iCommons.org - .: iCommons.org Resources :.

resources .: iSummit Interviews on dotSUB

2007-7-09T10:47:49Z

Check out these iSummit interviews from dotSUB, that have been captioned.

Heather Ford, iCommons Executive Director talks about CC and film in South Africa

iCommons on Film: Samuli Torssonen, the producer of Star Wreck, talks about a recent trip to the Cannes Film festival.

John Buckman from Magnatune and Bookmooch talks about why the industry should use CC licensing.

resources .: CD Insert - Creative Commons License Agreements

2007-12-05T18:15:07Z

This archive contains 6 Creative Commons license agreement cd-inserts along with the template file I used. The template file is a GIMP XCF file. The finished license agreement files are in PNG format.

I hope that people find it useful.

resources .: The iSummit 2008 in Sapporo: presentation by CC Japan

2008-1-28T15:58:53Z

At the iSummit 2008 planning workshop held in Johannesburg on 17 and 18 January, Yuko Noguchi presented 'The iSummit 2008 in Sapporo', which outlined the practical conditions and consequences of having the iSummit in Japan, and identified issues which need to be addressed during our planning event.

For feedback on problem-solving and brainstorming that took place at the event, read the workshop page on the iCommons wiki, for full notes and report-backs.

resources .: Unlocking the Potential through Creative Commons

2007-8-30T23:09:39Z

In November 2007 the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation (CCi) hosted the CCau Industry Forum, a research-focused industry engagement event. The event was organised by the CCi Creative Commons Clinic and Creative Commons and Open Content Licensing research projects in response to the Australian Government's 2005 Digital Content Action Agenda. It was designed to follow up the Action Agendas recommendation that industry engage with work occurring in the area of alternative approaches to intellectual property licensing, such as Creative Commons.

Focusing on the government, education and the creative industries sectors, the Forum aimed to evaluate understanding of and attitudes towards copyright, open content licensing (OCL) and the Creative Commons initiative within Australia. With the rapid growth of digital technologies over the last decade has led to a revolution in the creation and dissemination of knowledge a revolution that has created unprecedented challenges for copyright law. The all rights reserved model of traditional copyright law, with its complex legal concepts and requirement for permission for even the most common and non-controversial of uses, does not fit well with an environment which both enables and requires reproduction and communication on an unprecedented scale. From a legal perspective, one of the most significant responses to these changes has been the development of new OCL systems designed to open up access to and use of protected material. These OCL models preserve the creators intellectual property rights whilst giving permission in advance for the content to be used more broadly than would be permitted under default copyright law.

The Unlocking the Potential Through Creative Commons report evaluates and responds to the outcomes of this Forum and presents a strategy for continued research into Creative Commons in Australia. Full copies of the report can be downloaded at http://creativecommons.org.au/unlockingthepotential and may be used and distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Australia licence.

resources .: Free High School Science Texts and the Case for Continuous Learning

2007-11-16T22:23:39Z

A collaborative, participatory framework for teaching and learning, where teachers and learners take on the role of active researchers in the instruction process, was an important theme that drove discussions, informal talks over coffee, and several of the presentations at the 2007 OpenLearn conference in Milton Keynes, UK.

The presentation of the Free High School Science Texts (FHSST) project likewise created some buzz. The presentation by Cynthia Jimes of ISKME told the story of how FHSST built open content from the bottom up, and grew into a project that has inspired the South African Ministry of Education to consider a more broad-scale initiative to create open textbooks for all grade levels in South Africa.

resources .: The iSummit 2008 in Sapporo: presentation by CC Japan (pdf format)

2008-2-08T23:58:36Z

resources .: iSummit 07 presentations

2007-7-09T16:58:07Z

For all of you who weren't able to attend the keynote sessions or some of the other interesting presentations that were held in the main hall, you'll be pleased to know that we have managed to get a hold of some of them. So if you would like study or share these presentations, please feel free to download them here, from the cultural database.

