be a perfect match, and might even be far from the actual sentiments of the public. I think it's important to keep in mind how well received a work would be in the consideration of whether to publish it or not, but I also think it's important not to let public sentiments restrict the type of material being published. That being said, I think that products like AMV Hell 3 deserve a chance, and would be in the same vein of programming as Robot Chicken, and perhaps Family Guy, South Park, etc. With a bit of polishing, I think that something like this would be worth publishing because of its humor and novelty, and I believe that there would be a significant audience for it. And yet, as I write all of this, I feel that maybe my decision to publish is really based on my own preferences. It really is difficult to separate oneself and think purely objectively about something, especially if you had a previous interest invested in something..

And If You Know Where You Stand, Then You Know Where To Land...

Where I stand on the issue between humanism and materialism in reference to authorship is a bit complicated. First of all, my understanding of the definition of these terms goes as follows: humanism embodying the possibility that there can be original ideas and that authors have varying degrees of creative license, but nonetheless, their works are their own, created for their own purposes and from their own intentions (as postulated by those like Buscombe and ; and on the other hand, materialism, which holds that works of authors are simply just products of labor, produced for mass culture, and excludes the possibility of original ideas, stating that ideas are merely social constructions (as put forth by those such as Macherey and Benjamin). That being said, I seem to lean a bit more toward humanism. I can understand how materialism may have some merit in its arguments. It is difficult to say if there are any "true" original ideas, since all that we learn is a result of social interaction, and it can be argued that all works are merely manipulations of old works, or otherwise their antithesis. Yet, what I am tempted to argue here is that there has to be a conscious decision made to create, whether it is considered an original idea, or a rehashing or reworking of an old idea, and this is what makes works more than mere products for consumption, but the product of an author's mind, a portait of their ideas.

Technology

To what extent does technology influence our definition of author -- I would argue it affects it greatly. How many struggling artists, directors, etc. are out there, working with minimal equipment and minimal exposure, and not one of them achieving the status of "auteur", and yet it is possible for their work to be more innovative; those that do achieve that status are generally those who do have access to much more sophisticated technologies, not just a hand-hald video camera. Exposure and celebrity I would argue also play a big role in how we define who is and is not an author. Though many do not start out with access to such technology, it is often more rare to recognize a director of a low budget film or a garage band as a bonafide author, as opposed to a well-established director or a Grammy winning artist. At the same time, though, I feel that technology has allowed for a more vast understanding of what can be considered as art, regardless of whether artists of "low budget" art are considered authors or not.



Which leads to the role that institutions play in shaping our perception of the author.. from a corporate perspective, such as a music label or a publisher, there is tremendous control over who is considered an author or not, and this begins with the decision over who gets exposure and who does not. If they do not believe that a certain person's work is not worthy for publishing (or else, is not profitable), then it makes it that much harder for that person's talents to be recognized. Institutions such as these work to filter out what types of talents are "acceptable" or not, and therefore contribute to the definition of author. And in some cases, they can take it a step further by marketing a certain desirable image of whoever they are trying to promote, even if it compromises that artist's personality.

There must be a beginning...

I didn't make these words, nor did I make the letters that make up these words. But I understand them and have the power to use them, often in a way, in a pattern, that I imagine has not been created before. I can use these words, like anyone else, and arrange them in such a way to create meaning. That is why I am the author-- because I am the one who has access to this place, to create meaning where none existed previously. These are not my words, but they are my patterns of words; I am the one who chooses what order and what meaning to create with them.

As far as choosing my favorite authors... it would be easy to say that I don't have a favorite, and maybe that's not so far from the truth. It seems to change often, so I suppose I can focus on some of my favorite authors at present. One of them would be John Mayer. I have a lot of respect for those who write their own lyrics and music and create their own product. The way they go about creating it does not matter so much to me, whether it's with an actual instrument or a computer program, but mainly that the end product is their creation. And I don't deny that there are potentially dozens of people that help singer/songwriters produce their music and guide them in their creative process, but what is most important is that the original idea come from within the artist, even if it is shaped and influenced by others during process which leads to the creation of the final product. At any rate, because he is in control of the creative process that leads to a completed piece of music is one of the reasons why his music is appealing to me; knowing that he has experienced the things that he sings about, or at least that they are thoughts that have gone through his mind, make them more real to me. On that note, I also find that I can relate to a lot of what he addresses in his songs, whether it is about abandonment, lonliness, or simply certain wishes or desires about how life should be.

Also, if you consider movie directors to be authors, then I suppose that Tran Anh Hung is also one of my favorite authors at the moment. I have seen several different movies of his including "Cyclo", "Scent of Green Papaya", and "Vertical Ray of the Sun". Although I enjoy the stories that are told in all three in varying degrees, I particularly enjoy the choices that he makes in how to shoot the film to best tell the story. My favorite of the three would be Cyclo, which is set in Vietnam in the late 1980s during an economic upheaval and focuses on the lives of those who struggle to get by in the changing times. Shots of movement, whether it's cars or people or bicycles are constantly focused on, whether in the background or the foreground, in such a way to remind the viewer of the changes occurring and the frantic pace in which most people are trying to adapt. Hung is also considered a diasporic filmmaker (born in Vietnam, moved to France as a child), and therefore he also brings a mix of different ways of thinking and perceptions to the table when he decides how Vietnam should be depicted. On the one hand, he feels that he should provide an accurate representation of the times, and on the other hand, he is deeply influenced by French perceptions of what Vietnam looks like. Trying to negotiate between these two "realities" can be difficult at times, and in the end the product is perhaps a mix of both truths. The mark, therefore, that he makes on these films as director is very powerful in that he is essentially seen, for better or worse, as an expert on Vietnam by some, and particularly by those who do not know much about Vietnam's history or landscape.