National Alliance for Media, Arts, and Culture; WGBH Forum Network; Commonwealth: Collaboration and Connectedness

So I guess we're ready to introduce our brilliant panel here today. This again is the keynote session of the conference where we're discussing common wealth. That's the theme of this whole year's conference. It's it's about collaboration and about community and we've got a brilliant list of speakers lined up to talk to us about it. First let me introduce David Ball you're. David is an author and activist. He's a leading scholar on the comments. He's the producer of a website called on the common stop board. He'll take that car seat over there. He's also the co-founder of public knowledge the Washington based advocacy group and he is the author of a new book called viral spiral about the rise of the digital comments which I will plug right here. And I think he also has some of these cards that you can take with you. Great book highly recommended. Another speaker is Tamara Gould who's a former name board member. Give it up for name board members. Again. An independent producer and an executive producer. She's the former aide of Babe back. She also launched the international arm of ITV s the international television service. Tema gold.

Also we have Christina Newman Scott who is the visual arts director at real ways in Hartford. She's got an upcoming exhibition that she's planning right now on contemporary West Indian art. And as you can see she's eight months pregnant with a beautiful baby girl that will be adding to our community. And that may require her to take a bathroom break during the session. So looking for that lever. And the moderator for this discussion today is Valerie Linson. She's the series producer for basic black a television show on WGBH PBS station here in Boston. That's a public affairs and multimedia program that explores the black experience so I'll leave you with this fine panel to explore our theme today coming off. First of all I'd like to thank you for inviting me to moderate this panel and to meet these distinguished panelists. I remember when around the time that they invited you to come in moderate this panel I read an article about your leaving and

to create this new company connecting distributors advertisers and producers and I thought these commercial guys get together at the drop of a. So I know that nonprofits and all the folks in it are fully capable and could do their thing. So in terms of laying out that the foundation for our discussion I was just wondering if you could tell me. What does Commonwealth mean to you as it relates to the interconnected creative community. Well when I think of Commonwealth I immediately think of a structure that I've been studying for a lot over the past years of the Commons as a vehicle for creating Commonwealth and preserving it and maintaining it. And essentially a commons is created whenever a given community gets together and decides they want to manage a resource collectively for the long term with equitable access and sustainability over the long term and it's a sort of a paradigm for

creating valuable stuff that's different from the market. And I think we see it's most evident most visible on the Internet where we've seen such a explosion of not only viable but flourishing Commons as from Wikipedia to open access journals to social networking to the blog a sphere. It just goes on and on. And I think in fact we're seeing a common sector that's emerging that is distinct from an operating and different dynamics from the marketplace. But having a dynamic. And productive relationship with the market as well so it's not as if it's sequestered from the market. So I mean my short answer is I see the Commons as a new vehicle for communities to preserve their wealth over time and it's something that I think people in creative sectors especially need to pay attention to as a way for husbanding martially in protecting their resources.

Yeah I definitely want to come back to that notion of value and wealth because you have some really interesting things to say about what that means outside the financial sector. But. I think David spoke about the common part I think also to think about this. The wealth piece which is that together we can leverage so much of what is happening in the public sphere to become so much more than the sum of our parts. At the PBS conference a few months ago Ken Burns was there and ubiquitous Ken Burns on PBS speaking about his new program about national parks. And I was really struck by one of the things that that the producers spoke about which was that the most beautiful land in the United States was really protected for all the people. And I think that in many ways. The Commonwealth of media is that the most amazing creative output right now is happening by independent makers and by every day makers and we're sort of in that same moment where if we can

really you know work on the legal side work on the on the public side to preserve what is being created in the public space in the realm of media I think that the 21st century promises to look dramatically different than the media consolidation that we saw in the 20th century. Just as it relates to you know coming from a space like real or ways which is a multidisciplinary Contemporary Art Center which exists in a community in the community of park which is in Hartford. I think that the Commonwealth for us especially coming out of these four public art projects that we just it is very much based on. Kind of. Linking into and choosing and what members of the community are already doing and kind of serving as a partner and facilitator for what's already happening instead of you know because with the visual arts it's very. Unlike media. I think we could do a better job. What do you mean.

Well you know I think it's naturally for us where the visual arts I mean I'm you know I'm I'm working with artists a lot of. Specific projects that engage that engage people in various you know specific ways like media does but I do think that in terms of that crossover in terms of radio television people doing the performing arts and I think that we could learn to tune into that community in a better way even though it will always be that very organically in some ways I think media. I think television and radio have an understanding. That we necessarily don't have especially in terms of marketing. Advertising really thinking about some of these some of the bigger companies that can help. Smaller contemporary centers or nonprofit centers get the word out. So. I mean right now the Commonwealth to me is being a sport for our artistic community and the community that we live in and kind of helping to facilitate that. And.

So. What leads me to you know the part about the community I mean a Mac is you know of course a great example of how that connected and connectedness happens on a national level. I was wondering you know how do we begin to do that within our local communities where we live and work. Christina. How do you begin and it's like how do you operate those networks how do you. I think you know because I think coming from Jamaica. When we were working I used to do television and radio in Jamaica. While curating exhibitions and also working as an artist and because there is not as much there not a lot of power structure so to speak. So things like that happen really naturally and people are there so many people involved in how they're the kind of fingers in the pot without having to go to the script to do this kind of formal like formal protocol for these things to happen so no one's thinking of it in this way like well. How can we.

