Cc singularity u-panel_on_open_source

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Singularity University

Panel on Open Source

2009-07-28

The Commons as a collective intelligence meta-innovation

Mike Linksvayer

Creative CommonsPhoto by asadal · Licensed under CC Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 ·

http://flickr.com/photos/68242677@N00/2117153416/

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Creative Commons .ORG

●Nonprofit organization, launched to public December 2002●HQ and ccLearn in San Francisco●Science Commons division at MIT●~70 international jurisdiction projects, coordinated from Berlin●Foundation, corporate, and individual funding●Born at Stanford, supported by Silicon Valley

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Enabling Reasonable Copyright

●Space between ignoring copyright and ignoring fair use & public good●Legal and technical tools enabling a “Some Rights Reserved” model●Like “free software” or “open source” for content/media–But with more restrictive options–Media is more diverse and at least a decade(?) behind software

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Six Mainstream Licenses

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Lawyer Readable

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Human Readable

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Machine Readable<rdf:RDF xmlns="http://creativecommons.org/ns#" xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#"> <License rdf:about="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/nl/"> <permits rdf:resource="http://creativecommons.org/ns#Reproduction"/> <permits rdf:resource="http://creativecommons.org/ns#Distribution"/> <requires rdf:resource="http://creativecommons.org/ns#Notice"/> <requires rdf:resource="http://creativecommons.org/ns#Attribution"/> <prohibits rdf:resource="http://creativecommons.org/ns#CommercialUse"/> <permits rdf:resource="http://creativecommons.org/ns#DerivativeWorks"/> <requires rdf:resource="http://creativecommons.org/ns#ShareAlike"/> </License></rdf:RDF>

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Machine Readable (Work)My Book by <a rel="cc:attributionURL" property="cc:attributionName" href="http://example.org/me">My Name</a> is licensed under a <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License</a>. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at <a rel="cc:morePermissions" href="http://example.com/revenue_sharing_agreement">example.com</a>.

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DRMfree

“DRM Voodo”by psd licensed under CC BY 2.0http://flickr.com/photos/psd/1806247462/

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Software/Culture (i)

Utilitarian/obvious but narrow reuse vs non-utilitarian but universal reuse possible

● Gecko in Firefox, Thunderbird, Songbird... = Obvious

● Device driver code in web application = Huh?

● Cat photos and heavy metal = music video

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Software/Culture (ii)

Maintenance necessary vs rare● Non-maintained software = dead● “Maintained” cultural work = pretty

special● (Wikis are somewhat like software in this

respect)

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Software/Culture (iii)

Roughly all or nothing modifiable form vs varied and degradable forms

● You have the source code or you don’t● Text w/markup > PDF > Bitmap scan● Multitracks > High bitrate > Low bitrate

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Software/Culture (iv)

Construction is identical to creating modifiable form vs. iteratively leaving materials on the cutting room floor

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Software/Culture (v)

Why NoDerivatives and NonCommercial?● Legal sharing of verbatim works made

interesting by filesharing wars● Maybe less emphasis on maintenance

means–Restrictions on field of use less impactful–Free commercial use more impactful on existing business models

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Sofware/Culture (vi)

Commercial anticommons● When distributed maintenance is

important, NC is unusable for business (one explanation of why free software ≅ open source)

● Maybe some artists want a commercial anticommons: nobody can be “exploited” ... but most want to exploit commerce. NC maybe does both.

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History (i)

Some evocative dates for software ...● 1983: Launch of GNU Project● 1989: GPLv1● 1991: Linux kernel, GPLv2● 1993: Debian● 1996: Apache● 1998: Mozilla, “open source”, IBM

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History (ii)

... evocative dates for software● 1999: crazine$$● 2004: Firefox 1.0● 2007: [AL]GPLv3● ????: World Domination

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History (iii)

Open content licenses (some of them Free):

● 1998: Open Content License● 1999: Open Publication License● 2000: GFDL, Free Art License● 2001: EFF Open Audio License

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History (iv)

Other early 2000s open content licenses (some of them Free):

Design Science License, Ethymonics Free Music Public License, Open Music Green/Yellow/Red/Rainbow Licenses, Open Source Music License, No Type License, Public Library of Science Open Access License, Electrohippie Collective's Ethical Open Documentation License

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History (v)

Versioning of Creative Commons licenses (some of them Free):

● 2002: 1.0● 2004: 2.0● 2005: 2.5● 2007: 3.0

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History (vi)Anti-proliferation?

