What is the Free Culture Movement? Does it have to do with something that is free? Of course it does. Is the movement gaining steam here in the United States? Not really. According to Wikipedia, the definition of free culture movement is “a social movement that promotes the freedom to distribute and modify creative works using the internet as well as other media.”
This concept is not very common today, at least in the United States. There are digital rights management and copyright laws to stop this sort of “distributing”. The British, however, have begun to offer full episodes of their network’s TV series before they air, with favorable results. One such British TV series, a sitcom, was once also under development by NBC, called “The IT Crowd.” The sitcom began on Britain’s Channel 4 in February of 2006, and the first full episode was available online before it aired on television. The online episode was created, according to Digital Lifestyles, “as a way of extending a buzz around a show and enhancing the market activity.” The offering has worked well for the series, which is considered to be “very British.” That probably doesn’t just mean very pale actors with bad teeth and eating bland food, it means British humor!
NBC’s interest in adapting the sitcom soon fell through because of what they said were “administration changes” in the network. However, according to Why That’s Delightful, the whole series couldn't simply be re-produced with American actors, it had to be severely overhauled. British humor is just too different for the American audience. An example of their type of humor given on the site describes a scene where the main male characters are sitting calmly at a desk while the office building burns down all around them. As you can see in this clip of the first part of the first episode of “The IT Crowd,” there's an over-emphasis of awkward silences, use of sound effects and sight gags for humor.
The TV networks here just don't offer free online full episodes of TV shows before they air on television. Some reasons for not having episodes online before they air might be due to concerns about TV ratings and copyright issues. There are, however, some networks that have full episodes, but they are either not a current episode of the series or put online the day after the episode airs. But, maybe our TV networks should learn from what the British have done. The networks should be willing to try it out at least as an experiment. If it caught on it could bring back the “buzz” and discussion to many sitcoms and dramas, and thus generate more money for the networks. After all, we seem to follow everything else the British do nowadays! This would be only the next logical step!
Yes, the British have come up with a great idea!
This concept is not very common today, at least in the United States. There are digital rights management and copyright laws to stop this sort of “distributing”. The British, however, have begun to offer full episodes of their network’s TV series before they air, with favorable results. One such British TV series, a sitcom, was once also under development by NBC, called “The IT Crowd.” The sitcom began on Britain’s Channel 4 in February of 2006, and the first full episode was available online before it aired on television. The online episode was created, according to Digital Lifestyles, “as a way of extending a buzz around a show and enhancing the market activity.” The offering has worked well for the series, which is considered to be “very British.” That probably doesn’t just mean very pale actors with bad teeth and eating bland food, it means British humor!
NBC’s interest in adapting the sitcom soon fell through because of what they said were “administration changes” in the network. However, according to Why That’s Delightful, the whole series couldn't simply be re-produced with American actors, it had to be severely overhauled. British humor is just too different for the American audience. An example of their type of humor given on the site describes a scene where the main male characters are sitting calmly at a desk while the office building burns down all around them. As you can see in this clip of the first part of the first episode of “The IT Crowd,” there's an over-emphasis of awkward silences, use of sound effects and sight gags for humor.
The TV networks here just don't offer free online full episodes of TV shows before they air on television. Some reasons for not having episodes online before they air might be due to concerns about TV ratings and copyright issues. There are, however, some networks that have full episodes, but they are either not a current episode of the series or put online the day after the episode airs. But, maybe our TV networks should learn from what the British have done. The networks should be willing to try it out at least as an experiment. If it caught on it could bring back the “buzz” and discussion to many sitcoms and dramas, and thus generate more money for the networks. After all, we seem to follow everything else the British do nowadays! This would be only the next logical step!
Yes, the British have come up with a great idea!
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