How can we make this happen. It's just happening like this organic coming together. I mean so for instance if we're doing an art project a friend has somebody who's doing who's a deejay who has a friend who's doing radio who has a friend who works for the ad company who did the design and then red stripe heard about it and they want to get involved to support it and sponsor it and then there's you know the people that run the parks want to host the concerts and so it kind of has a slight trickle down effect where I find a difference in America because everything is so much more formal. And so it's kind of this let's start with a round table and figure it out at the Round Table. And I just want to go to the source. I don't own it. Because I just feel like the energy and the synergy and everything that's happening is right with the people that are producing the quality work and doing the projects and they have so many ideas that don't get hard to get hard. And so you end up speaking to the same

people discussing the same things all the time and you missed like a whole group of people but. You know. Some. Some really important things to share with you. So I think listening to the people in your listening to the people that you're working with and the right paying attention to that community first before you try to kind of remove it from there. I don't know I mean I I understand they have the Round Table and that one is me but the round table can be very important. You know in terms of death and creating those formal structures you know I was going to ask David and Tara you know those how do you how do you change the dynamic of that round table. One reason I'm fascinated by online comments is is because they open the door to many more people albeit not in the impersonal way so there's different dynamics. But the barrier to entry is different and people can self-select for issues that they're passionate about where they have the talent for. And

so instead of somebody from the center or the top coming down to identify who has talent or passion people self-select. And that in fact is the paradigm for a lot of successful online promises such as open source software where people gravitate to the things where they see they can make a contribution and want to make a contribution. And so in a way a more efficient way of matching talent with with needs. And furthermore there's such a the online platforms provide an architecture for creating a community in a different way and interact on a wiki wiki where people can contribute it or it's a bully and it's still this experimental front to rear. But the point is you can construct and move communities in different ways through online structures that then compliment what's going on around in-person roundtables. I would just add to that in my in my experience you know our world which is just changed so dramatically even in the last 10 years has gone. It's it is

simultaneously both much more in a sort of hyper global but also hyper local and those things are not exclusive at all in fact they really work together and just to kind of describe it a little bit more. You know five years ago at ITV Yes we really saw the need for Americans to be getting you know much more international content than we were getting and looking at kind of the beginning of what were the international bureaus closing and the lack of foreign news coming through and and after 9/11 the fact that we were actually getting less context about the rest of the world rather than more. And so we started looking at how we might sort of globalize our what had been previously for 15 years an entirely domestic operation of supporting independent filmmakers to bring their work to public television. So we thought well what does that look like in this global and this global world. And it's amazing in five years what has changed even with our thinking five years ago to today because because we had been so oriented towards broadcast in the

US because of our mandate and mission we sort of developed an international program that was also centered on broadcast. So it looked different very different than what we were doing domestically but it's still sort of privileged a broadcast in the U.S. And so the concept was we would work with filmmakers from around the world help develop programming for U.S. television. And that's what we've done we've actually now funded 100 projects from over 80 countries were working about 120 languages and we've distributed films to about 60 million American audiences on 35 different platforms in the US. And what what I've seen is that that's that's been huge. Those platforms are broadcast but in the last three years they've also become digital and they've become mobile that the broadcast is huge but we've really moved into a beyond broadcast phase of the programming as well because that is where audiences are really expecting to engage with the content it's not people don't no longer just want to see it. They want to respond to it they want to make their own

content in response they want to use it they want to play games they want to be really involved with that content in a different way and that that is actually enabling us to serve our mission which was really about engaging Americans with ideas and that the fact that the potential has changed so much in the last five years makes me think for all of you in the room with you as producers or as media art centers that we're already thinking how we serve our missions using you know again the hyper global but also the hyper local And just to speak about the local piece for a minute because I think it has never been more important. You know although people want to connect. Mind they want to connect you know using technology they want to connect with people around the world through games all these things they also want to connect in person. You know we've been running the community cinema campaign where we work in that now we're in I think 80 80 cities around the U.S. where we screen films and have discussions and panels. All I can say is that there are not we cannot host enough of those events that people and I'm sure you know I know we do that with some of your centers around the country. People want to come together in person at the same time as all of this is happening in the

virtual space and so kind of. I think we all need to really look at our operation and look at are we offering a diversified range of services to our constituents that kind of meet all the different ways that people want to connect and if anything technology has made our lives much more complicated I think in terms of you know people now expect everything all the time in every way you know sort of 24/7. And obviously the right environment has not caught up with that with the viewer or the viewer preferences. I think the public system and I don't want to jump I know Valerie have other questions we're going to but I think that the public system has not yet found a way to ensure that our public makers are really able to meet the audience demands and once you get into rights you know we are we're also looking at a way where we're trying to ensure I know many of you are concerned with making sure that our filmmakers are actually able to have revenue from the films that they're involved with and the right that independent rights holders are paid for the work that they do at the same time we're balancing that with the desire to have their work seen any time any place on any form of media and

so I think these are the conversations that we need to have which is how does this global digital public media resonate with traditional rights and distribution structure that has not yet caught up to the potential of what is out there. I just wanted to mention briefly that towards the end of our discussion there are micro. In the middle of the auditorium it will have time for a Q&A afterward. But I want to follow up on this notion of. Public Media trying to catch up with the you know it almost seems as though the the mission and public media are almost. Not so much at loggerheads but they're almost missing each other in conversation and I was wondering David is this a place where what you've learned around the creation of the Commons might help that conversation that building together. Well I think we're in a messy interregnum where the 20th Century Media my broadcast is top down centralized out are being

challenged profoundly by this other model. And so I don't think there's any easy answers we're going to have to grow some new institutions. I know that there is profound growth of open business models which are trying to build new profit structures upon communities where there is less reliance upon intellectual property greater leveraging of people's social proclivities as everybody wants to interact that way in building ways to develop revenue streams from those communities. I think that that's that's the direction it's going to have to go or the top down institutions are going to have to adapt in some serious way. I mean a friend of mine pointed out to me that the only thing worse than being sampled on the Internet is not being the same. So some way we have to learn how to use the my theory of the commons is that people coming together as a social community are creating socially created value. And that is extremely important to markets. Well. Michael

it's Mike still there. The question is how can you develop some innovative business models to respect the community but still monetize something from those people coming together. And I think that's really the challenge that we're facing. And I don't pretend to know your world as well as you do but I think there are some interesting experiments going on interacting with communities and still getting revenue or the way academics do. Having institutional revenue sources but them interacting as a commons yourself and not having everything be a market transaction. When you talk about some of those experiments I'm sorry. Can you talk about some of those Yeah. For example in the there's a musical label called Magnatune which it's a label that has its roster of scores of artists and they give a 50/50 split to the artist. No accounting trickery or shenanigans. And customers can buy albums for $5 to $18. They

choose the price knowing that they can be directly rewarding their artist and this is a direct deliberate strategy to cultivate a sense of appreciation honesty respect for the community which in turn they're banking on is going to have loyalty for the company. So in other words the company is building a relationship with the community. Another gets a a non-media example but it might be political here is there's a lot of extreme sports like extreme skateboarding and skiing and so forth where the communities and its practitioners are on the cutting edge of developing innovative new types of equipment. Well a lot of companies are developing these symbiotic relationships with these communities especially online to do they're have the community there are indeed for them to have the community do their word of mouth advertising for them. And so in a way a business can use the community to offload cost structures they previously had to bear and let the community do it. But at the same time they have to respect the community. And

