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We have some exciting new upgrades to icommons.org to report! The latest updates to the site include:
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iSummit 08 is for students of Free Culture!
1
Heather Ford · Johannesburg (South Africa) · Oct 29th, 2007 9:26 pm · 52 votes · 5 comments
 
Heather Ford, CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/)
by Heather Ford
Next year’s iCommons Summit will introduce some exciting new programme areas in response to this year’s final brainstorming workshop with participants. The iSummit will continue to showcase some of the world’s greatest visionaries in the commons arena and the iCommons Artists in Residence programme will again act as an alternative viewpoint on discussions, but next year we will introduce four new programme streams that capitalize on the successes and needs from previous years.

The most important of these is the ‘learn’ track. In this track, commons newbies or those who want to brush up on their knowledge in certain areas, will attend introductory sessions on key areas of commons theory and practice. In keeping with the spirit of the iSummit to deepen the impact of this important three-day gathering, the resources (high quality video of lectures and workshops, selected readings and tools, interactive exercises) will form the basis of a distributed curriculum that could be used by lecturers and teachers around the world as a basis for their own teaching of the creative and knowledge commons.

Incorporated into the ‘learn’ stream will be two single day programmes specifically aimed at Sapporo artists, creators and students, and a programme for creative business and academics.

Another new stream will be the ‘debating chamber’ where current, contentious statements will be deliberated. Participants will be invited to suggest topics and speakers for inclusion in this part of the programme.

The ‘create’ stream next year will be really exciting – especially since it is being held in one of the most creative nations in the world. The aim of this ‘stream’ is to enable participants to recognise the creative potential of all human beings and to better understand how creativity and innovation happens. Some of the current ideas include a workshop by the ever-popular C-shirt project, workshops by iCommons Magazine cover design company, Loftwork, and ‘node parties’ where iCommons nodes set up stations and invite participants to take a few minutes of their time to help them to do something valuable for their project. The iCommons Artists in Residence will help to coordinate this stream, assisting nodes in developing their interactive potential and in creatively expressing some of the core ideas from the Summit.

Next year, the iCommons scholarship programme will be centered around iCommons nodes. The community will be invited to vote for nodes, and a jury will decide on the top nodes from each continent who will send representatives to the iSummit.

The ‘show’ stream is inspired by the TED conference’s ‘conversation breaks’ during the traditional ‘tea time’ at the Summit. Here, projects will have an opportunity to display their current activities using posters, products or computer displays/demos, and to share some challenge or question that participants help them solve.

Finally, the ‘play’ stream will, once again, delight participants with a series of events – from dinner at the famous Okurayama Ski Jump where the Olympics were held in 1972, dancing and karaoke evening in the city, an incredible concert organized by Digital Garage, and an excursion to local areas of interest.

In January, a planning meeting will be held in Johannesburg to decide on the core themes of the event, to start work on the ‘learn’ curriculum and materials, as well as to workshop the look and feel, and mechanics of the various streams.

To help, join up at the iSummit Node.

tags: sapporo japan media-events summit-08 learn play create debate show inspire programme workshop


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This is a really good vision. There is a potential to really evolve the iCommons conversation based on this frame.
Surman (Canada) · Oct 30th, 2007 12:14 am
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This is a great vision worth investing time, labor of love and money. We learn and create best in an inspired environment of play! Only 'term' that I find in disharmony here is the word 'debate' where people tend to stick to their own view and position. A better approach would be "dialogue" where the aim is to remain open to all views including minority niews and create shared understanding and higher co-creative solution.

cheers
Susmita_ Barua_seek2know.net · Lexington (United States) · Oct 30th, 2007 8:11 am
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Thank you so much for your comments, Mark and Susmita! Really inspired now :)
Heather Ford · Johannesburg (South Africa) · Nov 01st, 2007 12:45 am
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I definitely like the idea of branching out to more groups, and that's what it seems like the "learn" track is aiming to do.

Is there a separate inspire track? If so, what does it do?

Also, I'm not sure I agree that scholarships should solely be dependent upon nodes. There are a lot of people doing great work out there who may not have started a node, and to solely limit it to those who have may be too restrictive. Having some based on nodes would be fine, just not all...
Elizabeth Stark · New York / Cambridge (United States) · Nov 29th, 2007 1:07 am
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'inspire' is the goal of the keynotes and panel discussions that will frame the event. Scholarships are almost totally dependent on whether we receive funding :) There will be obviously be some funding to bring over speakers as well, but we really feel that for scholarships, we want a commitment to be working on common projects - see below for the latest on this stream:

A handbook on home-based care of AIDS patients in rural South Africa? A textbook for South Indian 10th Grade Students on editing Wikipedia in Hindi?

Multidisciplinary teams of artists, developers, lawyers and others will meet before the Summit to work on projects to deliver quality, free knowledge in subjects were there is a deep need and where the impact can be felt most keenly. Asking communities to tell us what they need, iCommons will facilitate a project that bears fruit at the Summit and inspires others to work on similar projects for communities in need.

Heather Ford · Johannesburg (South Africa) · Dec 03rd, 2007 10:54 pm
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