Experiments in Communication

Scott McCloud and Clay Shirky both make convincing, solid arguments, and I don't think that either of them are wrong. I think they are discussing slightly different aspects of the same issue, and that's why I think they're disagreeing.

When Shirky says that if you have to pay for something and you can get it elsewhere for free, I am not sure if that it refers to something of the same category, of to the specific thing. McCloud seems to think it is the former, in which case he makes a good point that users won't be satisfied with the free items (Donnie Darko vs Dances with Wolves). In reality however, you can probably get the actual thing for free anyway, so then obviously no one would prefer micropayments. I think Clay is assuming that you can find high quality content for free (legally), whereas McCloud isn't really agreeing with this assumption.

I think that Clay is right in that having to pay, even if the amount is microscopic, is a significant barrier to deciding to acquire something through buying it. I think that both of them should take more seriously into account the reality of the situation (McCloud mentions it briefly in the end) that if users can find the exact same thing for free, with the same ease, they will probably get the free version.

I think the one succesful example of micropayments is the itunes music store. I believe it works well because it manages to automate the process so much that you do not feel the "mental transaction costs" of paying. Having itunes on on your computer, you are usually signed in, and it has your credit card info, so whenever you want something you can just click and click to confirm that you want to buy it (i think, to authorize the transaction) and you're done. Very painless, and it doesn't feel like you are spending that much. Interestingly, this example is sort of mentioned by McCloud, who mentions mac users buying many many songs online.

I think users want to take the path of least resistance, and paying (any amount) should defintely be calculated as an instance of resistance. If you can get the exact same thing just as easily, for free, then people will choose that option.

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The Still Life endeavour had a few mishaps -- our tripod was missing the tripod head, and during the very time-consuming photoshop work we did to try to fix the jolting pictures (a consequence of the tripod problem) we lost a lot of work because of a computer failure.

The concept of Still, Life? is a slowly disintegrating still life "painting". The shoot took much longer than we had imagined, and eating all the food was not as pleasant as it seemed. I learned the importance of a sturdy tripod, and that stop-motion animation requires some degree of skill and lots of attention to detail!

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I was interested in the parallels between "cult value" in traditional art, photography, and the film (as Benjamin likes to call it).
Benjamin says that traditionally, the purpose of artworks was to serve a cult need ("artistic production begins with ceremonial objects designed to serve in a cult"). For example, people worship something, they create artworks to represent it and use the (unique) artworks ritually. An artwork with cult value has to be protected, and so cannot be exhibited widely for fear that the object will be damaged. Mechanical reproduction of art allows art to be free "from its parasitical dependence on ritual". Consequently, new forms of art that are mechanically reproduced, "exhibition value begins to displace cult value". He goes on to claim that even so, some cult value is present. Early photography focused on portraiture, and cult value "retires" into the "human countenance".
Then the idea of "cult" returns in the case of the film and the movie star! In film, where the actor and his "aura" is not present (as they are on the stage of the theater), there is instead "the cult of the movie star", an artifice that is created by the movie producers. The cult of the movie star is undisputably a real phenomenon. Why are people willing to buy into such an arbitrary value system? Why are people so enamored of this artificial public persona of the movie star (that is mechanically reproduced through the press and the film)?
So in each of the cases (traditional art, photography, film), the artwork always seems to carry cult value. Is Benjamin saying something about art, or about human nature? About our impulse to make art, or about our need to understand art? It could just be that art always has to have some form of cult value to it (people's motivation in making it is to express this value -- this is probably not the case for movies, where the cult value is more of a consequence than a cause). Or humans might like to ascribe cult value to objects they find important.

Other thoughts:
my younger brother's ideas that mechanically reproduced art is superior to traditional art forms
--After seeing a theater performance with my younger brother (who is 16), I asked him if he liked the play, and he said he thought it was ok, but in general he doesn't think theater can ever be up to par with film. Apparently, the fact that every performance will be a little bit different, and the transience of the performance is a negative thing as far as my brother is concerned (I think he said he feels the same way about music concerts). I was amazed, because I thought that it was so obvious that theater is a more enriching experience than cinema! I wonder if this is a generational thing, or if it is just my brother who is being weird. But also, what would Benjamin think if he heard this?

mechanically reproduced art & psychology of perception -- interesting consequence of mechanically reproducible art. i wonder if that is when visual perception research really started to flourish, and how much these reproducible media were used in actual research.

dada, film, contemplation & distraction -- i thought this part was also really interesting. I don't think the dadaists would really be happy about the comparison, given how mainstream film is today, but I think the parallel is interesting.

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