Weblog
2007 June
Girl Talk Interview on “Ryan Is Hungry”
Be sure to check out this recent interview w/ Gregg Gillis, aka Girl Talk, over on Ryan is Hungry. In the interview, Gregg goes into detail about creating his art, how it intersects and interacts with current copyright law, remixing, and specifically how efforts like Creative Commons can help artists in a positive way. It is a great interview and is a must-see for anyone interested in how remixing, new technology, and the internet are changing our very understanding of content creation and consumption.
We’ve mentioned Girl Talk plenty of times before (we’re big fans), and if you haven’t had a chance yet, go grab a copy of his latest album Night Ripper ASAP.
No Comments »GPLv3!
Congratulations to the Free Software Foundation on the release of the GNU General Public License, Version 3. The GPL is critical underpinning for free software, but it is hard to overstate its importance for all computing, or indeed society at large.
The FSF took this responsibility extremely seriously, putting GPLv3 through by far the most rigorous versioning process of any public license to date. Creative Commons has some experience in this respect, but we are mere newbies by comparison.
Note that Creative Commons has always recommended the GPL and other free software licenses for software. We look forward to transitioning software we create to GPLv3.
6 Comments »Creative Commons statistics@iSummit 2007
It has been a long time since we’ve posted a proper update on Creative Commons license adoption statistics, so a presentation on this topic was eagerly awaited at this year’s Creative Commons international meetings at the iSummit.
I led off with an overview presentation (PDF; Scribd; Slideshare). Here are the major points:
- Metrics based on search engine queries are conceptually straightforward but highly volatile and hard to verify, but the overall growth trend looks good.
- We’re also seeing strong growth at leading CC-enabled content repositories and strong growth of innovative CC-enabled repositories.
- Upcoming challenges including measuring reuse.
- Big mistake: not encouraging rigorous outside analysis by people who know something about statistics long ago.
With that last point in mind, I’ve been thrilled to be in correspondence with Giorgos Cheliotis of Singapore Management University. Giorgos had been doing independent research on open culture and digital media ecosystem topics, including Creative Commons adoption. He has academic papers on the subject in the works and we were very lucky to have him give us a taste at the iSummit. View his presentation: (PDF; Scribd; Slideshare).
While the presentation is based on a snapshot from early this year, it includes some very interesting findings, including an experimental index based on license choices in different jurisdictions (e.g., Sweden seems to be the most liberal so far), while Spain is the standout in terms of overall Creative Commons adoption.
I’m really eager to see the results of this research published and for future research taking into account time series data and additional sources. In the meantime Giorgos’ presentation is the place to start if you’re interested in CC license adoption statistics. If you’re a researcher with interest in this topic see contact information in the presentation.
Addendum: Giorgos summarizes the main findings on his blog.
No Comments »CC Salon SF on WED, July 11 from 7-9 PM: Jumpcut, OWL Music Search, and Slideshare.net Powerpoint Karaoke!
On Wednesday, July 11th, from 7-9 PM, Creative Commons will be returning to Shinesf.com (1337 Mission St. in San Francisco) for another Creative Commons Salon! There is a lot of wonderful things in store and it is a great opportunity to meet-up with others interested in Creative Commons’ flexible licensing, technology and standards and informally discuss how we can all work together.
Confirmed to present is Yahoo’s Jumpcut Online Video Editing Community, who will be discussing how their new online video service allows for both uploading of videos as well as online remxing/editing . Also presenting will be OWL Music Search, whose audio similarity search engine allows you to find CC-licensed music through an online comparison with your own mp3s (we’ve talked about OWL before here and here). Lastly, but certainly not least, slideshare.net (discussed earlier here) will be presenting Powerpoint Karaoke, MC-ed by EFF’s Danny O’Brien! We can only imagine the hilarity that will ensue…
No Comments »CC Canada Podcasting Legal Guide
Creative Commons Canada has just released their version of the Creative Commons Podcasting Legal Guide, ported specifically for Canadian laws and practices. The guide was handed out this weekend in printed form at the Podcasters Across Borders conference in Kingston, Ontario and is available in PDF format on the CC Canada website. The guide is released under a CC Canada Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike licence.
When it was first created, the Podcasting Legal Guide pertained specifically to the U.S., with the hope that other jurisdictions would translate and adapt the guide for their own jurisdiction in order to assist podcasters around the world. CC Canada has done just that, and you can read what one of the original PLG authors has to say about it here. We hope this is the first of many adaptations to come and that other jurisdictions will be able to follow in CC Canada’s footsteps.
