Ethics Of Digital Technology Essay

Through the past few years digital technology has grown and this has resulted in a dramatic change in the way we produce, distribute and cosume music from growing and well known artists. The relationship between the producers, distribution team and finally us the consumer can be believed to be very unethical. Due to the way the money is not fairly divided up and the rights to the music do not go to where they should be, the artist, the one who writes the music. This is because the company of the where the music was recorded has ownership on the music for between 50 to 70 years. In addition to rights another problem that accures when discussing the relationship between these three parties is financial problems. The producer pays for all costs towards the artists to get their music. Then the distributors get involved and pay for all the promotion of the artist to ensure it is successful and well known before the music is released, and finally the consumers that buy the music produced by the artist. Within these three categorise the producer gets the most money back. I personally believe this is morally wrong. The artist should be allowed to receive as much money as possible, as they have created the music and the producers have just helped get the music formed into a digital format. Although another way to look at it is if the producers are wealthy they may be more likely to help out more growing artists and bands into getting their music recorded.

Technology lately has had an astronomical effect on music. What with the evolution of the illegally downloading, sharing files and the likes of the style of grooveshark and spotify websites getting made.
There are newer ways to receive your favourite music which sometimes involve not even moving from your chair. It can be a mere 3 clips away, and there is your album you've been wanting for, for months. The younger population are the biggest consumers at the moment and they tend to not conform and get their music for free from various downloading sites where things like bittorrenting are used. So although the growing technology is fantastic is it causing major problems in the music industry. Because the public not paying for music ricochets money problems to both groups; producers and distributors. The producer will be using their money to create an album for an artist then when that album is released receiving next to no money to get put back into the company. To pay for things like their technology, wages and repairs if things go wrong in the studio. The distributors also majorly lose out, they would be putting all their time and efforts getting the artist promoted like going to interviews on the televison and getting adverts made for them which all costs money and they would have no way of getting that said money back as not as many people as there used to be actually go out and buy the records.
Websites like spotify are aimed at teenagers and are loved as you are able to listen to music for free, this is however in comparison to bittorrently completely legal to take part in. The free spotify version allows the listener 10 hours of music per month, which is a pretty decent offer considering it is for free. But once you upgrade you have an unlimited amount of time to listen to music. You can either download spotify premium for £9.99 per month or Spotify unlimited for £4.99 per month.  Some artists have opted to not be added to Spotify. Additionally, some artists are missing in certain regions due to licensing restrictions imposed by the record labels. For example, The Beatles are not available because of a digital distribution agreement that is exclusive to iTunes. On iTunes there are no free streaming options, you are only allowed to listen to a part of the song for free and to lisen to the rest you would have to purchase it. But a single song can sometimes cost 99p which is a bit pricey.

Case studies show us how a big label has responsed to success. You see how SONY UK took over emi because emi was under-going money issues and had lost its right for copy rights. It shows how powerful one wealthy company can be. Because big companies will expand and buy other companies not experiencing as much success out. With this all going on the artist that may be involved with these kinds of companies will not have much say in what is going on behind the scenes. As sony are not just involved in the music industry, they are the creators of many amazing technology products like; cameras, televisions, laptops, computers, stereo-surround sound and more. This makes the brand and name very well known in the technology world and this will help them to retain their custormer bases.

Small companies like ghost records, domino and XL that is the name behind the likes of Adele, Dizzee Rascal and The Prodigy operate in a more relaxed way compared to the bigger companies like SONY UK. Within smaller companies the artist is allowed to have more free will and say in what goes on during the making of their album. Richard Russell, the recording boss of XL said to help survive in the music industry is to have a 'small release schedule is fundamental' to keep the quality of the record steady. He also stated that 'only sign about on artist a year' this means that they have less to get stressed about and they they are allowed to just concentrate on the few artist they have signed. There is major evidence to prove that small companies are extremely powerful in their own right. Take for example the likes of Adele's newest album '21' that was released at the beginning on this year, it has already sold over 1 million copies and her fan base is quickly growing by the day and it is all thanks to XL being able to concentrate on amazingly talented artists like Adele. Instead of signing on loads of artists that may only make one or two album before fizzling out.

Digital technology brings the cosumer and artist closer as in there are the likes of popular celebrities on twitter, where the artist can promote their upcoming album release for their many follows to then witness them posts. The consumer having the opinion to follow their favourite artist will add a more personal relationship between the two. Because the consumer will get to have an insight into their day to day life and know their favourite musical artist more. This may form a bond, the cosumer may feel more in need to buy the album instead of illegally downloading the album for free that would not help the artists growth in the slightest, they might want to know that they are helping their favourite artist get even more successful which would mean purchasing the album or single.

There are many advantages and disadvantages to smaller and larger companies. With the smaller companies it may take longer to get well known in the publics eye whereas larger companies like Simon Cowells 'Syco Music' you pretty much get instantly famous when on that label. For example the likes of the new band called 'One Direction' they have only been around less than a year yet they have already had their only two singles released as of yet in the UK top five. In additon to this 'Olly Murs' has received a quick dose of fame when on 'Syco Music'. In my opinion 'Syco Music' is mainly aimed at the more mainstream genres of music.
Where as XL, a smaller company, contains many different types of music. For instance The Prodigy, they are a big band within fans of that genre but they're not well known across the music board. This is because XL believe in the artist having a say as to what their music and band are going to be like. Whereas in bigger companies where the likes of One Direction are, they are manipulated into being what the main music audience are looking for but in the mean time that might not be what the artist itself wants and feels comfortable being like.

Being able to download music on the go onto your mobile phone helps the modern growing music industry. People may not have time to goto their local town where their HMV is so the facilities such as 'Cloud' and 'Android' are very appealing to that kind of audience.

