Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

Remix, Reuse, or Repurpose This Blog Post! Creative Commons Teachable Moment

Remix this Powerpoint

View more presentations from kanter.

I've been an strong advocate of Creative Commons for the last four years, have written many blog posts, and even taught a workshop or two on "Open Content."

(If you don't know about Creative Commons, it was founded in 2001, with a mission to increase the amount of creativity (cultural, educational, and scientific content) in “the commons” — the body of work that is available to the public for free and legal sharing, use, repurposing, and remixing.  They provide tools that let everyone have a simple, standardized way to grant copyright permissions to their creative work. The Creative Commons licenses enable people to easily change their copyright terms from the default of “all rights reserved” to “some rights reserved.”   Poke around the web site and their wiki to learn more about their work and be sure to watch this brief, inspiration video about "Shared Culture.")

The licenses let you pick how to publish your work and grant others the right to reuse it.  Three years ago I created that PowerPoint deck based on a discussion I had with Mike Seyfang and Stephen Downes trying to really deeply understand which license to use.   I came to the decision that the "By" attribution license was the best for me because I wanted to make it easy as possible to share the work.   This licenses means that you don't have to ask permission to reuse, remix, or repurpose the work as long as you attribute the creator. 

Last week, I got an email from my one of my blog readers and asking me if my work was copyrighted because one of my original diagrams was used in the attached slide deck shared from a recent Webinar.  I replied, my work is licensed under Creative Commons attribution - as long as it attributed that is not a problem.  They responded, "But what if the person who reuses your context slaps their logo on it and add a "All Rights Reserved" on the slide.  What does that mean?"

I decided to look at how my work was being reused and realized there was a teachable moment about Creative Commons "by" attribution licensing.    So, I asked Mike Linksvayer, Vice President, at Creative Commons, Mike Seyfang and Stephen Downes for their thoughts. I also threw some ideas out on Twitter and Dave Cormier, Hildy Gottleib, and Harold Jarche also responded.  Since "sharing" is a theme in the book that I'm working on with Allison Fine, we also batted the ideas around as well.

When I first decided to share my work through Creative Commons, my motivation - as I've stated before was that I wanted people to not only re-use the work, but to make it easy as possible for build to build and extend the ideas.  I didn't want the barriers of asking for permission or having to retain a "verbaitem" copy because that would get in the way.  The conditions of the license is that people can use it - as long as they "provide attribution in the manner specified by the author."  The license itself doesn't specifically define attribution. 

When I looked at the diagram, I wondered:

• Can they really copyright my work under this license?
• Why didn't they link to the original context?
• Why didn't they include my name and blog name?
• How do you encourage people to build on your work versus cut, paste, and attribute?

Mike Linksvayer gave me an answer to the first set of questions:

One can create an adaptation incorporating your work and release the former under whatever terms they want (including default copyright/all rights reserved) so long as they give you credit and provide notice of the license you offered (ie that they used your content under CC BY, even if the resulting work is All Rights Reserved).

The licenses offer a fair amount of flexibility to licensors (to specify how to attribute) and to licensees (how to do so in a manner appropriate to the medium being used). See the full license text for exact wording of that -- see 4(b) of creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/legalcode -- and maintaining license notice is the previous clause, 4(a).

You could require that attribution include a link back to the specific post where you published the content (ie also where you offered the license).

You'll see a bunch of examples of attribution and you'll see a bunch of examples and a lot of explainers like this one from Molly Kleinman.

It probably should go without saying, but for anyone who stumbles across this, (1) one can always ask the licensor for permission to use outside the scope of the license and (2) one may not need a license at all if your use constitutes fair use/fair dealing or triggers some other copyright limitation or exception, though unfortunately this isn't likely.

All that said, I'm not a lawyer and this is't legal advice!

I don't think they were trying to pass off my work as their own - perhaps they used "All Rights Reserved" as part of their powerpoint template and it is just added automatically to each slide.  But, then again, perhaps I'm being sloppy.  I don't have a formal attribution policy.   Hildy Gottleib pointed to her policy for her work which grew out of a plagarism issue.

Having an "attribution policy" where you "demand" attribution is good, but then there is the onerous work of ownership - policing it.   That seems like Tower behavior to me.     

@davecormier  I can't tell what's 'my own content' anymore. think I've decided to stop 'demanding' attribution.    

@HildyGottlieb Yes, completely. I WANT people to build on our stuff. I just don't want them saying that our stuff is THEIR stuff! :-)

@davecormier  my license says you must tell people i did this sounds very demanding. a teachable moment would be want to use this stuff? click and explain the complexity of ownership.

Hildy, in a follow up email, that she was thinking through how to create a program that actually encourages people to share the stuff, but also build on it and to do so in a way that makes it clear that her organization was the source of at least some of the building blocks.

Stephen Downes' comment was insightful:

"My stuff is all over the web, and I don't really bother looking to see who is using it or in what context. Life's too short. In fact, I think that the agony people get into over copyright and licensing and all that is reflective of a (very successful) propaganda campaign, one that has really convinced that that their creations are completely their own and that they should be militant over the ownership of them.  In fact, 90 percent of anything we create is borrowed. It is extraordinarily difficult to show any flash of originality. And such flashes of originality made sense only when embedded in a surround of other people's work."

Allison Fine and I had an interesting email thread, where she pointed out:

We want to create nonprofit sector leadership that values giving credit as much, if not more, than getting it.

We don't want Credit Free Zones we want Credit Full Zones! We want people to be aware that what they're working on is building on the work of others (which they too often haven't wanted to admit to themselves or funders in the past) and they should give appropriate - dare I even say heartfelt - thanks and credit for that work, just as they hope others will do for theirs. People can say how they want their work attributed - or without that the creditor would be wise to be generous and forthright and transparent in their crediting - better in the long run, for their work, for the health of the network, to apply credit generously.

So, here's where I've landed with all of this.  Want to use any of this content?

This blog is under a Creative Commons license "By" Attribution. I'm not going to waste precious time policing how you attribute my work or ideas because I am assuming that you will be forthright, transparent, and generous in your attribution.  My hope is that you go a little beyond reuse (cut and paste and attribute) and add some value to the sharing chain.  I'd love to know how you have reused, remixed, or repurposed my content so I can learn from how you have extended the ideas or added value to the sharing chain, but it isn't a requirement. But please don't be evil and not attribute with my name, blog name, and link to the blog.

How do you define Creative Commons Attribution?

Earlier this week, I wrote a post called "What happens when you set your content free using Creative Commons Licensing?."   I explained why I set my own work free, provided some examples, and pointed to a new tool. The tool is called FairShare, a Creative Commons aware tool,  that helps you track how your content is being used by others.  

The tool and the ideas behind the post post generated some good discussion, great questions, and additional blog posts that I'd like to explore further.  

