Collaborators Needed for Outward Looking Film/Series

Not too bad (though the world at the beginning is horribly overused), might need the voiceover tweaking though.

Seems like a good idea to me, what sort of stuff are you looking for in terms of content?

Not bad! I didn't think that the voiceover was terrible, I just thought it could use a bit more compression to make it a bit louder. In a documentary I think that dialogue should always be the loudest thing by far.

I think that both ideas are good, although one thing I will comment on is that there is definitely NOTHING out there that could serve as a basic "Anarchism/Communism 101" primer, which is something (if done properly) that could be pretty useful.

I'm down. Send me a message and we'll exchange emails. I think that it is something that will take quite a while to put together and do properly, but that it would be very worth doing. We should try to get other people onboard, but not at the expense of pandering to any shitty "teh anarky" politics.

Well I've just looked at your Tube effort & I think it's v positive, though as a dinosaur unused to this medium (hate Facebook; no space for Myspace, etc, etc), I don't have much to compare it with.

As a (left) communist, I'd also make some (subtle?) changes to the script: ie the idea that this is just another in a long succession of crises, rather than seeing it as a profound deepening, a more serious stage in an on-going decline.

I also look forward to protracted arguments about the response of 'people' rather than the 'old fashioned' 'working class' (though I don't believe the working class is the only element in society to react to crises) and, as a musician, I'll fight for my selection rather than yours (though I have no quarrel with your v/o or the image of the world in the opening sequence).

In short, though my techinical abilities are limited to mini-DVD, in principle, sign me up, please.

I'm very much agreed. I'd put myself somewhere broadly within the interplay between the Anarchist-Communist and Left Marxist tendencies. I see communism as a concrete movement emergent within the Class-Struggle which comprises capitalist society.

we can get into more detail on principles of theoretical consistency off list.

As far as content goes, I think that if we were to cover the basic ground that Prole.info's "Work Community Politics War" does (although in more depth, and in a different fashion given the difference of medium), that would likely be a good start.

I like it. The only problem I see is that after presenting different ideologies and what they think the problem is caused by (immigrants, freemasons, liberals), your viewpoint doesn't necessarily stand out compared to them to an apolitical viewer. You need to show why your analysis is more accurate and shouldn't be rejected as just another ideology blaming a different section of society.

OK, given that we all come from different (political) backgrounds, and possess different skills (very few in my case), this 'ain't going to be easy. But I feel the attempt is worthwhile. I repeat, that while I may have approached the 'opening' a little different from you, I think your basic approach is positive and is a blueprint, a fine template.

Why?
- Because it adresses the crisis of capitalism, and poses questions in a way which, I'm convinced, are of interest not just to those of us committed enough to show our faces on Libcom.
- Because it does so with visual flair: it integrates different media (cartoon; stock footage; original footage, graphics, music) in a way which may well be necessary to attract a generation not particularly enamoured with mainstream broadcasting.

To concretely answer your question about what form in which to proceed: well given the current state of distribution of 'radical' views on existing media, I think 5 minute segments, dealing with different aspects, is the way forward. The Internet is the immediate (potential) audience. It's not an accident that your 'opener' adheres to this format.

I've had, on various hard discs over the past 15 years, different projects attempting to promote visual treatments of the economic crisis, its history and perspectives. They've previosuly bowed to the broadcast TV format of 30 minute or 50 minute 'documentaries'. They've all been lost along with the computers that died with them, and along with my own (lack of) enthusiasm.

I'm now convinced that the shorter, UTube format, is best. 5 or so minutes each sub-division dealing with different aspects of the crisis. Hopefully, if they are coherent, they could always be re-edited, but that's jumping a long way ahead.

To this end, I'm drafting a framework, beginning with the existing introduction. I'll post it on here - at whatever stage it's reached - before the end of the week. Then let the bloodletting - and the creativity - begin.

I've no idea how long it took you to produce what I call your 'introduction': as a former media employee, I'm aware of all the conctractual, copyright and other pitfalls ahead. Let's cross such bridges if this beast ever builds on your launch-pad. To infinity - and communism - and beyond!!!

Bitten off far more than I can chew (of course). But below some undeveloped and incomplete suggestions for discussion.

Apart from obvious omissions (we’ll, they’ll be obvious to others) and inevitable downright political disagreements, there’s the small matter of how to turn a jumble of words and ideas (having reached some semblance of agreement on same) into something visual.

There might be some useful resources on the recent thread posted by Catch: see here: http://libcom.org/forums/theory/open-source-news-cc-copyleft-etc-13012009

No doubt there are others:

Anyway, this might be a project too far but...

Crisis: A Film Project in 5-minute bitsesize chunks

1) Introduction.
- Already completed (subject to discussion?)

2) The Gravity of the Present crisis:
- Its global nature and simultaneity in all countries;
- Comparison to the 30s Depression (apparently not as deep – yet - but...)
- It’s unfolding despite all historic and conjunctural attempts to, first, deny it, and then, to avoid it
- And as a consequence, the ‘experts’ all agree on one thing: ‘we’re in uncharted territory’.

3) Why it concerns us:
- The whole of society suffer as a result of the open crisis
- The proletariat – the producer class, the source of most ‘value’ – in particular bears the brunt:
- Through unemployment
- Through increased exploitation
- Through the destruction of the means by which we make a living (including the planet we live on)
- Through reduction in services/’social wage’
- Through the tendency towards greater economic competition between capitalists, a tendency which expresses itself in tensions leading to war
4) So we’re helpless in the face of the crisis?
- Before we dive into history (and to stress something positive, plus a link to a future episode, Capitalism as a Social Relation), a brief round-up of global struggles against the effects of the current phase of the crisis. Well, make your own choice: mine include:
- The action of ‘apathetic’, ‘de-politicised’ youth: France 2005; Greece 2008/9;
- New York subway workers struggle of 2005 against degradation of contracts – in particular their concern for future generations;
- Struggles in Bangladesh, Egypt, Britain (Gate Gourmet)

5) What is capitalism?

