Press Releases
OPEN COPYRIGHT LICENSES OFFERED IN AUSTRALIA
Creative Commons and the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) introduce innovative copyright licenses to Australia
San Francisco, USA and Brisbane, AUSTRALIA Jan. 19, 2005 Creative Commons, a nonprofit organization that offers a flexible copyright for creative work, today unveiled a localized version of its innovative licensing system in Australia. The Creative Commons licenses afford authors and publishers an intermediate degree of protection over their photos, music, text, films, and educational materials under a “some rights reserved” copyright, in contrast to the traditional “all rights reserved.”
With the announcement, Creative Commons now offers free legal tools in a total of fifteen country-specific versions. The organization already provides copyright licenses specific to Austrian, Belgian, Brazilian, Croatian, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, U.S., Taiwanese, Canadian, and Spanish law, thanks to a global network of artists, lawyers, and technologists.
Staff at Creative Commons’s offices in San Francisco and Berlin worked with project lead Professor Brian Fitzgerald of the Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Australia, to adapt the standardized licenses for use under Australian law.
Professor Fitzgerald, an internationally recognized expert in intellectual property and technology law, said, “Normally to use other people’s copyright you have to go through a time-consuming process to negotiate your legal rights. What we aim to do with Creative Commons is to be able to license or negotiate those rights through a website with the click of a mouse.”
Creative Commons released the new legal tools, which are available free of charge from the Creative Commons website, at a conference at the QUT today. Lawrence Lessig, professor of law at Stanford University and chairman of Creative Commons, delivered a public lecture on open content licencing at the conference.
“It’s wonderful to see this organization become truly global,” said Neeru Paharia, Assistant Director of Creative Commons, who is visiting Brisbane for the launch. “We hope to localize the Creative Commons licences to other countries of the Asia-Pacific region very soon.”
The worldwide expansion of the Creative Commons is one of the main priorities of the San Francisco-based organization for 2005.
About Creative Commons
A nonprofit corporation founded in 2001, Creative Commons promotes the creative re-use of intellectual and artistic works, whether owned or in the public domain, by empowering authors and audiences. It is sustained by the generous support of the Center for the Public Domain, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Omidyar Network Fund, and the Hewlett Foundation.
For general information, visit the Creative Commons website
Contact
Christiane Asschenfeldt(Berlin)
iCommons Director
Creative Commons
christiane@creativecommons.org
Neeru Pahari(San Francisco)
Executive Director
Creative Commons
neeru@creativecommons.org
OPEN COPYRIGHT LICENSES OFFERED IN CROATIA
Creative Commons introduces its innovative copyright licenses at the Free Culture Festival in Zagreb
San Francisco, USA and Zagreb, CROATIA Jan. 19, 2005 Creative Commons, a nonprofit organization that provides a flexible copyright for authors and artists, this week unveiled a localized version of its innovative licensing system in Croatia. The Creative Commons licenses afford authors and publishers an intermediate degree of protection over their photos, music, text, films, and educational materials under a “some rights reserved” copyright, in contrast to the traditional “all rights reserved.”
With the announcement, Creative Commons now offers free legal tools in a total of fourteen country-specific versions. The organization already provides copyright licenses specific to Austrian, Belgian, Brazilian, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, U.S., Taiwanese, Canadian and Spanish law, thanks to a global network of artists, lawyers, and technologists.
Staff at Creative Commons’s offices in San Francisco and Berlin worked with project leads Tomislav Medak and Diane Kovaeeviae Remenariae of the Multimedia Institute (mi2), Zagreb, to adapt the standardized licenses for use under Croatian law.
Medak said, “In Croatia there was a powerful grass-roots free culture movement even before we started transposing the licenses into Croatian law. We hope to be able to build on the festival’s momentum to promote rapid license uptake.”
Creative Commons released the new legal tools, which are available free of charge from the Creative Commons website, at the Free Culture Festival in Zagreb, which featured an exhibition, various lectures, and a two-day concert that brought together representatives of the burgeoning local music scene and British artists from Loca Records. Lawrence Lessig, professor of law at Stanford University and chairman of Creative Commons, delivered a keynote speech at the festival.
“Many thanks to Diane and Tomislav for their terrific work,” says Glenn Otis Brown, Executive Director of Creative Commons. “The organization’s tremendous international growth is due entirely to our network of top-notch experts and volunteers worldwide. ”
The continued global expansion of Creative Commons is one of the main priorities of the San Francisco-based organization for 2005.
