Selling Yourself, Selling Ideas

On 15th November I was given a lecture on how to sell my ideas and myself in a professional way. This gave a lot of context to the work I'm currently doing and allowed my to view it in a new way - not just as "art" or "experience" but as something that can be sold as the basis for a business. The lecture was focusing on producing, which is not something I am usually interested in but found to be a fascinating and in-depth subject nonetheless. The main things we were looking at were:

• Selling culture
• Being a producer
• How to make money out of ideas
• The new and old ways of doing this
• Tips for selling yourself as well as ideas

This all brings to light the lines between "art" and "business". F.R. Leavis explores this in "The Popular Cultures Seldes 'The Great Audience'", and asks one rather difficult question: Has the rise of corporate/monetized media strangled aesthetic experimentation?
I, in defence of aesthetic experimentation and art, would hope that the answer is no, and for the most part, I believe it is. There is constantly change and new ways of doing things in television and all of this comes from experimentation. For example, HD TV would never have come about if some people, at some point, didn't have the money to experiment in new formats. Clearly, despite their reputations for being money-grabbers who care nothing about the aesthetics of art, companies are quite willing to invest in new forms and technologies. Another great example is the 3D revolution of the past few years (which is debatably slowing down now) - industries were quite willing to invest and sell it as a new technology and aesthetic of film.

This all brings to light a few more questions. For example, what is creativity? It's easy to use this word without really discussing what it means. And what does this mean for a producer? There have been significant technological changes in the last few years, how does this affect a producer role?

Finally, the lecture focused on myself as an individual - a company may not be interested in my ideas but myself and my skills. I am young and born into the technological age, I am much more integrated into new media and I can use it to my advantage better than my older superiors can - even those who have tried to stay up-to-date. I am "full of potential" and this gives me an edge in this technological world.