Friday, August 31, 2012

Media Convergence Essay


MAS110 Media Convergence Essay

Music Videos are a stark example of a media form that has been forced to adapt in order to survive. Numerous methods at adaptation have been attempted by artists and record labels, in order to achieve survival in a changing, converging media landscape. One of the most effective and successful methods is the creation of Vevo, particularly as it has partnered with YouTube and used its tremendous influence to reach a far wider audience than would otherwise be possible.



Vevo is a joint venture music video company, a peculiar alliance between three of the “Big Four” record labels (These three are Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Media Group and EMI), as well as Abu Dhabi Media.
The Vevo site itself is an attempt to recapture the content, if not the scheduling, of the Music Video shows that these companies (and artists) used to depend on for their revenue.

Contained on the site are premieres of new music videos, interviews with artists, recordings of live performances, and even experimental attempts at new original shows, such as Stylized, a show that examines the style (musical and visual) or artists such as Selena Gomez or Labrinth. These combine to create a culture of the “Life and Times” of individual artists, providing content on them which goes beyond the actual music. This is a response to the oft-used ability of the viewer to exclusively follow a single artist throughout the site, rather than waiting for their favourite band or singer to perform their new single on a typical morning’s episode of Rage, as was the case when options were more limited.

Orgad refers to this when discussing not just Music Videos but TV in general, as the concept of “TV Anytime, Anywhere”. The effect is described as one that “emphasizes users’ novel capacity to extend reach and range and to control… what content to consume, when, how and where.” The consequence of this today in regard to music videos has been that today’s music video viewer focuses more on individual artists than on the pleasure of a morning show’s diverse and often unexpected lineup.
In the previous format, the viewer would have to watch the whole show and experience every artist. During the viewing some artists would certainly stand out more than others, but all were ultimately a part of the experience of the show. Vevo caters to this new individualistic desire and magnifies the viewer’s interest in their favourite artists by providing them with more in-depth knowledge of and access to their lives, commodifying not only the performance but also the performer.

Of course, Vevo’s success would have been quite limited if not for its relationship to the online video-sharing colossus, YouTube. The sharing of music videos across YouTube has been common practice for a long time, and the record labels involved have usually retaliated with innumerable claims of Copyright Infringement, resulting in thousands of videos being removed, and thousands more put up in response to fill the new void in YouTube’s extensive archive.
Regarding this response by the YouTube community in opposing the record labels, Hilderbrand has remarked, “Expectations for access have developed into a sense of access entitlement” (Hilderbrand, p50). YouTube’s users have become so accustomed to being able to access their favourite videos online, that they believe nothing should be allowed to deplete their online video repository, or restrict their access to it. The vital question of “Who owns the data?” (Meikle & Young, p66-67) is of no concern or interest to the YouTube community as long as their access is unimpeded.

Due to the sheer size of YouTube’s online community, attempts by the record labels to shut down all cases of Copyright Infringement became more and more ineffective and exhausting, until finally a remedy was proposed. Vevo opened its own YouTube Channel. Rather than shutting down the infringing content, Vevo’s YouTube Channel opted instead to provide the same content in far superior quality. Hilderbrand has noted, “In a word, YouTube clips look and sound terrible. Off-air recordings get compressed, and source webcams and camera-phone images look blocky and jerky from the moment of creation” (Hilderbrand, p54). Vevo can therefore place their own original music videos online in their original, excellent quality, naturally attracting attention away from the low quality, poor-resolution counterfeits.

In turn, when users view Vevo’s music videos, they are presented with a series of advertisements around the page which can range from a tour or album promotion below the video to a brief TV ad before the video itself, to a showcasing of new talent on the label in the “Related Videos” sidebar. YouTube has assisted Vevo in becoming the online music-video giant it was always designed to be, and this fact has not been lost on YouTube’s owner, Google, who accordingly claims a portion of Vevo’s advertising revenue.

The effect of YouTube and Vevo’s collaboration has been largely positive in regard to larger labels and better-known artists, but lesser known artists experience positives and negatives. On the one hand, it is now easier than ever for an artist to get his work out into the public eye. On the other hand, it is now harder than ever to get the public eye to actually look at said work. In the absence of the older Music Video Show format still practiced by the likes of Rage, viewers have no obligation to take risks any more in discovering new artists, and are free to stick to their own little niches of preferred music.

The chief source of success in this area seems to come from either a talent scout from a large label (Such as in the case of Justin Bieber, whose online videos propelled him to fame when noticed by Scooter Braun of RBMG) or by Music Video Companies such as the Ark Music Factory (Such as in the case of Rebecca Black, whose video ‘Friday’ [Placed below] propelled her to widespread internet infamy). So, it seems that up-and-coming artists must wait for discovery, or find a new method, adapt to survive, just as their more well known counterparts have been forced to do.



The creation of Vevo can clearly be seen as a conclusive victory in the attempted transition of Music Video from TV to the Internet. A victory further bolstered by a partnership with YouTube that has now evolved into an advertising powerhouse benefiting both parties, highly impacting artists both famous and unknown (although not at some cost to the latter), and allowing the public the content they desire legally and at a high quality.


References:

Meikle, G. and Young, S. 2012, Media Convergence: Networked Digital Media In Everyday Life, Palgrave, Basingstoke, pp 59-78

Hilderbrand, L. 2007, “Youtube: Where Cultural Memory And Copyright Collide”, Film Quarterly, Vol. 61

Orgad, S. 2009, “Mobile TV: Old and New In The Construction of an Emergent Technology”, Convergence: The International Journal of Research Into New Media Technologies, Vol. 15

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