No Comments »Ground Report TV Launches
GroundReport.TV, a streaming citizen journalism news channel online, has officially launched and needs your help! They are looking for CC-licensed documentaries and video news content to broadcast on the channel as well as people interested in reporting live from around the world.
We’ve talked about GroundReport.com, GroundReport.TV’s companion site, here before. Both sites are great examples of how CC licenses can positively contribute to the growing realm of citizen powered media by providing a clear and established means of identifying user-generated content. When CC licenses are built into communities like GroundReport.TV and GroundReport.com, the sharing of vital information becomes more simplified, ultimately leading to a stronger online “ecosystem”.
To get involved with GroundReport.TV, simply visit their website and hit the “Participate” link
UPDATE: A clarification – GroundReport.TV has not officially launched. They are simply in the process of finding CC-licensed content from people like you. Apologies for the confusion!
No Comments »CC Salon London this Thursday
Hello friends. A quick reminder that the very first CC Salon London will be taking place this Thursday, at Juno, Shoreditch High Street, London E1, from 6.30pm until midnight. There will be music from the after-dinner.net DJs as well as talks and presentations from Elizabeth Stark (freeculture.org), Tom Reynolds (Random Acts of Reality) and Jonathan Roberts (FreeMeDVD).
These salons are a real great chance for like-minded folk to inspire and excite one another – a strong community is so important for a movement like CC and fostering it through events like these is essential. If you are in the area, don’t miss out on such a great opportunity!
There’s more details at CC Salon London Homepage. You can also RSVP on both Upcoming or on Facebook.
No Comments »Mainstreaming open music
Michael Gregoire, curator of the beautiful netBloc compilation series (previously mentioned here and here; #6 now available) has published an essay on some of the things needed to make open music a part of mainstream culture:
Once a listener realizes that net audio is as good or better than mainstream music, they’re in. They’re part of the movement. They begin to explore the net audio world. The more you explore and listen to net audio, the less you’re influenced by the mainstream music-industry. Wouldn’t it be great if it were easier for these new listeners to find GREAT new net audio? What can be done to make it easier to dig through the immense numbers of net audio releases?
Music to my ears. I’ve been harping on the criticality of discovery services and tastemakers (and praising ones that exist) for a few years. There’s now a lot more great CC licensed music available than when I started.
Speaking of tastemaking, check out the music of Lee Maddeford.
No Comments »The music of Lee Maddeford
I first read of Lee Maddeford in a comment on Bob Ostertag’s website. Ostertag was announcing the release of every recording he held the rights to under a CC Attribution-NonCommercial license.
Maddeford had similarly put his recordings online under the same license, but a year earlier.
There’s a huge variety of quality music (well over 10 hours of recordings) to enjoy, crossing several genres and many projects led by Maddeford under various names. Visit his listening lounges to browse roughly by genre (piano duo, songs in French, songs in English, lab, and others), the library for lyrics, lead sheets, scores, and information lounges describing each project.
I should especially point out some ironic pop songs that may have wide appeal (mp3s), including a goth spoof Scratch My Body, 80s ska sounding Optical Illusion , and an over the top Le Train.
There’s also plenty of avant leaning material that meets my approval, but I finally want to point out a few tracks that I cannot get out of my head. Actually five different recordings (mp3s) of the same simple composition, called [Le] Bouchon: Bouchon, Bouchon 1, Bouchon 2, Bouchon 3, Le Bouchon.
Go explore Lee Maddeford’s music yourself. Don’t worry if something gets stuck in your head–it won’t be wasted space, as you’ll be able to use it in your own creation down the line.
No Comments »Spoon to Headline Creative Commons Benefit Concert to Kick Off WIRED NextFest in LA
We are very pleased to announce that Spoon, the Austin, TX based rock-quartet, will headline a benefit concert for Creative Commons on September 10, 2007, at the Henry Fonda Theater in Los Angeles!
The concert will function not only as a fundraiser for CC, but also as a kick off for WIRED NextFest, “a unique world’s-fair-style event showcasing future technologies in design, entertainment, communication, healthcare, transportation, sustainable living and more”. NextFest will be taking place at the Los Angeles Convention Center between September 13 and 16 – you can read WIRED’s press release about the concert and NextFest here.
If that wasn’t enough, the concert will also serve as a reunion of sorts for Spoon and “Keepon the Robot”. If you have no clue who or what Keepon is, head over to YouTube and prepare to be mesmerized. Look at that thing move!
This is incredible news – we’ve got our calendars marked and are counting down the days. Tickets go on sale this Saturday (June 23rd) at 10AM and are only $20! Get yours here through Ticketmaster.
No Comments »
