The iSummit, an annual conference that originally grew around Creative Commons, but has grown beyond CC to encompass related movements, has announced its 2008 schedule.

As befitting a conference dedicated to global digital culture and hosted by Sapporo, Japan, the schedule is very diverse, including tracks on open education, open business, local/global collaboration, openness in Japan, and most exciting to me, a concurrent commons research workshop.

One of the keynotes I’m particularly looking forward to is Rebecca MacKinnon on Free Culture and Free Speech: Why strong and vibrant free culture communities are important for freedom of expression, one of my favorite topics.

The announcement also includes this about remote viewing and participation:

And for those who can’t make it to the event – we’ll be documenting the highlights so that you can participate ‘remotely’. We’ll have liveblogging, lists of resources on the wiki which you can add to, in-depth articles, a Flickr feed of photos from all attendees, the keynotes will be streamed and will be available on our Youtube channel and Dotsub collection and a daily podcast will be made available. There is so much to do it’ll be like you are in Sapporo along with us!

You can get a “friend” button like the one above.