not be predatory or try to over monetize it. So there's a difference between say a Facebook which is a company that you know is the Facebook going to try to data mine your privacy in that being respectful of the community while the community was pushing back and on Facebook for that. So there's an interesting tension between the business motives in the community self-interest. And I think but that is the nexus that needs to be explored and innovated with. You are also talking and anyone please jump in on this. You were talking about the building of new institutions in order to to make this happen and part of you know institution building in this country is around politics. And I was just wondering if there are any. Policies or you know who should we be you know making demands from our public officials and what should those kinds of demands are programs which should that be. Well net neutrality is sort of the first word out there because without net neutrality as a policy to allow players to function on the internet without

discrimination by the telephone companies the cable companies in terms of how their data streams are routed whether the big players have a fast track higher quality service than the rest of us have degraded service. That's a non-negotiable issue that we need to get codified in or at least the FCC for. So that's just they want to put that right out there. And just to just to add to David's comment I think it's not only the creation of new institutions but the transformation of some of our older institutions that's also really at play here. You know one of the it's a it's a small example but it actually has huge impact is looking at you know for filmmakers looking at the traditional forms of distribution for independent film. You know many of you I'm sure have worked with some of the educational distributors and the companies distributors who have really been part of the independent media ecosystem for the last 30 years you know and what's been interesting with digital rights is that it's sort of come in and I think really kind of had.

Sort of an earthquake how to hold world of distribution was happening for independence because what happened is you know if you say great I'm going to put your film on line it's going to be distributed through iTunes and people are you know two billion people on the Internet can find your film now and buy it for you know a dollar ninety nine or five ninety nine or nine ninety nine in their price and keep changing. Well of course the traditional distributors you know and they're right to think this you know what will happen to my model where I'm selling licenses to schools for $299 what will happen to my model where I'm delivering this through DVD and for filmmakers like myself. And so I really am sympathetic to the position where you know people were selling DVDs from 1999. Well what's going to happen to this to this business model and I think the stakes are high because of course you know many of us financed our next project based on some of the revenue that we're able to to earn from our existing project. And nobody wants to sacrifice you know real dollars for digital pennies. Some of the some of the fears are out there but at the same time. The

risk of not doing it is you know I think David's point the only thing worse than doing it is not doing it. And many of our many of the filmmakers The goal is to be seen by as many people. The money is there as a huge part of it but audience is huge. And so coming up with you know this is not a zero sum game coming up with smart strategies smart windowing strategies smart ways of you know using the Internet for what you know for promotion or using it for limited periods to reach new audiences. I think we're also looking at what is actually going to shake out with with consumer habits I think consumers are waiting to see what's going to happen with their own habits because all of these options are relatively you know just just born. You know we've created to kind of give to sort of beta test some of this because we got tired of the answer always being we don't know. We don't know. You know when filmmakers would say well should I do this you know will I lose money if I put my film up on iTunes. Will I no longer be able to sell DVDs and you know what I ts it was like whoa. Maybe but maybe not and you know and we decide that

we want to get better answers and so we we created something called the independent digital distribution and we were able to get PBS to agree to be a partner with us in the lab and the idea is really it is a it is a lab to test what happens. We're bringing in you know we're working with traditional distributors and trying to get them onboard with really experimenting and getting metrics and getting data and reporting that back to the field and letting people know here you know obviously it's not prescriptive but it's much more like this is what's happened to our you know now we have about 100 filmmakers participating in the lab meaning that they have given PBS they are getting media rights and with that PBS is distributing their films to places like iTunes and Hulu and snag films under a PBS banner. These are all films that aired on PBS. But the idea is that we're measuring what happens obviously with you some of the audience but also with their traditional distribution. So let's find out let's have some answers. So that we can actually have this conversation from a place of some knowledge and so I think that's you know slightly more drilling down the what they were talking

about but hopefully that kind of impact will help us help us talk about what it is that we want in this bigger public media 2.0 landscape. What I've seen is Johnson and I was just thinking about this because as relates to the museum or gallery space where our our our members our community is less. I think they're less not they're less in tune with the fact that we don't get to explore our content the way that they're exploring your content so for instance the normal situation would be is if you go to an exhibition there's a major catalog to be used in conjunction with this exhibition and you can purchase the museum or the gallery and just till recently I mean museum spaces and contemporary centers are seem to be reluctant to go the whole Facebook. You know Twitter YouTube because they don't feel their constituents are going to be exploring they're seeing the shows that way they need to have some kind of physical intimate relationship with it. And I found with this

exhibition that we're doing on contemporary West Indian art which you know we're going to be coming in from all over the Anglophone Caribbean England Canada et cetera. We have decided to not make this like Precious physical catalog and do it with a group in Trinidad called draconian switch. And they've been really successful doing this. A mag that they did just got featured on Stephen howlers blog and they got like 50000 hits in two minutes or something ridiculous they were. But we're trying to re educate our our community. You know like it's not just that you can go to YouTube and see all these great clips or go to Hulu or you know you can actually go and take a virtual tour of an exhibition so for especially for the purposes of the show coming up I've been thinking about. You know and working with Jamaica and Trinidad and Bahamas there's not a lot of. Resources there for them to be traveling to the shows so we're showing a lot of artists that aren't able to make it. We don't have the funding to carry them so it's really key for them to be able to share this

information with the people that they're working with. And you know so. I remember we didn't log for an exhibition two years ago. And I think that even though we were promoted it. It got so little there was so little traffic I think the probably like Channel 3 News repeat from like 2002 got more traffic and it was such a beautiful i was you know we were also proud of it and the artists were proud of it and they were spreading the word but it's almost like there was a disconnect with people that are using these science and to experience other. You know interesting media whether it's you know radio or their podcasting in the woods but what comes to the visual arts. They're not it's like there's a they shut down so for us I think we have a. A longer road ahead of us. Than you guys do because you know I think that they're already understanding. At least there are you know they're on the ball at the end they're kind of they're in the same world. And then also we have to

