Last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine has an issue devoted to the American amateur, called The Amateur’s Hour. Jack Hitt, a great news magazine and radio reporter, wrote an article about a group of eccentric amateurs who enter a contest to design new space gear for NASA. And Jonathan Dee writes an article about the thousands of mostly anonymous volunteers (i.e. amateurs) that strive to keep Wikipedia honest, neutral and accurate.

When I opened the magazine, I thought, “Oh, good, maybe there will be an article about amateur filmmakers…” thus revealing my one-track mind. Indeed, there was no such article in the Times, but the focus on amateurs could also apply to the latest ten years in the documentary film world and the online video world in general, of course. The vast majority of those posting original videos on YouTube, are, by definition, amateurs. They didn’t go to film school, they are not recognized as filmmakers by some professional body, but of course, they are making films, so calling them anything else would be a misnomer. There has been a revived tension between professional and amateur documentary filmmakers since digital video brought the barrier to entryway down in the last decade or so. We at Arts Engine bridge this divide; we celebrate the video work of both amateurs and professionals, and we don’t sweat the distinction much.

I can appreciate the tension that exists: On the one hand, I consider myself a “professional” filmmaker, but I certainly started out as an amateur. I didn’t go to film school, I experimented with making films when I didn’t really know what I was doing, and eventually I started working on other people’s films in order to learn how it was done. And somehow now I consider myself a professional. Hitt is writing a book about amateurs, the Times tells us, and in his article Hitt hints at some of the material in the book when he writes “Ever since Benjamin Franklin broke with his apprenticeship in Boston as a teenager and recreated himself as a freethinking and fearless inventor… amateurism has taken on different connotations in this country. Old World use of the word “amateur” intimated lower-class status, even incompetency, but in America, the land of second acts, “amateur” has accrued some of the more positive meanings we associate with the autodidact”. Hitt goes on to remind us of our national fascination with amateurs who make it big — no better example of it than “American Idol”.

Right now amateurs are giving media professionals a run for their money with all the popular amateur videos that are flooding online website. And whenever there is a big wave of popular amateurism like there is now, it makes professionals sweat. Not only do popular amateurs make professionals seem less impressive (anyone can do that), they also threaten to drive professionals out of work. Generally, when professionals are put on the defensive like this, they react by claiming that amateurs are not the real deal. Angela Tucker touched on this point in her blog entry about Web 2.0 when she referenced Andrew Keen’s new book The Cult of the Amateur: How today’s Internet is killing our culture. I suspect Keen’s book will continue generate a lot of interest because it speaks to all those who feel that YouTube videos are not made by “real” filmmakers, bloggers aren’t “real” journalists and wiki-everythings are going to misinform the world.

My feeling is while I can sympathize with professionals’ fears that amateurs will take over the world, and while I value the experience that professionals in all branches of media offer, we professionals would do well to remember that a) most of us were amateurs once and b) amateurs are where a lot of the best new cultural and technological ideas come from. May we both learn from each other!

What better way to celebrate our country’s independence than to go see Michael Moore’s latest indictment of American society, SiCKO? That’s exactly what I did on Tuesday night, in a packed theatre near Union Square.

While the film is being heralded as Moore’s best work to date, from an aesthetic and storytelling perspective it felt a lot like a rehash of Moorian narrative devices—funny archival footage, eye-catching onscreen graphics, choreographed stunts in which the enemy is confronted/exposed/ridiculed, Moore’s wry voice-over narration. And while these devices feel a little stale and Moore himself like a nagging voice that just won’t go away, SiCKO is still very entertaining and, more to the point, enraging.

Yes, enraging. Having recently decided to give the U.S. another go and not to emigrate to Canada, every passing minute of SiCKO left me rethinking that decision and getting fed up with this country all over again. During the course of the film, you are not only presented with the many ways that our healthcare system sucks, you are also shown the many ways that other countries are meeting the needs of their inhabitants, especially Canada, Great Britain, France and Cuba, all of which have free universal healthcare and where, according to SiCKO, life is peachy. If anything, this is the part of the film that is the weakest—by idealizing these other countries to the point of glorification, Moore presents a simplified world view which is practically begging someone with more knowledge of the internal affairs of the countries at hand to critique. A recent article in the Dayton Daily News, How well does ‘SiCKO’ stand up to the facts?, does just that, examining the film, point by point and reporting on Moore’s accuracy (and occasional lack thereof).

For me, a little exaggeration or fudging here and there is not really a problem, since, as Jonathan Cohn writes in The New Republic, “SiCKO’ got a lot of the little things wrong. But it got most of the big things right.”

What inspires me most is Moore’s commitment to social change. His goal in making the film is to fix the system, and that’s what his outreach campaign sets out to do. From partnerships with MoveOn and advocacy groups like Guaranted Healthcare to Capitol Hill press conferences, Moore’s film release is akin to the launch of a political campaign. And just as the latest crop of candidates are engaging the masses through YouTube, Moore is using the site as a platform to gather more “healthcare horror stories” that he promises to screen and share with Congress. The video that I watched in response to Moore’s call was indeed a horror story. For those who say that Moore’s ego undermines his arguments, it is clear that the man is trying to give voice to as many people as possible rather than to limit the discussion. And that might just be the cure for America’s ills.