Lucy Bernholz, on her Philanthropy 2173 Blog, wrote a post called "Foundations Set Your Content Free where she shares an interesting historical perspective of open sourcing your work.    She describes several different systems and share economies. She relays a story about how Leonardo Da Vinci freely shared his art work, but closely guarded his scienctific inventions.   Its from  "The Science of Leonardo" by Fritjof Capra. Apparently, he gained great fame from sharing his art work, but no one knew about his scienctific genius until many years after his death.  

The First Giving Blog has a post "Riffing On Creative Commons License".  The post makes the analogy to empowering your supporters to fundraise on your organization's behalf. 

"When it comes to raising money online, empowering your network of supporters with the tools to fundraise for your NPO is like giving them Creative Commons access to your organization."

In the comments, BethP asked a great question:

How often do you come across situations where you feel like the CC license has been abused? And how do you respond?

As I responded in the comments, I run across a lot of abuse.  Well, except there was this one instance a couple years back.    I tend to look at the from the perspective of a "teachable moment" or perhaps a conversation starter.

The question made think about the word "attribution" which is an important concept in the Creative Commons license.

You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your copyrighted work — and derivative works based upon it — but only if they give credit the way you request.

The license deed and language do not specify what that means.  It's left up to the person who created the work.  I haven't gone to the trouble to specify how people should give credit.   I only started to think about this in the comments to this wonderful post called "The Benefits of Creative Commons Licenses" from the Spreading Science blog.

So, it brings up some quetions about defining attribution in the "By" license.

• Does it mean that it is okay to cut and paste the entire blog post as as they clearly say who wrote it?
• If someone is quoting from the blog post, how should that be done?
• Should they say "by Beth Kanter" and that's enough or should they link back to my blog or the specific post?
• Does it mean they can the RSS feed and republish my content on their site as long as it clearly notes that it was "by Beth Kanter"?
• If they use the work as a basis for creative a deritive work, how do they attribute what they contributed versus the original?  

Maya Norton who writes the Blogging Jewish Philanthropy wrote a post called "To My Readers: Avoiding Plagiarism, Understanding the Creative Commons License" and made some good points about giving attribution in blog posts beyond a link.   

• Put my words in quotes if you are quoting text directly
• Cite me by name, journal title, and the URL of the post (Maya Norton, The New Jew: Blogging Jewish Philanthropy, www…)
• Leave me a message or send me an e-mail letting me know that you have done so– if we have the same interests, I would like to get to know you

I've never gone to the trouble of spelling out the specifics of how to attribute a post, but the point about letting the author know about is important.  (Although, if they link or use my name, my listening system pretty much catches it)  Right now it is interesting to watch and observe how people attribute and look for additional insights or teachable moments.

Michelle from aids.gov left a great comment in the original post letting me know how they remixed the work and use the strategy map questions to create their organization's social media strategy.  This is exactly the intention and spirit of the license.  Also, it is great to close the loop and have the opportunity to remix a remix.

Alan Levine, who left a thoughtful comment about the tool and who is a good at making up words (and adopting them too) came up with a new word called Linktribution.  It means linking back to the original post that inspired your post or linking to the person or originally shared the link to something that you write about.    Recently, Alan used the term, Twitterbution, which I assume means linking to the original tweet that includes a link.

If you're using Creative Commons license, have you specified how you want your work attributed? If so, please share.

Update:

Ari Herzog, Using Blog Photos With Creative Commons

Skelliwag, Complete Guide To Creative Commons Licensing

What happens when you set your content free with creative commons licensing?

Winner of the Creative Commons 2006 Photo Schwag Contest

I believe in setting my content free.  It provides a huge return on investment.  Here's why:

• A way to crowd source ideas.  People can add and embellish your content and if you have access to the remix, it can give you new ideas
• It creates a gift economy and that help you build your network
• It gets your work out there. My photos and blog posts have traveled around the world!

I use the "BY Attribution" creative commons license.  I've used this license now for four years because it is simple, direct, and easy.   "You are free to use the content, just me credit and/or a link."

Among other reasons, that's why I've been a fan and evangelist for Creative Commons for many years.  I've even taught my children about creative commons (check out Harry's screencast - What A Second Grader Knows About Creative Commons that earned him a feature story in the School Library Association Journal)

All of this assumes that people really bother to look at the license,  understand it, and respect the rules.  I still sometimes see rather blank expressions when I ask about turning to CC licensed resources to find photos.  It turns to surprise when they see what is there and it free for the using.  Or, I get gasps of horror from some colleagues who more concerned about how to "lock up" their content with "all rights" reserved and hire IP lawyers to help them police and protect their work so no one "steals it."

I've always wondered whether or not when someone makes a gazillion dollars on one of my photos or my blog posts, will I be sorry?  No, but is more likely to happen is that people will use the work, use the license honestly, and improve the work. Or, it might open the door for a teachable moment about Creative Commons and the share economy.

Here's a few (good) examples of how I have remixed other people's work or other people have remixed my work.

1.  Remix This Powerpoint.  The powerpoint slides came from a webinar I did a couple years ago for University Extension professionals.  The title was "Ten Steps to Extension 2.0."  The presentation itself is a remix of a remix.  I remixed it from an earlier presentation called Associations 2.0 which was based on Marnie Webb's Ten Ways To Use Web 2.0 to Change The World.  It also incorporates cc licensed materials from others, including videos and flickr photos.

The cover is from a remix mashup that Mike Seyfang and I did a couple years back from a conversation about the least restrictive creative commons licensed.   That photo is one of my most viewed flickr photos and resulted in a number of inquiries for work.

2.  How Much Time Does It Take To Do Social Media? This was a blog post that I wrote remixing an earlier blog post with the same title from Nina Simon as part of thinking through some of the material for the WeAreMedia project, another open content project.   The illustration is a powerpoint slide that I shared on slideshare.  It's been remixed with and without attribution.  Many do not add more improvements on the idea itself, but rather just cut and paste.   A number of folks have sent back thanks for saving them some time in prepping a presentation.

There was a brilliant example of remix from Morgan Sully who took the idea and remixed it for electronic musicians.  Creating a remix that goes beyond cut and paste, takes some time, creativity and higher thinking skills! 

3. Social Media Game In 2007, David Wilcox and I presented a workshop at LASA using this game he created. I've created a wiki for other people to remix it and it has traveled around the world. We used it for the WeAreMedia workshop and one of the participants, Aids.Gov, remixed a version to train their staff.  I created a version to teach folks about creative commons licensing.

4.  Remixing David Armano's Listen, Learn, and Adapt: I was really inspired by a paper that David Armano wrote for a business audience called Listen, Learn, and Adapt.  I remixed it for nonprofits.  Nancy White picked up on it and blogged it.  Through my remix of the material, I've introduced David's original article to an audience of nonprofits.

