Salon has two good stories this weekend on mash-ups (also known, across the pond, as “bastard pop”): 1, 2. These older Salon stories on the same subject, from 2002 and 1998, provide a couple of nice reference points. If this is all just a trend, it’s a sure and steady one. Read about Creative Commons’…

This week’s featured content is the open-source film “Nothing So Strange.” While the whole film is protected by full copyright, individual clips can be downloaded for a nominal fee (a few cents in most cases), with the film’s footage available for reuse, remix, and commercial use in any other work provided attribution is given. It’s…

“Getting audio recordings of landmark legal arguments is becoming as easy as downloading the latest Snoop Dogg single.” There are two nice pieces on the OYEZ project’s recent release of Supreme Court audio under Creative Commons licenses in the New York Times and AP today, among a few other places.

iCommons has expanded to Brazil. The Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV) Law School, in Rio de Janeiro, will lead the effort. FGV and Creative Commons also plan to begin work with the Brazilian Minister of Culture, world-renowned musician Gilberto Gil (!), to use the licenses to expand access to Brazilian culture. Read the first porting (for…

Announcing The GET CREATIVE! Moving Image Contest. Win a computer, a DV camera, or an iPod. But first, read a description, the rules, and our list of amazing judges. Then start getting creative. It’s open-source messaging. (Read the press release).

As a part of the Texas Center for Educational Technology’s Web Library, Free Media is a storehouse of stock photos provided under a Creative Commons license primarily for educational purposes. They currently have over 400 high-quality images in a variety of categories, waiting for your reuse.

On Saturday, we posted about the Creative Commons licensing used by Scott Andrew and Shannon Campbell on their collaborative music project. They ended up creating two songs by Sunday morning and released them under a license. Late Sunday night, Scott posted a link to the first derivative work made from it, a re-recording by previously…

A big thank you to Lisa Rein, Joseph Lorenzo Hall, Chris Burkhardt, and the amazing Pho list for helping us make contact with Dave Allen. And thanks to David Jacobs for showing Allen’s letter to us in the first place.

A helpful reader spotted this great letter-to-the-editor in the Portland Mercury. It’s from a member of the influential punk & new wave band of the late 70s and early 80s, Gang of Four, but it could’ve been written by us. Copyright is the issue! Our archaic copyright laws allow artists, musicians, and other creators to…

We’ve previously featured Scott Andrew, a musician and blogger, talking about his Creative Commons licensed songs. Last year, he noticed a song by Shannon Campbell that he liked, which he began adding to, rearranging, and remxing. He emailed it to her, she liked it, and he posted it on his site (this was done before…