de·con·struc·tion (dē'kən-strŭk'shən)
n. A philosophical movement and theory of literary criticism that
questions traditional assumptions about certainty, identity, and truth;
- American Heritage Dictionary
The world and business of media and new media Production is traditionally a top-down, one-to-many institution. Media, especially video and TV, has become the dominant form of social communication. It is the medium through which many of the values of society are shaped and shared. Traditionally, this media has been created by a very privileged few, for consumption by the many, and constructed within a framework that is, at its core, designed entirely to serve advertisers and commercialism.
Deproduction does not assert that this institution is evil. We are not interested in combating it (or anything else). We do, however, feel that the traditional media approach is neglecting and dismissing significant human desires to communicate and connect around topics and interests that do not necessarily serve commercial interests. Deproduction is here to fill that void, and to put the power of the media and technology into the hands of the community.
Deproduction is not, and has no capacity to be, the voice of the disenfranchised. We are not here to speak for others, but only to help provide them with the tools, skills, and resources they need to speak for themselves. Equipment, training, and distribution services that allow them to reach across the globe and find others with an interest in connecting and communicating about anything they choose. We believe the world would be a better place if the barriers to free speech and communication were removed, and if the social dialogue truly represented the diversity of the people.
Vision Statement
The text below was originally written by Tony in the spring of 2005, about 6 months before the city of Denver shut Denver Community Television down, giving Tony and Deproduction the perfect opportunity to follow-through on his vision for an entirely new business model. It is posted below, unedited, exactly as it appeared in Tony's fledgling MySpace blog in 2005. His subsequent writings and presentations have added graphs, statistics, and eloquence, but none have done much better at representing the basic idea behind the Denver Open Media model.Media Technology Driving the Society:
As technology advances, the tools for creating Video and other multimedia content are literally becoming more common than pen and paper.
That statement is true, but only for wealthy communities in the US. As it becomes more true, the poor will soon be left behind with a pen that is no longer mightier than the sword.
This, above all else, is going to be the single biggest force behind class separation and the cycle of poverty. Video is the way communities communicate on a grand scale. It is where we learn our values, it is where we get our news, it is how we interact with the world around us, its how we learn what issues our society is concerned about, what our society values, etc, etc.... In the US, people spend more time watching TV than all other leisure activities combined.
At present, that communication is created by and designed for the wealthy. Driven by the needs of advertisers, TV programming is aimed at consumers, leaving the concerns of low-income communities ignored. We get a few dozen channels aimed at stock market investments, house remodeling, fashion, etc, while the concerns of the poorer communities are left out of the public discourse, and those communities are discouraged from engaging in the community.
Looking to the Internet as the Model:
When the internet formed, we all assumed that the technology was beyond the reach of the common man/woman. We all expected that the majority of the content on the web would be produced by government and large corporations. As it turned out, the tools for web development became so affordable and easy to use that today, over 90% of the content on the web is made by everyday people. Web design today has become so simple that, in two weeks, young students are able to create their very own websites in courses like Deproduction’s Digital Design class.
The same story is unfolding for Video. While Corporate Media tries to hold on to control over the way societies communicate, technology is making media creation tools affordable for all. High Schools in wealthy neighborhoods now offer video production classes with studios that rival anything Hollywood had 20 years ago. Every home computer today comes pre-loaded with software that rivals the quality of a 1980’s post-production company, and for $300 you can purchase a video camera that can produce broadcast-quality media.
Corporate media still controls the vast majority of media distribution, but as technology brought about the end to corporate control over media development, the same is becoming true for distribution. New, alternative networks are popping up, web distribution and video on-demand are becoming more popular, and the result is that today we have an opportunity today to do with Video what we did with the internet: mold that power so that it benefits the people, not just the corporations.
Much of that battle is being won. Any member of a middle or upper-class community today has the potential to create media that can be seen across the globe on the 1-billion-plus computers connected to the internet: a number that dwarfs the reach of ANY other media outlet.
As this boom in media creation occurs; poor communities will continue to be left out of the dialogue. Advancing technology in media and communications is poised to be the strongest force in society for widening the gap between the wealthy and the poor, or for closing it.
The Power of Voice:
The reason low-income communities are often disengaged from society is because no one is targeting them. This is not going to change in our market-driven society because it isn’t profitable to target communities that lack disposable income. As the barriers to entry in video production and distribution have disappeared, progressive production companies have formed, aimed at representing the interests mainstream media ignores, and aimed at engaging communities that have been left out of the public discourse.
The sad truth is, these new networks like Free Speech TV or Link TV cannot compete with Fox and CNN. Progressive production companies like Just Media or GNN, try as they may, can not compete with MTV. Funded by pledge drives and grants instead of billion-dollar advertisers, there is a limit to how effective they can be. Targeting audiences with limited financial resources limits their financial return, and while they’ve made a lot of progress and deserve our support, they cannot change the face of media today.
What we need is a new approach.
A New Age of Opportunity:
Ten years ago, the people who controlled the mindshare of the public were the content creators. A few large corporations produced video with technical skills so advanced and equipment costs so high that the barriers-to-entry protected them from competition from the everyman. As these barriers-to-entry for media creation have been trampled by the digital revolution, the people who now control the mindshare of the public are the distributors. You can create Blair Witch Project for $3,000, but nobody is going to see it unless Sony puts up $30 Million to put it in thousands of theatres and in every Blockbuster in the world. You can create a lovely PSA for your organization, but nobody will see it unless Comcast agrees to show it on their channels to their 100-million viewers.