Click below to download:

Business Models-ppt/odp

Open Source Culture- ppt/odp

The future of open education-ppt/odp

Global Lives Project-pdf

SJ Klein - The future of open education-ppt/odp

Ekalavyas Secret Library -Tales from the I-Commons (pirated copy)-ppt/odp

Star Wreck - In the Pirkining-ppt/odp

Jon Phillips Building Communities Isummit 2007

Please check back for more presentations.

resources .: The African Digital Commons - A Participant's Guide

2008-1-14T16:09:39Z

Download the guide below:

FRENCH, .doc

FRENCH, .PDF

ENGLISH, .doc

ENGLISH, .PDF

One of the goals of the Commons-sense Project is to conduct research that helps equip African activists and decision-makers with the information they need to develop cutting-edge, relevant intellectual property policies and practices.

We decided to begin with a map - a map that hopefully presents a broad picture of how far we've already come in Africa towards the goal of achieving a "digital information commons", as well as providing some sense of how to grow it further. We have tried to chart the international, regional and national policies, players and movements that to some extent dictate the scope of the commons in Africa, and at the same time to outline some of the creative responses from people on the ground working towards the expansion of the commons in some way.

Because we wanted to get as extensive a picture as possible of who is already involved in digital commons activities throughout the continent, we decided to try to get people in Africa to represent themselves in the Guide . The technology we used was an online "wiki" which anyone, anywhere in the world could edit, amend, build on and improve. This Guide , then, is the offline version of a living "wiki" built by the people living and working on these issues in Africa.

We are hoping that the offline publishing of this Guide can become an annual event, where we take stock of how far we've come, how issues, policies and laws have changed, which new projects have begun, and what the impact has been on the ground and on the net - in terms of the growth of the African Digital Commons.

In time, we're hoping that the Guide will be used in classrooms and offices, by policy-makers and activists, educators and students, to raise awareness around the value of the commons to African innovation, education and creativity.

One last word of thanks must go to our colleagues at the LINK Centre for their support and advice, to Wits University Copyright Librarian Denise Nicholson for innumerable leads and contacts, to A2LM in Southern Africa project leader Achal Prabhala for editorial support, to the IDRC - especially Heloise Emdon and Steve Song - for their ongoing encouragement, and finally to the hard-working builders of the African Digital Commons who, in the face of many challenges, continue to inspire with their vision of a continent that is turning the corner in many ways.

resources .: From Legal Commons to Social Commons: Brazil and the Cultural Industry

2007-6-08T13:31:39Z

I am publishing at the iCommons website the paper I wrote for the Centre for Brazilian Studies at Oxford University (http://www.brazil.ox.ac.uk). The paper was finished in March, 2007. It is the result of the very nice months I spent as a visiting professor there.

ABSTRACT

This article describes some of the current transformations regarding the processes by which information and culture are generated, from the point of view of developing countries. In this brief analysis, the article discusses the role of projects such as Creative Commons for developing countries. It also discusses the idea of legal commons and social commons.

While the idea of legal commons can be understood as the voluntary use of licenses such as Creative Commons in order to create a commons, the idea of social commons has to do with the tensions between legality and illegality in developing countries. These tensions appear prominently in the so-called global peripheries, and in many instances make the legal structure of intellectual property irrelevant, unfamiliar, or unenforceable, for various reasons.

With the emergence of digital technology and the Internet, in many places and regions in developing countries (especially in the peripheries), technology ended up arriving earlier than the idea of intellectual property. Such a de facto situation propitiated the emergence of cultural industries that were not driven by intellectual property incentives. In these cultural businesses, the idea of sharing and of free dissemination of the content is intrinsic to the social circumstances taking place in these peripheries. Also, the appropriation of technology on the part of the peripheries ends up promoting autonomous forms of bridging the digital divide, such as the LAN house phenomenon discussed below. This paper proposes that many lessons can be learned from the business models emerging from social commons practices in developing countries.