When I remix someone else's work, I go to great lengths to give it proper attribution. But, I never know if people who have remixed my work have done so in return.   Now there is an easy way to track it.

Attributor Corporation and Creative Commons have just launched FairShare which is now in public beta.

The press release describes it as:

A free service allowing bloggers and individual content creators to understand how their work is shared across the Web.  FairShare allows anyone creating text content to submit an RSS feed of their work and choose a Creative Commons license to determine how it can be shared. Users then receive license-specific results via RSS with detailed insights into how and where their work is reused.

The FairShare service enters public beta supporting six Creative Commons licenses. Creative Commons is a not-for-profit organization, founded in 2001, that promotes the creative reuse of intellectual and artistic works, whether owned or in the public domain. The FairShare service will be integrated with the Creative Commons license selection process and available in each of the 12 languages that FairShare currently supports.

FairShare helps make the Creative Commons “Sharing Economy” vision a reality by enabling millions to reuse content in a way that provides a value back to the original content creator – value that each creator can define for themselves. 

As you know, I do a fair amount of listening, so when I using monitoring tools I can see exactly who is using my content and in what context. That is if they mentioned my name or linked to me. My goal in using this tool is not to police my content. Rather, I want to see how it is being remixed so I reap the benefits of the Sharing Economy.

Update:  Article in the LA Times

Lucy Bernholz, Foundations Set Your Content Free

How do you feel about setting your content free using creative commons licensing?   What are your concerns?  What are your rewards?  How would you use a tool like fairshare?

Creative Commons: Help Build the Commons

Photo in Flickr by Creative Commons

I've been advocate for Creative Commons for a couple years and even the kids too!  I usually make a cash donation and will continue to do this year - but I'm definitely going to give the Schwag as a gift.  What special geek in my life wouldn't want a Creative Commons jump drive while supporting their work? 

Find creative ways to make your giving have more impact ... don't keep the schwag - give it as a gift!  Get some more ideas at GiveList

Draft Lessig

Harry's Interview in the School Library Journal About Creative Commons!

Harry was interviewed for this article in the School Library Journal about Creative Commons - and the screencast we created in November.

His photo was also featured in a Creative Commons poster by Berne Guerrero

Best Practices Using Creatives Commons License

Photo by Cambodia4kids
Creative Commons License

 

I discovered a new blog called Blogging Jewish Philanthropy by (hat tip Tactical Philanthropy blog).  This post titled "To My Readers: Avoiding Plagiarism, Understanding the Creative Commons License" made some great points about giving attribution in blog posts beyond a link.  Basically, use quotes to distinguish your words from the author words.  Here are the points made by the author Maya Norton

• Put my words in quotes if you are quoting text directly
• Cite me by name, journal title, and the URL of the post (Maya Norton, The New Jew: Blogging Jewish Philanthropy, www…)
• Leave me a message or send me an e-mail letting me know that you have done so– if we have the same interests, I would like to get to know you

I would add for blog posts, you can let the author know via track back - which I have done with this post and the one with a screencast from Harry about how he uses Creative Commons.

In addition, for photos in flickr, link back to the photo page and the license, although latter isn't required but  nice to promote CC

Also, when you find a link to something, it is a good idea (not required) to give Linktribution a term coined by Cogdog Alan Levine (hope I spelled it right this time).  That is if you didn't discovered the link but you discovered through another blogger, give them acknowledgment.  See my example in the first sentence above.

More about Open Content and Creative Commons licenses here

If you enjoyed this blog post, consider subscribing it's free.

What A Second Grader Knows About Creative Commons Licensing ...

Harry is in second grade and he is very much a digital native.   He's pretty smart too. To keep him engaged with his school work, I've been teaching him powerpoint and how to make slide shows related to content he's learning in class.   He also has a digital diary in the form a powerpoint presentation.   I wanted him to appreciate Creative Commons and not just think of it as "those t-shirts that mommy makes me wear"

So, we sat down tonight and he shared what he learned about the Creative Commons "by" license -- attribution is a big word for an eight-year old.  Here's the screencast.

Screencasting turned three years old over the weekend and I wanted to acknowledge Michael Pick's post and also thank Betsy Weber for the screencast of the week.   So, here's another application -- as a digital scrapbook to document what your kids learn!

And of course, I'd to mention that the Creative Commons annual fund is in full swing - so do consider a donation if you haven't already.

 

Creative Commons Swag Contest: My 2007 entry

My Flickr Photo

This is becoming an annual tradition on our house.  I donate enough money to Creative Commons to get the new cool t-shirt. I evangelize about CC.  I take a "two-headed t-shirt monster" photo of my kids.   Enter it into the CC Annual Swag Photo Contest.  It's a fun way to support a cause.  Last year we won!

And I would be totally remiss if I didn't include the Creative Commons fundraising widget and urge you to purchase some swag and enter the contest.    But wait until next week because I don't want anymore competition -- there's too many great photos in there already.

Personal Fundraising Remixed: I Love CC, Do You?

As a blogger and social media maker, I have a strong interest in the future of my work and participatory culture.  As an activist and evangelist for creative commons' values and tools, I want to play a major role in helping to ensure that our culture remains as free and accessible as possible. 

That's why I remixed the fundraising widget on my blog in support of Creative Commons Annual Campaign.  I hope you will do the same and donate too.

I donated $75 so I could get the t-shirt and photograph myself in it - and added it to all my social networking profiles.  Here's what it looks like on Facebook and Twitter.

 

That's how much I appreciate Creative Commons licensing, no love Creative Commons. 

So much so that I release almost everything I do under CC licensing - with the least restrictive license -- the "by." That means I've made it easy to share my work with you and others.  I've reaped the benefits too .. my photos, my articles, my videos have traveled around the world literally.  It's help me build an audience and I'm sure I've helped some of you too.

And I want to make sure that my kids still enjoy this freedom when they grow up.

And I'm teaching my kids about Creative Commons too. Just the other day, my son had to create a slide show about beavers. So, we searched for creative commons licensed photos. I taught him the four different licenses. He's only 8, but was able to not only tell his classmates about beavers, but also told them why and how he can use those photos from the Internet! He's only 8 too!

So, join me in putting that widget on your blog, social networking profile,  etc - and tell the world why you love Creative Commons.  And, if you can - please consider making a donation to the Creative Commons annual fund this year.

 

I Contribute To Creative Commons! Won't you?

Photo from CC site - It didn't have a CC license, but I am assuming I can use it?