In today’s business model, the corporate media kings decide what issues and values do and do not get included in the public discourse, but it isn’t a monarchic system. The viewers play a significant role, but the system isn’t democratic either. Its plutocratic. Media organizations have one goal in mind: selling audiences to advertisers, and so the true decisions aren’t based on how many PEOPLE the stories can reach, its based on how many DOLLARS they can reach. For every “vote” a community with an average disposable income of $10/day gets, a community with an average disposable income of $1,000/day gets 100.
That’s how issues are selected and programming decisions are made. For the most part, the media corporations don’t have a political agenda, it isn’t an immoral system, its an AMORAL system. The issues that get addressed aren’t generally selected because they promote one view or another, they get selected because they appeal to communities that advertisers want to reach.
The changing landscape of technology is setting us up to change this dynamic from a plutocratic system to a much more democratic one. The number of choices when it comes to media content is rising exponentially, and within a few years, the majority of our media will not be served up by a cable network, but will be hunted down by us.
Within ten years, “video on-demand” will be a defunct term, because there will be no other kind of video. We’ll all watch what we want, when we want. Following the model of internet radio-stations, TV channels are likely to be treated more like DJ’s, vying for the loyalty of viewers who ‘really dig’ the way they reach out into the infinite void of programming and pick the select gems for your viewing pleasure. And like the web-radio stations popping up today, any kid with a computer and an internet connection can do it
In that world, anyone with access to a camera and a computer could conceivably as much potential to make the top-rated show on “TV” as Rupert Murdoch. While this new structure is guaranteed to result in a more diverse social dialogue, the problem with this picture is that the vast majority of the content will still be created by those with access to these resources… the wealthy. The point is, that its more important now than EVER to begin engaging low-income communities in media creation. The opportunity is greater than ever before to level the playing field and create a public discourse that truly represents the public interest.
DCTV presents the opportunity to level that playing field: to ensure that all our communities can contribute to the public discourse, to ensure that the issues of concern to low-income communities are part of the media mix, at a time when that content has the greatest opportunity to reach wide audiences and engage communities that would otherwise be left behind, and left out.
Revolutionary Production Companies:
Innovative Production Companies like Deproduction and Just Media are taking advantage of the disappearing barriers-to-entry of the media industry, building new models that embrace emerging structures and technologies while corporate media tries to fight the onslaught. But as brilliant as we are, NO production company can save the world.
Deproduction and Just Media continue to do great work, promoting local non-profits, creating short films and documentaries that promote progressive, grassroots issues and values, but the ONLY way our business model will work is if it is based on getting the ONLY group in the world who is really capable of competing with big business to do the REAL work. The only group that is up to the task is the people.
In the short term, there is great opportunity for the kind of production work we’re doing, but in the long term, the way for us to step to the forefront is to mobilize communities into taking over the media system. As the landscape changes, there will be a lot of organizing and education required to ensure that this new media system isn’t limited to the wealthiest 20% of the population, the way the current system is. The opportunity is here to put the primary form of social communication into the hands of the people, to ensure popular control over the media system that was always intended to serve the people, but somehow strayed from that course.
The Structure-less Structure of Business to Come:
There’s no corporation in the world who will have the resources to dominate the future of the world’s media, especially when every hobbyist from Denver to Detroit is making films. In looking to organize the masses, Deproduction is looking towards today’s most innovative and successful business models: an approach that cannot be rivaled by even the most dominant of traditional, hierarchical institutions.
For example, Ebay works as the world’s most active and profitable marketplace, but there isn’t a company on the planet that could afford to manage and coordinate the 1.4 billion auctions it holds each year. It’s designed for the public to do the work: post the listings, take the pictures, rate the users, and so on. Google’s entire web search system is based on the tastes of its users (millions of searches and link patterns logged and evaluated by their computers every day). The most successful new business models like Amazon and Netflix show users a short list of titles that were most popular among people who selected the same product you’ve selected, with reviews from your peers. The WikiPedia is the most extensive and popular encyclopedia in the world, and the reason Microsoft and Encarta can’t keep up: WikiPedia has an estimated 1-million-plus developers and contributors, adding a little bit at a time, evaluating each other’s contributions, and putting more man-hours into the project than even Bill Gates could pay for.
This is the business model for the future of Deproduction. We want to engage the community, equip them with the skills and tools they need to transform a media system that has traditionally been the single greatest force in society for discouraging the poor and dividing the society, into the ultimate promise of media: the strongest force in the world for engaging communities and bringing society together.
Footnote:
Relevance of Blogging:Borrowed from Kevin Kelly’s Article from Wired, August 2005:
Every media expert in the world agreed that audiences would never get up off their asses and start making their own entertainment. Reading and writing are dead. Music is too much trouble to make when you can sit back and listen, Video production is out of reach. Even if they did, there’d be no audience. Now there are 50 million Blogs on line, creating more content than all the world’s news networks combined. Blogspot has more content than any News website in the world would have the time and energy to create… and more readers. And where is this content coming from? Its coming from the audience.
The future is decentralization. The most powerful hierarchies will fall one by one. In every model, in every opportunity. Centralization will fall, and the people will take the driver’s seat.