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December 29, 2006
YouTube and Art
My good friend, Bruce Braun, sent me Mark Cuban’s blog about YouTube, titled “Ripping on Gootube” at http://www.blogmaverick.com/2006/12/27/ripping-on-gootube-again2/. Cuban makes some salient points about YouTube’s problems involving copyrights. He claims that many copyright holders of video material are asking that the content be removed rather than sign license agreements and pay anything. Cuban’s criticism focuses on the business and legal entanglements Google’s YouTube faces.
I had lunch yesterday with a young woman who is finishing her Ph.D. in Art History at the University of Michigan. We had a great time discussing art and its importance to our culture. I talked about how, when I ran for the School Board in Columbia, MO, that one of the planks in my platform was a proposal for increased funding of the arts in the schools. I remember saying that “art is the soul of our society and must be encouraged.” We agreed that art was not only vital for the health of a society and that art not only reflected the political and cultural philosophy of the times but also impacted culture—that artists were, in a sense, clairvoyant and led the culture, introduced it to new ideas and pushed the boundaries of understanding.
Discussing YouTube from a business and legal perspective is interesting; however, I believe that looking at the popular website from an art perspective is more meaningful. What impact do the videos on YouTube have on the culture and artistic sensibility of America? Are senseless, silly, soft-porn, prurient videos reinforcing a moronic, kitschy, anti-art culture of celebrity gawking and of mindless curiosity? What impact do the videos on YouTube have on the creative abilities and sensibilities of American youth, or even on the general population? YouTube is tasteless chewing gum that debases our culture, I believe.
Do people have a right to view this nonsense? Of course they do. Just like people have the right to watch “American Idol” or other senseless TV shows that debase our culture or to go to ever-more violent movies such as “Apocalypto.” I just wish that movies theaters would hand out free passes to art museums when people bought tickets to violent or stupid movies. That way, it might encourage people to view art, to get another perspective.
YouTube might occasionally put up a video of an art lecture or MySpace might occasionally feature a symphony in its music section. In other words, some of these websites might develop a social, artistic conscience. Not that these gestures will have much impact, but you never know. At least it’s worth a try, if just to salve the conscience of the owners and investors, to say nothing about making the Media Curmudgeon happy.
Posted by Charles Warner at December 29, 2006 12:56 PM
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