Today, when I couldn't get online, I was cleaning up and organizing my paper work and I found an old fashion, snail mail annual fund request. from Creative Commons in my bills.   Creative Commons?    And, it was signed by Lawrence Lessig or at least someone actually signing his name. (I wet my finger and rubbed the ink and it smeared ..)  I put it in a pile and left at my computer desk, hoping that my Internet access would return and I could donate online.

When I finally got my Internet access back, there was an email from Lawrence Lessig that said:

Beth,

Last week, I sent you a letter (yes! a physical, personally signed letter!) launching Creative Commons' third annual fundraising campaign. Those letters (and these emails) are not easy for me to write. You don't become an academic because you like market pressures. Yet each year, I find myself in the middle of a campaign that is the most important measure of our market success. And so, faced with the prospect of facing a real world test, I cower. I beg my staff to leave me to my books. I daydream about ways that CC might avoid this need to prove itself, yet again.

But they don't give tenure to nonprofits. And so I am writing again to ask for your help. This is our fifth anniversary. (You can read a bit about where we've been, and where we're going in the link below.) We've set $500,000 as our goal. We're 1/5th the way there. But we need to be all the way there by the 15th of December. Please do what you can -- or maybe 5 times what you can. I can't promise another physical letter in response. But I do try to reply to each gift individually, and I would very much like to reply individually to a gift from you.

Support CC:
http://support.creativecommons.org

Lessig Letters:
http://support.creativecommons.org/letters


Thank you in advance.

Lawrence Lessig
CEO
Creative Commons

So, I donated online, my preferred method  - no checks to write, no envelopes to lick, no trip to the post office.  And, of course, I just had to give enough so I could get the cool new 2007 campaign t-shirt.  I can't wait to add it to the series of photos of I have of my kids wearing CC t-shirts.   Of course, I also have photos of other kids and bloggers in Cambodia wearing them - as well as friends.

 

Disney Mashup on Fairuse and Copyright

Click here to play

via Amalyah Keshet and Wired Magazine "Hijacked Disney Characters Explain Copyright"

The ten minute movie, directed by Eric Faden, came out of Stanford University's Fair Use Project Documentary Film Program. Stanford's Fair Use Project--to which Stanford Law professor, Copyright guru, Creative Commons advocate and Wired writer Lawrence Lessig contributes--was founded last year to "support to a range of projects designed to clarify, and extend, the boundaries of fair use in order to enhance creative freedom." And, well, the movie is damn sure creative, and certainly seems to take the boundaries of fair use about as far as they can go

.

Remix This Power Point!

I have been doing a seminar called "Ten Steps to Web2.0" which is an introduction to social media concepts and tools for nonprofit use.  Yesterday, I presented this seminar to University Extension Professionals.  The title was "Ten Steps to Extension 2.0"

I'm trying to walk the walk and talk the talk of Remixing Content for nonprofits.  One thing you'll notice is that the presentation itself is a remix of a remix.  I remixed it from an earlier prsentation called Associations 2.0 which was based on Marnie Webb's Ten Ways To Use Web 2.0 to Change The World.  It also incorporates cc licensed materials from others, including videos and flickr photos.

The above slides are from yesterday's Extension presentation and focus on Step 8: User-Generated Content and Remixing.    The title is "Remix This Powerpoint" -- it's some draft thoughts on remixing and wink  to SlideShare's new feature - the ability to download the Powerpoint file!

I would love to develop more indepth training workshop or webinar on this topic, geared more for nonprofits and participatory campaigns, perhaps incorporating the Creative Commons Open Content Game.   There is so much I'm learning from educators about this, including some of the comments I culled from the Chat from yesterday's Extension webinar:

• In our 4H Youth Development work, copyright has been a big issue, but this step 8 opens up some things
• Youth trying to learn new art mediums, they often incorrectly use copyrighted works...they create a derivative work....a site that has photos, etc., where derivative work is allowed is a great tool for the
• The CC licensed work on Flickr and CCmixter are wonderful resources.

While browsing RSS reader today, I noticed someone had favorited my recursive mashup photo that I have on the cover the presentation.   I followed the profile to the blog and discovered Brian Lamb's Abject Learning.  His post about how he discovered the photo and how he planned to use it (or not):

I was preparing for tomorrow's virtual session with Alan, D'Arcy, and Jim, doing a search on CC-licensed stuff in Flickr tagged with "mashup," when I came across the image above. It wasn't quite right for the page I ended up assembling.  But I like it so much, for so many reasons, I can't resist sharing it here.

He has created a "Mashup Page" with the sub-title:  Dr. Mashup or: Why educators should learn to stop worrying and love the remix. 

Do mashups and the notion of content remix finally fulfill the promises once made by proponents of learning objects? But instead of instructors being sidelined by automation, this process places them in the roles of creators, or remixers. What is required for this promise to come through in education?

•     discoverable resources (does not mean repositories, but does mean openness)
•     transparent open licensing, such as Creative Commons
•     open remixable formats (ie an MP3, not a RealAudio stream)
•     enhanced cultural and technical literacy, not just an ability to reuse materials, but a willingness to do so

I also recently discovered this post/podcast called "Remixing the Classroom."  Which uses the metaphor of cake to explain remixing.

A student came up with an amazing metaphor for how intellectual property should work in the classroom and in greater society. She described the idea that remixing should be like cake making. You buy all of the ingredients and then can prepare any kind of cake you like. Once you have the cake, however, you can't un-remix it and get back to the sugar and flour. You can also borrow sugar from a neighbor, but generally you give them credit when you are serving your delicious cake. The podcast outlines the metaphor further.

This is reminding of what Zittrain said two years ago at iLaw about source code and copyright:

Source code: Source is a recipe, a set of instructions to get at something tasty. The recipe can be passed around and shared. There are comments in code which as Zittrain notes, “Are for the programmers when they come down from the caffeine high the night before and help them understand what they did the night before.”

Object code: Is the cake. Executable code for a operating system. The stuff the runs on the machine.

So here is my challenge to you ... help me and others understand the value of remixing content and remix culture by remixing this powerpoint!  What are your metaphors for remixing?  How you explain to educators, nonprofits, or anyone else for that matter.  Why do you think it is valuable?

Remix the powerpoing and put it into slideshare and include a link in the comments.

Invitation to Open Innovation Exchange

Via David Wilcox

"I though you might be interested in a £1.2 million bid a group of us are putting together for the UK Third Sector Innovation Exchange. I've written about it here.  We are looking for people to share their ideas in shaping the bid, maybe join in, and get some exposure if that's what you are looking for. The news release below explains what it is all about or visit the site.

Open Source bid for Third Sector Innovation Exchange

The Government's £1.2 million invitation to tender for a third sector innovation exchange has prompted an innovative response - an "open source bid" under which people are invited to share ideas with one team that is preparing a proposal.

