Od spektakla do odgovornosti: hrbtna stran oglaševanja
Nikola Janović:
Če začnejo mainstreamovski oglaševalci razpravljati o družbeno odgovornem komuniciranju v času krize, je treba biti previden – Kaj počnejo oglaševalci danes? So subverzivni? – Oglaševalci, postanite asketi, potem vam bo mogoče verjeti – Pogovor z Oliverjem Vodebom
Ko sem čisto iz firbca pogledal agendo 18. Slovenskega oglaševalskega festivala (SOF), sta me takoj zbodli dve besedi: kriza in odgovornost. Začel sem razmišljati, se spraševati, kaj za vraga lahko pove arogantna kreativna industrija o svetu krize in o družbeni odgovornosti, če ga je ravno ona neodgovorno (s)kreirala kot katastrofalno podobo iz sanj? Seveda gre za alegorijo na delo Susan Buck-Morrs z naslovom Dreamworld and Cathastrophe: The Passing of Mass Utopia in the East and West (2000), ki govori o zgodovini vizualne (in besedne) kulture za množice – o kulturi, umetnosti in propagandi 20. stoletja. Slednje bi zlahka povezali z rojstvom kreativne industrije oziroma konkretno z oglaševanjem. Tudi ta imata ima svojo zgodovino prakse, ki je bila usmerjena k množicam, in ta nikakor ni nedolžna.
Historično dejstvo je, da se je kreativna industrija razvijala sočasno s stadiji kapitalizma, začenši z industrijsko revolucijo. V dialektičnem odnosu s svojim gospodarjem, kapitalom, je rasla in se razvijala kot vednost, ki ve zanj, kako se streže stvarem na trgu. Prav tako ne moremo zanikati dejstva, da so se uporniki-revolucionarji-pionirji prepričevanja, danes se temu lepše reče vizualnega in besednega komuniciranja, hitro zavedli lastne vrednosti – institucionalne moči (agencij), cehovske moči praktične vednosti – znati narediti, znati svetovati gospodarju – kapitalu.(1) Danes se celo razglašajo za »kulturnike«, »artiste«, »kulturne kreatorje«, pri tem pa pozabljajo, da so bili na začetku 20. stoletja le del propagande, ki je bila na voljo tako političnim in ideološkim interesom države kot zasebnem kapitalskem in tržnem sektorju.
Oglaševanje, kot ga danes leporečno imenujemo, je v historični perspektivi, recimo že po prvi svetovni vojni, v času gospodarske krize, pa po 2. svetovni vojni in restavraciji kapitalizma, prevzelo nase vlogo liberalnogospodarskega pospeševalnika, proteze, ki se je uspela vzpostaviti kot pomemben člen v odnosih med kapitalom in trgom. In tako je še danes; zgolj razsežnosti, v katerih je treba zadeve rezonirati, so daleč bolj obsežne. To nam ravno kažejo in sporočajo sami oglaševalski festivali, ki se danes ukvarjajo z egoistično mislijo »kako nadaljevati svoje poslanstvo v času (sedanje) gospodarske krize« oziroma humanističnim videzom »kako biti družbeno odgovoren pri svojem (egoističnem) početju«. V njihovem jeziku to pomeni, kako »kreativno« prelisičiti samo krizo in zadovoljiti zahtevo po etični drži/družbeni odgovornosti, pri tem pa še vedno služiti zahtevam svojega gospodarja: oploditi čim več kapitala (presežek), da bi povečali lastni rating in zagotovili apetite po vse večjem užitku (denarju, simbolnem kapitalu, slavi, prepoznavnosti). Ali je res temu tako?
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Knjiga Družbeno odzivno komuniciranje je po petih mesecih od prve izdaje ponatisnjena. Mene predvsem veselijo dobri odzivi in zanimanje zanjo. Sedaj jo bo spet možno kupiti v vseh večjih knjigarnah ali preko spleta. Oliver
Delo v ti. kreativnih industrijah je vedno večji problem. Ne spomnim se kdaj sem nazadnje srečal kakšnega zadovoljnega "kreativca". Zadnje čase me vedno bolj zanima kakšno psihologijo kreativnih delavcev npr. oblikovalcev, tekstopiscev, kreativnih direktorjev, art direktorjev, programerjev..., vzpostavlja specifičnost medosebnih odnosov, ki so jih ti kadri primorani dnevno negovati zato, da ohranijo lastno pozicijo znotraj fleksibilnega trga. O tem bova kmalu napisala izčrpno analizo s kolegom Nikolo Janovićem. Problem bova obravnavala s perspektive kulture komuniciranja, sociologije komuniciranja, poslovne kulture, socialne psihologije, psihoanalize in estetike. Tema je izredno zanimiva in kompleksna. Inspiracijo za analizo teh dinamik sem dobil iz vsakodnevnih stikov s kreativnimi delavci, kjer sem opazil temeljne razlike v psihologiji in socialni psihologiji glede na kulturo komuniciranja katere del so posamezniki. Način poslovnega delovanja je v trenutni fleksibilni ekonomiji zelo specifičen in proizvaja globoke značajske poteze, ki so, zanimivo, zelo povezane s samo kakovostjo komunikacijskega dela.
