Online vs. Traditional Marketing

Online marketing is a rapidly expanding trend that ecompasses any type of advertising or brand building exercise done through the internet. It has a number of advantages over traditional media, as well as a few setbacks. The biggest advantage of online marketing is the ability of a company or advertising firm to specifically target a very narrow audience, allowing their message to only reach those who are most likely to be in their target market. In traditional media marketing, advertisers often find themselves wasting money on large audience numbers that include huge sections that will be very unlikely to respond to their advertisements. Another positive element of online marketing is the ability to create interactive campaigns that allow users to feel more involved with the company or product, and thus increase interest as well as time spent with the marketing element. The main downside to this kind of marketing is the expansive nature of the online environment. Although it is easy to pick out several websites that may fit well with a product's target market, there are always new websites being made and hundreds of better opportunities that a marketer simply cannot be aware of. Television, cable, and radio have the advantage of only having relatively few choices for advertising efforts. This means that a marketer can always be able to predict with relative accuracy the reach and effect of the ad. Still, advertising online continues to grow due to the rapid growth in number of websites as well as the growth of individual sites or networks. It is a good way to reach a targeted audience and will likely take over nearly all advertising revenues within the next 15 years.

Fair & Transformative Use: Girl Talk case

When considering intellectual property rights and the implications of big business on creative expressive means, a number of dicey questions come up regarding the legality and morality of both sides' positions on the issue. Should a person's own creative expression be considered his property? that of the company that owns his contract? and what constitutes fair or transformative use? Well, although U.S. copyright law has undergone a number of major changes throughout history, the fair use act was probably the most important distinction to creative implications of copyright law. Although there are several factors that constitute a kind of "grey area" within its main tenets, the law is fairly clear on what kind of use, profitability, and volume of sharing is allowed. The "transformative use" clause, on the other hand, is much more subjective in its definition of acceptable use.
In the case of Girl Talk, there is a major discrepancy between his "combination" technique of remixing songs and the constitution of "transformative use." His use of the songs generally does not seem to be a complete rearrangement, but rather a series of juxtapositions among several genres. The concept is intriguing, to use a full arrangement to create an original soundscape, but in strict legal terms probably not fully acceptable. He has not made an effort to purchase rights to any of the music he uses, and although he considers the rearrangements to be an original work, the copyright holders would probably not see it that way if he were making substantial money off of it. I think the lack of backlash from these companies is probably owed mostly to his model of sharing his content, which has always consisted of very cheap or free copies of his arrangements. Additionally, since he was working with a small independent record label for much of his career, there is little threat of corporate litigation between the two firms. Large companies like Warner Bros. or Sony/BMG likely realize the unsubstantial returns compared to expensive lawsuits against individuals or very small companies.