think about our senior. Audiences and how they're participating as you were saying it's important for us to make sure that. Our we have diverse you know diverse programming that fulfilling the needs of the different people that come to our spaces and so. We have a really wonderful senior audience that comes to our mass made films. You know we get up to a hundred. Active adults at one o'clock in the day for a film and a discussion. And I they are not going to Facebook. Maybe. Well no that's not true. There are a couple of them that might be on Facebook. But. But the common denominator is that this is more socially driven as opposed to market. Right. And whether it's through in-person networks or through online networks the idea is that. These social communities I think are the basis for developing the markets. And there are the open platforms in which people may or may not be socially integrated or just check in and check it out. But there are these more coherent communities that if you come if the media product can be meaningful to them

and organically related to them that's where I think the payoff is going to be for developing audiences. Well I wanted to follow up on that notion of audiences because none of this work exists in a vacuum you know it goes out into the world in its consumed and you know. By my audiences and I'm just wondering what part does the audience play in some in some ways they become creators themselves that's where you know user generated content comes from. But you know in making you know Tamra to your point about the lab you know in making these materials available to the audience what are we or what are we what are you expecting to hear to learn to to what the audience what you want the audience to do. Well I think you know in my in my world and especially in the world of ITV s international audience the audience is paramount to what we're doing. It's like you know it's a slightly different domestically when I say the U.S. is working hard.

You know we're sort of part of our work is supporting independent filmmakers and part of our work is making sure that the work that they're that they're making can get onto public television. So it's kind of a dual it's a dual mission and I CBS International our real goal is bringing international perspectives to American audiences and so being able to support 100 international makers is a great kind of byproduct of what we're doing but the mission is really about reaching audiences and you know it's a slight difference and I often have to remember that when you know when our committee is looking at some original you know esoteric interesting project that will never get seen on American television. And so part of that is working with the films that we that we get we want to push audiences and we want to push broadcasters and distributors in the U.S. more importantly to show things that are you know different than what they would be showing if we didn't exist we see ourselves as really kind of a place that can help tip broadcasters and distributors. Of just to stretch a little bit and take sense takes some more risks. But we also work with the filmmakers to help them kind of shape their film somewhat by giving them

input about you know American audiences and what is one of the first projects that we've funded for years five years ago was a film called circus school. Bye bye. Two young Chinese filmmakers who were filming in Shanghai they had had sort of this incredible access to an acrobat school that was really really intense. But the film that they came up with it was this amazing footage but it literally tracked. There were no characters a track it followed you know for events basically it was like one armed headstand you know kind of it was all sort of by this event that the kids were competing and. It was like well you know American audiences are are used to at least having some characters that we get to know where we have to be able to follow sort of a narrative arc about the story and it was like a different it was a really different orientation because because the filmmakers were making circus school were much more oriented towards kind of the competitions themselves and the team. And so it was just sort of working with them on being able to kind of keep keep what they were doing but also adapt it for what people in America are you know were kind of.

Able to kind of understand and so it went through a number of cuts and the filmmakers were really really involved with us and actually involved one of our producers going to China and working with them and so I think keeping the audience in mind isn't as huge on the international side to me. You know without that. You know the work it's just not it you know it's just it's just not quite it's not going to be marked as a success for us I think the challenge has been that it's much more than watching. Now you said just to get the audience to watch it now it's like the bar is so much higher because they get the audience to engage get the audience to give feedback get the audience to create their own work and response get the OK. So it's kind of you know if your job was hard before to get them to actually watch it now it's you know kind of a whole new set of things and what the kinds of films that you know we're looking at that kind of inspired that kind of response and action and education. Require news and you set up partners and I think you know what we're finding is that our domestic model which involves a lot of on the ground outreach and audience engagement we're doing the same

thing on international because it's like Asha broadcast alone it's not it's not going to cut it. Right right. I'm switching gears a little bit now going back David to something that you mentioned earlier. Christine it be great if you could weigh in from a visual arts perspective. This notion of wealth and value and having it go beyond the financial you know especially as you saw it develop or the notion of wealth and value and how that developed through the creation of the commons. Well I think for me one of the things I most learned about the commons is that there's different forms of wealth that are not recognized by mainstream economics. And that just because it doesn't have property individual property rights around it or have a price tag associated with it doesn't mean that it's not functionally valuable. For me the Commons starts to point to. Let's have a conversation about these socially created value that is often patronized or considered too intangible to take too seriously or too long term. But.

I'm reminded of many of you may be familiar with Lewis Hyde the author of The Gift of The subtitle was the original subtitle it was recently released after a twenty fifth 25th anniversary edition but the original subtitle was imagination and the erotic life of property. And it was about gift giving and how property was a how commuter the commerce of the human spirit was created through gift exchange and how this created immense value that the market can understand in his his book was a meditation on creativity in a market culture and how the creative spirit can be nurtured in a world in which everything is monetized right. The Internet is making this more legible. And I think we need to pay attention to the gift economy I took the liberty of reading a quote getting a quote of his which may bear on this. He says scarcity in abundance have as much to do with the forms of exchange with the form of

exchange as with how much material wealth is at hand. Scarcity appears when wealth cannot flow. The problem is that wealth ceases to move freely when all things are counted in price. It may accumulate in great heaps but fewer and fewer people can afford to enjoy it. Under the assumptions of exchange trade property is plagued by entropy and wealth can become scarce even as it increases gifts that remain gifts can support an affluence of satisfaction even without numerical abundance. So it's an interesting meditation on how. The creative spark can be more vital in a gift economy than in something that's over marketed you can think of top 40 radio and how moribund it is vs. what a small neighborhood or a community might do creatively. So that would go towards building this. This notion of commonweal coming well indeed. Christine I think that what's special about me and special for me working there is the fact that what we do isn't

like. Commercial galleries were not commercially driven and it's. You know so I find that when one we work with artists to produce exhibitions they can truly focus on their work and their process. And use the space is a as I said earlier it's like a platform to share what they're doing. And. That's a wonderful place to be because you know we don't have to worry about. I mean of course there are we have worried about the economy right. Howard you know surviving but in terms of how we function with our artists and our performing artists. And. You know all the different programming that we do there it's really about. Exposing people and educating people to contemporary cutting edge contemporary art. And so it's been such I've. Been working with artists I've seen how they were the response every time they come in the space they have these questions that they would normally have for traditional museum spaces or for commercial gallery

