Blue Orange Records releases “Come Tomorrow”, CC-licensed Electro/Indie-Pop Compilation

Cameron Parkins, December 10th, 2008

Blue Orange Records, a net-label that aims to “provide a portal for quality Indie Pop bands to connect with a global community of Indie Pop fans”, recently released Come Tomorrow, a compilation of songs by some very talented electro/indie-pop acts. The disc is released under a CC BY-NC-ND license to encourage sharing and is available for free online. From BOR:

A bit of background on the project–we spent 2008 listening to music from all over the world to find the best new electro indie-pop sounds. Included you will hear from Kiesgroup (DE) featuring Stereolab’s Laetitia Sadier performing in the song Punishment, Lucy and the Popsonics (BR) with their Brazilian electropop Garota Rock Ingles, not to mention our local favorite, Potion (US) with their Film Noir titles collage in Band of Outsiders as well as many other new artists ready to make you dance and smile. So let the sunshine in over these looming dark clouds of recession and download this compilation for free thanks to these wonderful artists and the Creative Commons License.

Eighth Annual Media That Matters Film Festival DVDs on Sale

Fred Benenson, November 25th, 2008

The Media that Matters 8th Annual Festival DVDs have officially gone on sale. There are a number of facts that make these DVDs exceptional in the festival and documentary world:

• They use CC’s BY-NC-ND license to encourage educational reuse and sharing of the material.
• The DVDs are not region encoded or encrypted. This means you are free to copy and share the DVDs according to the license without running afoul of laws regulating anti-circumvention technologies.
• All of the films are available online in high and low quality formats.
• The DVD cases are clearly marked with the badge of our the license.
• Arts Engine uses these DVD sales to support more CC licensed films being made.
• Arts Engine provides educational materials and discussion guides to help educators present the films to students.

If you’re interested in submitting your work to the 9th Annual Media that Matters Film Festival, check out their submission page here. Either way, consider buying a DVD today!

Democracy Now! – now under a Creative Commons license

Eric Steuer, November 19th, 2008

We just received some tremendously exciting news. Democracy Now! – the daily news program broadcast by hundreds of radio and television stations around the world (it’s also the source of a very popular podcast) – is now being offered under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND license. This includes not only new episodes, but also those in the show’s archive, dating back to the program’s beginnings in 1996. The show, hosted by journalists Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, and originally created by Pacifica Radio (which has continued to provide critical support for the program since it became an independent production), is funded by listeners, viewers, and foundations who believe in independent media – an approach to doing things that we here at CC wholeheartedly respect (visit our fundraising drive for more on this). Democracy Now! was founded to report on issues and stories that the producers believe are underreported by mainstream news outlets. The program’s new usage terms are made clear via a Creative Commons license notice at the bottom of each episode’s page (see today’s conversation with Cornel West for an example).

Ozmo launches with CC+ protocol support

Eric Steuer, November 18th, 2008

Copyright Clearance Center has just launched Ozmo, a new web-based service focused on helping photographers, bloggers, and other content creators license their work for commercial use. Ozmo supports Creative Commons’ CC+ protocol (see the press release about CC+ for more information), meaning that it enables creators to license their work to the public under one set of terms via a Creative Commons license, and offer the ability to obtain a private license via Ozmo’s licensing system — to purchase rights not offered by the CC license a work is under (e.g., commercial use if the work is under a CC NonCommercial license, the right to make an adaptation and not share under the same license if the work is under a CC ShareAlike license, or the right to use without attribution), or simply to obtain a private agreement with the copyright holder for situations that require such.

To use Ozmo, a creator sets up an account, selects license terms, and sets a price for the use of their work. Ozmo then works as a broker to companies, publishers, and bloggers who are looking to use work commercially. Ozmo manages the licensing process and pays creators when a license to their content is purchased. You can find more details about how Ozmo works on the site’s About page.

Artist, animator, and filmmaker Ryan Junell (who is the designer behind the Creative Commons logo, as well as several of CC’s explanatory videos – see “Get Creative,” “Wanna Work Together?” and “Reticulum Rex”) worked with musician J Lesser to create a short video that explains how Ozmo works. It’s licensed under CC BY-NC-ND.

Open Music Wire

Cameron Parkins, November 17th, 2008

Open Music Wire is a new initiative from Musik1 that promotes CC-licensed music from affiliated net-labels. Most readily seen as a music blog, OMW curates the music they feature on their home page in an effort to shine a light on the songs and artists they find particularly inspiring. All of the music on the site is released under a CC BY-NC-ND license.

OMW is still in beta, so many of the services aren’t fully launched. With that said, it is important to note that although there is a distinct emphasis on OMW’s affiliated net-labels, anyone can submit music to their Open Music Library as long as it is licensed correctly. Presumably, this music will not only be freely available but also pooled for the curated content on the main page.