The tension between legality and illegality in peripheral areas in developing countries is not new. The work of Boaventura de Sousa Santos and others in the 1970s was paradigmatic for the discussion of legal pluralism regarding the occupation of land in Brazil. This paper aims to follow in that same pioneer tradition of studies about legal pluralism, and to apply those principles to the discussion of intellectual property rather than the ownership of land.

resources .: iSummit 2008 Planning Workshop -

2008-1-29T18:19:12Z

One of the discussions that we had at the end of the iSummit planning workshop in Johannesburg was an evaluation of what we need, in terms of people and resources, to help realise our plans for the Summit. This is the audio recording of that discussion.

resources .: Innovations in Copyright for Digitised, Sustainable Film in South Africa

2007-9-12T20:26:52Z

Introduction: March 2006 will be remembered for many years as a first for the South African film industry. On this day, director Gavin Hood held up South Africas indeed Africas first Academy Award for Best Foreign Film. The coveted Oscar was received for Tsotsi, and for days afterwards, national television, newspapers, radio and the Internet showcased interviews and features with anyone involved with the production basking in what South Africans hoped was a sign of a new era for filmmaking in the country.

But the euphoria around this accomplishment was in some respects short-lived. Soon after the win, Tsotsi was in the news again. This time because a pirate copy of the movie was being distributed throughout the country, and it was believed that someone at the post-production facility had leaked a cut of the film. In early April 2006, two former employees of the firm where post-production took place were arrested and charged with fraud and theft (SAPA, 2006).

During this time, national public radio station SAfm aired a debate about the case, discussing the issues of piracy and local film production with key figures in the industry and members of the public. One caller living in the village of Ramosadi, North-West Province the home village of Tsotsi lead actor Presley Chweneyagaes family said that, after hearing about the film and Chweneyagaes role in it, he had wanted to watch it, but because the nearest movie theatre is many kilometres from where he lives, he had to buy a pirated DVD of the film.

The Tsotsi story got people asking some pertinent questions about the dynamics of South African film distribution about how best to reach audiences, about how to facilitate better and faster distribution of legal DVD versions of films, about the balance of distribution control between creators/producers and the broadcasters/cinemas, and about the role of more creator/producer-oriented distribution efforts such as those provided by the Film Resource Unit (FRU).

This paper does not aim to account for all of the complex dynamics in South African film distribution, but rather to focus in on two broad themes: the dynamics of digitisation; and the dynamics around rights (copyright and licensing of distribution rights). This article aims to point to potential opportunities for improved South African film distribution, to the benefit of both creators/producers and distributors, as presented by:

the digital environment and the innovative distribution and promotion techniques this environment makes possible for South African film; and

new approaches to copyright and licensing of distribution rights approaches seemingly made both more necessary and more realisable in the digital environment.

Exploitation of both of these sets of opportunities has the potential to give added dynamism and sustainability to South Africas independent film production sector a sector which has, in recent years, consistently proved its ability to generate world-class cinema with a South African flavour. Tsotsi is but one of many examples of local film productions that seem to have deserved, and could potentially have drawn better revenues from, wider distribution/promotion in South Africa on cinematic, broadcast, DVD and online/cell phone platforms.

The central argument of this paper is that creative approaches to copyright management and to licensing of distribution rights, deployed within the digital, multi-platform environment, hold the potential to better balance the rights of creators/ producers with those of broadcasters/cinemas/DVD distributors, thus potentially building a South African film industry with more winners and fewer losers.

resources .: How Does An Asia Commons Mean?

2008-7-25T18:27:09Z

This document is a first draft of a monograph which formed the basis of the "How Does An Asian Commons Mean" discussion at the ACIA event in Taipei in 2008.

resources .: ICT Policy: A Beginner's Handbook

2008-3-01T19:53:31Z

Information and communications are at the heart of human life and social development. People have always worked together by sharing information and knowledge through speech, writing, the printed word and, more recently, telephony and broadcasting. Sharing information empowers individuals and communities, and enables whole societies to benefit from the experience of everyone within them. This book aims to guide non-specialists through some policy issues and enable its readers to engage effectively with the decision-making process. It came about through a partnership developed between the Association for Progressive Communications, the leading international civil society group on ICT policy issues, and the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisations.

resources .: Open Sourcing Education: learning and wisdom from iSummit 2007

2007-9-12T00:29:28Z

This report summarizes learning and wisdom from the education track at 2007 iSummit, held in Dubrovnik, Croatia. Organized annually by iCommons, the summit serves as a gathering of people from the global Creative Commons movement. This was the first year that there was a full track dedicated to open education.