spaces where they're like so tell me what you want me to do or what do you what's the price. What do you think the price of that should be. Or will this be a prop you know to have all these and then when they come in through our doors were like No no no. What do what would you like to do. How would you like to see the worksheet in space let's talk about that. And then I find out through that experience. I mean it just the word spreads far and wide because we've lost in this kind of being so caught up with the market especially in the last couple of years where the art market and with all of these art fairs that are happening and everything you know artists are graduating you know and their first exhibitions are trying to sell work for $55000 and they think that that's OK. No one's really educating them. No one's. There's no one kind of setting the bar or there's really no information cause I don't have a clue as to how people are pricing things these days in terms of. How visual artists are kind of. Getting their work seen so I think that. I think that's a problem. Because I do think it kind of confuses and models things and

but I do I do enjoy the fact that we don't have to necessarily meet. We are not part of the. Problem that we can help to kind of have dialogue about how to solve that so. You know for me it's just much more refreshing to focus on work. But in practical terms it's like you know there are costs that have to be borne and I'm just wondering how do you how do you marry those costs that have to be born with you know the commitment to the mission you know to to value value for its own sake or to value the art for its own sake. I mean we get a lot of support from. Well. But you know we get a lot of support from our members. So we have if we'll Kay Wilkins our executive directors or he can tell you how many members we have I always mess it up. So like 2000. Well. He's around there you know. We you know without organizations such as the you know the National Endowment for the Arts and the sort of traditional Stripes is very very traditional

structures that. Help keep us afloat. But I think. What makes a stand out too is the fact that the types of programming that we're bringing that the types of programming that we're doing is so very different to your kind of standard traditional arts space that it continues to create a buzz and and you know. Keeps a competitive and whole idea of the focus on the art and arts process. Just so you know there the artists are our best evangelists so they carry bad and I mean you can't you can't write advertising that can do you know what artists and your members can do. When you give them these kind of key experiences. Switching gears just a little bit more. And one last question before we head to Q&A I wondered if you could talk about the notion of the term that has been used in the past few years the creative economy and how. That plays a part in this notion of building a

common wall. I was just thank you for that question I was just thinking about that in terms of your other point about there are real costs that have to be borne. This is. It is so true and I think I'm sure like like me many of you you know are looking at kind of you know again kind of back to the closing of the international bureaus the closing of you know the sort of the end of newspapers that you know where are how are we supporting and valuing our storytellers and our journalists and our and the people who are out there. And you know over over time really trying to tell the stories that are so important to our time. You know what I see with I ts is that we are one of a handful of places that supports long form. Documentary films and filmmakers who are telling stories over years that we need stories like that and we need we need journalists who are able to follow stories for the time it takes to really have the story told you know and I'm sure you thought this too but it's you know Yahoo does not have a bureau anywhere in the world they themselves are not a news generating source they're a fabulous distributor of the news but who will be the place

where will be the places that actually are getting the story tellers financed to be able to do it as their job and not as kind of you know on the side that it's not a way of valuing our storytellers they're going to do it on top of their other jobs and you know I can't I can't say who it was but I will say I was with a senior person at Google who's has to me. Oh yeah there's all this ballyhooing about the closing of the news bureaus I'm so happy I'm so sick. You know that masquerading as journalism. And I was like What do you know what he's saying and he was like Well I think that there is you know time for the transformation of journalism where anybody and any you know in any part of the world can be can you know can tell their story. And I said sure but it's very different if you know anybody in the world is telling their story and putting that up and that's fabulous and all and well and good but that is very different then than what then what we're asking people to do who are actually there as their job for months on end you know really trying to get under and inside the story and I think it really raises some of the questions too that we have faced. And I to the S which is you know everyone now is a

media maker and and I think that is you know probably one of the most exciting things that ever could have happened but then how do you you know where are kind of there is a spectrum and how do you deal with that and how do you kind of. I think you know what is the difference between a professional media maker and somebody who's making media in their you know in their college dorm room and kind of supporting all of those stages of media making. You know I look at the bay back lab and I think the big producers Institute and I think this is just one of the most wonderful things I wish we had a hundred of them to really help producers you know shape their shape their stories and figure out the best way of telling that story and getting it to the right platform because what we really need to be doing is incubating and developing kind of all stages of talent from across across the spectrum and. That is you know talk about our wealth. To me that is where we need to all be investing kind of in all the different phases that we're interacting as media art centers. You know for media centers to funders to broadcasters you know that is just one of the most important places that we can be investing.

But I think that's a really important point though that if the wizard how media is transitioning and what's happening the technology if the. Community has the power. Right. And so you're talking about like the journalist the real journalist versus the hobbyist. If the community is responding and only paying attention to the hobbyist who's How then does the who validates the read real journalist because you know with all of this what's happening with technology we're empowering our community or empowering our audiences and they hold they you know they hold the key. And so if they're not on the same page as the ones producing the content where does that leave us with. I think that's why we need to get a greater alignment between those communities and the media itself. One of the crises of journalism is that people don't trust commercial journalism anymore they trust their bloggers. And in fact while a lot of bloggers are you know in their pajamas many are rather serious journalists who have

specialties and expertise that no beat reporter for The New York Times is going to have yet. So I think what we're having is this. Struggle For who is more socially trustworthy and connected. I think that arguably what the media needs to media both commercial media but also in the media needs to find the social validation connection that journalism struggling for right now in its own way. Just to respond to the whole cost issue I think that is the key issue I don't think journalism is going to reinvent itself as a for profit lucrative institution. It's going to reinvent itself as a nonprofit more a localized regionalized or social community oriented institution. And I I would submit that that's where a lot of media is going to go because that's going to be a more stable secure and ultimately more. Profitable way to to generate revenue than trying to flog the beast through top down

advertising. Thank you all very much. I think that now we're going to move to the portion for Q&A Phillip anyone has any questions or microphone. In the middle of the room. Don't be shy. Thanks for your. Thanks for your illuminating talk here. One of the. Things I love speakers. When you talk about rights. Creator creator rights creative rights and how. Difficult that model is. Both to to educate. Content creators as well as. The public. I don't know if you're aware of it but this this past legislative year a bill called The Orphan Works bill of 2008. Nearly passed without a single member of