The idea of the innovation exchange, when up and running, is that it should help nonprofit organisations deliver improved services under action plans developed by Cabinet Office and other departments. However one team - led by social entrepreneurs - decided to break away from the competitive approach to bidding for contracts, and develop their proposals in public.

Simon Berry, who is leading the team, said: "We believe that innovation involves doing things differently, and being prepared to work with others. That will certainly be essential if the exchange is to succeed. "We decided that the best way to show what's needed is to start straight away, and invite others to contribute ideas. That should both improve the bid and show the Government who's who on the innovation landscape."

The group have set up an Open Innovation Exchange website where anyone interested can sign in to comment and also contribute. All content is licensed as "share alike" so people are free to use ideas, and build on them, provided they offer attribution and license anything they use in the same way. This means that competing bidders could use material from the site.

Simon adds: "We are delighted if other people use our ideas, attribute, and then offer improvements back to us and others. The Cabinet Office will get the best possible proposals, while being able to see where the ideas started, and who has the most innovative and collaborative approach." The Open Innovation Exchange bid is being led by RNUK Ltd  supported a team of associates. Details of the team, the tender, and first ideas for the exchange are available at http://www.innovationexchange.net

One of My Photos Published by Eroski Foundation Publication

From Flickr Stream - Grandfather and Grandson

The translation of the article is here and is about how grandparents help take care of their grandchildren and help their children save money on day care costs.   

Dear Beth

This is to inform you that we have made an information of Consumer.es EROSKI, specially ‘El ahorro en guarderías, gracias a los abuelos' illustrated with one of your pictures that has Creative Commons license.

Consumer.es EROSKI is the consumer magazine edited by Eroski Foundation. The cooperative Eroski is a consumer association that has made a special effort giving training and information to consumers for over 20 years. Its aim is always to analyze the daily life from consumer´s rights point of view. Consumer.es EROSKI is a non-profit organization and it does not include any advertisement.

Of course, the picture has been named adding a link to your personal website at the bottom of itself. Thus, our users all (over 3.000.000 visits per month by Oficina de la Justificación de la Difusión, OJD), can access to your website.

Thank you in anticipation,

Yours Faithfully,

Benyi Arregocés Carrere
CONSUMER.es EROSKI

Interplast Releases Story of Healing under CC License

Click To Play

Received an email from Interplast's Seth Mazow about this:

In 1997, a film crew accompanied an Interplast volunteer surgical team to An Giang province in Vietnam's Mekong Delta. The filmmakers donated their services to document the team's experiences and produce A Story of Healing, which earned the 1997 Academy Award for best documentary short subject. The 28-minute film is followed by a short epilogue after the credits which follows-up on two patients 16 months after their surgeries.

Ten years after its original release, A Story of Healing has been released under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivatives license (by-nc-nd) and is available for free online.

nterplast’s 1997 Academy Award® winning documentary, “A Story of Healing,” has been re-released today under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommerical-No Derivatives license (by-nc-nd). This marks the first time in history that an Academy Award® winning film has been licensed under any Creative Commons license, allowing free and legal distribution of the film via the Internet. We'll be showing it tonight (Wed. 4/18) at the Creative Commons Salon from 7-9pm at Shine (1337 Mission) in San Francisco, so come by and say hi if you live nearby.  If not, feel free to watch the video at the top of this post or on the Interplast website.

Or better yet, embed it on your website or blog by going to the film's page on Blip, clicking “Share” and following the instructions. We hope that by publishing our media under a Creative Commons license we can encourage people to spread the word about Interplast's work. For this reason, Interplast has licensed thousands of photos on our Flickr photostream (such as all the ones on this blog) and dozens of videos on Blip.tv under a Creative Commons by-nc-nd license.

  We hope that other nonprofits see the benefit of distributing their photos and videos via the Internet under any of the Creative Commons licenses so that the public can more easily share info about change-makers worldwide. Creative Commons, American Public Television, Blip.tv and Steve Rhodes were instrumental in helping us make this happen, and we're deeply grateful for their help.

The film be presented at cc Salon tonight.

Open Content for Nonprofits: Wanna talk about it?

Michelle Murrain has set up a new NTEN Affinity Group called Open Content Business Models.  The description:

There has been a lot of discussion in the nonprofit technology community about open content. Open content is content (papers, articles, presentations, graphics, etc.) that is freely available, and released under a Creative Commons (or similar) license. But, so far, a successful business model has not be tested or evaluated. This group is designed to provide a forum for frank discussions of open content business models for the nonprofit sector, to discuss what works, what doesn't work, how to evaluate different models, and, eventually, to help develop, disseminate and foster different kinds of content business models that provide the ability to provide quality content to the sector in ways that are both financially sustainable for the authors and editors, and are as open and freely accessible as possible. Please join, and enter into the conversation.

The conversation about Open Content started percolating in the NpTech blogopshere sparked by a thoughtful post from Michelle Murrain commenting on the licensing of the new Journal of Information Technology and Social Change.  Michael Gilbert responded here.  Michelle Murrain summarizes the discussion and adds some food for thought.

Laura Quinn explains why she feels the "all content should be open" attitude is not responsible and explains how/why there aren't sustainable business models in nonprofit content creation.  Her call to action:  "If we want good nonprofit content in the world, we can’t just arbitrarily demand openness. We can't assume that someone else will foot the bill for us, because that just isn't a sustanable long term solution. We need to support the organizations that are writing it in figuring out how to cover their costs. Or these organizations will simply cease to exist."

Where Most Needed had this to say.  In the comments, Michele Martin points to an interesting article "Saying You Can't Compete for Free Is Saying You Can't Compete"

What is your take ...on Open Content for Nonprofits?  Please join, and enter into the conversation.

Penguin Day Reflections: OS as FairTrade, OS Feminism, and OS - the Next Generation

Open Source Feminism - Click to Play

Penguin Day is a day-long workshop for nonprofit organizations to explore the range of issues and options inovlved in using Free and Open Source Software.  Penguin Days happen in different locations several times a year and for the past three years, these meetings have taken place after the annual NTC: Nonprofit Technology Conference.  Last Saturday, I attended my first one.  Although I was pretty exhausted by Saturday,  I learned a great deal.

I was curious to observe the gender balance at Penguin Day and while I'm not as meticulous as Christine in counting and calculating the number of women and men in the room, I took a quick video to get a reading. Very roughly, the percentages for Penguin Day look better than industry standards for both OS and commercial software.  The video incorporates some slides from Angela Byron's excellent presentation, "Women in Floss" which also speaks to the dark side of gender issues in FOSS communities.  The presentation offers some good pointers to women in how to get involved in FOSS communities.

Click To Play

The morning started off with a Spectrogram Session.  A line was drawn with duct tape from one side of the room to the other.  Aspiration's Executive Director, Allen Gunn, read a series of opinion statements and asked if we disagreed or agreed or were neutral.   Everyone in the room found a place on the line relative to their opinion.  A group dialogue followed allowing people to articulate why they felt one way or other.

