Creative Commons Australia blogs

CCau Animations

jess — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 20:06:49 -0500

CCau has created two animations for QUT Smart Train, the Queensland University of Technology's outreach project, which travels around Queensland every two years to highlight the great work being done at the university.

Both animations star the fabulous Mayer and Bettle, CCau's favourite advocates, with the second featuring a cameo by newcomer Flik. They aim to provide a fun and accessible explanation of Creative Commons. The first focuses on the basics of what Creative Commons is and how it works, while the second provides a bit more detail about using the CC licences for your own work.

Both are, of course, available under CC licences that allow you to distribute and remix them - so spread the word and see what you can do with them. You can watch them below, or for more details, different formats or source materials go to their dedicated pages:

* Mayer and Bettle
* Mayer and Bettle: the sequel

Powerhouse update

jess — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 23:12:09 -0500

Sailing on a Sunday Morning
by magical-world CC BY-SA

Yes, that's right - we've got an update on the Powerhouse Museum's foray into the Commons on Flickr already.

As part of their initiative to release out-of-copyright photos from their Tyrrell Collection on Flickr (see below), Powerhouse has just launched a new initiative - Tyrrell Today. It aims to extend the Powerhouse Museum’s set of images on The Commons by allowing members of the public to post contemporary images from the same Sydney-centric locations as the original Tyrrell photos.

And, excitingly for us, they're encouraging people to provide the photos under a CC licence, so that the Powerhouse can archive them as part of their ongoing collection.

Some of you might note that this is very similar to the Click and Flick project that the National Library has been running for the last couple of years, which allows people to add photographs to the national collection by uploading them to Flickr. However, PHM is making their initiative more interactive, by encouraging people to use the photographs to respond specifically to images from the original Tyrrell collection. People simply upload their photos onto Flickr, tag them with TyrrellToday, and then link to the original photo they're 'responding' to. PHM also adds a geographical dimension by providing a map for people to identify where their photograph is from.

It's great to see Australian institutions leading the world in using Web 2.0 technologies to help our national collections reach their full potential.

Australia's history now free, thanks to the Powerhouse Museum

jess — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 21:21:05 -0500

The Powerhouse Museum in Sydney made a fabulous announcement the other day - they have joined with the Commons on Flickr project as the first museum in the world to release publicly-held historical photographs for access on Flickr. PHM joins the US Library of Congress, the world's largest photo library, which released its first images for public access in January this year.

An initial 200 black and white images from the Powerhouse's Tyrrell Collection of Sydney life in the late 1800s and early 1900s were made available last Tuesday, with 50 more added since then.

The really exciting thing about this initiative is that the images are designated 'no known copyright restrictions', a new label for Flickr created specifically for this project. This means that the photographs are able to be re-used however you like, without any limitations or fear of copyright infringement - for commercial purposes, as part of a remix work etc. You don't even need to attribute (though it's still polite to).

This is one of the most publicised efforts by an Australian archival institution to release material in their collection that has fallen into the public domain for free re-use by the general public. And apparently it's been a roaring success. According to this blog post by PHM staffer Seb Chan, they've had over 20,000 views int he frst week, and hundreds of tags have been added.

And to further encourage public interaction with their collection, the PHM also publishes select images from its Photo of the Day blog under Creative Commons.

happy birthday CCAU!

emma.carroll — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 19:17:13 -0600

so my login is working after all!! will take this opportunity to say happy birthday to CCAU and congratulations on your outstanding efforts in 2007 - looking forward very much to seeing how things progress in 2008. love your work!

CC and Virgin Mobile

jess — Fri, 27 Jul 2007 02:27:24 -0500

Some of you have probably noticed news stories over the past week about Virgin's use of CC licensed photographs as part of an advertising campaign. Here are some thoughts floating around the CCau office about the case.

The basic story is that Virgin found photos on Flickr that had been licensed under CC licences, and used them in a series of billboard and web advertisements around Australia. The advertisements are essentially the photographs with captions written across them - which were often insulting to the people pictured in the photographs - and the tagline 'are you with us?'. Controversially, Virgin did not inform the photographers that they were using the images, or the people in the photographs.

There has been a lot of discussion online about the legal and ethical implications of the campaign. Some of the photographers have criticised the campaign. Some of the people captured in the photos (and in particular the brother of a 15 year old girl who was the subject of an insulting tagline) have also expressed displeasure. On the other hand, other photographers have come forward saying they approve of the campaign, and that this is why they CC license their photos in the first place.

From a CC standpoint, there are a few legal issues to consider. If the photographs Virgin used were licensed to allow commercial use and the company complied with any other licence restrictions (ie Attribution, No Derivatives, ShareAlike) this kind of use is almost certainly permitted under the CC model. However, there are some questions about whether Virgin has followed these steps. For example:

* At least one of the images Virgin used appears to currently be under a licence that doesn't allow commercial use - though it's not clear whether it was under a broader licence in the past.
* The same photo also has a ShareAlike requirement, and there's no sign of Virgin badging the billboards ShareAlike.
* It's questionable whether Virgin's attribution satisfies the CC requirements. They have included a link to the home page of the photographer's Flickr account in the bottom corner of both the billboards and the web versions of the ads, but they haven't directly named the photographer, linked to the photo itself, or referenced/linked to the CC licence the photo is under - all of which are the standard attribution required by the CC licence. Although the licence allows users to vary these requirements when it's 'reasonable', it can be argued that Virgin had no reason not to give greater attribution.
* There is also an argument (though probably a weaker argument) whether by adding captions that are insulting to the subjects Virgin has breached the moral rights of the photographers.

