How can we create a media network where the process of creation is organically distributed amongst all entities, rather than a binary division between the creator and the receiver?
In a cultural landscape dominated by closed-control platforms, this repository aims to present Open Media Ecologies (OMEs) as an alternative cultural structure where the approach to the creative process is essentially shared and open in all phases of the media experience including its distribution.
Given the profound impact that industrialization has had on our societal structures, modes of production, and consumption habits, it is crucial to redefine our relationship with creation and distribution. While industrialization brought about unprecedented advancements in technology, medicine, and various other sectors, it also established a paradigm where creation became increasingly centralized, leading to a dichotomy between creators and consumers. This dichotomy has resulted in a passive culture, largely driven by closed-control platforms, where the audience is distanced from the act of creation and its ethical implications.
Furthermore, the traditional industrial model is characterized by its emphasis on mass production and consumption, often sidelining the nuanced, diverse needs of individuals and communities. This not only stymies creativity and innovation but also promotes a culture of disposability, contributing to numerous environmental and social challenges.
In such a scenario, the need to decentralize and democratize the act of creation is not just a matter of promoting creativity; it's an essential step towards building a sustainable, inclusive future. By fostering Open Media Ecologies (OMEs), we can succesfully blur the boundaries between creators and consumers, making the act of creation a collective endeavor.
Moreover, by emphasizing open creative processes within open-source distribution infrastructures, we ensure that the creative outputs are not just accessible but also adaptable to the ever-evolving needs of societies. This fluidity is pivotal in ensuring the sustainability of cultural outputs, as it allows for constant evolution and adaptation, unlike the rigid structures established by industrialized models.
You are invited to contribute by submitting any additions and deletions to the defining essay or, ideally, to the "Composing participation" compilation; this section offers practical guides, tools, and methods for developing sustainable open media structures.
This text was written within the context of 2023 Cultures d'Avenir program hosted by Centre Pompidou in Paris, Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin, CCCB in Barcelona, and thanks to the funding and support from the Franco-German Youth Office (FGYO).
An Open Media Ecology (OME) refers to any form of culture that has been deliberately conceived to enable and promote public participation within: 1. The creative process that defines the content of a specific media instance, as well as 2. The infrastructure responsible for its maintenance and distribution.
In essence, an OME refers to any cultural structure which is actively conceived through Open creative processes within Open source distribution infrastructure:
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Open creative processes: All (or at least a considerable part of) the content, elements, and variables that define a media composition exist as open functions; The receiver is thus stimulated to engage in a sensory conversation that relies upon their unique conditioning and creative will [1]. The work’s range of possibilities is directly proportional to the public’s willingness to change these. This stands in contrast to a closed creative process, where media is actively conceived by a predefined composer and passively consumed by the public, which although is able to reinterpret the work, there is no active invitation for recreation, due to the medium’s impeding ability to enable the public to interact with the defining elements of the composition (unless the public decides to recreate the work through an intervention e.g., sampling).
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Open source distribution infrastructure: all elements which structurally maintain the cultural experience are open source[2] and thus open for public adaptation. The public has the opportunity and responsibility[3][4] to participate in shaping and modifying the distribution infrastructure. Within an open source media network, all individuals hold potential in determining all maintenance variables, for example: how information is shared, goals and policies are set, tax resources are allocated, programs are operated, and benefits such as contracts and patronage are distributed. In the case of individual works, open source distribution infrastructure ensures for free public accessibility and recreate-ability of the work, independently from the revenue structure and licensing which the composer might choose upon. In regards to collective projects open source distribution presents significant potential for public adaptation. However, it is important to reiterate that the aim to hold for public adaptation processes must be sustained with the necessary infrastructure of participation. This tends to include: governance structure for consensus achievement, systems of mediation and conflict resolution, and perhaps above all, a strong set of values and core rules which establish an ethical working structure. It is here where the potential open source distribution infrastructure is set; within carefully established maintenance and ethical structures the distribution system becomes and an adaptive entity able to respond and change to their immediate socio ecological environment [5]. OMEs thus propose an alternative in comparison to modern closed media platforms in which distribution is often governed by economically-driven decisions and institutions that are plagued by conflicts of interest due to their top-down hierarchies and convoluted heritage systems.