Describing the conversation about open education in Dubrovnik, the report says:

it is clear that these ideas offer huge potential to transform and improve education. At the simplest level, open sourcing education can provide top quality textbooks, courseware and learning aids to millions of people who have limited access to educational materials today. There is also tremendous potential for innovation in education, as well as improving the quality of materials we use for learning. Similar to open source software, educators who translate MIT Open Courseware into Chinese may improve these materials along the way, in turn sharing these improvements for others to use. And, ultimately, if learning materials of all sorts are open, there is an opportunity to put learners at the centres of this collaborative value creation: with students playfully adapting, remixing and resharing materials for others as a part of the learning process. There is a movement afoot here, and it is a movement with an aim no less than making learning accessible and adaptable for all.

However, the report is far from pure boosterism for open education. It also warns that there are critical roadblocks in areas like community building, licensing, reaching out to policymakers and including a diversity educators, authors and activists from around the world. Unless it can get past these roadblocks, the movement has little chance of making an impact.

resources .: The Development Agenda for WIPO: Another Stillbirth? A2K vs. enclosure

2007-6-19T08:01:16Z

The private sector has played and continues to play a decisive role in the shaping of policy-making concerning knowledge-based goods. The result is an unequal battle between access to knowledge and enclosure favouring the latter over the former. Such an unbalanced scenario chiefly affects the South, but has implications for the public everywhere. The Development Agenda being proposed for adoption by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), and which has been advocated for and designed by developing countries governments in collaboration with a coalition of governments, academics, civil society and public interest NGOs from both North and South, is the latest attempt to bring a balance to this scenario. However, the Development Agenda is encountering opposition and despite the unique nature of the coalition backing it, the outcome is uncertain.

resources .: Submission by TACP on the South African Draft Bill on Publicly Funded Research

2007-9-12T20:20:00Z

Introduction

As an organisation with the objectives of bringing together the Free Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS), open culture and open science communities as a means of developing and encouraging Africas creative and innovative potential, The African Commons Project welcomes the Draft Bill on Intellectual Property Rights in Publicly Financed Research. We understand and appreciate the Departments commitment to disseminating innovation in South African research.

The Draft Bill aims to ensure that both the public sector and the South African community at large are able to benefit from the inventions and innovations that are the result of publicly funded research at academic institutions in South Africa. This objective is commendable and long overdue. However, as an organisation researching global best practice in developing innovative economies, we believe that there needs to be a greater balance between the needs for the public to have access to research and development via open access.

Download the PDF for the full submission.

resources .: Jimmy Wales interview on 702

2007-11-26T18:23:22Z

Click here to download and listen to the Jimmy Wales interview with 702, during his visit to South-Africa, where he was promoting the Wikipedia Academies.

resources .: Tony Curzon Price Presentation to 2007 iSummit business models stream

2007-6-20T20:08:13Z

a simple argument:

- you need a community to build a web site
- but a hidden cost of CC licensing is community dispersion
- solutions

===

The condition of modernity is to find ones identity in the communities we choose to belong to

Hannah Arendt

making sense
making cents

=====

the crisis of credibility

- from globalisation - (We must not) underestimate the rage and despair of people who, arriving late in the modern world, have known its primary ideology, democracy, only as another delusion, Pankaj Mishra, Temptations of the West
- to technology - "Are we turning the Internet into a tabloid, destroying the truth? ... We're in an awkward position, because we don't assess truth or falsity.'' Eliot Schrage, Google

resources .: iSummit 2008 Planning Workshop - Presentation by Japanese team

2008-1-29T18:19:09Z

At the Summit planning workshop, the team from Sapporo City, Digital Garage and CCJP gave a presentation on the Summit venue, the city of Sapporo, and some of the other practical and logistic considerations for the Summit. This is the audio version of the presentation, you can see the slides here

resources .: iSummit 2008 Planning Workshop - Summit Design Discussion

2008-1-29T18:19:06Z

On Day 1 of the Summit Planning Workshop, all the participants were asked to design their dream summit venue, using toothpicks, sweets, straws and other materials. This audio clip is of the feedback session afterwards, when each group explained their designs and why they chose to do what they did.

You can read more about this session here, on the iCommons blog, or watch the video of the session here, on the video Fumi shot.

Note: The sound on this clip isn't uniformly good, so the blog and video will help give you a better idea of what happened...