If there is a ‘value chain’ of meaning, corresponding tovalue chains in business, then a suggestive correlation can be explored between author/production, text/commodity and audience/consumer. This article argues that meaning has been attributed to different sources in different historical epochs and that these have been associated with successive stages of the value chain in premodern, modern and contemporary (globalized) times. The analysis suggests that creative and cultural activities whose meanings are associated with one link in the chain (i.e. consumer/audience) may be negatively valued or even unintelligible to those whose ideological or disciplinary training centres on a different link (i.e. text/commodity or author/production). If observed from such a perspective, a critical ‘parallax error’ may distort our view of creativity in the new consumer economy.
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