About Creative Commons
A nonprofit corporation founded in 2001, Creative Commons promotes the creative re-use of intellectual and artistic works, whether owned or in the public domain, by empowering authors and audiences. It is sustained by the generous support of the Center for the Public Domain, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Omidyar Network Fund, and the Hewlett Foundation.
For general information, visit the Creative Commons website
Contact
Christiane Asschenfeldt (Berlin)
iCommons Coordinator
Creative Commons
Glenn Otis Brown (San Francisco)
Executive Director
Creative Commons
CREATIVE COMMONS COPYRIGHT TOOLS NOW AVAILABLE IN SOUTH KOREA
The Silicon Valley nonprofit releases South Korean versions of its innovative copyright licenses at the High Court in Seoul.
San Francisco, USA and Seoul, SOUTH KOREA, March 21, 2005 – Creative Commons, a non-profit organization that offers free, flexible copyright tools to the general public, today unveiled a localized version of its innovative licensing system in South Korea. The Creative Commons licenses are available (free of charge) from the group’s website http://www.creativecommons.org. – affording authors and publishers an intermediate degree of protection over their photos, music, text, films, and educational materials under a “some rights reserved” copyright, in contrast to the traditional “all rights reserved.”
With South Korea being the latest country to join its international effort, Creative Commons now offers free legal tools in a total of 15 country-specific versions. The organization already provides copyright licenses specific to Australian, Austrian, Brazilian, Belgian, Croatian, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, U.S., Taiwanese, Canadian, and Spanish law, thanks to a global network of artists, lawyers, and technologists.
Staff at Creative Common’s offices in San Francisco and Berlin worked with Professor Suk-Ho Bang of Hongik University, Seoul and project lead Professor Dae-Hee Lee of the Inha Law School and the Korea Association for Info-Media Law (KAFIL) as Affiliate Institution to adapt the standardized licenses for use under Korean law.
“We are very happy to make Creative Commons a reality for artists, lawyers and Internet users here in South Korea”, says Professor Suk-Ho Bang. Professor Suk-Ho Bang and his team worked together with Judge Jongsoo Yoon to release the Creative Commons licenses in South Korea.
The Creative Commons South Korean licenses were launched at an official function at the South Korean High Court in Seoul. Chairman of the Creative Commons Board, Professor Lawrence Lessig, presented at the function and also discussed Creative Commons with judges from the South Korean High Court.
The ongoing global expansion of the Creative Commons project is one of the main priorities of the San Francisco-based organization this year.
About Korea Association for Info-Media Law (KAFIL)
KAFIL was found in 1996 by distinguished leadership of Judge Chan-Hyun Hwang. KAFIL focuses on information law issues. KAFIL is a unique organization in part because of its member composition. The majority of regular members are judges and public prosecutors and thus, it is situated as the leading law association in Korea, bridging academicians and legal professionals. KAFIL holds an annual symposium around June and three academic seminars at other times during the year. In addition, KAFIL hosts bimonthly case study workshops that enable debates among legal professionals on topical issues. KAFIL also published its own law journal on biannual basis.
For general information, visit KAFIL’s website
For information about iCommons Korea, visit Creative Commons Korea Project site
About Creative Commons
A nonprofit corporation founded in 2001, Creative Commons promotes the creative re-use of intellectual and artistic works — whether owned or in the public domain — by empowering authors and audiences. It is sustained by the generous support of the Center for the Public Domain, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Omidyar Network Fund, and the Hewlett Foundation.
For general information, visit the Creative Commons website
Contacts
Professor Suk-Ho Bang (Seoul)
Inha Law School
bang5555@hotmail.com
Neeru Paharia (San Francisco)
Creative Commons
neeru@creativecommons.org
Christiane Asschenfeldt (Berlin)
iCommons
christiane@creativecommons.org
Creative Commons Expands Internationally & Restructures Its Key Management Team
San Francisco, USA, and London, United Kingdom – May 17, 2005 – Creative Commons, a nonprofit organization dedicated to building a body of creative works free to share and build upon, today announced the launch of Creative Commons International. Incorporated in the UK as a nonprofit organization, Creative Commons International will provide support to the global network of collaboration partners of Creative Commons who have taken on the responsibility of translating the Creative Commons licenses.