Today is Fair Use Day! Ars Technica reports on the little known day that started three years ago to raise awareness about copyright law.

For more information about fair use, you should check out the article written by our awesome (now former) intern Molly.

Read the full article.

As you may know, we’ve been working hard at getting the Seventh Annual Media That Matters Festival out to you and yours. While our official festival DVD (complete with filmmaker interviews and awards ceremony footage) is not yet available, I thought I’d share some other ways you can get your hands on the films so you can start showing them to your friends.

All of the Media That Matters Film Festival selections are available on our website and on YouTube. Check out our profile, share the films with friends, or post a video response.

Another great way of downloading and watching our films is via Participatory Culture’s Democracy Player Miro. Miro, which in case you were wondering means “I watch” in Spanish, is very much like free TV on the Internet — you can channel surf, subscribe to channels you like, and watch the latest videos all in the same player.

It’s a great resource and simple to use too: download and install the player, search for “media that matters” in the Channel Guide and subscribe, then download the films.

Alternatively, if you are into feed readers you can use this link to subscribe to our films using your reader of choice.

In the MediaRights news we have posted an alert about some troubling proposed regulations from New York City Mayor’s Office of Film and Television. The New York Times covered the situation thoroughly so I won’t go into too much detail here. Suffice it to say that the city is proposing requiring a film permit and a $1 million liability insurance package for any “group of two or more people who want to use a camera in a single public location for more than half an hour” or “any group of five or more people who plan to use a tripod in a public location for more than 10 minutes, including the time it takes to set up the equipment,” according to the Times article.

The city quietly proposed these new regs over a month ago, but only in the last couple of weeks has the issue started to get coverage and public attention. Tonight a group of concerned filmmakers are getting together to brainstorm a plan of collective action, for all those interested. The New York Civil Liberties Union was one of the first entities to formally protest the new regulations on many grounds, but particularly on the basis that the regs violate the First Amendment.

This disturbing development gives independent documentary filmmakers an opportunity to appreciate how crucial our First Amendment rights are to our ability to do our job well (see this month’s Fair Use article for another great opportunity to prevent those free speech muscles from atrophying). On any ordinary day, we indie filmmakers might just take it for granted that we could head to a city street, set up a camera and film any number of public events or situations that we wish to document for the purposes of our work.

But these new regs remind us that such a freedom is something we need to identify and protect, in fact. By taking it for granted, we may well lose it. Both the Daily News editorial and the NYCLU’s critique cite the problem the proposed regs will pose for tourists with handycams. The city is meanwhile trying to reassure folks that tourists are not the intended targets for enforcement. So who are the targets, exactly? Us independent filmmakers? I hope not, but maybe so. I would argue that for the small crew on a low-budget documentary, a city permit should not be required. Currently, independent docs do apply for city permits for certain productions, such as commercial shoots that take up lots of time and/or space in the city’s public areas. On the other hand, many independent filmmakers are shooting “on the fly” in public places for the purposes of informal, nascent or no-budget projects, and few of these artists are equipped with press passes or hefty production insurance packages. Lack of funding or lack of professional credentials should not stand in the way of an individual’s ability to document events in the public space.

And as with any infraction against our civil liberties, additional problems lie in the potential for selective police enforcement of these new rules. Beyond being denied a fundamental constitutional right, amateur and professional filmmakers will now join the ranks of New Yorkers subject to the perils of unchecked cop power.

CNN and YouTube have teamed up to bring us a new kind of format for the Democratic Presidential Debates tonight in Charleston, SC. For the past few weeks, YouTubers have submitted video questions with the hope that their stumper might be posed to the unsuspecting candidates. Check out Arts Engine’s submission on public media. Then tune in tonight at 7pm EST to see the debates. Fingers crossed that we get selected.

What will you do for public media?

The New York Times ran an intelligent article today about Animal Welfare. The article focuses on Farm Sanctuary, an organization that was featured in a film also called Farm Sanctuary from this year’s Media That Matters Film Festival.

What I most appreciate about the article is its exploration of the gap between Animal Rights activists and people who are advocating more humane treatment of animals in order to respond to the growing market for humanely raised animal products. As the article explains, activists are beginning to explore a more moderate approach: “Mr. Pacelle [head of the Humane Society] understands that not everyone is going to stop eating animals, so he focuses on what he calls the three R’s: refinement of farming techniques, reducing meat consumption and replacement of animal products. That way, he hopes, the Humane Society tent is big enough to include both ardent meat eaters and hard-core vegans.”