Congress. Voting on it. We discovered it in the early. Spring of 2000. And they just form an ad hoc group that went to Washington. Through the Internet we're able to collectively represent about half a million people. But there are only 15 of us that. Actually went to Washington and met directly with senators and House of Representatives people to educate them on this bill. They had never heard of. Or if they had they knew nothing about it. And it's amazing what you can learn if you yourself go to Washington. And sit down has extensive constituent. In your representative or senator's office and tell them of your concerns. You mean a lot more to them. Than a paid lobbyist and they know. This was quite a different view than I had of Washington and I really learned a lot. But it was largely through a very committed effort of Education that. This bill was finally

block. And the House Judiciary Committee it passed the Senate. Nearly passed the House. And. It will come up again. What your friend works at Bill was. Was that. Anything that any content creator whether music film photography painting sculpture whatever. Wasn't registered with the Copyright Office. And with one of. Several. Databases. That could be searched by somebody who wanted to use your content. I'm sorry I don't mean to interrupt your question for David or for time of what is the question. Well we just we just welcome. Anybody's input and knowledge of the orphan works. Bill and also about educating copyright. For. This new age and also. Educating people. OK and your membership. Thank you.

There's a question in the back there. Yes. I wanted to ask a question I was very interested in the whole concept of the Commonwealth. I'm sorry we can't hear you can't hear the front one. You come up to the front my shield. It's big for a nice big thank you. Can you hear me now. OK wonderful I was very intrigued with the topic of the Commonwealth has one of the reasons why I made sure I attended the session and I guess one of the things that concerned me is that in all of your discussions about the Commonwealth preserving it and. Enabling it in the future there was very little discussion about the audiences that are coming in terms you talk about engaging your audiences capturing them etc. etc. getting responses from them. And I work with children I'm a children's author. And so the K through third grade group

is going to be the audience in the next 10 to 20 years and I haven't heard any concept of engaging him really in terms of exposure that if you look at. I was watching a PBS documentary about how the blues is becoming a very esoteric very sort of exclusive group of people who appreciate the blues and a lot of it is exposure. So if you look at children's television Where's the part. Where's the high quality music Where's the high quality video. Where are your audiences going to be come our Where are they going to come from. And you keep talking about technology and the real innovators in creators with this new technology are tweens. Their kids in 12 years old. And if they've not been acculturated to art. To appreciate the visual arts to appreciate dance to appreciate you know all of these elements that we as you know artists are giving to the world. Where is our audience going to be what I'm concerned about is that the hip hop is wonderful but I think that there's a lot of art that's being

created. And part of our job as artists is to envision all of society and not just adults. You know we've got to talk tweens we've got to talk kindergarten. You know we've got to expose them to Picasso in kindergarten. Why not. It's a lot of color a lot of shades. It works. And so the concept of our audience needs to go down a little bit so that we can grow into the future because if we're talking to the adults we're all going to die. And the people be coming coming behind us we're not going to have the sensibility to appreciate the art that we've developed. Thank you. That's a really interesting point. You know I was as you were speaking I was thinking how do we prepare these coming audiences to participate in this this atmosphere this commonwealth. To this woman's point. I have just two quick points one I couldn't agree with you more. I have a 5 year old and a 3 year old and my 5 year old will ask me if we're planning to Skype or

Blackberry her grandparents so I can see that the digital natives are way ahead of where we were at that at this time and that the potential is huge for what we need to be doing with them and what their capacity for understanding digital media is tremendous. I also think something we didn't talk about is legacy content and part of the Commonwealth is also the incredible body of. The archive of public media and I think it would be remiss not to talk about that as part of the Commonwealth in terms of you know what does it mean to go back and make sure that the work that has been created as part of public media since you know really going back to to the 60s and before in cases as far back as we can to make sure that that work is protected and you know license when necessary or part of the orphan works or is available to the public. I mean what we've been doing you know on a very limited scale is going back and trying to clear rights for four previously funded ITV s programs and make them available. Online and in partnership with PBS. That alone is just turned into it's kind of one of those projects that just gets stickier and stickier and

secure because the more you get sucked into the complications of each each film but you realize that this is a pressing issue so it's both about protecting our past and the legacy that we can bring that to the younger audience as the next generation because I think you know I mean it's. You know. I mean just I mean there's so many so many examples I want my children to be able to watch eyes on the prize I want my children to be able to watch you know the amazing documentaries that have been made and not to have them just go away because nobody is able to protect those rights. There really are ways we have this really fantastic program called the on field trips which we've bused in over 10000 children across Hartford in the past couple of years to see a film and there's a facilitator that talks about it so we'll show you times. Or will show for valor rising. We have about six films on the rotation. And. Most of them address some of the. Kind of. Issues that are happening in schools around the sun.

And kind of how they're feeling how you know right now we're just as kids the kids are usually between the ages of I would say 11 and 15. And it's been really successful because you know. As a contemporary art space to contemporary art on a whole is intimidating. And so we don't have a formal educational program in terms of doing art education workshops we do workshops with our community we do these things but we don't have an. Education a core education person. But what I've what we found is that these children. That come through this space and see these films and. Talk to the facility they have this you know immediate connection and they bring their families back. And they spend some time in the galleries and they'll ask questions and they become much more engaged and some of them didn't even know that we existed and you know we also have this fantastic program called Neighborhood Studios which is something that we partnered with the Greater Hartford Arts Council which we have kids from 14 to 18 that there are 10 that are selected to get interviewed and then they're

taught by. A master teaching artist who teaches them about filmmaking and editing and at the end they do these little mini documentaries their screen and they're super proud because you know we have this very wonderful cinema with a hundred and fifty three seats or so when they get to screen it with their families and you know I think the. Film has been instrumental in engaging kids because they're so you know this is their going home and they're Googling and it's all kind of happening very fast and. The kind of slow pacing you know are sauntering through the museum is like they're about to doze off and they're not as you know they're interested but I think that the way that it's been successful for us is to have these types of programs and then just within our community we have this free program every year called Park Art. Which is a very informal drop in program for children that live in the Park neighborhood and it's seven weeks and we have a young teacher that comes in. And they do projects and then we host an exhibition for them and they can invite their parents who rarely

come to the space because they're busy and you know things are going on but I think you're very right about you know. You know the youth audience and not overlooking them. Right. They're extremely important I think. I think it's the the prism technology has its limits. But the presumption of participation participation and access is probably the best means for getting young people more involved. I know my own sons have discovered all these artists from the 50s and 60s by going to YouTube videos of them that were resurrected. Now that's you know in a strange way a way that the past has been brought alive for a new generation. I don't want to overstate this because that kind of participation is very different from truly being part of a community. But it is a point of access. There's a question in the back yard comment last night. Here's a really interesting discussion and now it's happened. That's where they all have their. Summit. Mission.