I'm sort of foggy on all the questions - due to my tired state, but the first set of opinion statements was "Nonprofits should adopt open source software for practical reasons" and "Nonprofits should adopt open source software for philosophical reasons."    The discussion reminded of the one I heard in the UK and read later on the Circuit Riders list "Is Open Source Fair Trade for Nonprofits?" (Interesting that KhmerOS had a table at the Cambodia Fair Trade Expo)

The video captures those on the philsophical side.  I was standing on the "adopt for practical reasons" side of the line.  I was somewhat persuaded to come closer to the middle in listening to David's and Jamie's arguments.   I think that of advocates need to have open source technology stewards behind them to be successful -- there is a need for stewards to guide the choices, training, translators -- to help nonprofits adopt open source software.

Might I dare suggest that future spectrograms include a question about gender balance in OS? Or, has this issue already been discussed in this context?

I attended a session about OS Online Communities facilitated by the Joomla! guy (whose name I can't remember due to my exhausted state and I apologize for that). UPDATE:  His name is Johan Janssens.  He told the story about the growth and challenges facing the Joomla! community.  (These stories need to be written down and it sparked a memory of a conversation I had with Zittrain at iLaw in 2005 who pointed me to a researcher at HBS who was looking at Open Source Software Communities.)

The questions that emerged from this group were not different from those that are asked when we talk about online facilitation and online communities.   These folks would be perfect participants for Nancy White's Online Facilitation Workhop. 

• How to bring new people up to speed.  How to get the good pieces to rise to the top.
• What are the tactics for supporting online open source communities?
• What makes online forums work or not work?  What are the best practices?
• How to get into the forums without being labeled as a stupid newbie
• How to engage people in valuable conversation?
• How to prepare the next generation of moderators in OS communities?
• What is the best tool for very large communities?
• How well does the tool support the organic growth of the community?
• What are the techniques for conversational weaving?
• What is the gensis of an open source community? 
• Since OS communities generally begin with a small group of developers or a scratch your own itch approach and some developers tend to be egomanics - how do you build community within this culture?

I participated in the speed geek session where about ten people get to pitch a project or idea to a rotating group of four or five people.  I pitched my Open Content game for Nonprofits.  In retrospect, I designed the game more for a range people who work in a nonprofits - technical and mangerial - and this audience a mix of more technical and technology providers.    Still, I got a lot of great feedback for the next remix of this game.  (Sorry Janet, no videos too tired to multi-task.)

After a lunch of pizza (which accelerated my tiredness), I lead a very small group informal discussion on Open Content.  We didn't play the game, but we had a great discussion about the creative commons licensing and the issues the notion of open content surfaces.

While she was busy facilitating a linux session, Michele Murrain had managed to blog a very thoughtful post shining a light on the Open Content issues (pay for it or set it free).  I agree with Michele's viewpoint, although I understand why Michael Gilbert and Laura Quinn respectfully disagree:

But ultimately, yes, I do think that all content that we provide to the nonprofit sector should be freely available, and under Creative Commons (or similar) licensing. That's the only way to provide important information to nonprofits that need it - some have a hard time affording even nominal fees for that sort of thing.

Click to Play - Adam Thompson Interview

At the end of the day, I met Adam Thompson who teaches at UofC Santa Cruz and I discovered that he distributes some of my blog content to his 25-40 students each semester.   He notes that the field is changing fast and that the blogosphere moves faster than textbooks and the "by" license makes this sharing easier. 

So, if my content was locked up and available on a fee basis, I might make some money but then again I might have less exposure.  I guess the key whether your main source of income is from the sales of your actual content or whether your content is line extension and you make your income via consulting or teaching.  Lots to think about here.

Click to Play - Are Mediated Experiences Bad?

I went out for a group dinner after Penguin Day.   I got a ride from Simon Rowland who was using his blackberry and GPS to help navigate to the restaurant to meet up with the rest of the group. In the front seat, Simon was talking about mediated experience with Zac Mutrux and how our engagement with gagets gets in the way of us being in the moment and interacting with people face-to-face.   This reminded of a post I wrote called "Shall we put away the cameras and have a conversation?"

This calls to mind a debate in the educator community about some years ago about computer-mediated experiences - and how it is a (mostly) bad thing.  Has this view changed by the pervasive Internet access? What struck me is that Simon is probably a Gen Y and Zac a Gen X and I'm a babyboomer.  My perception was that younger people do not feel mediated experience is a bad thing.  I was wrong -- this attitude isn't necessarily generational.

Click to Play - OS Next Generation
Music - Voyage Black

And, since I mentioned generations, my kids are "We Gen" and I wonder if they think mediated experience is a bad thing?   I must also mention that the blow up penguins were huge hit in our house - they are still being flung down the stairs.   Even more importantly, it gave me a chance to introduce the kids to the concept of Open Source software -- Harry's observations about penguins were interesting.

Creative Commons Affnity Group at NTC

 

I am sitting in an affinity group session for nonprofits and creative commons.  The facilitator is Amit Asaravala from Techsoup.   He gave an informative overview of the creative commons licensing and how TechSoup is using the licensing.    Some good points about why nonprofits should use creative commons licensing:

• Reducing time and cost of granting permission
• Enlist constituents and other organizations in hleping to spread your message
• Reach constituents outside your immediate circle
• Access free content

And, my article was published over at icommons -Open content for nonprofits: developing a learning card game

See you at Penguin Day on DC! Penguin Toys?

Source:  From screencapture at Penguin Day Site

Are you passionate or curious about the reality, the potential and the role of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) in nonprofit organizations? Do you want to learn about latest free and open web publishing tools and technologies? Would you like to meet other like-minded and passionate participants, including developers, activists, and nonprofit "techies"? Penguin Day DC will bring together nonprofit technology staff with free and open source software (FOSS) developers for a day of learning and conversation.

I'm really excited, I'm going to Penguin Day - it's on the Saturday after NTC.  You can still register.  Details here.

I told my daughter Sara, who is 5, that I am going to Penguin Day on my business trip.  She got very excited.  No, not about FOSS (sorry), but at the possibility that there might be some Penguin swag -- maybe even a Penguin stuffed animal.   She wants me to bring her home a Penguin something or other.    Harry, on the other hand, wanted to know if there was an FOSS version of Zoo Tycoon that featured Penguins?  Any ideas?

Open Content for Nonprofits: Developing A Learning Game - Beta Version

Images from the Creative Commons Comic book and remixed for the card game

People, like me, who work in the nonprofit technology field are very aware of and are often advocates for Free and Open Source Software (F/OSS).  In 2004, a trio of nonprofit technology organizations, Aspiration (www.aspirationtech.org) NOSI (www.nosi.net) and the LINC Project (www.lincproject.org), established Penguin Days, an opportunity for nonprofit organizations to explore the range of issues and options inovlved in using Free and Open Source Software.