Sony Music Entertainment UK Research

Sony Music Entertainment UK is the second largest global recorded music company of the "big four" record companies





Nielsen SoundScan reported that the big four accounted for 81.87% of the US music market in 2005.









'Sony Music Entertainment UK' is in the category Music and entertainment industry and the products they produce are obviously aimed at the music and entertainment side of technology. That in turn helps publicize their artists via social networking sites and tv shows.

Sony Music Entertainment UK is the famous company Columbia Records' parent company. In addition to that Bertelsmann Music Group is the successor or Sony Music Entertainment UK.

Smaller music producing companies like this in my opinion are much better and are more likely to get new artists sucess. This is due to the music company not having too many artists to organise and 'look after'. If there are less up-coming celebrities they have more time and energy to put their effots into just a few new artists making music resulting in the company being able to distribute and produce the album with more care.

Media Assignment On British Films

Due to the sheer size of the world and in comparison how insignificant the UK looks compared to the likes of America and the amount of power and fundings that it holds to make films it can be a struggle to make films in the British Film Industy successful or at least known because basically it is a dog eat dog world. Very competitive. For the amount of money Hollywood films on average are given to make one film would probably be able to create around 4-5 films in the UK. With America it would only need one highly successful film to cover the costs of many other fails in the past. Whereas the UK doesn't have that luxery. Just one failure in the British Film Industy could cause major money problems and effect the makings of many other films to come after it.
The British Film Industries have kept a successful name making high quality films because they keep to strict rules under the British Film Act. This was to ensure a competitive, successful and vibrant UK film industry and culture and to promote the widest possible enjoyment and understanding of cinema throughout the nations and regions of the UK.
The British Film Industry is still blooming because the new century has so far been a relatively successful one for the British film industry. Many British films have found a wide international audience due to funding from BBC Films, Film 4 and the UK Film Council and some of the independent production companies, such as Working Title, have secured financing and distribution deals with major American studios. Working Title scored three big international successes all starring Hugh Grant and Colin Firth with romantic comedies that are an extremely popular genre in countries like America.

Two films that had Working Title behind them are Love Actually and Pride & Prejudice which were both mainly set in the United Kingdom. Love Actually has one of the most recognisable British actors of this era, Hugh Grant. The film itself presents many examples of mis en scene. Mostly being the scenery, the busy London roads including the classic British black taxi's. Another studio that are behind these two films are StuidoCanal which headquaters are in France but they focus on European productions like ones that are created in the UK. Throughout the movie there are many non-diagetic sounds like the choice of background music. The writtens and produces of the film cleverly picked out suitable songs. Such as 'All you need is love' written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney from one of the most famous British bands of all time, The Beatles.

Pride & Prejudice is from the off an obvious British film down to its historical British literature background. Being originally written by the famous English author Jane Austen in 1813. The film itself screams British down to the beautiful mis en scene of the classic victorian clothes worn by the actress Keira Knightley, a famous British actress. The whole set up of that film is an accurate view on life in England in that time era. Down to the way the actors and actresses spoke, the sounds give the film a major boost in the film being a perfect example of a film in the British Film Industry. The whole persona that is presented in this film by Keira Knightley shows us what it was like to be a woman of the 1800's that is in love. Non-Diagetic sounds consist of music composed by the English Chamber Orchestra with help from Dario Marianelli and Jean-Yves Thibaudet on piano. A very detailed classic touch to what would have been listened to back in the victorian times. Also the fact that this film caries a historical value upon it makes it a success. People from all over the world who are interested in Jane Austen or British history would want to view this film.
 

My third film that I have picked is 'Bend it like Beckham' that also stars Keira Knightley. Its plot is around the love of football from unlikely people. Such as character Jesminder Bhamra played by Parminder Nagra. It has a very British topic, as football is a very popular sport in the United Kingdom. So it would appeal to many people within the UK and other places such as American that have their own slant on football but may still be interested in the English football game.
Bend it like Beckham's were made by BSkyB, British Screen and Helkon. Sky is a very famous satellite broadcasting company and its headquaters are in London, United Kingdom. This would inflict that the film has a very British way about it. In my opinion this film is trying to break stereotypical views upon the typical Punjabi people. This films topic may help people that are in the same situation that the main character 'Jesminder' is in. It may even give young teenagers hope that they can be themselves even though their families are strict and have strong relgious views.
The soundtrack to this film goes hand in hand with the plot of this film. Music consists of both very British songs by famous artists such as Blondie and then in contrast to that there is also Punjabian music by Malkit Singh.
Link to the rest of the soundtrack here.

Things like that make the likes of the British Film Industry stronger than ever. New technology is making it much easier to make films go around the world and get international with ease. Because an actor of a new British film could be interviewed on an English show and nearly instantly after the interview is shown on television it will be up on youtube for the whole world to watch at their own

Although distribution teams do a fantastic job at getting these films out in the public eye there are more powerful ways to help spread the word in society nowadays.
Sites such as twitter facebook youtube and tumblr help spread the word of a new release of a film. The internet holds great power in the making or breaking of a film. Within the twitter community things can nearly instantly become a 'trending topic' and then from there many people will hear about it on such sites as DigitalSpy which contains the top news that is sometimes filtered from the likes of twitter. This goes hand in hand with facebook, since you can post a video you see on your facebook page to your twitter account with 5 clicks of your mouse. That then means that with you posting the video could result in a chain reaction of people re-posting and re-tweeting the video if they like the look of it.

Things like that make the likes of the British Film Industry stronger than ever. New technology is making it much easier to make films go around the world and get international with ease. Because an actor of a new British film could be interviewed on an English show and nearly instantly after the interview is shown on television it will be up on youtube for the whole world to watch at their own leisure.