And open space around issues of digital literacy that many of us don't tend to often grapple with when we're thinking about the wonders and celebrating mobile technology which is really kind of ripping the veil away from some of you. With around some of the ethical issues involved in using these technologies in terms of how they can affect people's daily lives in terms of representation in political situations as well as cultural situations and how there is actually a real dark side that we don't always acknowledge. And part of the commonwealth of this community is that we hold the key to looking at the ethics of the technologies that are out there and not accepting them really only at face value for what they are and trying to really understand the kind of corporate change that a lot of these technologies and snaring. And I think.

Oh that's. So I mean I think oh boy so much about everything we did but we don't really only Center standing like you. Know what it means to you cannot. Time. Environment. House fronts. That's. Thank you. I would say Helen I think that's it's so true and one of the things that I think we're starting to see is kind of a backlash a little bit against this idea that the web automatically connects you to all these different perspectives and they're finding some some new data is finding that. Peepholes use the use and practice of the web is actually serving to reinforce people's existing beliefs and ideas because people are because of the niche aspect. People are kind of curating for themselves by finding like minded people that are reinforcing

their same ideas and in some cases stereotypes and the same you know the same. So it's not necessarily you know that it's opening everybody's mind by connecting them to the world in fact it's allowing them to stay connected people who are just like them which is not necessarily what the goal or what the potential of the technology is. I just wanted to follow Alan's intervention. And add a quote and had a comment. David you started with quotes. If you're. The only thing worse than not getting. Things getting sampled is not going to see you. And I'd like to bring us back. To the classical Hollywood studio system car Lemley in 1931 said there ain't no such thing as bad publicity and movies live from mouth to mouth. So I think when we look at new technologies. We cannot just amputate them from their histories with a

global capitalist media system that was in place since 1995. And these economic Li these economic cultures of transnational media corporations have not been reinvented themselves they've always been platforming themselves to do what our Lemley suggested which says just say the movies live in the mouths of people who see that meaning word of mouth. So my point also is that if we're looking at new technologies and new forms and more globalizing What exactly are the forms that we are putting out there. There have been issues raised in the international human rights movement for example by witness and others by and use in India. You too creates vaudeville shows out of human suffering. And we saw this a lot in the work coming out of Iran or similarly and I

don't mean this as a kind of snotty criticism tomorrow but when I hear you discuss filmmakers in the Chang'e high working in a circus and you work I TVSM a strategy to get them to use characters and narrative. I respond and I think there are many many narrative forms around the aeration multiplication of different forms of telling stories. When I hear character narrative narrative arcs I hear a racialized white first world popular culture notion. Of how to tell a story. That disturbs me because my question would be to take all of what you've all said and turn it inside out. Like when you wash your good jeans and and ask if you turn it inside out. What are ways to think about new forms new concepts

new interventions new epistemologies that can be outside. Very placid ways of accepting things. I'm very disturbed by the Shanghai story and I just have to say I have lived in Asia and I would dare to just put out there that I think that if we are truly looking at a commons we must really think about new forms that are sometimes beyond antagonist protagonist stories. We have to think of ways of using technologies that are not just about viral the spreading ideas that can become R&D units for corporations you know so my question really and I don't mean this to feel like you know intervention that. Throws the wet rag on things but really just say as in our euphoria of the new 21st century to pick up on how and I think that there are

enormous contradictions raising enormous ethical and political issues that are like tectonic plates moving cracking open things and weedy new ways to think about it. So I think you're all much smarter than me in this and I'll be that anxious to hear what you all have to say. Thank you thank you. Thank you. Yes absolutely I just you know I really really understand what you're saying and I support what you're saying I want to you know just sort of think through a little bit though about you know part of a part of what what what I'm trying to do is think about. You know kind of the right you know what formats work best with what storytelling techniques and I think that's what we're all doing which is you know trying to bring out the best stories and take advantage of all the new ways of telling stories that are out there. And with that with those filmmakers you know I think you know the issue was what how can we make this a one hour film that can be on. We couldn't find any broadcaster in the U.S. who

would actually take the film. And so it was a question of how do we get this to a place where we can actually keep it as close to how it was but also make it make it available. And at the same time really preserve the filmmakers and how they want to tell they when they themselves were actually so happy for this process they were also new emerging filmmakers so part of it was really a filmmaking experience and kind of being in their own kind of lab themself in terms of how to get the film. You know made and completed. But I think that there's lots of different ways for that story to have been told a one hour one hour broadcast may not have been the right way for that initial version of how they were doing it to be and I think there's lots of ways kind of through different formats that in shorter or shorter ways are sort of forms that could have been possible but I agree that you know there are now more opportunities to tell different kinds of stories not all of them are right for broadcast. And that's I think that's just part of how we have to think about it. I resonate to those comments I think that there's going to be a lot of new innovation of institutions that need to be created and the market is going to have to sort of the

market is more problematic at least in the traditional ways than it's ever been because market modes of creation and distribution are more viable more efficient more socially convivial that whether the markets can have to be domesticated find new ways to interact with communities so that it is less like the predatory media corporations of the 20th century. But the commenter was absolutely accurate they were living with these paradoxes. I mean for me the idea that Google might be doing a great service to humankind by putting all this Google Books Online at the same time it's monopolise in the public domain an orphan works. Get your mind around that and I so I think we're dealing with a lot of these. Imponderables you know. In a world of great turmoil I take great encouragement for the fact that the market has to reinvent itself does have capacities that the Commons or