Penguin Days happen in different locations several times a year and for the past three years, a Penguin Day, takes place following the annual NTC: Nonprofit Technology Conference, the largest gathering of nonprofit techies from all over the world. The event began and still continues to be an important conversation about the challenges and opportunities nonprofits face as they adopt Free and Open Source Software.

For this year's Penguin Day, the topic of Open Content is on the agenda and I've been asked to facilitate a session.   The participants may have awareness of Creative Commons licensing, some may already be using it, but others may be new to the idea.  Further,  the idea of remixing and open content is something that is just beginning to spread in the nonprofit sector - so this session will be more of introduction and exploration of what issues come up as we try to use Creative Commons for content in the nonprofit sector.

I am not a lawyer or legal expert, but you don't need to be to understand and use Creative Commons licenses.   I wondered,  "How can I incorporate the use of Open Content ideas and demonstrate their value in the content of the session itself?  In other words, how I can walk the walk of using or remixing open content in a workshop setting?"

In researching instructional materials and resources licensed under Creative Commons license or in the public domain, I came across Lucy Chili's Copyright and Commons Publishing Game.  This became my initial inspiration or building on someone's effort to create a game to learn about the Creative Commons Licensing and Open Publishing!   Even better, the game was developed for Software Freedom Day!    

I wondered though whether I had to use a verbaitem copy of the game or whether I could create a derivative game based upon her game.   I found what I needed in this document.  I also emailed Janet Hawtin to ask her advice for adapting the game as a way for learning about the creative commons licenses.  She further expanded her metaphor of Unix Permissions and Open Content.   I was excited by this I'm bound to have some folks in the workshop who can certainly build on this idea!

Janet's game was a brilliant example of how content creators to learning about open publishing.  But, how to further adapt this game for people who work primarily with nonprofits?   I had to look no further than David Wilcox's Social Media Game.  David and I did a workshop at the LASA Conference back in January to introduce Social Media tools for nonprofits.  David has licensed this games as a Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike.  That means I can adapt and remix, as long as distribute with the same license and give David attribution.

Okay, so here's the here's the description for session:

While there is much discussion about the promise of "Open Source" software, there is much promise and potential in creation and utilization of "Open Content" for nonprofit needs. The building blocks for Open Content are the Creative Commons licenses. This session will use an open content training game that was created by remixing Creative Commons licensed instructional materials. The game will offer an opportunity for participants to discuss their open content ideas, questions and challenges. We will also take a look at other open content projects benefitting the nonprofit sector.

I want to use some of the excellent materails over at the Creative Commons site that introduce the why and what of creative commons licenses.  I've decided to start with these:

• Why Creative Commons: Get Creative Movie

• What: Choosing A License and Creative Commons Comic Book

• How: The Six Main Licenses

• Examples of Open Content for Nonprofits
  • NGO-in-a-Box
  • TechSoup Presentation:  Content Distribution in a Nonprofit World
  • Telecentre.org
  • Idealware
  • Unesco Open Training Platform

I loved the comic book characters and decided that I would use these for the artwork on the card game!  I will also use Flickr Creative Commons licensed photos for some of other cards as well as incorporate verbaitem David's Tool cards and Janet's publishing cards.   

My biggest question is what license should I choose for my version of the game?  I'm thinking it should be this one.

Here is a description of the card game:

The Creative Commons License and Open Content for Nonprofits Game

Purpose:  To trigger conversations about what creative commons licenses may be appropriate in different situations, and further explore the issues that may be raised in the context of nonprofit adoption of cc licenses for open content projects.

Props:

• Instructions (see below) 
• Pack of Cards Download cards.pdf
• Scenarios: one-liners about an individual, group, organisation, network or other situation where they implement an open publishing or content project.

Play of the Game

1. Workshop participant split into small groups (or maybe not)

2. Each group is given a one-line scenario.  They spend a couple of minutes expanding on this, and the likely open content project.  The scenarios might include:

-An international NGO that provides technical assistance, professional development, and networking for development professionals around the world.  The NGO offers a workshop on how to use online communities to support development practices.  It wants to publish the curriculum.

-A national organization that provides nonprofit technology consulting, services, programs, and education wants to publish an online magazine.  It wants to transition from "all rights reserved."

-A regional nonprofit organization is running advocacy campaign and is sponsoring a photo contest.  It hopes to use some of the photos in its publications.

3. Groups choose from a pack of cards to address scenario.  Cards are different options in the following categories:

-copyright and commons licenses (artwork from Creative Commons Comic)
-source materials (art work from Janet Hawkin's game)
-publishing tools (idea and text in some cases from David Wilcox)
-publishing projects (I hacked this)
-blank cards

4.  Groups do not have to use all the cards, can modify or add cards

5. After choosing/adding cards to address the scenario, the group reflect on issues/queries on the cards chosen.  What's going to be the big challenge?

If there's more time we usually go in to storytelling with a timeline at this stage - the group is asked develop the story of how people and groups use the tools in practice. Organisers to throw in crisis/opportunity cards to liven things up!

Next, we'd break into 3 small groups and each group would be given a pack of cards.  The cards would include: creative commons license cards (source material and published material), publishing tools/platforms, and types of publishing content/projects.   Each group would be asked to:

1.  Brainstorm a context - ngo, goals, strategy, type of project
2.  Pick tools, publishing license
3.  Discuss issues/questions that come up
4.  Bring everyone together for a report out.

More resources on my wiki - comments and feedback on this game most appreciated. 

• How to simplify?
• Instructional design advice?
• Are there types of publishing projects, tools, or licenses missing that are critical?
• Graphic design - need to make sure that categories or suits are clearly labeled on cards and there is some sort of color coding.
• David's game is licensed sa-nc-by and Janet's game is not cc licensed, but similar to free software.  What license should I choose for this game?  And, since I've published this post on my blog, which licensed with cc "by" license - is there a clear answer? 
• Anything else to think about?

Growth of Creative Commons Photos on Flickr

I need to finish my Open Content/Creative Commons card game before I leave tommorrow ... so, while working on it I found the above data and just had to remix and blog it.  The chart was generated by a program called Swivel.  What's cool is that you can remix the chart graphics (see below) and Swivel has CC licensing.  Some other metrics can be found here.

 

The Iron Cage of Copyright

Interesting article over at the icommons.org site called CC Licensing Practice Reviewed Alek Tarkowski, ccPoland  It mentions an experiment in a dutch town where they removed the traffic signs or the rules.   As noted in the article,

Once rules are removed, people become considerate. Lacking formal guidelines, they establish order intuitively - through gestures or eye contact.

