Inherent Vice

Bootleg Histories of Videotape and Copyright

Nonfiction, Reference & Language, Law, Patent, Trademark, & Copyright, Entertainment, Film, History & Criticism, Performing Arts
Cover of the book Inherent Vice by Lucas Hilderbrand, Duke University Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Lucas Hilderbrand ISBN: 9780822392194
Publisher: Duke University Press Publication: May 28, 2009
Imprint: Duke University Press Books Language: English
Author: Lucas Hilderbrand
ISBN: 9780822392194
Publisher: Duke University Press
Publication: May 28, 2009
Imprint: Duke University Press Books
Language: English

In an age of digital technology and renewed anxiety about media piracy, Inherent Vice revisits the recent analog past with an eye-opening exploration of the aesthetic and legal innovations of home video. Analog videotape was introduced to consumers as a blank format, essentially as a bootleg technology, for recording television without permission. The studios initially resisted VCRs and began legal action to oppose their marketing. In turn, U.S. courts controversially reinterpreted copyright law to protect users’ right to record, while content owners eventually developed ways to exploit the video market. Lucas Hilderbrand shows how videotape and fair use offer essential lessons relevant to contemporary progressive media policy.

Videotape not only radically changed how audiences accessed the content they wanted and loved but also altered how they watched it. Hilderbrand develops an aesthetic theory of analog video, an “aesthetics of access” most boldly embodied by bootleg videos. He contends that the medium specificity of videotape becomes most apparent through repeated duplication, wear, and technical failure; video’s visible and audible degeneration signals its uses for legal transgressions and illicit pleasures. Bringing formal and cultural analysis into dialogue with industrial history and case law, Hilderbrand examines four decades of often overlooked histories of video recording, including the first network news archive, the underground circulation of Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, a feminist tape-sharing network, and the phenomenally popular website YouTube. This book reveals the creative uses of videotape that have made essential content more accessible and expanded our understanding of copyright law. It is a politically provocative, unabashedly nostalgic ode to analog.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

In an age of digital technology and renewed anxiety about media piracy, Inherent Vice revisits the recent analog past with an eye-opening exploration of the aesthetic and legal innovations of home video. Analog videotape was introduced to consumers as a blank format, essentially as a bootleg technology, for recording television without permission. The studios initially resisted VCRs and began legal action to oppose their marketing. In turn, U.S. courts controversially reinterpreted copyright law to protect users’ right to record, while content owners eventually developed ways to exploit the video market. Lucas Hilderbrand shows how videotape and fair use offer essential lessons relevant to contemporary progressive media policy.

Videotape not only radically changed how audiences accessed the content they wanted and loved but also altered how they watched it. Hilderbrand develops an aesthetic theory of analog video, an “aesthetics of access” most boldly embodied by bootleg videos. He contends that the medium specificity of videotape becomes most apparent through repeated duplication, wear, and technical failure; video’s visible and audible degeneration signals its uses for legal transgressions and illicit pleasures. Bringing formal and cultural analysis into dialogue with industrial history and case law, Hilderbrand examines four decades of often overlooked histories of video recording, including the first network news archive, the underground circulation of Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, a feminist tape-sharing network, and the phenomenally popular website YouTube. This book reveals the creative uses of videotape that have made essential content more accessible and expanded our understanding of copyright law. It is a politically provocative, unabashedly nostalgic ode to analog.

More books from Duke University Press

Cover of the book Aloha America by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Archipelagic American Studies by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Asia as Method by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Dialogues/Dialogi by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Songs of the Unsung by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Imre Lakatos and the Guises of Reason by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book History after Apartheid by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Not Quite White by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Everyday Utopias by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book The French Atlantic Triangle by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book In the Aftermath of Genocide by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Fluent Bodies by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book The Money Doctor in the Andes by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Barbie's Queer Accessories by Lucas Hilderbrand
Cover of the book Displacing Whiteness by Lucas Hilderbrand
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy