Effectiveness Case Study: My Winnipeg

This is the seventh post in my attempt to hierarchize media uses according to a utilitarian rubric. My first six posts dealt with James Cameron’s Avatar, Marcel Duchamp’s The Fountain, Homer’s The Odyssey, Ludovico Einaudi’s Primavera, the Idle No More movement, and with producing media for a good cause such as the Against Malaria Foundation. In this post, I examine the effectiveness of Guy Maddin’s My Winnipeg. This is a Canadian movie made in 2007 that I’ll use as a rough stand in for “art house and independent cinema.”

My Winnipeg is an experimental cross between autobiography, tourist film, and dark comedy. It features Maddin’s traditional use of retro black-and-white visuals, Soviet Montage-style editing, nightmarish imagery, and Silent Era intertitles – but with a voiceover that makes My Winnipeg more accessible than any of Maddin’s other films. The voiceover makes the film feel like a traditional documentary, one in which a filmmaker reminisces about his experiences in his hometown. Of course, many of the “facts” in this documentary aren’t true, some scenes are recreated for dramatic effect, and the film is shot and edited in a style unique to Maddin.

It’s often thought that the increased sophistication of art house films makes them better than mainstream entertainment. But when our criterion for “good” is based on consequences, this may no longer be the case. Will this film, so different from Avatar, receive different scores?

Strength of Impact:

1. How many people does the project reach?
2. How significantly does it impact the people it reaches?
3. How likely are the people it impacts to spread this impact?
4. How long lasting is its impact?
5. How grave was the issue pre-impact?

My answers: 

1. Medium
2. Low
3. Low
4. Low
5. Low

Explanation:

In terms of SoI, My Winnipeg is just like Avatar except it reaches less people. If anything, some of the “Lows” here, such as SoI-2, would be won by Avatar if there existed a tiebreaker.

Although My Winnipeg is an intelligent, original, and funny film, there’s no reason to assume that it changes people more than Hollywood films do. If anything, it’s less likely to result in narrative transportation and thus less likely to affect viewers. The degree to which intelligent, original, and funny thoughts and experiences alter people is mostly guesswork, but I suspect each viewer is affected in his or her own way. That isn’t a bad thing, but it certainly doesn’t scream “optimal.”

According to my basis for valuing art, I can see no reason to expect My Winnipeg to affect people more strongly than Avatar, or for longer, or to make them more likely to pass anything relevant on to others.

Quality of Impact:

1. How much does it increase the accuracy of people's models of reality?
2. How much does it improve people's quality of life?
3. How much more likely does it make people to act altruistically toward others?

My answers:

1. 0
2. +1
3. 0

Explanation:

I again have no reason to score this differently than Avatar. It doesn’t really hold any educational value – and if it does, the knowledge in the film is countered by the fact that there is much false information that is easy to be intertwined with fact – and it certainly doesn’t make people more likely to act altruistically toward others. It is, however, an enjoyable, thought-provoking, emotional experience, and for that it scores a point to QoI-2.

If there is a mistake anywhere in these scores, it’s in the answer to QoI-1. Although My Winnipeg isn’t very educational in the sense of teaching basic facts, maybe it teaches critical thinking skills by forcing viewers to parse fact from fiction, or emotional knowledge by showing them complex emotional experiences, or social skills by making them put themselves in the mind of the narrator. These are plausible and they are part of what QoI-1 is meant to encompass. I’m simply not convinced that anyone is leaving My Winnipeg with more of these skills, certainly not with noticeably more of these skills than they’d get out of the average movie.

By being more sophisticated than Avatar, the film might be better at making viewers more sophisticated or more thoughtful or see the world in a new light. I think that is true to an extent, but I’m skeptical of the idea that people learn core ideas and values through art. This is a somewhat arbitrary call though and My Winnipeg may deserve a +1 in answer to QoI-1.

According to my criteria, art house films are not inherently more effective than Hollywood blockbusters, even if it possesses more of the traditional criteria of artistic greatness. Unless the art house film is especially likely to provoke specific patterns of thinking or specific actions, the difference in “greatness” might not actually amount to anything worth caring about. More research needs to be done on the concrete benefits of standard criteria of artistic greatness.

