In the 1970′s you could tour a new surf movie around Australia for a couple of years and draw a constantly large audience, even though you had no advertising budget. Wind the clock forward 30 odd years and you’d be lucky to tour it around Australia at all.
How can this be happening?
Have a look around.
Right now on the Internet you can watch the latest hero footage with hero surfers and hero music shot in premium locations for free. Have a look at some of these video’s and some of them have only been watched by a couple hundred people, no more. One that springs to mind is David Rastovich and Derek Hynd surfing finless fun on merseabeaucoup.com , unbelievable free content and a cracker soundtrack to boot.
You can tune into a number of sites and see the latest interview with legends like Mickey Munoz and Gerry Lopez, it’s free to view and it’s something ten years ago we would have paid to look at. This whole free internet stuff is NEW to us as a species. In our long and winding past, when someone provides a good or service, they get paid. We should be paying now, but the Internet is delivering surfers so much amazing FREE content that it makes you wonder, how can everyone be giving it away?
Where does that lead us with surfing content?
But today they have to give it away in order to compete with all the free shit out there. If there was a plumber out there giving away his services to fix your toilet, then the other plumbers would also have to be free. This scenario would lead us to a future with a generation not interested in being plumbers. Does this mean that the days of highly shot professional surfing films are going to die? Not at all. Well, maybe not yet. The independent film makers may well fade away though because they cannot get their money back that they put into it. For now this is not happening. There are plenty of young talented surfers and artists out there prepared to put their life and soul into making something beautiful for no financial reward. I do not understand how people have the time to be able to run a website/blog and provide/create interesting content in their own time and let people look at it, for free.
Who is funding the fantasy? Are people out there working their tits off to make a living and then in their spare time thinking, I will make something on surfing and hope people come and watch it for free? How long will it go on?
Maybe the independent art house surf films will die…maybe be will be left with big budget corporate cheese and amateur home video’s shot on crappy digital as the only two options.
It is the ‘facebook era’ and people are happy to create something in the hope they will get people to click ‘thumbs up’ or maybe, just maybe they will spend one minute of their precious time to write a ‘comment.’
In conclusion, even the very words you are reading now are for free on a website we all know gives away hero shit for free. I wrote this because I know the guys at Korduroy and I wonder what the hell are they up to? Are they really planning to go on like this? Something tells me they won’t, they’re too smart for that… Time will tell. I’ll be watching…
-WALLACE MCDOWELL
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August 8th, 2010
Change is the only constant. do what you love. be smart about it. stay broke.
August 8th, 2010
Wallace, thank you for an excellent post.
I can definitely feel this as we run a “free” website with surfing content, too. Personally, I do it for the love and passion for the soul of surfing.
And thank you, Cyrus for raising the bar and giving back to the surfing community. Korduroy deserved the Battle of The Blogs award.
August 8th, 2010
i think the saddest thing is the lose of the ‘gathering of the tribe” sort of thing that always went along with goin’ to see a surf film. most of the current surfers don’t remember this because they are too young and have lived with home video or internet all their lives. surfing last a part of it’s self then the big nite out to the film ended….
August 8th, 2010
Wallace,
Great insight. You’re touching on an issue that has become commonplace in the media world and has been slowing creeping it’s way into almost every aspect of modern life…. including the surfing world and it’s associated media. There’s so much good “free content” out there available that it waters down or sometimes even overshadows “paid content”. The issue is incredibly multidimensional and leaves websites, or collectives or even mainstream media organizations like the New York Times scratching their heads about the worth of content in a constantly changing playing field. How do you charge for content that doesn’t have to physically produced? How much are words or videos worth? Who decides those values?
I’d like to point out another aspect that is going to sound all hypothetical and academic but is increasingly important to be aware of (even for the independent surf world). It’s an issue about internet regulation that would essentially determine who could even be allowed to be a “plumber” and to provide their services.
Last week the New York Times published an article about a relatively fuzzy issue known as net neutrality. More importantly it was about recent alleged negotiations between Verizon and Google that would allow corporate regulation and paid tiers of internet service to consumers. Essentially independent media like Korduroy and other blogs and DIY operations with little budget to pay for premium contracts with ISPs would be drowned out by paid content from corporations with deeper pockets and larger interests in advertising.
Rather than catching a Surf Sufficient, I’d likely find a 4 minute Tilly’s promo advertising their season’s must-haves….The “cable-ization” of the internet.
Personally, I’m a fan of the independent surf media as I’m sure most Korduroy visitors are. It’s authentic because it’s not being done strictly for profit. It’s real and the quality of the production gives paid commercial content a run for it’s money. One dude with a great idea and a camera can be better and more interesting than an entire production department at a company “designed” to pump out hero shit.
You can’t buy authenticity. Besides, real shit, if it’s good, always has a way of bubbling to the surface.
Keep the internet free and keep creating whether you’re paid or not.
August 8th, 2010
Oh yeah,
here’s that article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/05/technology/05secret.html?_r=1&ref=technology
August 8th, 2010
Wallace is onto it, he’s been a friend and confidant for years. This digital age is a polarizing time for artists- it demands making art for art’s sake and having the faith it will all work out. Despite the looming possibility of “net neutrality” and other potential schemes to control the internet, the experience of making episodes for “free” has been far from draining for us. Its simply been a chance for us to sharpen our skills between paying jobs. A change is indeed coming to Korduroy, but one that is in line with our original intent and creates more opportunity for independent artists to make a little coin for their creations..
August 8th, 2010
Thanks for the insight,
the times they are a changin’
Lets hope the corporate dollars dont work out a way to quieten the epic free cool shit.
August 8th, 2010
Crazy Shit- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_neutrality
August 9th, 2010
I can think of a dozen ways for Korduroy to make money. Call me.
August 9th, 2010
Hi Grant, that is pretty interesting what was written in the NY times. Thanks for pointing us to that.
It is pretty clever speak and i do not really understand. Does it mean that in the future the big corporate websites will be fast to view and download content and the small indie websites will be slow?
Thanks, Wallace
August 12th, 2010
Money for nothing, chicks for free
August 12th, 2010
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-july-19-2006/net-neutrality-act
The Daily Show clip is from a few years ago. It’s still at the top of the net neutrality page at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which works on digital freedom and privacy.
EFF posts a rundown of of the Google/Verizon agreement (the subject of the NYT story):
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2010/08/google-verizon-netneutrality
Their net neutrality content, linking to the Daily Show clip, is collected at:
http://www.eff.org/issues/net-neutrality
(If you want to make yourself unhappy, look up their posts on privacy. Or pretty much any other issue.)
July 12th, 2011
I work my tits off so I can get my rocks off making sweet art. Film por vida!