Bootleg Video

A Brief History of Magnetic Tape

Electronic Signal

• catoptrics/dioptrics

A visual medium containing no images

• P- and I-frames/scanlines/half-images
• No linearity

Bootleggers vs. Pirates

Correcting the Market

• bootleggers bring un-author-ized products to market where they would normally exist
• timeshifting and betamax decision
• the Law

The Camcorder, the VCR, and the Repositioning of the Viewing Subject

Surveillance, Sousveillence

• rodney king
• cctv aesthetics
• foucault
• flash-forward to "citizen journalism"

Transferal of Jouissance

• the "pervert" who films
• pamela & tommy lee

Palimpsest of Jouissance

• the "pervert" who watches
• the underground tape railroad

The Freedom of Timeshifting

• the VCR will watch for you
• nationalism & shared time

References

• Crary, Jonathan. Techniques of the Observer: On Vision and Modernity in the Nineteenth Century. The MIT Press. 1990.
• Hilderbrand, Lucas. Inherent Vice: Bootleg Histories of Videotape and Copyright. Duke University Press. 2009.
• Spielmann, Yvonne. Video: The Reflexive Medium. The MIT Press. 2008.
• Zizek, Slavoj. "The Interpassive Subject" in Traveses. Centre Georges Pompidou. 1998. [1]