It goes to point to some alternative viewpoints on cc licensing:

A similar argument is made by Niva Elkin-Koren in “Creative Commons: A Skeptical View of a Worthy Pursuit”, in which she argues that Creative Commons licensing, even if introducing an alternative and open licensing model, nevertheless “strengthens the hold of copyright in our everyday life.” The concept and mechanisms of licensing are introduced to people who would not previously consider copyrighting their works, and thus possibly commodify their creations. Creative Commons, writes Elkin-Koren, “may actually strengthen the rights discourse and the hold of property as a conceptual framework and regulatory scheme for creative works.”

He goes on to explain how creative commons works differently in theory and in practice:

If there is an “iron cage of copyright” clamping down culture, as the criticism goes, then schemes like Creative Commons, piggy-backing on top of the copyright system, are inadvertently helping to build that cage. There is truth to this argument - but only as long as we look at the Creative Commons licensing model as an abstract design. This picture changes, in my belief, once we look at actual licensing practices.

The truth is, we know very little about this, as there have been no rigorous studies of open licensing practice. All evidence we have at the moment is anecdotal. Yet even a quick look at the way content is licenced shows that licensors approach licensing in a much looser manner than intended. Looking at some random CC licenced examples, I’ve found content licenced without referring to the particular terms of the licence, as if a simple “Creative Commons licence” existed. I’ve found copies and derivative works used without proper attribution, sites with community-built content using the CC licensing scheme, but only partially, and the use of a different licence than the one providing intended freedoms and limitations, and so on.

To some extent these are mistakes, probably due to insignificant knowledge, and these errors that can be corrected with a bit of effort. But this is also a sign that licensors use CC licences in their own fuzzy ways - almost everything on the internet becomes appropriated by the users and it would be surprising if things were different with CC licences. What this ‘sloppiness’ suggests is that people using the licences are not the rational, calculating licensors that the above-mentioned critics assume they are, and the licences are used only to some extent, as the legal tools that they are designed to be.

The alternative licensing scheme in the form of Creative Commons licences is confusing even to many lawyers who specialise in intellectual property law. No wonder that it is an arcane matter for the average content creator – even though six CC licences doesn’t seem like a big number. People still get confused by licensing choices and often the decisions they make might not be rational. What’s left is the Creative Commons logo and name - and these are treated as symbols of certain values, such as openness and sharing. For many people the phrase “CC licenced” is more of a badge of affiliation to a social and cultural movement, than a label for a legal licensing scheme.

Some Thinking Outloud About Open Content for Nonprofits and Penguin Day Session

 

This year, I'm staying in on for Penguin Day and am facilitating sesion on Open Content and Nonprofits.  Here's the description.

While there is much discussion about the promise of "Open Source" software, there is arguably more promise and potential in creation and utilization of "Open Content" for nonprofit needs. This session will define core concepts including the Creative Commons license, and then offer examples of how open content is already benefitting the nonprofit sector. Participants are encouraged to bring their own open content ideas, questions and challenges to the dialog

So, for demonstration of the value of open content, I am remixing two existing games for these session:

• The Social Media Game from David Wilcox
• Lucy Chilli's Copyright and Commons Publishing Game

I'll start the session with a very brief overview of examples (NGO in a box - Open Publishing) and an overview of the CC licenses.   Next, we'd break into 3 small groups and each group would be given a pack of cards.  The cards would include: creative commons license cards (source material and published material), publishing tools/platforms, and types of publishing content/projects.   Each group would be asked to:

1.  Brainstorm a context - ngo, goals, strategy, type of project
2.  Pick tools, publishing license
3.  Discuss issues/questions that come up
4.  Bring everyone together for a report out.

Need your feedback:

• The cards will be in three categories: CC license, publishing tools/platforms, and types of projects.  I'll include some blank cards, but need to identify specifically what licenses, what tools, and what types of projects.  Do I need anything type of card?  Ideas appreciated. 

• I'm debating about giving each group a different scenario - like the questions here

• What examples exist of Open Content/Publishing in nonprofit sector?

Some questions/issues/further exploration:

Map the Unix Read Write  Permissions to Creative Commons Licensing
Matrix
http://www.lucychili.net/au/

Question: Is CC by/NC considered open content?  Why? or Why Not?

Resources:

Resources from CC site to have handy - will be wireless in the room:
To download graphics of license and logos (here)
The simple how to choose a license  - what changes with 3.0?
The CC Comic - Use some of the images in cards:
http://creativecommons.org/about/licenses/how1
http://creativecommons.org/about/licenses/comics1
Legal Terms:
http://creativecommons.org/about/legal
Detail FAQ
http://wiki.creativecommons.org/FAQ

Educause
http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7023.pdf

How to license mixed media, without a law degree

Beth's Flickr Stream

From Icommons comes an incredibly useful legal brief to remixing media in the age of participatory media and campaigns by Steve Vosloo, Digital Hero Book Project.  What's even better, you don't need a law degree to understand it! 

The post answers the questions:

• How do you negotiate the potential minefield of legalese surrounding your content?
• How can you be creative and stay legal?
• And how do you protect your own digital creations when you put them out there for the benefit of millions of screaming fans?

There are some issues related to the remix chain and what is or isn't fair use.  But one scenario, well I had that very question in a video I just published:

I create a short movie, comprised of a video clip and three digital photos that I took, my -over and a royalty-free soundtrack song, which I bought from Premium Beat. How do I communicate my content’s licensing and that of the sound bite? Must I always create credits for the movie, shown at the end?

When deciding where to indicate licensing information, it is again a case of “more is better”. CC takes a three-pronged approach to this:

1)    Include credit information in the media itself, for example credits shown at the end of a video or, as in the case of Magnatune, a “shout-out” at the end of their try-before-you-buy audio tracks referring listeners to Magnatune;

2) Include credit information on the website or other source from where the content is being downloaded, for example, on the page for American Bach Soloists Favorite Cantatas album on Magnatune there is a clear link to license information for that album. If you upload your images to Flickr, the license information is displayed on the photo page;

3)    Embed the license information directly into the file. Currently this is only possible with MP3 audio files through embedding of metadata into the file itself. The CC developers have promised this functionality in additional formats – images, video, etc. – in the future.

In the example of the movie you created, what you need to say regarding the bought song all depends on the licensing terms of use for the third-party from where you bought the content. Sorry folks, but you have to read those terms and act appropriately! In the case of Premium Beat, they retain ownership of the file, even though you buy a worldwide “non-exclusive” license to play the song. You can’t sell the song, though. Based on the terms, the credit for this video should include the song information as follows: “‘Sounds of Samba’. Some rights reserved, PremiumBeat.com.”