Customer Reviews

Darknet: Hollywood's War Against the Digital Generation

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

First heard of this book at Gnomedex2005. While there I watched JD speak on a panel about tomorrow's media and talk about participatory culture, user generated content and how the smarts are with the audience, not with the people on the stage. He is so passionate about the subject, and was having such a great time talking about the personal media revolution that I picked up a copy of his book that night.

The only problem with this book, like a roller coaster when you are a kid, is that it ended too soon. 267 pages of fun, and interesting people and WTF? moments of corporate and legislative stupidity. JD isn't pro-piracy. JD isn't pro-RIAA/MPAA/MS. He lays out an excellent argument for why we need more moderation and common sense and why it is more important that we the people and our legislators have an understanding of historical record behind innovation and copyright and culture.

Lasica tells a cautionary tale about what might happen if we let the regulators (business, MSM, govt agencies) have their way without our say. They want control over their content, and more importantly, their sources of revenue.

He balances that with a strong warning to the big players: there are more pirates than there are lawyers, and they are fighting back against the limitations. Without being silly or sci fi, he takes the reader through a short tour of the darknets, giving the reader a peek into the people and motivation inside.

This book touches on copyright, free culture, software, file sharing, business, Hollywood, professionals and amateurs. Lasica's writing style is fast and clean and very direct. It is a fun and fast read with a great set of footnotes at the end the user can follow up on.

Google Lasica and ourmedia and see what else he is involved with regarding participatory media/culture.

I originally heard about this book, while I was listening to a recorded Q and A session of South by Southwest (SXSW). I'm really glad I followed up and got it. Lasica did a fantastic job explaining our culture and how we interact with technology and new media. This book really wraps up how different groups such as corporations, senators, pirates and musicians affect it. Things are happening that you won't necessarily agree with on all sides.

Technology isn't as simple as making discoveries, because of the slow moving patent driven society we have become. The two sides covered brilliantly by Lasica are basically those who want or have ownership over information so they can control pricing, distribution, and those who want to use technology and media as creators, not just consumers. But it's the examples in the book that make it great...of the groups driven to darknets who don't want to be limited by laws that they feel are outdated, unjust, those who want information for everybody. These people from all walks of life are very interesting. Plus I loved all the references I learned about from reading it.

As someone who spends a lot of time online and in the television world, Ill be the first to admit that I havent read as many books as I would have liked to in recent years. ( Not sure if Dean Koontz and John Grisham count)

But JD Lasicas "DARKNET" helps make up for all those nites in cyberspace wilderness. This is the best and most complete book Ive come across on the subject of the major transformations taking place in the media world. It wouldent suprise me if this book becomes the NWE BIBLE for the next generation of media...

The trick is that Lasica dosent do what most Big-J Journalists do: Latch onto a huge media or tech company and tell its story. Yes, Microsoft, Sony, Intel, HP, Play important roles here, But the author burrows into whats really driving todays changes in the digital world, and its happining at the grassroots, much of it OUT of the spotlight. This should be a textbook for students students studying media or next-generation online business models. Its all here in ONE comprehensive package.

Through example after example ( and LOTS of Beautiful no-nonsense writing) we see how Big Entertainment is spinning the public into believing this is a debate over piracy, when in reality the restrictions showing up in our digital gear are REALLY about preserving existing business models.

But the most Interesting chapters are not about law or corperate shenanigans. I was blown away by the author's insights fleshing out the future of television, movies, music, and gaming. Media will change more in the next five years than it has in the last 50 years, Lasica writes.

A few years from now, when millions of us will be walking around with mini computers in our pockets containing the storage capacity of today's Library of Congress, what kind of deal will we strike with the purveyors of information and entertainment? These are questions we should be debating today.

Today we get to decide what kind of future we want for tomorrows media-saturated society. There are some stark choices before us all, if only "The Media" began telling us WHAT they are.

But they WONT.. So get up to speed. READ "DARKNET"

5 STARS.......

In what is essentially a PR war of hysteria (on both sides), JD presents the middle ground, shifting the focus off the corporations and file-sharing teenagers. We learn about real people who, having become accustomed to technology in their lives, adopt it to create a richer media experience. These hobbyists have the tools and ambition to express themselves, except now the law has intervened. Before, fair use was an acceptable compromise because it was hard to make a perfect copy. Now with perfect duplicates, all fair use is suspect, since the tools used to digitally record a few seconds of a song or movie for a remix piece are the same that pirates would use to steal music or, worse, to profitably bootleg. Those tools illegally circumvent copy protection and the act is a crime no matter the intent.