To date, as a result of the efforts of our iCommons Executive Director Christiane Asschenfeldt, seventeen different countries – including Brazil, Croatia, Spain, Japan and South Korea – have translated, both literally and legally, the Creative Commons licenses for their local jurisdiction. Twelve other jurisdictions are currently in the process of porting the licenses and overall, Creative Commons is in talks with partners in 70 countries.
Creative Commons International will support Creative Commons’ international collaboration partners after they have launched their locally adapted Creative Commons licenses. This support will include porting Creative Commons’ technologies, such as ccMixter and ccPublisher, to these jurisdictions, representing Creative Commons’ interests in international fora and with significant content providers and artists associations to explain Creative Commons licensing and, thus, indirectly to increase the range of works made available under a Creative Commons license around the globe.
Creative Commons International’s new Executive Director is the former Project Director for the Creative Archive project at the BBC, Paula Le Dieu. Paula has considerable experience in broadcasting and online issues and originally worked in theatre. She is also a dual Australian-English citizen.
The Chairman of the Creative Commons International Board is Joi Ito, a citizen of Japan, and venture capitalist. Joi also serves on the Creative Commons Board of Directors.
Chairman Joi Ito said: “We expect it to be easier to develop a truly international movement if it is directed outside of the United States, and led by non-Americans. Creative Commons’ experience in Africa and Brazil demonstrates that post-launch work with artists is especially important. Organizations within these countries, dedicated to finding ways to support their own local artists, have begun to see Creative Commons as an important tool. By licensing content within the Creative Commons network, access to their creativity can be substantially increased.”
Neeru Paharia, who has served as Assistant Director of Creative Commons since 2002, has been promoted to Executive Director of Creative Commons. Neeru replaces former Creative Commons Executive Director Glenn Otis Brown who has accepted a position as inhouse counsel at Google. Creative Commons CEO and Chairman, Professor Lawrence Lessig, said: “While it is truly a loss to see Glenn go, we are fortunate that, as one of our alumni, we will still have the benefit of Glenn’s insight and experience. We are also fortunate to have Neeru as our new Executive Director because she has worked side-by-side with Glenn over the past three years to establish Creative Commons as a successful organization that speaks to the needs of creators and users of creative works. Neeru is therefore well-placed to maintain the continuity needed to continue to grow Creative Commons and flexibly licensed content.”
Creative Commons has also appointed Mia Garlick to be Creative Commons’ first General Counsel. Mia will work with Creative Commons’ domestic and international offices to oversee legal strategy and advise on the general legal issues that arise for Creative Commons in working towards its goal of encouraging the spread of flexibly licensed content. Mia joins Creative Commons after several years of working in private practice as an intellectual property lawyer.
About Creative Commons
A non-profit founded in 2001, Creative Commons promotes the creative re-use of intellectual and artistic works – whether owned or in the public domain – by empowering artists and audiences. It is sustained by the generous support of the Center for the Public Domain, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Omidyar Network Fund and the Hewlett Foundation. For general information, visit the Creative Commons website
Contact
Neeru Paharia (San Francisco)
Executive Director, Creative Commons
neeru@creativecommons.org
Paula Le Dieu (London)
Executive Director, Creative Commons International
paula@creativecommons.org
Creative Commons Unique Search Tool Now Integrated into Firefox 1.0
CREATIVE COMMONS’ ONE-OF-A-KIND SEARCH ENGINE DEBUTS, HERALDING NEXT-GENERATION WEB SEARCH FEATURES
EXTRA: The new Mozilla Firefox 1.0 browser ships with the Silicon Valley nonprofit’s new search technology, allowing users to comb the web for royalty-free content.
SAN FRANCISCO, USA November 22, 2004 Creative Commons today unveiled an updated beta version of its search engine, which scours the web for text, images, audio, and video free to re-use on certain terms a search refinement offered by no other company or organization today.
Creative Commons’ announcement coincides with the Mozilla Foundation’s release of its industry-leading browser, Firefox 1.0, which now features the Creative Commons search technology in its toolbar alongside such leading search services as Google, Yahoo!, Amazon, eBay, and Dictionary.com.
“The Creative Commons search engine helps companies, educators, and artists find content they can re-use without having to call a lawyer, and it offers authors and artists who want to share their work a competitive advantage toward having their work discovered online,” said Neeru Paharia, assistant director of Creative Commons and the search engine’s product manager.
