Seven Samurai for Seven Weeks. Photo: ORAZ Studio

So as we enter the seventh week of semester, the symposium enters its 4th incarnation. It was an interesting hour of discussions and debates, one that yielded enough to satisfy the avid networked media fan. It’s very interesting to see the ideas of three minds collide, and certainly makes for a much more invigorated sense of learning. I think I found one aspect of the symposium more interesting then any other, coincidentally it was one that was touched for the longest. That is the issue of authorial control.

Coming from a background of learning about communication and audience theories, I have always found the control (or lack of) of the author to be a complex and intriguing debate. It is clear that people from different backgrounds and with alternative ideologies have substantially different views. The key is to find the common ground. I think that’s what’s so important about the symposiums for networked media. In the end thanks to some thorough rebuttals and discussion from our celebrity panel, it was clear that there is an authorial intent in the work, but you can’t expect to have control over the audience. Something I agree with. Timeless debates have raged over this issue, and it is quite contentious. But it is true that you will never be able to control what your audience read from your message (Goodbye hypodermic needle).

With that being said, Brian and Elliot both raised valid points in that there are conventions and expectations that history and society prove can to some point be relied on. That is being said, I think, that there is a certain extent to which you can safely suggest your message will be received, the way you intended, based on certain principles that are pre-learned and developed.

It would be rash to suggest that the message intended by a filmmaker is not to some greater extent received by the audience (if he sends it and codes it properly). But it is also definitely valid that the work does not grant you access to the mind of the creator. Not their person anyway.

It is valid to point out that a work of an artist will carry their values and beliefs to an extent. Everyone has their own personal beliefs, bias and so forth that they take into the creative process, and in some way this will always end up impacting the work that is created. But as Adrian pointed out, context gets left behind. As society changes, so to do the contexts in which we consume texts. That’s what the author can’t control. I guess that’s why it’s hard for a lot of people to watch an old black and white monster film, and feel any sense of thrill, excitement, shock, or horror. They’ve seen it already. We’re a different society. I’ve tried watching the old Universal Monster films with friends (Some of my favourite all time films) and they usually end up laughing. Most people don’t take the time to consider things from a different context to the one that they understand, breathe and live in.