This is the tension JD describes is his book - a world where an absolute law applies to a range of activities, many of which seem perfect resonable and socially beneficial.

JD presents no real answers because as a society we haven't come up with them yet. Darknet triggers important questions: is fair-use an intrinsic "right"? should it be? what can people repurpose for their own use in a non-commerical setting? how can that be defined/controlled? where are the mechanisms to license use of this content?

JD points us to the root of the conflict: otherwise normal people become criminals in pursuit of creating their own art and entertainment - works as "trivial" as they are culturally important.

I first became aware of the issues surrounding our digital freedoms a few weeks ago during the arguments before the Supreme Court in the "Grokster" case. The justices are expected to soon rule in the most important case of the digital age.

I didn't fully appreciate the issues at stake in this case - and indeed, for all of us who care about how we may use our computers, our gadgets and other digital technologies - until I read an early copy of JD Lasica's "Darknet: Hollywood's War Against the Digital Generation."

I've read Lasica's columns for years on the Online Journalism Review site as he argued passionately for citizen journalism and a forward-looking approach to the online medium by the major media players. In "Darknet," he takes those reporting skills and goes to town, providing the first journalistic, narrative-driven account of the culture clashes that mainstream new organizations seem to be only dimly aware of. (News flash: It's not about file sharing!!)

Yes, some of this ground has been plowed before, but mostly by academics with little flair for making these issues accessible to a general audience. That's what I think "Darknet" brings to the table .... it tells stories rather than arguing fine points of copyright law.

There's the pastor who commits a felony because he wants to use Hollywood movie clips in his sermons (it's a terrifically vivid and real representation of a geeky man of the cloth - but a lot of my secular friends behave the same way and would be shocked to learn how much of their behavior is already illegal).

There's the inside look at movie piracy (has this been reported before? this was all new to me), with the interesting take on how Hollywood execs are ignoring the advice of their own consultants by refusing to make studio movies available on demand in a timely manner.

There's the behind-the-curtain look at the workings of these intra-industry consortiums that are deciding how you and I can use our computers, PDAs, and digital TV sets, with little or no input from the public.

Mostly, though, "Darknet" takes the pulse of the digital generation - young people especially - and winds up siding with their worldview of being producers and creators of content instead of one-dimensional consumers. That stands in stark contrast to the views of the people running the entertainment companies (and their
Capital Hill errand boys).

It's a disturbing, sobering and timely look at what's turning out to be a hugely important issue for those of us who aspire to be more than passive consumers of big media's infotainment machine.

This is a superb documentation of how people want to use and are in fact using the new digital media technology.

I'd strongly recommend it to anyone who is trying to make sense of what's happening in the media industry and society at large. Big changes are afoot and Lasica does a suberb job of mapping the new landscape and anticipating where things are headed.

An earlier review suggested, in noting that this book seemed rather one-sided (possibly true) that "this debate would have been settled years ago if there were not two valid sides to the argument". Respectfully I disagree. All that's required to maintain the status quo is deep pockets and the ear of the media. It's actually very hard to have a debate about copyright and the internet in any forum. Without books like this there would simply be no debate.

It's very difficult for example to discuss this subject dispassionately. Another reviewer notes that he is "struck by the unarguable fact that the lower-starred reviews actually review the book". I'm afraid this seems perfectly arguable. I would point you towards the review by user "John Q. Public" for example.

Personally I was well-disposed towards this book before picking it up (yes, that's to say I was biased :) ), in that I always find it useful to be reminded that before modern notions of copyright artists of all kinds had no problem expressing themselves, a minority of them (as today) earning a living, and a minority (as today) acquiring fame. Unless I have misunderstood this point a reviewer writes that "without artists, and their historic legal rights, "Hollywood" and Big Media would not exist". I thought that was the point the author was trying to make. Industry ideas of Fair Use, DRM, copyright, control over the internet, all help (so-called) "Big Media" not artists. I gave the book 4 stars as I happen to believe (did I mention I was biased) that a "read-only" internet will affect people more than they think, and this book makes me think.