Effectiveness Case Study: AMF Media Producer

This is the sixth post in my attempt to hierarchize media uses according to a utilitarian rubric. My first five posts dealt with James Cameron’s Avatar, Marcel Duchamp’s The Fountain, Homer’s The Odyssey, Ludovico Einaudi’s Primavera, and the Idle No More movement. In this post, I examine the effectiveness of doing promotional videography for a good cause. I’ll use the Against Malaria Foundation (AMF) as my example of a good cause, as it’s the top ranked charity in the world by GiveWell, The Life You Can Save, and Giving What We Can.

AMF is a charity that distributes insecticide-treated bed nets across sub-Saharan Africa. It’s just over $5 a net and roughly $2300 to save a life. Working for a charity seems like a great thing to do, but does it actually accomplish much? After all, not that many people will see your work, and the ones that see it, might not donate, and the ones that donate, might just as well have donated to another charity that isn’t drastically less cost-effective. It’s easy enough to see that producing promotional media for a top charity is better than producing promotional media for a weaker charity, but that doesn’t show that one couldn’t do more good by making art or culture jamming or producing promotional media for a political party.

Strength of Impact: 

1. How many people does the project reach?
2. How significantly does it impact the people it reaches?
3. How likely are the people it impacts to spread this impact?
4. How long lasting is its impact?
5. How grave was the issue pre-impact? 

My answers:

1. Low
2. Medium
3. Medium
4. Low
5. High

Explanation:

It’s important to remember that these answers apply to the resident AMF filmmaker and photographer, not to AMF itself.

The AMF YouTube channel is surprisingly underviewed. Despite hosting 192 videos over a 5-year span, their channel has a grand total of 63,670 views, for an average of 331 per video. Further, most of those views came from the first couple of years. Over the past two years, AMF has managed to crack the 200-view mark about once every 20 videos uploaded. Their 7 Jumbo Jets commercial has just over 1,000 views despite being well-made and featuring voiceover from Alan Rickman. The Become One In A Million ad has 2,700 views despite featuring the US Olympic swim team. Photos and video are also displayed on the AMF website but people watching these have evidently already heard of AMF and are interested enough to research them. Most AMF donors have likely never encountered any of their media. SoI-1 receives a resounding “Low.”

There is no way of knowing what percentage of 7 Jumbo Jets viewers decided to donate. I’d imagine that it’s very low. The percentage of people it impacts likely isn’t very different from the percentage of people a short film impacts, but unlike short films, charity ads urge at least a small minority of their viewers to behave in a specific way. People might watch fiction and have their attitudes changed, but we can’t quite predict their next move. In the case of the charity advertisement, we can expect those that were impacted to go onto the AMF website and donate.

People that are impacted enough to donate are moderately likely to get others in their social circles to donate as well. Recommending charities is a thing people do. Also, if someone really cares about minimizing suffering, they are likely to try persuading people they know. This is again different from how people usually react to fiction. If I loved Avatar, I’m likely to, as a result of having loved the movie, try persuading my friends to watch the movie, but not to, as a result of having loved the movie, try persuading them to value the preservation of the environment.

SoI-4 is difficult to answer because it really depends on the quality of the video. In general, and I think this applies to the 7 Jumbo Jets commercial, I would expect the impact of a charity commercial to be short lasting. Most people persuaded to donate were likely prior donors to other causes. And those that donate to AMF might next time donate to less cost-effective charities in the future. After all, the advertisement in question makes no mention of AMF being the #1 ranked charity in the world. It’s possible to imagine a particularly effective video campaign that manages to permanently convert people to AMF or to effective altruism at large, however.

Quality of Impact: 

1. How much does it increase the accuracy of people's models of reality?
2. How much does it improve people's quality of life?
3. How much more likely does it make people to act altruistically toward others?

My answers:

1. +1
2. 0
3. +2

Explanation:

Most people already have a vague knowledge of there being masses of “people starving in Africa.” The AMF video work I’ve seen is unlikely to significantly boost anyone’s state of knowledge but it is at least educational and somewhat informative. Their videos also show glimpses of life in various African countries that likely challenge Western stereotypes about what those places are like.