Probably the most difficult 5 minute segment of the lot: some suggestions:

- The exploitation of man by man, hasn’t always been the lot of humankind (primitive communism, historically, existed for far longer).
- Nonetheless, exploitation, money, commodities and trade have existed for millennia without taking on a specific capitalist form or ‘mode of production’ which is characterised by:
- Production not for human need, but for the reproduction and enlargement of capital;
- The divorce of the producers from the means of production: the creation of ‘free labourers’, ‘wage slaves’;
- A tendency conquer the whole planet, ‘making the world in its image’ and the creation of a global market
- A tendency to ‘socialise’ production on the one hand (for the workers, collective, associated labour; for the capitalists share holdings in giant companies) against a framework of ‘private appropriation’ by a minority of the results of this production

6) What does capitalist ‘exploitation’ mean?
- How to explain the production of surplus value, product of labour power, the ‘secret’ of capital?
- The book, Ragged Trousered Philanthropists contains a scene (‘The Money Trick’) which attempts this: it’s been performed on stage many times (and filmed for TV). Get a copy? Stage our own ‘re-enactment’?
- Specificities of capitalist exploitation: denouncing the ‘equality’ of ‘free’ labourers and ‘capitalists’ who apparently meet to mutual benefit
-
7) What causes capitalism’s crises?
- ‘natural and necessary’ spur to capitalist expansion and the concentration of capital
- Over-production: the tendency of capital to produce to the limits of existing technology, regardless of whether there’s a ‘soluble market’ for its products (ie whether they can actually be sold);
- Falling rate of profit
- Saturation of markets

8) Timeline of capitalism’s crises, part I: the early years:
- crises as a spur to further growth

9) Timeline of capitalism’s crisis, part II:
- The 20th century and today: qualitatively different crises?

10) State capitalism

11) Capitalism and War

12) Credit and Capitalism

13) Capitalism as Social Relation:
- Not a set of written rules or immutable laws, but a relationship between classes.
-
14) Perspectives of the crisis: ‘Same old same old’ v ‘Socialism or Barbarism’

Has the potential to be really good

Make sure that you get your stuff uploaded in the higher definition format that youtube now allows.

You could also check out other video websites when it comes to it, no need to limit yourself to just one. http://www.vimeo.com/ (for example) has good quality and is confined to user-made videos.

I think this is a great project, and the introduction is pretty good. A few thoughts on it.

The format of 5-10 min clips for youtube is best. But this could also be made into a high quality DVD divided into chapters, to be distributed on the internet with bittorrent, and burnt on blank DVDs to hand out together with freesheets etc.

I think the approach should be to engage the viewer at the level of consciousness they are at, explain a few basic concept that help to push that consciousness a little further, and then make a case for the kinds of actions and organisation that libertarian communists advocate. I don't think it should aim to convert the viewer to an ideology that may be internally consistent and theoretically perfect, but that requires the viewer to first accept specialised terms that are new and a bit alien. If shouldn't become a long lecture.

The views put forward will be competing with other worldviews, esp. the bourgeois propaganda spread by the mass media, but also fringe ideologies like conspiracy theories and christian fundamentalists. A case should be made (in very simple language) why the methods we use are superior to those of competing worldviews, i.e. we start off with looking at the material reality of our lives, we analyse history and try to use its lessons to understand the present and predict the future. So through the series, a case should be made why our explanations are superior to bourgeois propaganda, and on occasion the ridiculousness of other world views.

As to the overall structure of the series, we need to be aware that the majority of viewers will not watch a dozen episodes, they'll watch at most 2-3. Esp if the first ones are overly theoretical, they'll never get through it. The best we can hope for is to ask questions that genuinely make the viewer think, so that they come back because they want to know the answers. Basically the structure should correspond to the viewer's perspective and not to the logical structure of theory.
I think it should contain approximately equal amounts of theory, history and current working class struggles.

Resources:
archive.org have a huge collection of copyleft film footage in MPEG2 (DVD) quality. It includes a lot of historical footage (see Prelinger archive) and often absolutely hilarious US cold war propaganda/'social guidance' films (off-topic, but check out the 1951 Duck and Cover that teaches kids to duck and cover to survive nuclear war).
There are other sites that use CC licences, like ourmedia.org

I like the idea of a "modular" film that can be viewed in standalone chunks for youtube, that can be put together to make a longer film that would be a bit more comprehensive.

I also agree that any outward looking prop should avoid the use of jargon and terminology with historical baggage.

Probably a good call. After all, this is intended to be practical. I think that (as a rough estimate) 1/4 of the length will probably give us enough time to lay out as much as we need to about the problem.

This looks like a really great project. Unfortunately, I don't want to be on camera for it, but I will think about other ways I or libcom more generally can support it.

Good luck, I look forward to seeing how it develops.

I don't think anyone would want to let their politics become public knowledge by appearing on film.

One thing that came to mind to me today, is that if we are unable to find or capture relevant footage to cover a specific topic (which would obviously be preferable), I think it would be handy to have access to a library of copyleft or public domain high-resolution stills so that we could use the Ken Burns effect.

It may be a bit cheezy, but we will have to work with what we can get our hands on. I know that the libcom library has a lot of historically important photographs, but the ones available for browsing on the site are probably not high enough resolution. If not, it's no big deal, it was just a random thought I had.

definitely interesting

what can people do to contribute?

prole.info's Work. Community. Politcs. War. covers these iirc, and could form the basis for an accessible narrative, it's well-written and pitched at about the right level.