One gripe I have is the title. The author downplays the glamour of it all; "darknets" (wow) implying perhaps subversion, counterculture etc. But I suspect that's in fact a selling point of the book. And that's a bit misleading. When I read a hard copy book, I do so anonymously, there is no DRM, when I lend that book to a friend, that also happens anonymously. This is a real-world "darknet". But it's just everyday life.

Now more than ever technology is reshaping our world and the way we interact with it. We watch what we want when we want, we comment on Weblogs and download hours of music on to a device the size of a cassette tape. JD Lasica's work explores the media industries war against a new type of media that is growing at viral speeds: Personal Media. The book is alive with great examples anecdotes and in a world where every other person has an ipod and people spend more time in front of pc monitors than they do in front of TV screens this book is timely as it describes the fight that the big professional media is waging against the darknet.

While it's also called bottom up media and home brew media (among several other names) in a world of blogs, web pages and podcasting it seems that personal media is everywhere and with everything needed to produce widely available and rather inexpensive it's easy to create. So what's the big deal? Well first and foremost much of this media is created by cutting pasting altering and just plain using copyrighted material.

Unlike file sharing (like napster) where the users and proliferators copy and distribute copyrightable material as the original producers intended it to be, this new personal media changes the original intent of the media it uses. One of the first examples Lasica discusses is a DJ at a dance club who uses movie clips and sampled music in his show. While it surely is exciting it is illegal to show in public and for the intent to make money. - But this is a mere aside to the real issue.

With podcasts, (audio files downloadable for the ipod) downloadable on sites like www.kyou.com there you can download hundreds of different programs on any number of things big name media is chopped and altered in numerous ways. This of course is bothers the media industries and although no one (or at least) very few are making any real money on it media giants are spending time and money to put an end to it.

The work is well written, intelligible and fun to read. This type of media is not going away and while this is so it probably will never overtake the professional media's role. The author suggests that people like the gritty realism of this type of media. They appreciate that someone is making an effort and that personal media isn't so clean cut as the home grown stuff. The professional media companies will always exist and frankly I imagine that they will actually get better in the long run because of this counter voice. Either they will pick up the best of the darknet or they will at least learn what people want to see.

This book is a must read for all involved in the media industry and anyone else interested in the immediate future of media. The work could not have been written at a more appropriate time and will surely be wildly popular.

Ted Murena

First off, JD Lasica is a superb writer and story teller. He makes his points by tellig you about people who are just doing what people do with the technology that is in our hands all the time. Then he shows you the onerous, litigacious, incumbent holders of the entertainment industry reigns. He paints them with balance, letting them tell their sides of the story. Its important because these Hollywood incumbents are threatening the rights of everyone in order to protect their own domains. Darknet is a good read, but that's almost aside from the point. Darknet is important. It cover a subject I thoughyt I knew and had me concerned. When I finished it, I realized how much I didn't know and I was genuinely frightened. read it.

"Darknet" is a place where the bad guys are often good guys! The darknet is the term for the internet as used by those who share illegal files such as movies or CDs. This book gives a tremendous amount of information. The information details how big media companies lobby for laws that enrich them and which abuse consumers, writers, and artists. These media companies are eroding our rights of free use under copyright law, as well as having laws rewritten to their satisfaction. This abuse is resisted by those who take what they want and go to great lengths to protect themselves - the darknet!

J. D. Lasica helps us understand how very backward the large media companies are, how they use their wealth and positions to take our money and our freedom, and how they slow or stop the development of media technology, including the internet, to maintain their profit and control. Darknet also gives us information about how and why we should fight back!

While reading Darknet I became angry, frustrated, and more aware than ever that our current government's relationship to special interests is to the detriment of it's citizens, and would be despised by the founders of our country.

Then I began seeing how Lasica's well organized and very articulate "Darknet" (this book is very readable!) empowers us to oppose these greedy special interests and politicians, and I was reminded of a story about a visitor to India whose host kept a pet tiger. When the host pricked a finger, the tiger licked the blood, and the host promptly shot the tiger. "After they have tasted blood" he explained "they can no longer be trusted."

Reading Darknet gives the reader "a taste of blood", and with it the thought that we may be able to not only fight back, but we may be able to win, and ultimately to revenge ourselves on those who have taken advantage of us.

Go ahead - read the book. Taste the blood...