For example, a documentary filmmaker could use the Creative Commons engine to search for “images of the Eiffel Tower free for noncommercial use,” and incorporate any or all of the many photographs indexed. A DJ seeking songs free to remix or mash-up could browse listings of MP3s by their legal terms. An entrepreneur seeking illustrations for her slideshow presentation could reduce costs and liability by using a Creative Commons image-specific search. An educator building course materials could include texts and videos found by the engine.
What distinguishes the Creative Commons engine from other search services is that all of the above are possible without the hassle of rights-clearance, licensing requests, or royalty payments.
At the core of the Creative Commons search engine are two key innovations, one legal and one technological. First, Creative Commons offers authors and artists a simple, standardized way to mark their work as free to share or transform, on certain conditions. By applying a Creative Commons copyright license and (cc) notice to her work, an author invites the world to make certain uses of it without giving up her copyright. Rather than the traditional “all rights reserved,” a Creative Commons license declares “some rights reserved.”
Second, and complimentary to this free legal tool, is Creative Commons machine-readable translation of the copyright licenses. When an author affixes the (cc) copyright notice to her webpage or MP3 or image file, it is automatically marked with Creative Commons “metadata” as well. It is this metadata — akin to a library catalog card describing a particular book — that the Creative Commons search engine then reads, processes, and presents to users as it crawls the web for their search requests.
The search engine was developed with the help of Nutch.org, an open-source search developer. See http://nutch.org.
Creative Commons metadata is based on a language known as Resource Description Framework (RDF) using Extensible Mark-up Language (XML) as an interchange syntax, designed and standardized by World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the Web standards-setting body.
The beta search engine indexes just under one million web pages, but Creative Commons expects it will soon index the full five million pages known to carry Creative Commons licenses today.
“Creative Commons will keeping working with Nutch.org and other metadata initiatives to index more document types and offer domain-specific and reuse-specific searches,” said Mike Linksvayer, Chief Technical Officer of Creative Commons. “For example, to find music with a certain tempo or works that incorporate a specific piece of film footage.”
No Comments »Creative Commons Copyright Tools Now Available in France
CREATIVE COMMONS COPYRIGHT TOOLS NOW AVAILABLE IN FRANCE
The Silicon Valley nonprofit releases French versions of its innovative copyright licenses at the National Assembly in Paris.
San Francisco, USA and Paris, FRANCE, Nov. 22, 2004 — Creative Commons, a non-profit organization that offers free, flexible copyright tools to the general public, today unveiled a localized version of its innovative licensing system in France. The Creative Commons licenses afford authors and publishers an intermediate degree of protection over their photos, music, text, films, and educational materials under a “some rights reserved” copyright, in contrast to the traditional “all rights reserved.”
With the announcement, Creative Commons now offers free legal tools in a total of eleven country-specific versions. The organization already provides copyright licenses specific to Austrian, Brazilian, Dutch, Finnish, German, Japanese, U.S., Taiwanese, Canadian, and Spanish law, thanks to a global network of artists, lawyers, and technologists.
Staff at Creative Commons’s offices in San Francisco and Berlin worked with project lead Melanie Dulong de Rosnay of the Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches de Science Administrative (CERSA) and the Université Panthéon Paris Assas II to adapt the standardized licenses for use under French law. Ms. Dulong de Rosnay, a researcher at CERSA, specializes in European technology and information society law.
“Our mission was to bring the great spirit of the Creative Commons licenses to France,” said Ms. Dulong de Rosnay. “In doing so, we sought to preserve the key elements of the original US licenses while paying due regard to the specifis of the French law, such as in the cases of contractual law and moral rights. A wide-ranging public discussion has enabled us to come up with some great solutions balancing legal requirements and our new approach.”
Creative Commons released the new legal tools, which are now available free of charge from the Creative Commons website, at a conference in the French National Assembly in Paris on Friday, November 19. The event featured speakers from the media, academia, and the large community of volunteers who coordinated the French legal porting process.
“The concise translation and the superb legal research at CERSA have made possible this important launch in Europe,” said Glenn Otis Brown, executive director of Creative Commons. “Many thanks to Ms. Dulong de Rosnay for her splendid work.”
The global expansion of the Creative Commons project, which is chaired by Lawrence Lessig of Stanford University Law School, is one of the main priorities of the San Francisco-based organization this year.
