I know, I bought it (part 2)

For the record I would like to state that copy protection doesn't mean that the protected material isn't available for download.

A few years back the music industry felt their pockets emptying because of declining sales figures. Luckily there was a simple answer to why they were loosing money; Piracy. People everywhere, a faceless crowd, were downloading the music from popular peer to peer networks all over the globe like there was no tomorrow. The music industry though long and hard and finally they came up with a solution. If people hesitate to buy more records why not raise the prices? Said and done the price for a CD went from too much to this is ridiculous in an effort to sell more of their precious artists.

Not surprisingly this didn’t stunt help their sales so they were back to the drawing board. Enter the copy protection. In an effort to prevent piracy they invented a copy protection with the only drawback that some of the CD-players could not play the protected CD. Well you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette don’t you? This leads me back to my first statement. I bought the Massive attack CD 100th window when it was released in 2003. Excited like a child on Christmas eve I literally ran home popping the CD in my player.

Let’s stop for a minute and ask ourselves the question, if a CD can’t be played is it broken? With a poorly disguised rage I went back to the store demanding a refund for my broken record. The store clerk was very understanding; it wasn’t the first time he had done a refund because of the copy protection.

When I arrived home again I went on the net to see how hard it would be getting a hold of the CD I had been awaiting for over six months but the record industry now had denied me. I had given them a chance so I didn’t feel like a criminal when I ten minutes later had the album on my hard drive. So much for the copy protection.

A not too clever thing to do is putting in a protection that only affects the people actually buying it; Kind of like putting a trailer for piracy on a buy only DVD I would say.

I know, I bought it! (Part 1)

In the continuing effort of making people aware the Swedish arm of MPA, Anti piratbyrån, has made a trailer to inform people that it's not ok to download movies. The trailer tells us that we wouldn't steal a car or break into a house as a weak analogy to downloading movies. But wait, there is more. Where would you put a trailer like that to really reach out to the people that do the actual downloading?

How about putting them as a non skippable track on DVD:s people buy? Sounds like a great idea? I think not. When I buy a DVD I don't want someone to tell me that it's not ok to download. I have just invested my hard eared cash in buying the DVD, NOT downloading it so I'm probably not the target audience for such a scolding.

Ok, where else can we reach out to the people are putting the cinemas on the brink of ruin? Well, before the trailers of course. Not sure how their logic works but if I watch the trailers I'm not at home downloading am I? Talk about missing the point. Not only are they making themselves look like fools but they also stirring up hostility towards themselves for accusing everyone wrongfully of piracy.

Not the smartest move in the history of crime prevention I would say. Stay tuned for another not too bright move from IFPI.

A love monkey runs amok

I talked about product placement in my previous blog post Product placement turns movies into music videos and yesterday I read an article regarding a new TV-serie called Love Monkey. So what is the connection I hear you think. Fear not I will answer all your questions.

Love Monkey is what must be described as the lazy mans Idol. In the show Idol we could see a select group of untried people compete for a record deal. But the music companies behind the show had no way of knowing if their future albums would sell and even how it would sound before hand. they had no way of knowing the winners marketability beforehand. A lot of question marks so to speak and enter Love Monkey.

The show is a hybrid between a regular serie like Sex and the city and a reality show much like Pop star or Idol. The big difference here is that the artist exposed has already been discovered by Sony (who is behind the show). So the show is in reality only a long commercial for one of their more unknown artists. And with a script the TV companies doesn't have to worry about the human factor either with no ad libs and no surprises. A show where everyone is a winner. Or are they? Do we really need a show that in reality is a thinly veiled commercial made with the sole purpose of making us buy a record? Eventhou the concept of a tv-show for the only purpose of selling a product isn't in any way new this marks an important step for a music industry in change.

Can you spot the difference between Jenna Jameson and Britney Spears?

This question is harder to answer then what first meet the eye. The easy and most politically correct answer would of course be that Britney is a singer and Jenna is a porn star, end of story thank you very much.
But let's take a closer look. Under the microscope the similarities becomes more obvious than what Mr PC would have us think. Jenna can be seen stripping in front of a camera before a faceless crowd and after reading a few reviews on Britney's shows there doesn't seem to be too much difference in that department. Jenna might be a little more honest of her intention but they both prance around the stage in a variety of skimpy outfits and making sexual innuendoes. How about this quote from a review of one of Britney's Las Vegas shows:

"She’s also clearly gotten in touch with herself, evident because she frequently touches herself. Boy, does she grab her chest a lot! Not that this is a complaint, of course."

