Free Culture.
When it comes to free things, it always grab people attention. When a mother hears free sample of toilet paper, no one mother will be left behind. When a teenager hears free movie ticket, a long queue will be formed. When a kid saw a crown is giving free balloon, even if they crawl, i am sure they will reach him someday. However, whats the meaning behind free? Without using a cent, you get what you want. It's just like an mp3, copy and paste to your pc, right click save target as and then here you go, lady gaga's song is on your player.
In Lawrence Lessig article he talks about Disney, about doujinshi. These all have the same characteristic, the character or element is either rebuild,remake or re-perform to the public,and gain very much attention than the original work. Is it wrong? but nobody says Disney is wrong. In his article, he also says that, unless the person is rush to the mangaka home and steal the drawing in front of them and make money from it, it is not consider as WRONG. In other meaning, if nobody sees it, it is correct. If the person make the character way more interesting and popular, they are the "CREATOR". It seems ridiculous,but this is the cycle of market.
If Disney did not reform, it would not create the super cartoon for today, mickey mouse. Even our kid's time pyjamas is the illegal version of mickey mouse cartoon graphic. Nobody will miss out the little rat face. Athough they are running alongside the law, but it creates not only profit to the company, it creates a miracle and legend for the world. Creativity has no border, no matter if you are adding spice to it or recycling it, once it transform, it is a brand new thing. For example, transformer. Who would think a car movie can get so high popularity? ITs just a car! However, by adding some human nature on it, it is a brand new creativity. Here, i am not going to talk about law or rights, but the perspective of how people look at free culture.
If we are strictly on restricting a person's work, it creates a border to improve, a border to increse the production quality, a border to limit a people's mind. Let's take doujinshi to talk about. Doujinshi is another creation based on an existing character drawn by mangaka. Doujinshi is just taking those character and reform their characteristic, rebuild their story in a different way,lead the character to a total different direction than what the original works are. It has good, and bad at the same time. Everyone would want to immitate Justin Bieber, is just because he is famous enough. Same goes to doujinshi. If the character is likabel by the public, for sure there will be some imitation from it, and when it reaches certain popularity, the character would create a bigger space for the fans to develop a "living" lifecycle for them. For example, there are plenty of doujinshi for "one piece",one of the longest manga live in the industry. Now,they even have t-shirt sell in Uniqlo. Well of course it is paid this time. However, without all these to support the originality of the character, it would not be well known. If public does not involve in this character, they would not promote or looking forward with it. Another main idea would be, if the original artwork is not being repeated, it will not be remembered. It is cruel to the creator in a way but the repetition of the artowork support the fame and popularity.
I still remember how McCurry actually wins Mcdonalds when they come up to the court for the 2nd time. McCurry actually wins by not getting sued of using the word Mc which Mcdonals already using it. The reason is because, nobody would think of burger if they were go to McCurry which is a local restaurant stall,also known as "mamak". By not creating an image to the customer to think of burger when they are inside McCurry, it does not lost McDonalds profit an gain.Thus the results shows McCurry won and requires pay back from McDonalds. If this is used in doujinshi, they would not think of the 2nd creation is better than the 1st storyline. The originality is already there, its just creativity spices up the character to create another exciting part to the audience but eventually they will get back to the original artwork. Same goes to song, eventhou the person sings at the pub for 10times, audience will still go bak and search for the original singer.
It's true that people wants to copy them because they are famous to a certain extent. Sometimes, the parody might be the one that made the original songs/video famous as well. It's contradicting isn't it?
ReplyDeleteRepetition work creates fame. That's true! In the doujinshi world, it's cruel but it's true that the more exposure you got, the better fame you can get. Besides, creating characters and let the others to fantasize the characteristic might also be a way to trigger the readers to continue reading it.
Sometimes, we might think that the author should thank the author of doujinshi for making the popularity of the comic higher but in the same time, changing the characteristic and pairing up random characters together as couple spoil the creative juice of the original author. That's just so hard to do a decision to hate it or like it.
Nice analysis chea! Even though I am not very familiar with the Japanese culture but I really do understand the point of if the original artwork is not being repeated, it will not be remembered.I think it really not just applied in the Doujinshi and Mangata but it also appeared in other culture such as Harry Potter for example. It had comes out with so many story and Harry Potter had become a hit in contemporary society. Take another example, pop king Michael Jackson. "This is it" movies had created a high record among the movie industry's record. Agree with Jessine which that repetition creates fame. When people are exposed to the repetition for a long time, they eventually will become the fans and starts to adopt the practices in their life.
ReplyDeleteTake another examples which are the angry bird, you can see it everywhere in the street. From the children to the adult, from the night markets to the shop lots, it's very hard not to see the angry bird's product even though it's illegal. Nowadays, the China had come out with the games that similar with the angry bird's games with the fake iPhone which they create themselves. It seem to be a culture that everything is changing in the world. You may be the origin or the creator of your work, but after few month, the creator may become others which had bring the hits.
Thinks from the public, it may not cause very much harm but to the author, he/she may be forgotten because there will be many more new remakes that coming up which may be unfair to the author.