From my point of view, this approach to addressing the problem piecemeal, changing practices slowly rather than holding out for a wholesale conversion by American consumers, seems the one most likely to have a significant effect in the long run, and of course if we eliminate half of the animal suffering caused by our consumption practices, that’s good news for half the animals, which is a lot! The article also introduces the perspective that animal welfare is getting more attention, “because American gastronomic consumers increasingly want to do right by the animals they eat.” Even many who eat meat and don’t feel philosophically conflicted about it, still want to minimize the suffering of the animals that provide their food, and they are willing to pay the increased cost. As one animal rights activist says in the article, “We’re not really in philosophical alignment, but I like to think we’re in strategic alliance.”

On Monday CNN and YouTube partnered to present a new twist on the presidential debates. YouTube sent out a call for entries, inviting anyone and everyone to submit a video question for the democratic candidates. We put together a video here at Arts Engine, starring our fantastic interns, and submitted it alongside the 2,988 others.

It’s a cool new use of the internet as a conduit for the voice of the people, and although some people complained that since CNN picked the questions and moderated the discussion, it was the same-old same-old, nonetheless I appreciate the step that was taken. Maybe next time YouTube users could vote on the questions…

Outreach and Distribution are the constant themes throughout the year here at Arts Engine. Everything we do revolves around using film to foster social action and getting good films to new and unexpected audiences. Summertime is a season where outreach mode is at its peak. We have events, conferences, screenings and festivals to attend, coordinate, organize, co-sponsor and the list goes on…

Early June, we kicked off with our Media That Matters Film Festival and after that it has been a whirlwind of events. More than a re-count of our events calendar, I want to bring up one interesting event coordinating point: gift bags. Gift bags are a great opportunity to give visibility to a partner organization and an outreach opportunity for reaching a new constituency.

If it is a bad gift bag, you will usually dig in and find a bunch of flyers you may keep but never read. If it is a good gift bag, your fingers will slide against the hard plastic of cd’s, dvd’s, trinkets, soap bars, chocolate and discount flyers; and you will find yourself using the bag as a purse in the months to come.

Arts Engine’s partner, Docurama, has been a consistent gift goodie giver this summer. I have come across their documentaries in three gift bags for three completely different events. Something that would make any non-profit media arts organization employee ask, how does a distributor of independently produced documentary films have the resources to consistently give gift bag goodies in the hundreds?

And the answer is, this is an outreach luxury that they take to get cutting-edge documentaries to new spaces and places. For the past eight years, Docurama has been distributing the best of the documentary form. From classics like DA Pennebaker’s, Bob Dylan: Don’t Look Back to Academy Award winners and nominees like Murder on a Sunday Morning, The Weather Underground, Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision and more, Docurama has taken up the form and brought it to the home entertainment marketplace like no other distributor.

Their mission is documentary, they are documentary and they prove again and again that their business sense comes from getting the best of documentary film into new homes by any means necessary, even if it means giving the DVDs away continually. As the digital age takes over, however, it is becoming less and less profitable to produce, distribute and give away DVD’s. Who wants to go through all that hassle, when you can just download off of iTunes or somethiing similar? Unfortunately, for distributors like Docurama, transitioning to the digital age presents a real challenge. Not because of expertise, but because of resources.

So, while it is great that I have added three more films to my home collection this summer for free, I have also made it a point to support their mission by buying at least one. My reason for writing this is to encourage you to do the same. Co-Director of Blue Vinyl, Judith Hellfand recently wrote for MediaRights.org a touching and truthful reflection of the impact that Docurama distributed film, Blue Vinyl, has had as a mobilizing tool in the Environmental Preservation Movement and how it has deepened her vision as a social justice filmmaker.

As a way of supporting the work of both independent media makers, distributors and media arts organizations, Arts Engine and Docurama want to encourage you to go online and read “When The Personal is Environmental: The Legacy of Blue Vinyl by Judith. if you have not seen the film, support Docurama and buy it today! It is a witty, entertaining and incredibly accurate account of the threat of bioaccumulation of toxic chemicals to human life.

Not convinced? Here is a clip…

Support us in bringing documentary film and the best of documentary filmmakers to your living room, your computer, your community… And support Docurama’s efforts in bring mind-blowing documentary films to new and unexpected audiences.

Referring back to Katy’s blog on the city’s proposal to require a film permit and a $1 million liability insurance package for any “group of two or more people who want to use a camera in a single public location for more than half an hour” or “any group of five or more people who plan to use a tripod in a public location for more than 10 minutes, including the time it takes to set up the equipment”, a rally is scheduled today (Friday July 27, at 6:30pm) to protest these rules in Union Square.

The full list of regulation can be found here: http://www.nyc.gov/html/film/downloads/pdf/moftb_permit_regs.pdf

These proposed regulations may have serious consequences to independent film makers and impede on our First Amendment rights. We can stop these absurd proposed regulations from becoming law if legislation meets enough public outcry.

Join the film/photo contingent in the festive (un-permitted) Union Square First Amendment Rally, this Friday July 27, at 6:30pm. More info here: http://www.pictureny.org/?p=9

-Marko Vujovic