That's a comment that would fit any of Jennas shows as well don't you think? Ok, their acts are similar, check! More evidence of Britney’s fascination with striptease can be seen in videos such as Overprotected (original release, not the darkchild remix or the plug for Crossroads) and Crazy where she put on a sexy strip show with classic acts such as the pole and the chair. While Britney hasn't followed in Paris Hiltons foot steps by releasing adult videos yet she has been seen together with Jenna on several occasions impying that she is well versed in the adult industry. Technically Britney is already starring in pornographic videos thou. If you look up the word Pornography in the Encyclopaedia Britannica it says:

"The representation of erotic behaviour in books, pictures, statues, motion pictures, etc., that is intended to cause sexual excitement. The word pornography, derived from the Greek porni (“prostitute”) and graphein (“to write”), was originally defined as any work of art or literature depicting the life of prostitutes"

With the obvious emphasis on Intended to cause sexual excitement Britney is in good company with names such as the virtuous Beyoncé Knowles, Madonna and Janet Jackson just to name a few. With the media industry saturated with the sex sells message most of today’s content would be considered pornographic, a tell tale sign of the changing times and the progressing sexualisation of the media landscape.

So while Jenna makes millions of her porn empire focusing on the exploitation of her body Britney do the same but substitutes the word porn for music. But the porn and the music industry is similar in more ways than they want to admit making the two women almost colleagues in a shameless and expoloitive media industry.

What happens with morale after midnight?

Sometimes I stay up late and use my favorite music channel (no product placements here) as background noise. In doing so I have joined, what the programming department must call, the adult crowd. Their twisted logic is hard to follow but apparently the viewers who shun nudity and foul language never stays up this late so we sleezy viewers may roam free watching uncensored clips of Eminem making out with porn stars and see Robbie William tear the meat of his bones.

I'm not sure who we are protecting but I can't recall any cencored videos that actually had censor worthy material in them. The Robbie William incident conserned his video Rock DJ where he is standing in the center of a disco rollerskating rink with scantily clad women around his. He then proceed to stip down to his cute koala bear briefs before removing even this garment. One could easily think that it was this last act of "depravity" that called for censorship but no, After his naked butt is shown to the faceless crowd sitting in their living rooms watching he rips of his skin and proceed to tear the meat from his own bones throwing them to the crowd of women. It is this last act that was completely cut out in the European MTV version while the nudity was removed from the US one (to no ones surprise).

I still wonder why the video was re edited since there is no full frontal nudity and the tearing of flesh is so obviously computer generated that no one would take this for true. At least no one who stays up late. We are mature enough to realize this while the poor imbeciles who have to go to bed before 9 PM have no way of understanding this. They simply can't grasp the fine line between absolute truth and humor and irony. To them a pound of flesh is something you pay with and not something to play with.

I find it strange that when the clock passes into night the morale goes out the window. Either you think the message is bad or you don't, what kind of mixed messages are you sending by saying it's ok to show it later in the evening. I mean the kids watch dead bodies lying in the streets of Jerusalem but seeing Robbie dishing it out is simply too much for them. Talk about strange values when he can say "give no head, no back stage passes" but can't show him throw meat at girls.

Do people really listen to the music?

Seeing Arctic Monkeys being played on MTV make me wonder how much people really listen to what they are listening to. The band is mediocre at best and while it's fresh to hear something else and than sugar sweet RnB on MTV I still feel that they don't have their music to thank for the sudden stardom. No, they made headlines back in 2005 when they manage to promote themselves over the internet building a fan base before venturing on and signing with the label Domino (also home of Franz Ferdinand). The media have made them stars by using their name as a symbol of the change the media industry is currently going though. The Times had an article regarding this in October, and several other prominent news papers have covered this phenomena giving the band massive media coverage. In the words of Dr Hannibal Lecter we do covet what we see every day and no one sums up the media industry like him.

So by becoming symbols for how we consume culture today Arctic Monkeys have rocket themselves to instant fame despite their music. There must be thousands of bands out there sounding better that the Sheffield boys but as we all know it's how famous you are not how good you are that decide if you can be one of the select few to be aired on your favourite music station.