non-market sector doesn't have and that we can renegotiate the terms by which the market and the commons interact while because the commons itself can develop new muscles new instrumentalities for asserting itself as a different sector for creation and distribution. So I share a lot of the sense of wonder and shock that's going on right now. As someone who has spent 30 40 years in the electronic media and created programs with the idea. Of Taro said of reaching as many people as possible. I've had second thoughts about his reaching as many people as possible and the Internet actually. Frightens me because of that as well as the idea of public television or millions

and and that sort of concept. What I think we saw over the last. 15 20 years is the right means grassroots organizing really took place in space. And when I see that word Commons. I realize that. The progress. The people with multicultural progressive ideas have very few public spaces. And and and my fear. Is that we are putting a lot of emphasis. On. Distribution and technology. For larger audiences. And. The idea of the local which you which you so eloquently spoke for is something that seems to be missing in terms of how we organize our media. And I think there's got to be a way in which we need to create more space. And the model that I that I see that I think is very exciting something

like real art waves is a very exciting model but also the Gay and Lesbian Center model. Which has taken place all over the country where you see immense diversity intergenerational as well as I mean you know you see kids you see older people you see diverse in racial profiles. In these centers. And I think. We need to think about creating more spaces and centers. In relationship to our media and then moving from the internet. Face or the television or this individual sort of watching and being part of it and trying to create spaces where that media then ends up in places where people are going to have interactions among themselves in a much more grassroots place. The right wing. Has done wonderful.

Doing services through churches. And and have spread throughout Latin America because they had space and they had money. And they had services. And we are just providing you know an Internet piece of property maybe or something that someone can see on the Internet. But this idea of creating a space is not bringing people together and I'm concerned about space. And calm. Thank you. I just got the five minute mark and we have one last question. In the back. But I'm just one planet if you wanted to respond to this gentleman's. Comment. Before we go to that last question. And I think that's very volatile. You know. I am. One of my Which generation my. What did Mr. Jackson I say I was. I think I'm what I'm 34 What is that X or Y. Y. It's x Thank you. But I'm not I am not. I didn't grow up in this kind of Internet savvy world. You know I grew up and in Jamaica and you know

this idea of the spaces. If I was saying earlier that. How they chose the time to go to college in America instead of going into me my entire experience would have been different just in you know relating to my parents right now. And I don't I'm not good mothers bad or good it's just uniquely. Different. This idea of this the internet not internet was like a system a complex something that you can. Plugin but with people I write conversation and talking about things and expects periods and things together and. I think that's so key and I do I do have some fair about what's happening. As kind of technology is doing what it's doing in advancing at the rate it's advancing what happens in those spaces because I see my nieces and nephews who are 8 and 9. And they will literally spend six hours in their bedroom playing week or on YouTube or whatever.

Thing they're not you know they're not going to places outside of buying fast food or if their parents force them. I mean just some of those things worry me because in the future I really don't know what the effect of that's going to be if we can if we keep supporting that model without finding some kind of balance because the kids that's the model right. I mean if you can show me a kid right now unless their parents are forcing them to do otherwise there are all kind of bright zone out. At the same time so. About last question. OK two things I remember real are always. I mean a lot of us say I was a documentary independent documentary filmmaker and I want a computer with basic lack for a local lemming. So I think a couple of you. But my question is because of international contracts. And with my documentary right now I'm concerned about. The fact that I'm competing with documentaries overseas right now that are

funded by governments. And. Trying to get exclusivity in the U.S.. For. My dog and also get it out to a worldwide audience. And they're trying to come back in the US. And so my question was about with international productions I understand we want to. Help out the audience and the distribution of all our films worldwide globally whatever and make it more even. But that's kind of what I'm concerned about right now is how do you do that. But at the same point. Secure a window for your own production. Want to be sure I just heard I want to be sure I heard all of that question. Is the question. Just repeat the last part of your question I'm sorry the sound is not great up here. Sorry was it was about with. How do you get that global audience but secure your own production

when you're when it's two things I'm worried about. The documentaries over there which are funded and supported by governments already and they of course want to get into the US market. And I understand the exchange of ideas side of it and have a different viewpoint definitely. I'm especially with the war. It was great to have another viewpoint on that but my concern was also about exclusivity and competing with fully funded organizations over there when it's such a scramble to get funding here and trying to preserve my window here but also disseminate it to a wider audience as well. The concern about creating a level playing field in some ways. Intellectually Yeah you want to create it into a level playing field to get the ideas shared around the world. But then also how do you check it. While I was concerned about is if there's a competing doc overseas I want to get

into the U.S. market. Do you. Both wings. OK. Exclusivity both both ways yes. Yeah I'm so sorry to the audio is not great. I mean I think that this question of what happens I mean I think we've seen it with with with global trade right it's kind of like what happens if the pipeline gets open and what's you know kind of what's good for what's good for artists around the world I mean I think that you know the sort of the business terms of exclusivity and financing are always complicated. You know our hope is that CO financing is actually a way to bring more dollars to American filmmakers as well that it's not just about American dollars going to to buy U.S. rights for international makers but also U.S. makers able to secure more pre-production and production funding from International Co financers as well as it does work both ways. And I'm happy to talk to you after more detail about that question but I think you know the hope is that it's you know a bigger pie and not competing

for you know scarce resources with more competitors. Well unfortunately I think you know do we have time for one more. Sure. Could you move to the phone. Can you come here when you come to the mikes so we can see and hear you. Hi. I just want to make sure. Just to put in a word for saving what we have already. That name actually began to preserve media art centers around the country and public access really in many ways has been. Has served that function. And public access is around in many many communities is is is being threatened then the excuse for being to cut

off support for it is because of theirs. We have to proceed from here and there. And just as I think that those centers offer such an important space that there's a real media center provides. For it for access to the Internet. I mean there are many communities and people who don't have. Access to the fast lines that are enjoyed by. So a number of us here. But. It's it's sad. To. Think. Of the first of many institutions that have disappeared like they are here. I mean somebody actually. Use that as their. And Joe will I go say I am. Very strong advocacy organization pays

attention to saying to this independent community and I hope that a man can step in and. And help in places like free press. Here. Can you not jump on this bandwagon or. Tweet or Twitter. Public access. Thank you. So we have run out of time but I thank our panelists very much for an incredible discussion and the audience as well for your participation and question. And I think with that we're adjourned.