Bassel Khartabil is a computer engineer who, through his innovations in social media, digital education, and open-source web software, played a huge role in opening the internet in Syria and bringing online access and knowledge to the Syrian people. Many people reading this blog know Bassel through his work as lead for CC Syria. Coinciding…
The New UNESCO House in Paris United Nations Photo / CC BY-NC-ND UNESCO has announced a new Open Access Repository making more than 300 digital reports, books and articles available to the world under the Creative Commons IGO licenses. From UNESCO’s press release: “Currently, the Repository contains works in some 12 languages, including major UNESCO…
At today’s meeting of the Board of Governors of the California Community Colleges, the Board voted unanimously to require open licensing on publicly funded materials resulting from all Chancellor’s Office contracts and grants. Here are the key documents: Recommended Action at Board Meeting (CC BY required) – September 9-10, 2013 Press Release (CC BY required)…
California Seal of the Assembly Edward Headington / CC BY Today California (CA) Senate President pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (author of the CA open textbook legislation) announced that SB 520 (fact sheet) will be amended to provide open, online college courses for credit. In short, the bill will allow CA students, enrolled in CA public…
Ms. Catherine Ngugi.. and Letuimanu’asina Dr. Emma KRUSE VA’AI / Mariana Bittencourt / CC BY Through the generous support of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and in full partnership with the Commonwealth of Learning (COL), UNESCO hosted the 2012 World Open Educational Resources (OER) Congress last week to: showcase the world’s best practices in…
2071785 / jma.work / CC BY Update June 2012: The OER Policy Registry has moved to its permanent home at http://oerpolicies.org, please review and contribute any new policies there. Update October 2012: We’ve removed the links to the Google Form and spreadsheet below. Please visit the OER Policy Registry’s permanent home at http://oerpolicies.org. The open…
There was exciting open policy news from U.S. Washington State (WA) last evening. HB 2337 “Regarding open educational resources in K-12 education” passed the Senate (47 to 1) and is on its way back to the House for final concurrence. It already passed the House 88 to 7 before moving to the Senate. The bill…
Though our 2009 Commoner Letter series has officially come to an end, we are pleased to announce one final letter, this time from our Founder and Board Member Lawrence Lessig. Professor Lessig needs little introduction, so I’ll leave it to him tell you in his own words why supporting the mission of Creative Commons is…
Stephen Friend is the President, CEO, and co-founder of Sage Bionetworks. He was previously a Senior Vice President at Merck & Co., Inc. where he led Merck’s Basic Cancer Research efforts. Stephen is a committed advocate of Science Commons, the wing of Creative Commons dedicated to making the Web work for science. Stephen’s innovative work…
Indaba Music, an international community of musicians, music professionals, and fans exploring the creative possibilities of making music with people in different places, has been up to some pretty impressive stuff since being founded just a few years ago. We’re honored to have Daniel Zaccagnino and Matthew Siegel, the company’s co-Founders, write the fifth letter…