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Revisioning iCommons
In 2005, iCommons was established as an outgrowth of Creative Commons with an objective to ‘advance the wider dissemination of non-commercial sharing of scientific, creative and other intellectual works by the general public’. Creative Commons was the sole member, guarantor and sponsor of the charity, providing organisational and financial support.
Today, iCommons has a small,... more
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i vs. Commons: Some commentary
Karen (United States) · Jun 16th, 2007 11:14 pm · 13 votes · 1 comment
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| by Photos by Karen Rustad |
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I feel a little bad for Zittrain. Last night he gave a great keynote speech about how openness has a price (adware, spam, viruses, etc.) that makes a return to centralized, "appliance-ized" systems tempting for many and how we can "kick the can forward" and progress past the pitfalls of the current state of the technology. By the end of the evening, however, most or all of what he had to say was overwritten in his audience's minds with "OMG LESSIG'S LEAVING!"*
I guess I'm not terribly surprised that Lessig made this decision. FreeCulture.org, the organization that I have the greatest experience with, has a typical rotation cycle of only a few years enforced by students graduating and the allure of bigger and better things. Ten years is a long time to be doing the same thing. Nevertheless, actually hearing it was a shock for a number of people. Lessig has been the 'i', the unofficial spokesman, for free culture for the entire time that I (and pretty much all other student activists) have paid attention to the movement. FreeCulture.org is named after his book! His speaking and writing have uniquely contributed to the growth of Creative Commons and the entire movement with both his arguments and his charismatic presentation. Whether he liked it or not, I think it's accurate to say that there has been a cult of personality circulating around Lessig and his work. Now it is time for the 'Commons' to take over.
In retrospect I understand why Lessig so encouraged FreeCulture.org students to attend iSummit and worked to raise a ridiculous amount of money to fund scholarships for this. We students and young people are among those that will have to step up. At this summit are assembled 300 leaders in open access, copyright reform, education, art, and any number of other free culture fields. Countless more leaders and potential leaders aren't present. We can do this. As in Zittrain's lecture, the free culture community is the solution. With the communication and collaboration fostered through meatspace events like this summit and the many online fora for free culture, we can be mutually enlightened, effective in activism, and--our new challenge--respected by both our allies and our opponents. But we must first speak up and act up. As individuals we should be correcting misinformation and reframing our movement externally. Internally, as a community we must commit to active contribution in each others' projects--not only talking, but having our feet follow our speech regarding the various good ideas that are floating around.
Make Lessig proud. Better, make yourself proud. Let's get this done.
* For clarity: He'll still be working on Creative Commons and iCommons. But he will be leaving some other positions and declining the "spokesman" role he's had for the last ten years. Instead, he's starting a new project to fight corruption and the "economy of influence" in government. As a politics geek, I can't wait to learn more about what that's going to look like.
tags: claremont united states media-events dubrovnik croatia lessig zittrain creativecommons keynote freeculture summit07
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