Lessig and remix and Grey Albums and stuff

1. ENGLISH ONE ELEVEN:
Lessig, Owning Culture, and
Mashing stuff up

2. Today
1. Upload time
2. Remix, in my words
3. Let me tell you ‘bout Larry Lessig
4. Let’s talk about the Grey Album
5. Let’s do some homework

3. Memo time
Let’s take the next five minutes to type up your
reflective memos for inquiry 3. When you
finish the memo, upload it and your project
via the Niihka drop box. Remember to name
your two uploads lastnameMemo3 and
lastname3. Also remember it needs to be a
.doc, .rtf, or .txt file.

4. Remix is Like…
Remix is the act of taking one or more cultural
artifacts-- visual, video, audio, and/or
alphabetic texts- and deliberately mixing
elements together to create something new
that often specifically mimics one or more of
the sources. Many remixes are meant to be
satirical or overtly political, though satire is
not essential.

5. They Put me in the Remix
One of the things I’d like us to consider is
how we can remix/remediate classroom
space.
On April 9th, we will meet entirely online,
in an ANGEL chat room. If you don’t own
your own computer, please talk to me
after class so we can find a good place
for you to be during class.

6. A quick lead-in: Lessig on IP law
• Lessig declares that he has the following
position:
– He is anti-piracy
– He is anti-war (meaning law vs. creators
here)
– He is anti-lawyer and anti-lobbyist (he
includes himself here, so he’s anti-Lessig,
too)

7. Lessig video here (if you’d like to watch
later)

8. Lessig is like,
• “We need to hear less from lawyers and
lobbyists and more from artists [about who
owns culture].”
• " This is a relationship
between technology
and ownership,
which is translated
to digital technology
and copyright.”

9. Pirate Technologies
player piano – “pirated” sheet music
radio– “pirated” records
cable TV– “pirated” network TV
betamax– “pirated” TV and movies
But as these were regulated, the law
always waited to see “the potential
of the technology.”

10. We Didn’t Start the Fire…
• “...this is not the first time radical new
technologies have appeared and changed the
way that culture gets made and distributed.
This is a constant theme...”
• But… The law favored the pirate in those old
cases. It is now "fit the technology
to the law" and not "fit the law to
the technology."

11. "This architecture demands... the right to
remix culture."
Enter DJ Danger Mouse. He felt that the Beatles’
White Album and Jay-Z’s black album went together.
So he created
“the Grey Album”
which you can DL here:
http://www.illegal-art.org/audio/grey.html
but don’t, because it’s
totally illegal. *wink*
Or is it?
Or… should it be?

12. Remix
Remix
Remix is the act of taking one or more cultural
artifacts-- visual, video, audio, and/or
Remix is the act of taking one or more cultural
artifacts-- in this caseand deliberately mixing
alphabetic texts- visual, though video,
elements together to create something new
audio, and alphabetic texts are regularly
remixed-- and specifically mimics elements
that often deliberately mixing one or more of
together to create something new that oftento be
the sources. Many remixes are meant
specifically mimics onepolitical, of the sources.is
satirical or overtly or more though satire
Many remixes are meant to be satirical or
not essential.
overtly political, though satire is not essential to
the genre.

13. Remix
+ =

14. Remix
=
+

15. If you’re offended by profanity, plug your
ears right about now
Whose song is this?
Whose song is this
?

16. Another Example
• The New Yorker ran a piece on Danger Mouse
and the idea of mash-ups. You might
recognize it. 
• “Mashups find new uses for current digital
technology, a new iteration of the cause-and-
effect relationship behind almost every
change in pop-music aesthetics: the gear
changes, and then the music does.”
• So… whose song is this?

17. A Stroke of Genius
“In October of 2001, a d.j. named
Roy Kerr, calling himself the
Freelance Hellraiser, sent Temple-
Morris [a mash-up show duo] a
mashup called “A Stroke of
Genius,” laying Christina
Aguilera’s vocal from “Genie in a
Bottle,” a lubricious pop song,
over the music from the Strokes’
“Hard to Explain,” a brittle,
honking guitar song. “

18. A few more remixes
• Shine
• Brokeback

19. back to the visual while still looking at
music…
• Is it “okay” for Nas to do this?
• Is it okay for FOX to depict Nas in the ways
that they have?

20. Homewerkz
Forum 11: Find a remix online– post it.
Unlike usual, this is due before-next-class.
Read: This and skim Bolter and Grusin
(excerpt– on Niihka)