I never really thought about that question until now. But if you really think about it, I guess the most obvious answer is: yes. If we have hundreds of people submitting work, photographs and created content, then what makes it special? Instead of focusing on the individual and their work, our focus is on quantity, quality and the amount we have to pay to own rights to it. The reason why the original Mona Lisa is special is due to the fact that there’s only one original. If there were multiple “originals” displayed in every museum, the value would go down.
In terms of the article, I feel like some people may care more about what they can get out of something, like iFilm and Michael Hirschorn, for example. It seems like Hirschorn is more concerned about his business and making money from other people’s work, which is why he purchased iFilm in the first place. He doesn’t really care about all the submitted videos if they’re “crap.” He will only look at the top 20 or the most popular ones. Thus, he doesn’t value individual talent. He values money and making a profit. Personally, I can understand it but I don’t fully support it. As I was reading the article, it seemed a little selfish. Those people who submit videos put in time and effort. However, that is completely disregarded if it’s not a good one. A video can be good and entertaining, but if it’s not what Hirschorn is looking for or can’t sell, then it’s basically not going to be used.
However, if an individual decides to publicize their work or sell it at an affordable price, I don’t find anything wrong with it. I believe this type of crowdsourcing will be successful down the road because it’s already popular. There is something called Creative Commons, where Flickr users offer their photos under a Creative Commons license. I first discovered this through a blogger who talked about using other people’s photos without permission and possibly getting sued, even though you gave them credit or linked back to the original. The images on Flickr are free, I believe, and the photographer doesn’t get any money if you use it. To me, that is very smart and seems genuine. These people don’t care about making money and just want their images to get noticed. They want people to use them as they wish and don’t expect a huge sum of money in return. Hence, the non-profit. Like I mentioned in my previous post, if something is free, it will generally be successful.
Although crowdsourcing is becoming more popular and prevalent in today’s society, I hope we don’t sacrifice the integrity of our work. And although some things don’t necessarily cost anything, sometimes keeping things private and to yourself is better than releasing it to the public. In today’s world, everyone wants to share everything. We share our photos, feelings, thoughts, favorite songs, videos, etc. on social media. It comes to a point where nothing is private or sacred anymore. Instead of writing our thoughts down in a diary, we will share them on a facebook statuso. Instead of taking photos and printing them at Target, we upload them onto facebook in a virtual photo album. Instead of displaying our birthday cards on our walls or shelf, we display them on instagram so everyone knows we’re admired and loved. You get my point.
Overall, I think crowdsourcing can be used for good but to a certain extent. If crowdsourcing means making a profit or owning rights to something so you can get money from it, then I don’t necessarily agree with it. However, I do understand why it exists. People have to make a living. I get that. However, we shouldn’t forget the person behind the photograph, video, etc. and forget its value.
Intro. to Multimedia Comp SP14 