Through the combination of open source distribution and open creative processes a new open cultural structure can be created where the value (economical, aesthethical or ethical) of the given distributed cultural item is inherently extended to the receiver, thus converting this entity also into a cultural capacitor which is able to produce and extend his potential of perception. [6] It is thus of core importance for the integrity of the OME that these two qualities remain interdependent. Open creative processes without open source distribution infrastructure risks of acquisitive models which turn the participative potential of open creative processes into extractive products[7]. Parallel to this, a project with open source distribution without open creative processes risks of centralized value, e.g. "web 2.0" scheme[8].
OME’s stand in contrast to the currently dominating culture industry [9] or closed media ecologies [10] which have been designed to prioritise (mostly through industrial methods) massively accessible experiences of commodified attention over intimate and nuanced experiences. In other terms, the industrial logic [11] from a closed media ecology defines the potential of public participation purely on a quantitative measure, thus omitting participation in a qualitative level. The economical nature of closed media ecologies has thus systematically converted the public receiving entity into an object of passivity rather than a subject of creation. This has created a century-long deficient pattern where the public has become increasingly alienated from the ethical responsibilities involved in the act of creation, and to a more damaging degree, society has created a deficient understanding of what and how we can create[12].
Today, It should come to no surprise that as we face our current deficient cultural practices, so do we face the consequences of systematic extraction and control over our biological environments. Both issues stem from the same root; a generally flawed notion of creation as an activity that inherently exhorts control over its environments. We will not be able to reverse these issues until we fundamentally start to understand creation as an open and variable activity that is subject to change, as a system adaptable to the embedded chaos in nature.
Our modern society and its current cultural landscape demands now more than ever a new media ecology which isn’t based on control-seeking structures [13]; we need new systems of distribution which aren’t inherently based on soliloquies over dialogues through systems of commodified attention[18] that centralise and fix the creative process.
The new media ecology is thus, one, where the trench between the artist and the audience is narrowed, and the creative process is shared and distributed. In turn, the public ignites a heightened sense of perception[14] towards its environments and its involving ethical responsibilities, maintenance structures and labour systems commonly deceived in the creation of culture. Following the law of requisite variety[15], our potential for creation and imagination is directly proportional to the way we envision and treat our environments.
In a society where risk and uncertainty have become a economical product but also a prominent defining element of our modernity[16], OMEs presents itself as a structure that can systematically generate a new cultural attitude within the adversity of risk, thus trespassing the cultural limits implied by the industrial thinking structures. We can thus understand OMEs as "risk cultures"[19] ; The participative models which structurally define a OME are naturally bound to embrace risk and uncertainty[17].
"Risk Cultures deal with risk, with identity-risks and ecological-risks, not so much through rational calculation or normative subsumption, but through symbolic practices and especially through symbol innovation"[19]
It is thorugh this systematic distribution of openly-uncertain experiences where OMEs take effect; Culture shifts into an open model which actively invites the unknown person to the unknown experience, instead of inviting the unknown person to the known experience.
Being with the unknown is hence, being by surrendering, or rather, being by not controlling.
It is at this moment, that a culture of open creation is born. When the seeds of cultural surrendering begin to exist parallel to the seeds of cultural control, we can begin to harvest an open society.
Open media ecologies come with a heightened degree of responsibility. The potential for cultural development offered by OMEs is directly tied to assuming greater responsibility in media maintenance, addressing the basic needs of public participants, and ensuring the economic sustainability of freely available projects. Therefore, the question is not whether OMEs can exist, but rather:
How to design an open media ecology that effectively manages and maintains responsibilities collectively, while considering the well-being of participants and their involving socio-ecological environments?
As a form of example and test, this repository presents itself as a proto-open media ecology; It serves as a public collaborative space to explore and refine approaches that contribute to the growth and sustainability of open media ecologies. All contributions and participations are welcome by adding/editing/deleting within the “Composing Participation” section, or alternatively feel free to propose any change beyond the standard structure hereby presented.
[1] Eco, U. (1989). The open work. Harvard University Press.