Cory Doctorow @ Locus Magazine: Why I Copyfight

Eric Steuer, November 17th, 2008

Author, blogger, and permissive copyright activist Cory Doctorow writes a regular column for Locus, a monthly magazine that covers science fiction and fantasy publishing. His current column, “Why I Copyfight,” is filled with thoughtful analysis of why writers are increasingly using open approaches to distributing their work. A year ago, Doctorow wrote a great piece about Creative Commons for Locus; both columns are highly recommended.

I was recently talking to a friend, D.K. Thompson, who has been posting pieces of a YA novel entitled Unbelievable Origin of Superspiff and the Toothpick Kid, for the past several months. We’d never talked directly about Creative Commons before, so I was particularly interested to hear that he was publishing the entire story via poscast under a CC BY-NC-ND license. He, like other authors I have met, told me that he’s using CC because it helps define clear usage permissions and extends the work’s reach. Superspiff is a lot of fun – you can download episodes from it on D.K.’s site.

Literary publishing is a quickly-changing field, with new distribution models emerging regularly. We’re always eager to hear about authors who are using our tools to achieve their desired ends. If you or someone you know is offering their novel, short stories, poetry, or other literature under Creative Commons licenses (or if you’re a reader who has enjoyed someone else’s work that has been made available under CC terms), we’d be grateful if you would point us to it in the comments section of this post.

Onemedia Unconference

Greg Grossmeier, November 13th, 2008

If you can’t attend the Standford Open Source (Un)Conference this Friday because you are in London, you are in luck! There is another unconference option right in your city!

The Onemedia Unconference, which is being held in London today and tomorrow, is hoping to provide a venue for all who are interested in how new or multiple media technologies will transform the business landscape. The attendees of the conference will represent a variety of industries including TV, Film, Games, Animation, Mobile, Software, and Music industries.

Especially useful will be what is produced by the conference: a report that collects all of the unconference’s output from the wide breadth of topics that will be covered. The report will be provided under an Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license so attendees are free to share this report with others to allow for more enhanced discussion to happen.

If you are interested in how businesses are reacting to and creating new changes in the content arena you should check out the conference if able or at least the report when it is released.

GOOD + “The First 100 Days” charticle

Eric Steuer, November 12th, 2008

Over the past year, GOOD has grown from having a primary focus on magazine publishing to being a media mini-empire, with its hand in videos, blogging, event production, and a variety of other activities, both online and off. The company’s cornerstone project, GOOD magazine, is still going strong – and is published under a Creative Commons license (BY-NC-ND).

One of my favorite elements of the magazine is its design, which is managed by creative director Casey Caplowe, who spoke recently at CC Salon LA about the advantages of using an open approach to creating and distributing content. The greatness of the magazine’s design is typified by a recurring feature called the GOOD Sheet, which presents large volumes of information in useful and beautiful graphical formats. The most recent GOOD Sheet is a collaboration with designer Atley Kasky called “The First 100 Days” and offers a sampling of decisions made by various US presidents in their first months in office.

"The First 100 Days" - (c) GOOD Worldwide, 2008, made available under a CC BY-NC-ND license. Click above for a not-tiny version of this cool chart.

Update (12/03/08): The GOOD Sheet came out of a relationship between GOOD and Starbucks, in which the latter agreed to distribute free weekly newsprint copies of the GOOD Sheet in its stores for eleven weeks. This means that for the eleven weeks prior to the US presidential election, Creative Commons-licensed media was being given away for free to hundreds of thousands of people in Starbucks stores. Pretty cool. This New York Times article describes the deal.

Gwen Stefani and baby Zuma pic online under a CC license

Eric Steuer, October 31st, 2008

Photo: Dennis Stefani, (c) Mrs. Me, Inc., 2008, made available under a CC BY-NC-ND license

Pop star Gwen Stefani and her husband, rocker Gavin Rossdale recently welcomed a baby, Zuma Nesta Rock Rossdale, into the world. Many celebrities contract with a magazine to arrange an exclusive photo session that debuts mother with newborn. But Stefani and Rossdale took a different approach and hired their own photographer and put the photo online for the public under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND license, along with some additional terms that allow all print magazines, newspapers, and blogs to use the photo – even commercially, with some restrictions. You can download a high-res version of the photo (and check out the additional terms the photo is available under) at Stefani’s site.

IE Business School Opens Up Multimedia

Jane Park, October 30th, 2008

IE Business School, an international leader in business, offers masters and doctorate degrees via an innovative blend of in-class and online course methods. Though its central campus is in Madrid, the school caters to students from more than 65 countries around the world, and recently it has opened up its multimedia documentation to everyone else. 

“IE develops multimedia documentation for both online and face to face courses. More than one hundred modules across all management areas have been developed in house. These modules include multimedia case studies, simulations, online games, interactive graphs and exercises.”

The multimedia is offered in both Spanish and English and is released online under CC BY-NC-ND.