In order for a company to survive it is absolutely crucial to create a brand that resignates amongst consumers. According to Media Week “Companies will survive by creating brand identities for their goods, services, and corporate images which convince consumers they make a positive difference in consumers’ lives, not merely offer something desirable.” The corporation’s ability to create a positive brand and control meaning production will determine the success of their product. Since the inception of the Internet and the creation of a public sphere the corporate ability to maintain a postive brand image is beginning to erode. Companies lose an average of 22 percent of potential sales due to trademark infringement and counterfeiting, according to the International Trademark Association. It is now difficult to maintain one’s intellectual property throughout the Internet.
This defamation of a corporate brand can be seen through prevalent Internet images of Mattel’s Barbie. Barbie is an icon of the capitalist system, represantitive of what evryone wants, the American dream. To reiterate Dr. Strangelove writing in the Empire of Mind, Barbie is crucial in our economic system in that she represents the objectification of the female gender and programs the youth into consumption machines. Barbie is used as a branding device, lending her name to a wide variety of products.
Matell recently began a legal campaign against online artists who misrepresented Barbie. Withing traditional media Matell would be able to successfully eliminate the reproduction of negative images of Barbie. However, Matell often failed to remove the images from the Internet, and even if she was removed from a particular website she would appear somewhere else. B.L. Ochman writing for What’s Next Online states; “the stories will fade from newspapers and TV in a few days, but bad publicity will be in search engines forever. Score for Mattel’s image? Zero.” This is in regards to a Utah artist Thomas Forsythe’s use of Barbie dolls in photographs depicting the Mattel toy naked and being assaulted by kitchen appliances. The court’s stated the artist’s work was an expression of free speech. I believe Matell’s attempts to hault the steady loss over the production meaning and youth consumption patterns is not only failing but also tarnishing the image of the company who is now seen as a Big Brother figure attempting to eliminate free expression.
“Last Brands Left Standing.” Media Week 19(2009): 2.
Ochman, B.L.. “MATTEL PR SCORE IS ZERO IN LAWSUIT AGAINST ARTIST.” What’s Next Online? January 7, 2004 8 Mar 2009 <http://www.whatsnextonline.com/wno/newsletter92.cfm#>.
According to Dr. Strangelove there is a stark difference between the ways in which men and women utilize the Internet and new technology. Men are said to use these technologies as a way of achieving power and status. To my best understanding this means that men will attempt to implement new technologies including the Internet to further their own interests. From my own personal observations men’s own interests are primarily financial. They use Blackberry’s to organize their life and business in an attempt to achieve further financial success. These Blackberry’s are also used as a status symbol indicating that this individual is well-off. Women would use similar cell phone technology in order to contact friends and family.
In order for the capitalist system to continue there is a requirement for the ownership of culture and production to be in the hands of a few. Therefore within a capitalist society there is the necessity for control of all private property and intellectual property, this is done primarily through strict copyright law. However, the Internet is changing the nature of certain industries. Since the inception of the Internet there has been mass violation of property and copyright law. When something challenges the status quo it is the nature of the capitalist system to take corrective action and return it to the norm. Therefore, it is only natural for a corporation to attempt to draw the pirating of it’s material to an end. This can be exemplified through the use of copyrighted material on Youtube.
In order to examine the effects the Internet has and can continue to have on the capitalist culture I will draw upon the ideals of the cult movie and novel ‘Fight Club’. Many will argue that the underlying theme behind Fight Club draws upon Nietzsche’s ideas of Nihilism. Nihilism being defined as such “complete rejection of and possibly the destruction of beliefs and values associated with moral and traditional social structures.
Culture jamming is used across many mediums and usually uses corporate property illegally. It’s aim is to undermine the traditional media with an inherent belief that the corporate ran media machine is producing it’s own meanings and publishing selective information with the intention of shaping our own reality. The goal is to transform the way we perceive media from passive consumers to active producers. Guerilla tactics are often employed in order to remove the corporate monopoly on our mental landscape.
Capitalist societies are controlled by meaning producing systems. These systems are becoming increasingly concentrated as a result of large conglomerations and cross-media ownership. This allows modern day capitalist societies a certain level of control over the masses. However, a threat to this familiar system is now presenting itself as a result of the Internet’s popularity. The decentralized nature of online journalism could directly impact traditional media’s stranglehold on society and possibly impact the capitalist system. 