[2] Stallman, R. M. (n.d.). Free Software Foundation Open source distribution infrastructure refers directly to Stallman's free software: the public has open access to share, modify, edit and study the work. It is important to note that the potential of the public to freely modify the distribution structure remains also openly receptive of the artists right to create a revenue structure from their artwork.
[3]Castells, M. (2005). Innovation, information technology, and the culture of freedom: The political economy of open source. Presentation at the 2005 World Social Forum meeting, Porto Alegre, Brazil. February 2, 2006. In this conference Castells points out that open source refers to a “form of social organization of production” that “works as an open network of voluntary cooperation.” He points out four challenges in the open source concept: (a) the motivation of the volunteers taking part in the process, (b) the economic logic that departs from conventional market logic, (c) the coordination of hundreds of volunteers without a hierarchical organization, and (d) the management of the complexity.
[4] Buytaert, D. (n.d.). The Privilege of Free Time in Open Source. "Free time is a mark of privilege, rather than an equal right. Instead of chasing an unrealistic concept of meritocracy, we should be striving for equity. Rather than thinking, "everyone can contribute to open source", we should be thinking, "everyone deserves the opportunity to contribute".
Time inequality contributes to a lack of diversity in Open Source. This fallacy of "free time" makes Open Source communities suffer from a lack of diversity. The demographics are even worse than the technology industry overall: while 22.6% of professional computer programmers in the workforce identify as women (Bureau of Labor Statistics), less than 5% of contributors do in Open Source (GitHub). And while 34% of programmers identify as ethnic or national minorities (Bureau of Labor Statistics), only 16% do in Open Source (GitHub)."
Equal opportunity is a utopia within societies dominated by competitive markets; Following Castell's definition of common open source challenges in reference #3, adapting against meritocracy and creating systematic efforts for opportunities is a central problem to open source infrastructure. Failure to achieve this can convert the open source infrastructure into its counterpart: a closed media ecology where decisions are centrally conceived.
[5] P. A. Gray et al., “Strategies for Coping with the Wicked Problem of Climate Change,” in The Future of Heritage as Climates Change: Loss, Adaptation and Creativity, eds. David Harvey and Jim Perry (New York: Routledge, 2015), 186: “An organization’s adaptive capacity results from a unique combination of values and principles, institutional culture and function, commitment to public engagement, financial and human assets, acquisition and use of information, know-how and a mandate for decision-making.”
[6] Yuill, Simon. (2008). All Problems of Notation Will be Solved by the Masses: Free Open Form Performance, Free/Libre Open Source Software, and Distributive Practice.
[7] Ibid.
"Commercial software production is acquisitive in that firstly it acquires the labour of others, that is then sealed under employment contracts and copyright, and secondly demands that it is consumed as an acquisition whose disposition is similarly restricted. Copyright became significant to the emergence of commercial software as it is the application of copyright, used in its conventional restrictive sense, that is used to define the code as a fixed product. Free Software, in contrast, emphasizes the code as something that enters into a continuum of production."
[8] Kleiner, D., & Wyrick, B. (n.d.). InfoEnclosure 2.0. Mute, 2(4).
[9] Adorno, T. W. (1991). The culture industry: Enlightenment as mass deception. In D. Held (Ed.), The cultural studies reader (pp. 31-41). Routledge.
[10] Lessig, L. (2004). Free culture. Penguin Books. (xiv preface): “The opposite of a free culture is a ‘permission culture.’ A culture in which creators get to create only with the permission of the powerful, or of creators from the past.”
[11] Manovich Lev. 2001. The Language of New Media. Cambridge Mass: MIT Press. "The more likely reason why modern media has discrete levels is because it emerges during Industrial Revolution. In the nineteenth century, a new organization of production known as the factory system gradually replaced artisan labor. It reached its classical form when Henry Ford installed the first assembly line in his factory in 1913. The assembly line relied on two principles. The first was the standardization of parts, already employed in the production of military uniforms in the nineteenth century. The second, the never principle, was the separation of the production process into a set of repetitive, sequential, and simple activities that could be executed by workers who did not have to master the entire process and could be easily replaced. Not surprisingly, modern media follows the factory logic, not only in terms of the division of labor as witnessed in Hollywood film studios, animation studios, or television production, but also on the level of its material organization.”
