Kirby Ferguson is a Canadian filmmaker, writer, and speaker whose work covers creative works and

popular culture Popular culture (also called mass culture or pop culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as, popular art or mass art) and objects that are dominant or prevalent in a ...

; particularly

remix culture Remix culture, sometimes read-write culture, is a term describing a society that allows and encourages derivative works by combining or editing existing materials to produce a new creative work or product. A remix culture would be, by default, pe ...

. He is best known for his documentary series ''Everything is a Remix'' and ''This is Not a Conspiracy Theory''.

Career

In 2010, Ferguson created the four-part web series ''Everything is a Remix'', which discussed issues of

fair use Fair use is a doctrine in United States law that permits limited use of copyrighted material without having to first acquire permission from the copyright holder. Fair use is one of the limitations to copyright intended to balance the interests ...

and how creative works derive inspiration from existing works. The inspiration for the series came from Ferguson seeing the media portray derivative works as taboo. Defining remix culture, Ferguson states, "It's about whether or not you can recognize chunks of other people’s work. And if you look closely enough, every work contains pieces from previous works." Ferguson believes that creativity is based upon three elements: "copy, transform, and combine". These building blocks are the basis for all novel ideas. On the topic of

music samples Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspect ...

in popular music, Ferguson points out that the reuse and inspiration from other musical sources has happened since the early days of popular music. He argues that musicians have been doing this across genres and time, most clearly with the reuse of classical folk music in rock music. In a follow-up to ''Everything is a Remix'', Ferguson explored '' Star Wars: The Force Awakens'' as an example of remixing in popular culture. Ferguson's work led to a

TED talk TED Conferences, LLC (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is an American-Canadian non-profit media organization that posts international talks online for free distribution under the slogan "ideas worth spreading". TED was founded by Richard Sau ...

titled ''Embrace the Remix'', which expands upon the ideas in ''Everything is a Remix''. Ferguson's second documentary series, ''This is Not a Conspiracy Theory'', covers the culture and tools surrounding

conspiracy theories A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * * * * The term has a nega ...

. From 2021-2022, he updated his "Everything is a Remix" series.

Filmography

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ferguson, Kirby Living people American documentary film directors Year of birth missing (living people)