Spodaj je video, kjer prijateljica in sodelovka Memefesta in Popra- Zoe Romano govori o različnih vidikih samoorganizacije in mreženja kreativnih delavcev, kot odgovor na industrijo, ki je vse prej kot kreativna.
This email was sent to the international Memefest organizational team.
Hello all,
i know, it took me a long, long time to write this. So here is a sort of synopsis of what we have discussed so far. In many cases we already made a decision, some things need still some more discussions. All in all quite some changes will happen for Memefest, as it looks now and this is good. Besides conceptual issues we need to find ways to organize, so i pointed out at the end of the document things that should be done next. I hope you will find time and energy to do the next round. :)
After this, i believe, we can work faster in smaller groups, depending on who is interested to work on what. Looking very much forward to your thoughts.
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I. As for the concept:
1. I think that we should get rid of the disciplines sociology, communications studies and visual arts. Instead we should have
a) theory
b) visual arts practice
c) Beyond… category
Here we agree in principle. Some of you had problems with Beyond… which is not by its name and concept totally clear. Shoaib stressed that the names of categories should reinforce the critical/counter culture /social cause dimension of the festival. This sounds like a great idea! Kernow and Roderick, stressed that “arts” is a problematic word, so maybe we should speak about designed message (Roddy) or visual communication practice instead ? I suggest visual communication practice.
Theory is another issue. As Nikola said theory and for exmpl. sociology is not the same. Rok had a good suggestion: “critical writing”.
So, this are suggestion (c is instead of Beyond..):
a) Visual communication practice
b) Critical writing
c) Participatory /experimental communication
2. We should get rid of the »student only« part of the festival. We should open it up for everyone. No age limitation.In general the main question here is: how can we make the educational part of Memefest stronger?
Most of us agree that this is good. Shoaib stressed that Memefest should be still focused on students, though. I believe that opening Memefest up to everyone does not exclude students. Students and Universities can still participate and it will be up to them how strong the students part will be in comparison to non-students.v
Memefest grew mainly from the students and University community and working with this communities is something that we should continue to work on strongly.
The Beyond… category focused on non-student was always very successful. Since it was a more open ended concept we received some very good works. It is for sure that there is a big demand and interest for Memefest like activities in the non-student community. Professionals for example don’t have many other media (besides coopted versions of “socially responsible” stuff at advertising and design festivals) to show their work.
I also think that if we would manage to do summer camps, a mixture of educators, professionals and students would be great. I did that already with another project and it was a combination where really everyone learned from everyone in a more open manner than if we would remain in the sphere of University only.
The sphere of the University, however, should be used productively. Russel suggested a proved model, with a project he is working with. What i am saying is, we should use this institutions if we could get support from them.
A gathering of the international Memefest community would be a strong thing also for the local community of the place of gathering, so we should also consider (besides of whats possible) to think which environment that would need such a impact.
Another option would be to divide Memefest (on line “competition”) in to a student and non-student part. But i am not sure this would bring any good results besides dividing the radical communication pool from the institutional perspective. Ana and Rok are in favour of such a distinction. One argument is that this would make younger students more confident in participating. What is your opinion on this?
2a Competition and awards
There is a prevailing argument that Memefest should not be a competition. Although Memefest is light years away from the prevailing festivals, competitions, biennials etc it still gives awards to the one’s who seem to be the best ones. There has been a suggestion of a curatorial approach by Jason, but the concept of this needs to be developed yet. I think we could have a curatorial approach combined with public vote.
3. The web site needs to be reworked in to a more social medium. The problem is that participants at Memefest did not get enough in touch with each other. The community building part of the web site should be stronger.
Here we all agree. The web site needs to be reworked and has to be more of a community tool than it is now. We can use our experiences from Memefest and other projects and a bunch of new technological solution that have been invented in the past years. A concrete concept for the web site can be made after we finish the overall Memefest concept discussion.