[12] (n.d.). Brian Eno: Composers as Gardeners. Edge.org. Sunday, October 16, 2011. The Serpentine Gallery Garden Marathon, organized by Hans Ulrich Obrist. Within his lecture, Brian Eno stated: "we have to stop thinking of top-down control as being the only way in which things could be made"
[13] Bauman, Z. (n.d.). Zygmunt Bauman: 'No one is in control. That is the major source of contemporary fear' Video
[14][14] Moholy-Nagy, L. (1922) “Produktion—Reproduktion,” De Stijl 5, No. 7, 98--100 (1922)
“The objective of the artistic use of the media, in other words, should be to produce an extension and a refinement of the capacities of perception and the consciousness of the modern individual, in order to put him in a position where he can apprehend the products of social labour in their entire scope and in their entirety.”
[14] Verstockt, S., & De Moor, A. (2016). Recreating Commoning. Design for a Postcapitalist Society. Making and Breaking: The Grid: a Graphic Design Discourse. Presented at the 10th Design History Society Conference: Making and Breaking the Grid, Aalto University, Helsinki, Finland.
[15]Ashby, W. R. (1952). Design for a Brain: The Origin of Adaptive Behavior. Chapman & Hall. The Law of Requisite Variety states that in order for a control system to effectively manage and regulate a complex system, it must possess at least as much variety as the system it is trying to control. In other words, a system that seeks to govern or influence another system must be able to handle the same or a greater amount of complexity and diversity that exists within the target system.
According to Ashby, if the regulating system has less variety than the system it is attempting to control, it will be overwhelmed and unable to effectively manage the system's behavior. Conversely, if the regulating system has greater variety than the system it is controlling, it will have the capacity to handle and adapt to the system's complexity.
[16] Beck, U. (1992). Risk society: Towards a new modernity. Sage.
[17] Huybrechts, L. (2014) Participation is risky. "Participatory projects are in essence always uncertain. They rely heavily on the input from other participants. This contrasts with the makers' urge to control the participatory process and its outcome"
[18] Mark, G. (2023). Attention span. New York, NY: HarperCollins: Gloria Mark, a professor of information science at the University of California, Irvine, and the author of the book "Attention Span," began studying computer usage patterns in 2004. Initially, people spent an average of 2.5 minutes on a single screen. However, in 2012, Mark and her colleagues discovered that the average time dedicated to a single task had decreased to 75 seconds. Presently, the average time has further declined to approximately 47 seconds.
[19] Lash, Scott (2000). Risk culture. In Barbara Adam, Ulrich Beck & Joost van Loon (eds.), The Risk Society and Beyond: Critical Issues for Social Theory. Sage Publications. pp. 47--62.
Please note that the above references are for informational purposes and to provide additional context to the points discussed. It is always advisable to refer to the original sources for a more comprehensive understanding of the concepts.
A collection of works that extend the vision of Open Media Ecologies:
- Participative Audio Lab vision: harvesting a culture of open creation through music.
- Incompleteness Is a Feature Not a Bug (in Max/MSP/Jitter) - David Zicarelli - ADC22: David Zacarelli talks within this keynote about Perceptual Control Theory as a fundamental premise in any project. Wether it's an art project or a open source community, he describes the importance of creating systems which have been designed for a potential of adaptability within its respective environments.
This section of the repository repository aims to serve as a public compilation of methods and tools for handling and composing ethically and ecologically sustainable participative experiences. Please feel free to provide your own. If you want to participate yet don't know how to use gitHub follow this guide.
- MAP-it: created by Social Spaces research group “ MAP-it is a tool for participatory cartography and conversation. It's a low-tech mapping tool that allows you to debrief past projects, manage current ones and plan future activities.”
- Create an Architecture of Participation for your Open Source project: A practical look into the development process of Greenpeace’s “Plant 4” online architecture of participation.
- Open Source Guides | Learn how to launch and grow your project.
All writing by Miguel La Corte
The Open Media Ecology by Miguel La Corte is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at https://github.com/miguellacorte/the_open_media_ecology_essay/.