Ok, I think that is enough cynism for one day.

Product placement turn movies into music videos?

It might not be an entirely accurate title but bear with me and I'll explain what I mean. The user You-know-who made a comment on my blog article Name one great video regarding the fact that music videos were solely made for selling a product where as movies is selling a message. this made me sit down and think it over.

I can agree with him that the most important purpose of a music video is to sell a product, namely the artist. But is the movies really spared from the brutal messages of the commercial world? How big is really the difference between a music video and a box office movie commercial wise? I really only need to say product placement to answer that question. Most movies today use this to finance large parts of their operations. A quick search on Google with the key words product placement movies gives roughly 2.7 million hits and I even found a news site dedicated solemnly to product placement. For those who have no idea of how product placement works here is a quick expanantion.

In every movie you see today actors and movie characters use real life products. James Bond drives an Aston Martin and Forest Gump drink Dr Pepper. AUDI cut a spectacular sponsor deal with the movie I Robot creating a completely new car for the sci-fi movie (read an article about it here). The trick is to seamlessly place the product in plain view without it being distracting. By associating the item with a feeling or a character the status of it rises. This is the next big thing and TV-networks are already exploiting this. IMDB reported 21 July 2001 that an episode of the popular spy show Alias was sponsored by Nokia making it commercial free but instead completely financed by product placement. And Ford is heavily sponsoring the second season of the popular show 24 (Read the BBC article here).

The list of shows and movies using placement as a big part of their financing is growing every day as consumers starts to tire of the old styled commercial breaks. At least music videos are honest about their intentions.

Is Britney Spears the new Madonna?

The pictures above come from Britney Spears song Someday and are a text book examples of being too obvious (the image of the Virgin Mary I put in as a comparison). I can see the director Guy Sigsworth sitting in his office explaining his visions to the big shots at Jive records in a very animated way. “I can see the second coming of the Christ” he says arms flailing wildly, mouth foaming in religious zeal.

Using religious symbolism in literature and movies are far from uncommon but this is a tad too much I think. There must have been some kind of competition of who could come up with the most religious refferences in the 3:32 minutes the video run.
Not only is the portrayed as the virgin Mary (first photo) but for those who missed that blatant halo behind her another chance is presented only seconds later as she, in a wide shot, holds her belly in front of a big painting with an angel reaching out toward her. Together with a camera views that looks down from the sky not very subtly hinting that someone is watching her from above make this video one of the more blatant shows of religious symbolism I have seen in a long time. She is indeed reclaiming her virginal image not seen since the days of Don’t let me be the last to know. The virgin and the whore is not a too uncommon religious theme either... I might be on to something here.

I have talked about Britney before and I probably will again. The whole machinery that is Britney Spears is too interesting to simply ignore. Indeed a force to be reckoned with within the media industry... Amen

• you can watch the video at Yahoo music or VH1

Name one great video

There is something about music videos that keep me comming back for more. I have been collecting them for several years now and I passed the 1800 mark a few months back and still counting. One of the things I like about them is that everyone has an opinion. One think the babes are hot, one like the symbolism and another have fallen in love with the camera movements during a particular scene. And the great thing is that no one have the right opinion.

I think it's the intoxicating mix of music and images that seduce most people. I fit mostly into the 'look at that scene it looks just like the scene from The graduate' category since I can't get enough of intertexuality (references to other literary sources). On other days I can't get enough of camera porn, that is perfect composed images and filtered looks (Think Tony Scott's Man on fire).

Sometimes it's easy to get stuck in a rut only watching old clips not getting any creative input. That's why I need your help. What music video is playing over and over in your head at the moment? Challenge me by writing a comment regarding it and force me to watch it and make my own comment.

Let the good times roll

What does Duran Duran and Strokes have in common?

Not much would be my first response... That is until recently when I stumbled across a small notice in the paper stating that MTV was censoring the Stroke's video Juicebox. I went online to see what this was all about and this is what I found.

Even before the making of the video Julian cassablanca, singer in the band, made a humorous comment regarding the possibility of full frontal nudity in their next video. Not too surprising MTV went through the roof and the not too serious comment suddenly became a huge rumor that spread across the internet even making MTV news comment on it. Read the MTV article here.