“After France, we look forward to adding two more big EU countries to the list of available licenses before the end of the year,” said Christiane Asschenfeldt, the International Commons Coordinator, based in Berlin. “Thanks are due to the friends of Creative Commons around the world.”
No Comments »Creative Commons Poised for New Growth Phase with Key New Hires and Expansion into Science
The Silicon Valley nonprofit takes on
new personnel as it prepares to explore a Science Commons, continue its
rapid international expansion, and build upon the precocious success of
its first two years.
SAN FRANCISCO,
USA November 10, 2004 Creative Commons, a nonprofit dedicated to
expanding the range of creative and intellectual works free to share
and build upon, today announced the creation of two new staff positions
as the organization makes the transition from meteoric start-up to
online institution and begins applying its model to scientific research.
Silicon
Valley veteran Mark Resch joins Creative Commons as its overall Chief
Executive Officer, while entrepreneur and metadata expert John Wilbanks
joins as the Executive Director of Science Commons, a newly formed
branch of the organization.
Creative Commons’ long-time core
staff, led by Executive Director Glenn Otis Brown, Assistant Director
Neeru Paharia, and international affairs directors Christiane
Asschenfeldt and Roland Honekamp, will continue on in more specialized
versions of their roles. Under this leadership team, the number of web
pages carrying Creative Commons copyright licenses has grown from zero,
in December 2002, to around five million today. The nonprofit now
offers its free legal tools in nine different languages, with around
three dozen more translations in draft. The organization’s most recent
accomplishments include the sampling- and copying-friendly licensing of
the WIRED CD, a 16-track album featuring the
Beastie Boys, David Byrne, and other top artists, as well as the debut
of a unique semantic-web search engine, which now ships with Mozilla’s
industry-leading browser, Firefox 1.0.
“In just two years,
Brown and Paharia have led the Creative Commons team from the basement
of Stanford Law School to the cover of WIRED,”
said Lawrence Lessig, chairman of Creative Commons and professor of law
at Stanford, referring to the November issue of the magazine. “As the
new overall CEO, Resch brings a specific and
crucial skill-set to Creative Commons at this phase in its growth. The
core staff are now free to focus on their intense substantive workload,
while Resch will help the expanded organization become a broad and
stable movement.”
“Wilbanks’s addition as leader of the new
Science Commons branch also marks a very exciting new phase,” said
Lessig, “as the Creative Commons model is tested in unchartered areas
of intellectual endeavor.”
Mark Resch brings to the new CEO
position a wealth of experience developing successful start-up projects
into mature firms. He is chairman and co-founder of the interactive
system maker Onomy Labs, Inc. and was President and CEO of Commerce Net,
a nonprofit industry consortium that addressed critical enablers of
Internet commerce. At Xerox, Resch developed new Internet business
opportunities and managed http://xerox.com
worldwide. Resch was also co-founder and Vice President of Operations
at Luna Imaging Inc., which created large interactive photography
databases and was funded by the Getty Trust and Eastman Kodak.
Wilbanks
comes to Creative Commons from a Fellowship at the World Wide Web
Consortium in Semantic Web for Life Sciences. Previously, he founded
and led to acquisition Incellico, a bioinformatics company that built
semantic graph networks for use in pharmaceutical discovery.
Structurally,
the Creative Commons corporation will consist of three parallel
projects working in concert and overseen by Resch and chairman Lessig:
- Creative
Commons the existing organization that focuses on copyright and
cultural subject matter like music, images, and educational materials; - International Commons the effort to adapt Creative
Commons’ legal tools to various countries’ legal systems (over 50 and
counting); and - Science Commons a project to build on Creative Commons’ work in open-access scientific publishing (like MIT’s
Open Courseware and the Public Library of Science) and apply Creative
Commons’ voluntary “some rights reserved” approach to patents and
scientific data.
Functionally, both Science Commons
and Creative Commons will overlap with International Commons, and
current staffers will enjoy roles that span the various sections of the
organization.
Brown, for example, who coined the phrase
“some rights reserved” to describe Creative Commons’ middle-ground
approach to copyright, will continue to coordinate messaging strategy
and act as the organization’s main staff attorney. Paharia, who
directed the development of Creative Commons one-of-a-kind search
engine and its innovative MP3-tagging protocol, among other projects, will continue to coordinate business and technology development.