Despite only impacting a small percentage of a small pool of people, those that are persuaded are driven to do a lot of good. Donating $100 is already a 23^rd of a life. The advertisement does not necessarily improve the donor’s life (although it might), but it does significantly improve the lives of those who would have gone on to die from malaria, hence the decision to answer QoI-2 with a 0 and QoI-3 with a +2. It’s important not to confuse the receiver of donations from the receiver of media messages.

Though producing media for AMF and other good causes has a pretty standard SoI, it has an above average QoI, and thus might be a good way for media producers to do good in the world, if sub-optimal. It may turn out that the pay cut a media producer takes for a good cause accomplishes more than their actual work does.

Effectiveness Case Study: Idle No More

This is the fifth post in my attempt to hierarchize media uses according to a utilitarian rubric. My first four posts dealt with James Cameron’s Avatar, Marcel Duchamp’s The Fountain, Homer’s The Odyssey, and Ludovico Einaudi’s Primavera. In this post, I examine the Idle No More movement.

Idle No More is a recent movement started by the First Peoples of Canada in protest against offenses by the Canadian government against the indigenous. Some core values promoted by the movement are equality, indigenous rights, and the preservation of the environment.

The movement was launched toward mainstream media attention when Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence went on a liquid diet hunger strike as a reaction against legislative abuses of indigenous treaty rights by the Canadian government. Idle No More relied heavily on social media to coordinate stunts such as flash mobs in various cities around Canada.

The most obvious criticism of using Idle No More as an example of a media use is that it is unfair to compare a movement to an individual work. I disagree. The point of these case studies is not to determine which 2-hour experience will help your life more. It’s to determine how a media producer ought to spend one’s time. James Cameron began working on Avatar 15 years before the film was released and the film was his major focus from 2005 to 2009. The creators of Idle No More likely had to invest far less total hours and money into their product than the producers of Avatar invested into theirs. This is what makes the two comparable.

Comparisons should not be limited to works with matching Strength of Impact. Nor should comparisons be made only after adjusting SoI so that both products are equal – that defeats the purpose of making comparisons. My goal is to answer the question: if a media producer is to choose a project to invest years of effort into, which project will provide the greatest good for the lowest cost?

Strength of Impact:

1. How many people does the project reach?
2. How significantly does it impact the people it reaches?
3. How likely are the people it impacts to spread this impact?
4. How long lasting is its impact?
5. How grave was the issue pre-impact?

My answers:

1. High
2. Medium
3. High
4. Medium
5. Medium

Explanation:

Idle No More has by far the greatest SoI I’ve looked at so far despite sharing the usual SoI-1 rating. There are three main reasons for its superior SoI:

1. It impacts people’s beliefs and values
2. It motivates people to mobilize themselves politically and convert others
3. It targets a marginalized, rather than a privileged, group of people

Similarly to The Fountain, a social movement like Idle No More attempts to change people’s minds about a subject. But unlike The Fountain, Idle No More is very explicit about what it stands for and what it wants to accomplish. It also demands that those who agree take action and contribute to the cause. These people are then highly motivated to convince those around them to support Idle No More’s values or to get involved in the movement. None of this can be said for any of the works of art and entertainment I’ve formally looked at thus far.

Further, Idle No More is not a movement that provides middle class Westerners with a fun experience. It specifically targets a marginalized group of people that actually has something valuable at stake. While I do not think the answer to SoI-5 is morally relevant, I have found that it is a good heuristic for identifying causes likely to make a big difference in the world. This is a position Toby Ord labels Weak Practically-Negative Utilitarianism.

Quality of Impact:

1. How much does it increase the accuracy of people's models of reality?
2. How much does it improve people's quality of life?
3. How much more likely does it make people to act altruistically toward others?

My answers:

1. 0
2. +2
3. +1

Explanation:

Idle No More is similarly the media use I’ve evaluated with the highest QoI.

This is for some of the same reasons that make the movement high-impact. It targets rights violations that threaten to hurt people’s standards of wellbeing and it motivates people to act so as to prevent those violations and promote some good values.

