Restrict This!
Edward Deci recently conducted an experiment entitled “Soma Cube”. He gave two separate groups of students an identical cube. One group was offered money for every shape they created. These individuals were driven by extrinsic motivation. The other group was told just to play with the cube, and therefore were driven by intrinsic motivation. The individuals who were motivated by money stopped creating as soon as Deci left the room. The other group continued to create. The essence of this experiment was that individual’s create primarily due to their own motivations.
This is a partial explanation as to why there is such a recent increase in the trend of online amateur creativity. These amateur online works are far surpassing the creative works produced by corporations. Some may say this is a result of the larger numbers of amateurs. However, this phenomena could be a result of the institutional restrictions placed on the professional realm. Although amateurs too are also subject to institutional restrictions they are few and far between when you compare them to that in the professional world. Like in the “Soma Cube” experiment when you remove the restrictions individuals become much more creative.
David Baker states “many creatives prefer to work in such a way that is free of the restrictions of businesslike production processes.” This is because these individuals feel as if hierarchical restrictions truly restrict the creative works produced by these individuals. I believe the unrestricted nature of the Internet is a definite explanation as to why there is such a huge influx in the amount of amateur creative material online. However, this is not the only explanation. The easy accessibility of the Internet could also be used to explain the amount of creative works.
Baker, David. “Bringing More Process to Creativity.”Communication Arts 50(2009): 28-30.