Brown, anticipating Creative Commons’ rapid growth in 2004, first proposed the creation of Resch’s CEO position over a year ago.
“Our
growth has exceeded even our most optimistic expectations,” said Brown,
“but by mid-2003 it was already clear that our extremely lean team had
created a movement that would require new skill sets at various levels
of the organization. We’ve been looking forward to focusing on our
substantive legal and cultural projects full-time, and Mark Resch’s
managerial expertise will help Creative Commons further accelerate its
sustained and stable growth.”
About Creative Commons
A
nonprofit founded in early 2002, Creative Commons promotes the creative
re-use of intellectual and artistic works—whether owned or in the
public domain—by empowering authors and audiences. It is sustained by
the generous support of the Center for the Public Domain, the John D.
and Catherine T. Mac Arthur Foundation, the Omidyar Network, and the Hewlett Foundation.
For general information, visit <http://creativecommons.org>.
About Mark Resch, the new CEO of Creative Commons
Mark
Resch is deeply interested in the mutual interaction of society,
business, and technology. He is Chairman and co-founder of interactive
system maker Onomy Labs, Inc. Resch was President and CEO of Commerce Net,
a nonprofit industry consortium that addressed critical enablers of
Internet commerce. At Xerox Corporation, Resch was developed new
Internet business opportunities and managed http://xerox.com
worldwide. Resch was co-founder and Vice President of Operations at
Luna Imaging Inc., creator of large interactive photography databases,
funded by the Getty Trust and Eastman Kodak. As Vice President and
Director of Computer Imaging at CRSS Architects, Inc. Resch integrated CAD,
GIS, FM, and Visualization software to render data and space. As
Director of Graphic Arts at Computer Curriculum Corporation, Resch
supported the creation of more than 3,000 hours of interactive
courseware for students at risk. Resch was assistant professor of
Computer Art in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and drafted its MFA
degree. Resch served as co-chair for the Association for Computer
Machinery’s Special Interest Group on Computer Graphic and Interactive
Techniques (SIGGRAPH) in 1993, and has served on numerous non-profit
boards.
Resch is originally from Chicago, Illinois, and holds a BA in History from Grinnell College and an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
About John Wilbanks, Executive Director of the Science Commons
John
Wilbanks comes to Creative Commons from a Fellowship at the World Wide
Web Consortium in Semantic Web for Life Sciences. Previously, he
founded and led to acquisition Incellico, a bioinformatics company that
built semantic graph networks for use in pharmaceutical discovery.
Before founding Incellico, John was the first Assistant Director at the
Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School and also
spent time in Washington, DC, USA as a
legislative aide to U.S. Representative Fortney (“Pete”) Stark.
Wilbanks holds a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy from Tulane University.
Contact
Glenn Otis Brown (San Francisco)
Executive Director, Creative Commons
415.946.3065
glenn@creativecommons.org
Press Kit
http://creativecommons.org/presskit/
Remix Radio Show to Debut in the Bay Area This Sunday, 2PM on KALW
Cult radio favorite Benjamen Walker takes listeners through a novel, lawyer-free look at recombinant art.
SAN FRANCISCO, USA October 21, 2004
At 2pm this Sunday, October 24, San Francisco’s KALW
will debut a unique new radio special: “The Creative Remix,” written
and hosted by Benjamen Walker and sponsored by the nonprofit Creative
Commons, is an hour-long “lawyer free” examination of the art, culture,
and history of the remix in the broadest sense of the word. (More: http://mirrors.creativecommons.org/radio/).
The hour kicks off with a musical analysis of a familiar sort of remix: DJ Dangermouse’s
infamous mash-up of the Beatles and Jay-Z. Walker then takes listeners
back in time to check out the ancient Roman art of the poetry mash-up,
or the Cento. The show then rewinds to the 18th century to check out
the birth of copyright and how it affected writers like Alexander Pope;
and the early 20th century when the visual artist Marcel Duchamp used
the remix to reinvent everything. Walker also takes a field trip to the
Mass Mocca museum of modern art to check out the exhibit “Yankee
Remix,” where he talks to a few grad students and a pair of
curmudgeonly New England antique collectors to investigate different
attitudes towards remixing.
In the second part of the
program Walker speaks with three unique remix artists: The historical
novelist Matthew Pearl, “Walkman Buster” Gideon D’arcangelo, and Cory
Arcangel, a Nintendo hacker and one of the youngest representatives at
this year’s Whitney Biennial.