2003: author of Open Content/Publication licenses recommends CC instead and PLoS adopts CC BY

2004: EFF OAL 2.0 declares CC BY-SA 2.0 its next version

No significant new culture licenses since 2002

2008+: Possible Wikipedia migration to CC BY-SA

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Indicators (community)

1993: Debian :: 2001 : Wikipedia● 8 years● Wikipedia’s success came faster and

more visibly● Does Wikipedia even need an Ubuntu

(2004)?● But how typical is Wikipedia of free

culture?

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Indicators (business)

1989: Cygnus Solutions :: 2003 : Magnatune

● 14 years● Cygnus acquired by Red Hat (1999);

Magnatune’s long term impact TBD● Magnatune may not be Free enough for

some, but it seems like the best analogy for now

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Indicators (big business)

1998: IBM :: ???? : ?● No analogous investments have been

made in free culture. Most large computer companies have now made large investments in free/open source software

1998: Microsoft :: 2008 : Big Media● Could Microsoft’s attitude toward

openness a decade ago be analogous to big media’s today?

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Indicators (Wikitravel)

Very cool round-trip story:● 2003: Launch, CC BY-SA● 2006: Acquired by Internet Brands● 2008: First Wikitravel Press paper titles

Community is the new “IP”?

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Indicators (NIN)

Ghosts I-IV released 2008 under CC BY-NC-SA:

● $1.6m gross in first week● $750k in two days from limited edition

“ultra deluxe edition”● This while available legally and easily,

gratis.● NC doesn’t seem important in this

story ... yet

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Indicators (Summary Guesses)

Free culture is at least a decade behind free software

Except where it has mass collaboration/maintenance aspects of software, where it may rocket ahead (Wikipedia)

Generally culture is much more varied than software; success will be spikey

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In Innovation, Meta is Max

“The max net-impact innovations, by far, have been meta-innovations, i.e., innovations that changed how fast other innovations accumulated.”

Robin Hanson (Economist)http://www.overcomingbias.com/2008/06/meta-is-max---i.html

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Collective Intelligence

Meta innovation?

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Commons

Meta innovation for Collective Intelligence?

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$2.2 trillion

Value of fair use in the U.S. Economy

http://www.ccianet.org/artmanager/publish/news/First-Ever_Economic_Study_Calculates_Dollar_Value_of.shtml also see http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/7643

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Cyber terrorism(Cyber terror war on)

Privacy breaches

Loss ofGenerativity

Lock-in

Surveillance

DRM

Censorship

Suppressionof innovation

Electoral fraud

Luddism

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Threat categories

● Legitimate security issues● Protectionism● Politics and power● Security theater and fear-based

responses (driven by all of above, not just legitimate security issues)

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What digital freedoms needed for beneficial collective

intelligence?● Keep same rights online/digitally that we

(should anyway) have offline/IRL● Permit innovation and participation

enabled by digital world even if not possible before (probably follows from above)

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How building the commons (free software, free culture, and

friends) helps

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Security

● Data shows FLOSS is more secure● Security through obscurity doesn’t work● FLOSS encourages a heterogeneous

computing environment● Free software and free culture both

allergic to DRM and other mechanisms that sacrifice security to other goals

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Protectionism

● Peer production undermines policy arguments for protecting knowledge industries

● Free software and free culture both allergic to DRM

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Politics and power

● Free software and culture improve transparency

● ... and the ability of all to participate● Peer production works against

concentrated power — doesn’t require concentrated production structures and lowers barriers to entry

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Security theater and fear

● Access to facts mitigates fear and allows rational evaluation of responses

● Commons work against three previous threats that drive security theater and fear

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Can the success of the (digital) commons alter how we view

freedom and power generally?

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“The gate that has held the movements for equalization of human beings strictly in a dilemma between ineffectiveness and violence has now been opened. The reason is that we have shifted to a zero marginal cost world. As steel is replaced by software, more and more of the value in society becomes non-rivalrous: it can be held by many without costing anybody more than if it is held by a few.”

Eben Moglen

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“If we don’t want to live in a jungle, we must change our attitudes. We must start sending the message that a good citizen is one who cooperates when appropriate, not one who is successful at taking from others.”

Richard Stallman

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i.e., we can form collective intelligences instead of forced collectives ... and still “change

the world”

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Building the commons is key to achieving a good future

● Politicians and corporations are unimaginative ... they need to see solutions, or they react in fear

● A dominant commons makes many collective stupidity scenarios much less likely

● Beneficial collective intelligence needs universal access to culture, educational resources, research ... in machine-readable form

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License●

http://creativecomm

ons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Attribution

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Author: Mike Linksvayer

●

Link: http://creativecomm

ons.org

Questions?

●

ml@

creativecomm

ons.org Detail of image by psd · Licensed under CC Attribution 2.0 · http://flickr.com/photos/psd/1805374441

Cc singularity u-panel_on_open_source

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