In moving my blog over to this new site, I looked back at my very first blog post on Springboard Media, way back in January of 2006, and was surprised to see that almost everything I wrote back then could be written today without much having changed. It’s also a pretty long post, it had been written originally as an essay for a Foundation, and it kinda set the tone for all of my future posts – long.
You can read the original in its entirety here, which includes the state of affairs as I saw it then and still see it now. But here, I’m going to cut straight to the solutions I thought we should focus on then, and I still agree with them now:
POTENTIAL SOLUTIONS
This is a pivotal moment in the history of media arts, a time filled with possibility and uncertainty, but most of all, promise. To address these challenges and to have the greatest societal impact, the field needs to think of innovative, transformative ideas.
Research, Policy, Advocacy and Education
There is great need for continued research, mapping, convening and policy work. The field needs the data to show the problems (such as lack of diversity), and the advocacy to ensure good policy decisions. There is also a need to convene around the multiple issues facing the media arts: What can be done collaboratively to broaden the reach of socially important media? «Note: This is largely being done now, one good thing.»In light of new developments, what directions are most central? Who is not being served? What can be learned from other fields? Last, there is still a need for education — of gatekeepers, of artists and of general publics — in the importance of media arts; in the value of media artists’ contributions to society; in the craft, technology and business of media arts; in its distribution and in media literacy. Through such work, the field can encourage broader support for and public understanding of the value of media arts.
Distribution
There are new models for dissemination, including alternative distribution and marketing strategies, new exhibition avenues, direct video sales and ever-increasing home video markets. Systemization of festival screenings, web-based networks and new distribution strategies could get the work to broader audiences than ever before. The field needs knowledge sharing — strategies, stories, case studies and experiments focused on distribution and dissemination. Citizens need assistance in building communal media experiences where individuals and groups can connect, learn from and utilize media for social change or educational purposes. Leaders in the field must think of what the public wants and deserves, and work together to make that happen so that audiences can find and use this important media. As a result, media artists will prosper, by finding new audiences for their work.
New Financing Models
The media arts need innovative funding models that validate artists, help them attract new sources of funding, and help them find and reach the broadest possible audiences. New strategies could be found in novel approaches to the venture capital model, or with open source and social networking advances. For example, an online, audience-driven fund for progressive media arts could enable individuals, foundations and investors alike to support a variety of work «We’re getting there». The Internet provides great potential to encourage individuals to become art patrons rather than mere consumers. Most of all, funders need to support creative experiments, where new knowledge and thinking may help expand the field. Many funders are experimenting with ways to get money, services and advice into the hands of artists. Such funds may come from multiple sources, but collaboration could be encouraged to leverage investments to most benefit artists and society.
Furthermore, boundaries between commercial and noncommercial media are disappearing, and are increasingly irrelevant to creators and consumers of content. Many people theorize that successful future strategies in media arts will come from combining the assets of the for-profit and non-profit sectors to realize both financial and socialprofits. This new space, perhaps called with-profit (as in social goals with profit potential), promises a rich field for exploration. What if with-profit organizations funded socially important work that will receive commercial distribution, thus reaching broader audiences that aren’t commercially attractive to the for-profit community? What if a with-profit developed a rights-licensing system that allowed creators and rights-holders to be compensated based on actual usage while simultaneously increasing public access? Perhaps the greatest potential for increasing the impact of media arts lies in with-profit ideas.
Conclusion
These potential solutions, while not all-inclusive, suggest some of the work that remains to be done. Society will benefit most from a multi-faceted strategy that considers these options alongside methods that are already working. Most of all, the field needs to continue to discuss the “big picture” and imagine possible futures for society. Every new technological advance in the arts has brought us closer to realizing the ideals of a civil society. Each time, there has been a chance to realize dreams —of technology allowing everyone to share and build knowledge, of a more democratic society where everyone could be producers, not just consumers, where multiple viewpoints could be shared and, in general, where the world could be a better place. Each time, such possibilities have been squandered due to a lack of vision about the future, the forces of greed, the power of the few over the many and the simple fact that technology never quite realizes its potential. Once again, society has been given a set of tools, none perfect, that can help realize our dreams, if we are willing to imagine the possibilities and act soon to ensure their success. All that we need is in front of us. Will we act upon it, or let this chance slip away once again?