“‘The Creative Remix’ will
enlighten even the confirmed aficionado of recombinant art,” said Glenn
Otis Brown, executive director of Creative Commons. “I manage an
organization dedicated to highlighting artistic re-uses and
transformations, and I had never before thought of remixing in quite
the way Walker presents it. It’s eye-opening stuff for anyone who cares
about art and the increasingly disturbing trend of lawyers’ influencing
it.”
The show airs the same week that WIRED
magazine’s special November music issue hits newsstands. The issue will
ship with a CD with tracks by the likes of the Beastie Boys, Gilberto
Gil, David Byrne, and 13 others. Every song is covered by a Creative
Commons copyright license that invites fans to file-share the songs or
sample from them, on certain conditions. (More: http://creativecommons.org).
About Benjamen Walker
Benjamen Walker’s weekly radio program “The Theory of Everything” can be heard on WZBC
in Boston and, beginning Oct 31st, in San Francisco and on the
Internet. His previous show, “Your Radio Nightlight,” established a
cult following across the country and earned praise and awards from
several publications and other radio shows.
About Creative Commons
A
nonprofit founded in early 2002, Creative Commons promotes the creative
re-use of intellectual and artistic works—whether owned or in the
public domain—by empowering authors and audiences. It is sustained by
the generous support of the Center for the Public Domain, the John D.
and Catherine T. Mac Arthur? Foundation, the Omidyar Network Fund, and the Hewlett Foundation.
For general information, visit <http://creativecommons.org>.
Glenn Otis Brown (San Francisco)
Executive Director, Creative Commons
glenn@creativecommons.org
Press Kit
http://creativecommons.org/presskit/
Open Copyright License Discussion to Start in Belgium
Creative Commons begins work with the
University of Namur’s cyberlaw research center to offer Belgian
versions of its “some rights reserved” copyright licenses
San Francisco, USA and Brussels, BELGIUM Oct.
19, 2004 Creative Commons, a nonprofit dedicated to building a body of
creative work free to share and build upon, announced today its plans
to create localized Belgian versions of its free tools.
Creative Commons copyright licenses, which are available at no charge from the group’s website (http://creativecommons.org),
allow authors and artists to mark their works as free to copy or
transform under certain conditions—to declare “some rights reserved,”
in contrast to the traditional “all rights reserved”—thus eliminating
undue legal friction.
Belgium joins thirteen other nations
in the draft and comment phase of adapting the Creative Commons
licenses. Nine nations today offer localized Creative Commons licenses,
and several dozen more are in the preliminary draft phase.
In
cooperation with the Centre for Research on Computer Law (CRID) at the
University of Namur, Creative Commons has worked to adapt the copyright
licenses for use under Belgian law. CRID
intellectual property experts Séverine Dusollier, Philippe Laurent, and
Loïc Bodson have produced the French language draft, and Mélanie Carly,
a researcher at the University of Leuven’s Center for Intellectual
Rights (CIR), will publish a Dutch language draft later this month.
“We
are honored to work with these two great institutions,“ said Lawrence
Lessig, Professor at Stanford Law School and Chairman of Creative
Commons.
The Belgian drafts are available for review and public comment at <http://creativecommons.org/projects/international/be>.
“We are thrilled to be join the International Commons and to contribute in bringing it to Belgium,” said Dusollier.
About Creative Commons
A
nonprofit founded in early 2002, Creative Commons promotes the creative
re-use of intellectual and artistic works—whether owned or in the
public domain—by empowering authors and audiences. It is sustained by
the generous support of the Center for the Public Domain, the John D.
and Catherine T. Mac Arthur? Foundation, the Omidyar Network Fund, and the Hewlett Foundation.
For general information, visit <http://creativecommons.org>.
About the Centre for Research on Computer Law (CRID) at the University of Namur
Founded in 1979 by Prof. Yves Poullet, the CRID, linked to the University of Namur, is a research centre dedicated to computer law and information law. The Objective of the CRID
is to foster the legal thinking in the field of cyberlaw and to create
awareness of the legal and social issues engendered by the use of new
technologies. 35 researchers are currently working on a broad range of
issues, from IPR, privacy, fundamental
rights to e-commerce, telecommunications law, use of technologies in
the medical sector, computer crime and contract law. The IPR Department is headed by Severine Dusollier.
