Free Software, Free Culture Trajectories, and Free Culture Conference
@mlinksva just put out a great slide show, albeit the over-use of bullet points ;), that is an overview of CC as well as a general look at the historical trajectories of Free Software and how Free Culture Movement is approximately 10 years behind. This is a great beginning at the more intimate look at where WE are heading collectively, because of course, Free Software and Free Culture’s paths are intermingled. It would be quite interesting actually to write a book about these paths with major highlights and where WE are heading.
Yes, I know there are many books analyzing Free Software and then some coming out like David Bollier’s Viral Spiral that looks at Commons production overall including rise of Creative Commons, but actually one looking at the larger scope of Free Culture would be quite interesting.
Check out the slides and throw em up if you have any comments:
BTW, I wonder if we should collectively be working on a more finite conference about the Free Culture Movement for next year. This would be one targeted towards production of content, assessing failed projects, live events, and no eunuchs to assist in cultural production. The idea is that this conference would directly fit into the trajectory of Free Software. This conference would be in the optimal location globally for most people to attend for the least amount of expenditure, such as Amsterdam, Vancouver, Singapore, or a better optimized location. I think we can learn from Wikimania in Cairo and conferences in Sapporo as absurd for more than the usual suspects on the conference circuit (of which I am a part).
Free Culture Conference (”Get your FreeCon”) would be a meeting of specific projects to hash out interrelationships and collective trajectories for the coming year. We have had great success with the Libre Graphics Meeting which is not about people hand waving and armchair philosophizing about every single person’s movement, but specific projects coming together to their roadmap, challenges for interoperability, and real hacking on projects more than just declarations.
What would it take to put on a proper Free Culture Conference and who would need to be present. I would say:
Free Software Foundation
Creative Commons
Wikimedia Properties
Gnome Foundation
Open Courseware Consortium
Internet Archive
And the list keeps going on…please add to, as this is just off the head…the number of companies that would be interested in this intermixing would be quite high IMO. I’m particularly interested in this being a place for companies interested in Open Hardware and Specifications to intermingle (aka, Openmoko, VIA, Intel)
The idea is that this is a place where project roadmaps are compared, integrations resolved (like Wikipedia BY-SA compatibility), and real hacking would take place. Also, this conference would be 2-3 days max and marked with conversions of projects to more liberalized licensing as affirmations each day to pump up participants [0]. The goal of the event would be to produce actual statements showing resolutions with implementation to back them up, and to announce the next 5-10 free culture priorities for the year.
Is anyone interested in this?
[0] I’ve called this Freedom Day before, but it needs a better name without the negative associations with Freedom in many asian countries - aka, freedom means free as in destroy the government, which this is NOT. Rather, the idea of Freedom Day would be for projects to announce using free licenses and/or moving from more restrictive licenses to more free licenses. What would a better name for this annual day be? What about SHARING DAY, or Global Day of Sharing
Hell yeah!
However, I can’t parse your sentence “I think we can learn from Wikimania in Cairo and conferences in Sapporo as absurd for more the usual suspects on the conference circuit (of which I am a part).”
did you miss a word after “absurd”?
Comment by pfctdayelise — August 6, 2008 @ 1:45 am
in situations like these, I wish I had an English-language blog to link and comment!
Jon, thanks for some extra early catalization of good ideas that could push us forward! As for the name, creativity is big on my list of important things, so I’d call it “Creation Day” ^^. Or just “GROW”, like that weird click-and-grow game.
As for the content, one thing I’d avoid are keynotes. In the end, they semm like a waste of time. Or I’d do them differently, XXI century style: have them pre-recorded and available beforehand. At best sent to people on cheap portable video players, to watch on the plane and the train and the bus. Cause people need inspiration.
2-3 days, that’s tough to fill meaningfully. But people should have a bit of time to hack on what they are good at; and a bit of time to try hacking something new. And there’s the challenge of having the project / communities mesh - it’s easy to set up separate tracks, but how to make them work together? Maybe something basic, that anyone can do, like a fill-up-the-Wikipedia sprint, with funny teams from all over the scene writing up obscure examples of free culture.
And I wish someone did a proper re-thinking of all the available models: the un-conferences, the chaos congresses, the dorkbots, the keynote-driven TED events (good keynotes), the isummits, the wikimanias, etc. etc. - what works best?
One more idea. Every group has its own conference / meeting - do they need, and have time and money, to join one more meeting? What would be the special part, other than there would be so many different communities and too many people? Or would that precisely be the point?
Comment by Alek — August 6, 2008 @ 2:20 am
@pfctdayelise Yes, I missed word which I added to the post meaning it sis more absurd for the non-usual suspects…aka, the usual folks who can find the money for exotic locations.
@alek Yes, all these projects should have their own and do mostly, except CC, have their own event. The key idea for this event is that it is focused on the overlap between the projects.
Would be good to have half the day as all together and then half the day separated into: create and hack. Then, the night could be Party.
Parties are just as important as the conference. Free drinks and/or a set party each night with people from the conference performing, and basic cheers throughout the night.
Ideally, hotel and conference are at the exact same location or within walking distance. Conference attendees should be bussed to locations for events at night to get out and see things.
Also, eating should be on schedule with optional standing room and seating.
For host city, the culture of the city is important, but not as important as different cultures mixing together throughout the entire days of the event, especially with the topics of the FreeCon.
@alek pseudo agree on the keynotes. What would be good is for each major project to chart out roadmaps at the beginning of the event and what they want to get out of the FreeCon from other projects to initiate discussion. Ideally, issues are moved fwd because of the higher bandwidth (make sure not to waste those times together!).
@alek on the name of the SHARING/CREATION day. The idea is for anyone to put something that exists into the commons and/or create something to put into the commons, or move current licensing to more liberal licensing…what can encompass all that and still be easy to GROK by all?
Comment by jon — August 6, 2008 @ 3:32 am
@jon love the idea of this day, already been thinking about it in terms of long gestating viewshareremix.com
A much bigger and ambitious aggregation of sectors/institutions in your post.
I think a hub, or ‘just off’ hub would be ideal for a central event location. As much as I would have loved to take time-out to come to Sapporo, it was just too way off (plus you know if you make a location like that you want to spend much extra time exploring the locale).
I’d recommend somewhere like Istanbul near Europe, or Vancouver (as you suggest) or Montreal in North America.
Comment by Matt Hanson — August 6, 2008 @ 12:41 pm
Absolutely! Actually, looks like the http://fscons.org conference is covering many of the things I blogged about and would be a good venue.
I think some type of cultural event around the concepts of the commons would be excellent!
Comment by jon — August 7, 2008 @ 8:50 am
Other participants:
NOSI
Students for Free Culture
Great idea for a conference. If it is 2 or 3 days I would run half of it like a Bar Camp. Let the community choose some topics and activities.
Comment by Brian Rowe — August 7, 2008 @ 1:37 pm
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