Ana, for example, stressed a important point: the English web site would need more regular content, blog writing etc…
Is anyone interested to contribute to this part? Or do you have any other ideas how to solve this problem?
Also, Martha Patricia pointed out that some of the current works which are published in the gallery are not matching the ethical standards of Memefest, suggesting the galleries should be reviewed.
II. The organisational/action part
Memefest is a big project and to work on it every year means really a substantial input of time and energy. Without collaboration of a wider community the project can not be done properly and even more important, without such a collaboration it makes no sense to work on Memefest for me. Here i have a simple question. How are you interested to collaborate with Memefest in the future? In what way? How much time could you or would you like contribute?
Many of you have answered but also many did not. I am asking again for your answer. This information is vital in order to strategize next steps, which should be planned according to what is possible to do.
How to go off-line? In the past Memefest went off line in organizing street communications campaigns- like for example in Belgrade and Ljubljana, organizing round tables, discussions, lectures, screenings, exhibitions, workshops and printing a publication- like in Slovenia, Brazil and Colombia. To go off –line and not work only on the net is very important. What can be done here?
We all agree that face to face meetings are necessary and that we all would like to spent time together in real. Two main ideas came up.
a workshop/conference/summer camp or similar gathering
production of publications/books/readers
Here it is obvious, that we are not in favor of regular conferences as we know them from academia and business but we are looking for more radical forms of explorations, collaboration and fun.
The obvious problem is money.
Some of you like Andreja, Roderick have offered time for grand writing, and i know there is more of us who would be willing to do this.
I suggest that we start looking for concrete funding possibilities like for example:
1. National funding
2. EU funding
3. International funding for collaboration for example EU and Australia or EU and Colombia or EU and Brasil
4. University funding
A reconceptualisation is also needed in the operations of the Memefest local Centers: Colombia, Brasil, Australia and Balkan. What has been achieved in the past is great, but considering the specific local conditions i am sure we should in depth discuss conceptual and organisational matters regarding the local Memefest nodes.For now the question is : what is the current situation? What are the local problems? How do you see the future of Memefest local centers?
A decentralized network structure is the best way to function. The practice in the past shows that the centers need to get more interconnected, through this establishing a stronger economy of sharing.The current situation with the local centers is this:
Several Memefest local chapters have been evolving in the past years. However remaining them to work for a longer period of time seems to be difficult.
Memefest balkan- set up by Jaša, is currently not operating
Memefest Australia- set up by Zoe, is currently not operating
Memefest Colombia, set originally by Claudia, now Esteban is working , but as he wrote, it’s not easy.
Memefest Brasil- set up by Paulo Hartmann is alive but in 2008 it started to get more and more difficult to operate.
We are discussing with Shoaib, about establishing a local center in UAE/Shajrah.
Frederic wrote about a posibility of starting a center in Montreal.
The hub, based in Slovenia is alive and working.
I suggest that people from the nodes or potential new notes say what 's their perspective on the current local situation and global collaboration , now and future.
Another thing I like to point out is the on-line educational impact.
For now , participants have valued the written feedback very much. This was limited for those who were short listed in the competition. I believe that this feedback should be made public, so everyone can learn from it. I also believe that this feedback would be stronger if jurors or from now on “curators” would speak in to a web cam. This would than be automatically recorded and posted on the web site as comments to the work. Much more feedback in quantity could be given and the quality might be better too, because people would get a more intense experience. What do you think about that?
Concept/Manifesto
Nikola, and some others suggested a new written conceptual document or manifesto. I think this is very much needed, so let's do it.
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Ok, this is it. Besides commenting the above, we need to organize, therefore please let us know the following, so we could start work on concrete things. Note this is still work on the reorganization and reconceptualization, not on the next event:
Who is interested in working on :
1. Written concept/manifesto
2. Web site : concept, architecture/design, writing, code
Kljub popularnosti odprtokodne kulture pri računalniških programerjih, veliko med njimi se spogleduje tudi s hekersko kulturo, so moje izkušnje takšne, da večina programerjev ne išče povezave med lastnim delom (programiranjem), uporabnostjo, namenom in poslanstvom njihovega dela. Skratka, če govorimo npr. o spletnih komunikacijskih orodjih, programerji sicer uživajo v pisanju kode za namen weba, kako, kaj in komu komunicira pa jim je v glavnem vseeno.
Na Popru iščemo takšnega programerja/programerko, ki razume te povezave in si želi filozofijo odprte kode dosledno povezovati z učinki komunikacijskih orodji. Če te zanima takšno sodelovanje, si vabljen/a. Oglasi se na: interact at poper.si