For more information about CRID, visit
Contact
Christiane Asschenfeldt (Berlin)
iCommons Coordinator, Creative Commons
christiane@creativecommons.org
Glenn Otis Brown (San Francisco)
Executive Director, Creative Commons
glenn@creativecommons.org
Dr. Severine Dusollier (Namur)
Project Lead Belgium, CRID
severine.dusollier@fundp.ac.be
Press Kit
http://creativecommons.org/presskit/
Creative Commons South Africa Drafts Now Available
The innovative nonprofit pairs with
South African experts to offer localized versions of its “some rights
reserved” copyright licenses soon
SAN FRANCISCO, USA AND JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA —
October 19, 2004— Creative Commons, a nonprofit dedicated to building a
body of creative work free to share and build upon, announced today
that South Africa is the latest country to join its international
efforts. Creative Commons copyright licenses, which are available at no
charge from the group’s website (http://creativecommons.org),
allow authors and artists to mark their works as free to copy or
transform under certain conditions—to declare “some rights reserved,”
in contrast to the traditional “all rights reserved”—thereby enabling
others to access a growing pool of raw materials without legal
friction. South Africa joins twelve other nations in the draft phase of
adapting the Creative Commons licenses; another nine nations already
offer localized Creative Commons licenses.
Led by the Johannesburg-based LINK Centre,
Creative Commons South Africa plans to adapt the copyright licenses for
use under South African law and to build local engagement with and use
of Creative Commons-licensed content. Andrew Rens, a former lecturer at
Wits University Law School, is leading the legal aspects of the project
while Heather Ford, LINK Centre associate, directs the overall South African effort.
“South
Africa is well-placed to pioneer developments in the field of
intellectual property law,” said Ford. “Through the Treatment Action
Campaign we have had huge success in gaining access to cheaper HIV/AIDS drugs. More recently South Africa has helped to lead a ‘development agenda’ at WIPO which aims to use knowledge as a tool for empowerment, rather than to deepen existing divides.”
Rens
says that South Africa’s innovative constitution has resulted in
dramatic changes to many areas of law affecting the transmission of
ideas including freedom of expression and access to information a
development with potentially interesting consequences for the local
enforcement of copyright laws.
South Africa offers unique
opportunities and poses unique challenges for the Creative Commons
model. Since the demise of apartheid, South Africa has emerged from
global isolation as a model for democracy around the world. With one of
the world’s most progressive constitutions and a Bill of Rights that
stresses individual freedoms, it is also a leader in African policy
development, and a champion for the causes of the developing world.
South Africa is, nonetheless, still a divided society. A small,
wealthy, relatively sophisticated population lives side by side with
and a large, unskilled informal population. Only 4 million of the
nation’s 43 million residents are online.
To join the
discussion on the local ‘porting’ of the Creative Commons licenses and
help make some real change, go to South African website,: <http://za.creativecommons.org>, or view the South African drafts <http://creativecommons.org/projects/international/za/>.
More about the LINK Centre at the University of the Witwatersrand
The LINK Centre
is the leading information and knowledge hub providing training,
research and consultancy in the Information and Communications
Technology (ICT) arena in order to develop public, private, NGO and community-based capacity within the Southern African region.
The
institution focuses on capacity building in the public and private
sectors and development arenas through quality training, applied
research and consultancy services necessary to maximize the benefits of
the Information Society and economy.
For more information, see <http://link.wits.ac.za>.
About Creative Commons
A 501(c)(3)
nonprofit founded in early 2002, Creative Commons promotes the creative
re-use of intellectual and artistic works — whether owned or in the
public domain — by empowering authors and audiences. It is sustained by
the generous support of the Center for the Public Domain, the John D.
and Catherine T. Mac Arthur? Foundation, the Omidyar Network Fund, and the Hewlett Foundation.
For general information, visit <http://creativecommons.org>.
Contact
Heather Ford
Creative Commons South Africa
Ford.H@pdm.wits.ac.za
Phone: +27 11 717 3113
Cell: +27 82 872 7374
Andrew Rens
Creative Commons South Africa
andrewrens@yahoo.com
Glenn Otis Brown
Executive Director
Creative Commons
glenn@creativecommons.org
+1.415.336.1433
Press Kit
http://creativecommons.org/presskit/
