'Creative' Industries

[Philip Ferguson <plf13@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Gary McL wrote:
>It is as if the academics depressed by the failure of the left and
>the quiescence of the working class have turned to worship capital through
>the mediation of the computer based technologies.

Yes indeed - and talk about commodity fetishism!

> Creative Industries will not be so
>creative.  Or if creativity does happen it will be despite and not because
>of the academy or the market which it is so anxious to serve


You might be interested in this item from James Heartfield's email
newsletter 'The Week'

The Myth of Creative Britain

Top design magazine Blueprint blasted a hole in Culture Secretary Chris
Smith's claims that 'exploiting the full potential of the creative
industries sector will be a vital element in ensuring future economic
success at home and abroad'. Asking whether 'design creates wealth or
thrives on poverty', an article entitled 'Pure speculation' argues that
the growth of the creative industries might be seen as 'a beautiful
flower growing on a dunghill of deindustrialisation'. It notes that
Britain's much-trumpeted cultural industries are lagging, with British
television and cinema in the red, and popular music wobbling like Noel
Gallagher's marriage. Only design has a high export profile, but even
design is 'feeding off economic decay' as 'designers and
advertisers...make a killing with new branding of old companies from
letterheads to shopfronts'.

The September issue of Blueprint, 'The Myth of Creative Britain', is
available from ETP Limited, Rosebery House, 41 Springfield Road,
Chelmsford, Essex, CM2 6JJ, England.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Heartfield is the author of a couple of very good, readable, short works on
the subject:  'Need and Desire in the Postmaterial Economy', which was
published by Sheffield Hallam University Press in Britain and which we ran
as a special feature in 'revolution' #8 (no copies left, sorry, it sold
out) and also a newie called  'Great Expectations: the creative industries
in the New Economy' which is available from Design Agenda,
4.27 The Beaux Arts Building,
10-18 Manor Gardens,
London, N7 6JT
Price 7.50 GBP + 1GBP p&p