The director Michael Palmieri felt so violated by the censored version MTV aired that he removed his name completely from the project. He felt that the censored version failed to communicate the idea that he originaly wanted to say.

"the unfortunate problem mtv had with censoring the video is that there was nothing explicit in the video to take out to begin with. they were trying to censor an idea, which is really hard to do."

He states on the sitesite www.michaelpalmieri.com. A version of the video is also viewable on his site. Another interesting comment is

"is mtv up in arms about lesbians on a rooftop, or are they disturbed by how the lesbians on the rooftop are presented - as material for a man to jerk off to in the dark?"

It's a well known empiric fact that women in music videos more that often is portrayed in a erotic way both in mannerisms and in the way they dress. In the Strokes video you can see a dirty man making a pornographic video with two lesbians. Nothing in the way of nudity is shown and the sexual aggressiveness of the two women could be compared to any RnB video endlessly aired on your favorite music channel. So is it the obvious way Palmieri is showing the two women as sexual products instead of portraying their mannerisms as an image as say Lil Kim that has made MTV censor it?

I for one can't see any logic behind MTV censoring the video but showing videos like Candy shop with 50 cent or Dirrty with Aguilera. But then again MTV has become what it swore to fight when it was founded in the eighties. A corporate gigant not in any way connected or interested in music in any other way that money.

I'm on your side Michael, keep it up! And for those who still wondering about the title, Duran Duran's Girls on film was the first music video that MTV censored back in 1981.

What's the next step? Computer games?

The movie industry is currently in turmoil. No one want to go to the cinema anymore, at least not at often as they want us to. What to do, what to do? Let's sell the movie properties to computer developers.

Long gone are the days where Pacman and Digdug entertained us. Today computer games look more and more like their big brothers. Not only have the graphic opened up vistas in immersion but today games borrow heavily from the narrative structure of movies just as the movies themselves borrowed from literature back in the days of Lumiere.

The next evolutionary step is then to start producing games based on movie properties. Today this is a viable market strategy and most big movies try to produce at least one comuter game spin off to be released at the same time as the movie. Take Batman Begins, King Kong or Alexander to name a few.

Sowhat'ss next I can see you are thinking. Well let me tell you Jack. Computer game remakes of old movies or movie properties. How about Dirty Harry? or the old Marlon Brando classic the God father? Who do you want to be today?
There are several movies that is being or have been remade into computer games. A few months ago Rockstar games, infamous for their Grand theft auto games, released the Warriors based on the 1977 Walter Hill classic with the same name.

Could this be the reason young people stay at home instead of going to the multiplex? Certainly not the only reason but I think it plays a bigger part than we currently think. At home they get the cinematic story but with interaction... That's hard to beat.

This is how much I owe Britney Spears

I remember the first music video I owned. It was Britney Spears Baby hit me one more time and was in love. Not with Britney but with the sleek machinery that was her PR department. Ok, I fell for her as well, or at least the image projected but that was not the reason I started collecting her videos. The shallow but perfect images seduced me into start studying media at the local university. Talk about power images holds over us.

The commercial image is the perfect example of communication through imagery. The industry that is the media had perfected that language and for that I love it. Britney wasn't the end of it thou. today I own over 1800 music videos and the images still intrigue me. the music video is the ultimate merging of art and commercial interests. It's really nothing more that an expensive commercial yet there is channels that do nothing more than broadcast these all day. Would you watch The home shopping network all day?

Think of this next time you watch a music video.

Why 24 nation? I hear you ask

Well I tell you. It's a very poetic name with 24 representing both midnight and the ever vigilance of 24/7. I work the night shift at a hotel and when the clock passes midnight I'm pretty much left to my own devices - My own little 24 nation.

First I wanted to name the blog In the night but since that was taken I went with the more cool sounding 24 nation.

In the beginning god created man and man created television

Everything has to start somewhere and why not here in the misty dawn of 2006? Could this be the year that reality TV finally died a painful and agonizing death? The year when movie sequels will be something to look forward to instead of crying rivers over? I have seen the signs and the starts are in their right alignment I tell you.

Two solid signs:
A host of well produced TV shows such as Revelations
Philip Seymour Hoffman as the bad guy in Mission Impossible 3