I didn’t give the movement any credit for QoI-1 as I think the movement’s merits lie primarily in its ability to mobilize people toward solving a social issue, rather than in its ability to educate people or make them much wiser. I also do not accept all of Idle No More’s values. For instance, fetishizing the preservation of the environment is inconsistent with my ethical views. There are many hypothetical instances in which hurting the environment would be preferable for human and animal flourishing.

Idle No More is by far the most effective media use I’ve looked at thus far. In the future, I’m going to continue relying on my heuristic of choosing projects to score high on SoI-5. I expect future case studies to confirm my intuition that that question is a good indicator of media effectiveness. I’m also looking for projects that score low on SoI-1 as I haven’t taken a look at any yet.

Effectiveness Case Study: Primavera

This is the fourth post in my attempt to hierarchize media uses according to a utilitarian rubric. My first two posts dealt with James Cameron’s Avatar, Marcel Duchamp’s The Fountain, and Homer’s The Odyssey. In this post, I examine composer Ludovico Einaudi’s Primavera.

Primavera is a piece of contemporary classical music. At first glance, one might expect an abstract work of music to score similarly to conceptual artworks, such as The Fountain. But I submit that Primavera has more relevant similarities with Avatar than it does with Duchamp’s piece.

An important point to note – for those unfamiliar with the music – is that the piece contains no lyrics or concrete suggestion as to its meaning. It thus primarily structures an emotional experience, as opposed to The Fountain, which structures an intellectual experience.

Strength of Impact:

1. How many people does the project reach?
2. How significantly does it impact the people it reaches?
3. How likely are the people it impacts to spread this impact?
4. How long lasting is its impact?
5. How grave was the issue pre-impact? 

My answers:

1. High
2. Low
3. Low
4. Low
5. Low

Explanation:

Primavera scores identical SoI ratings to Avatar. With over 5 million YouTube views, it’s hard not to score Primavera a “High” in response to SoI-1. We should also remember that the piece was released on the successful Divenire album, and that Einaudi has toured around the UK performing the album. Thus while Einaudi is far from a household name, his music has reached mass audiences.

Primavera, like Avatar, has a powerful emotional impact on listeners, but this impact is not long lasting or spreadable. Personalities are not altered, beliefs are not changed, and political, philosophical, religious, and moral stances are completely unaffected by listening to an individual piece of contemporary classical music, even if the piece is listened to multiple times. The lack of a narrative component or of any concrete meaning limits the piece’s potential to impact beliefs or behaviour.

Unlike The Fountain, which entirely lacks aesthetic appeal yet provokes a range of intellectual reactions in viewers about the nature of art, Primavera is

The existence of a mass of musical content very likely has noticeable effects on society, and it could be argued that music like Einaudi’s is preferable to many other kinds of music, but it is difficult to argue that a particular piece of abstract music is, on its own, doing much beyond providing beautiful 7-minute emotional experiences. Beautiful 7-minute experiences are nice in their own right, but they don’t compare with other effective altruist efforts. If that is the best media content can do, then there is no basis for prioritizing media over other causes such as global poverty and catastrophic risk reduction.

As usual, SoI-5 receives a “Low” for appealing to those with enough money and comfort to sit back and listen to contemporary classical music.

Quality of Impact:

1. How much does it increase the accuracy of people's models of reality?
2. How much does it improve people's quality of life?
3. How much more likely does it make people to act altruistically toward others?

My answers:

1. 0
2. +1
3. 0

Explanation:

Primavera receives pretty standard QoI ratings for a conventional work of art. As an abstract piece of music, it has virtually no way of impacting models of reality or of influencing behaviour. It might be argued that listening to beautiful music puts one in a better disposition and makes one more likely to behave nicely to others. Although this may be true, I don’t know of any evidence suggesting that this effect lasts more than a few minutes after the end of the piece of music.

As per usual, Primavera receives a +1 for QoI-2 because beautiful 7-minute experiences are A Good Thing, they just aren’t a regular life-saving or torture-preventing thing. Their impact is limited to making neutral first worlders feel happy for a few minutes or making depressed first worlders feel neutral for a few minutes. I think works like this have every right to exist and I’m grateful that they do, but they do not belong at the top of effective altruist priority lists.