But public discussion of the issue has really focused on the question as to whether Virgin should have obtained model clearances from the people who are identifiable in the photographs. Although it seems to be industry practice to do so where a photograph is being used for commercial purposes, there is real question whether this is a legal requirement in Australia. Certain sections of the Trade Practices Act 1974 do appear to require consent before a company can imply that a person is endorsing or purchasing their product. However, these ads, with their deliberate 'amateur' style and sarcastic bylines, clearly don't imply such endorsement.

Nevertheless, some commentators have suggested that the failure to deal with the issue of model clearances represents a flaw in the CC licences. However, the licences make it very clear that they merely provide copyright permissions, and that they do not purport to deal with any other area of law. Due to the vast number of laws that can come into play when a person is using a copyright work (eg defamation, privacy, competition) it would be impossible for the licences, or the person issuing the licence for that matter, to definitively cover all potential legal issues in placing it releasing it for general use. There is arguably an onus on the person making use of the work to identify any laws their particular use might breach, and to make an effort to obtain any additional permissions that are needed - particularly if their use is large-scale and commercial.

But what this incidence has really highlighted is the ongoing difference of opinion as to the ethics of and motivations for CC usage. Some people have argued that this kind of use goes beyond the purpose of the CC licences. Even if they had no legal duty to do so, should Virgin have notified the photographers that they were planning on using their photos in such a widespread commercial campaign? This might have been a good risk management strategy, and would probably have helped them to avoid some of the public criticism they've received.

On the other hand, there is also an argument that this is exactly why CC has non-commercial licences - so that people can choose to share their material even with large corporations if they wish to, without requiring them to get extra consent. Hopefully those who are using the broader CC licences, like Attribution, understand this - but maybe, if they didn't, more explanatory materials are needed, to ensure that people only licence their material in way they will feel comfortable with.

Open Channel's Video-slam: call for registrations

jess — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 23:23:30 -0500

Interested in innovative film making online?

The Melbourne-based screen resources organisation, OPEN CHANNEL, is calling for expressions of interest from film, sound and video artists wanting to take part in its upcoming Video Slam.

The Video Slam will take place over 48 hours, from 10am Sunday May 13 to 8pm Monday May 14, and will provide an opportunity for individuals and teams to collaborate to create a 10 minute digital short from original content and content found on the Web. Most excitingly for us - the entire thing will be licensed under a Creative Commons licence.

The whole event is being run as an Arts Law Week workshop exploring the use of Creative Commons licences for the creation of original digital content. The idea is to explore the possibilities for innovation and collaboration in this new medium, looking at different ways a group of people can work towards a single whole - for example, a different editor may be used for each scene, or five composers scoring two minutes a-piece, or three actors performing the same part directed by four directors.

The event will be run out of Horse Bazaar, with the final product being screened on Monday May 14 in Melbourne’s community and arts hub, Federation Square, and made available on the Open Channel and EngageMedia websites.

If you have any kind of skill or interest in a relevant area (eg directors, technicians, performers, writers composers, production assistants) Open Channel wants you to get involved.

Do you have an opinion about copyright and Creative Commons? Well get online and share it!

jess — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 22:32:56 -0500

Vibewire, the Australian-based youth media non-profit, launched its 2007 e-Festival of Ideas today.

The e-Festival has been running for a few years now, in conjunction with National Youth Week. It’s a great initiative, which provides the opportunity for members of the public to come together with experts to discuss important issues of the day. And best of all, it all occurs online, so there are no registration fees or airfares. All you need is an internet connection and an opinion to get involved.

This year’s festival includes panels on climate change, multiculturalism and how to get arts funding - and one devoted entirely to Creative Commons. Elliott and I will be on the panel to answer questions, as well as a whole pile of industry experts such as DJ Spooky, Allison Fine from Demos and the team from EngageMedia.

So if you have something you’ve always wanted to say about Creative Commons, copyright or innovation in the digital era, get aboard and say it. Or even if you’ve just got questions - we still want to hear from you. Go on - have an opinion!

Terry Fisher: the Future of Entertainment

jess — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 01:38:49 -0500

Creative Commons Australia’s parent organisation, the Queensland University of Technology, recently hosted a visit by Terry Fisher, Hale Dorr Professor of Intellectual Property from Harvard Law School and Director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society. As part of this visit Terry presented a lecture at the Queensland State Library on the Future of Entertainment.

This Podcast is now available for download as a podcast (under a Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike licence, of course) here. It runs for about an hour, but is an interesting discussion of the effect of the internet on the entertainment industry from one of the world’s leading experts on the subject, and so is well worth checking out.

UNESCO Open Training Platform

jess — Wed, 14 Mar 2007 21:10:10 -0500

Creative Commons is now being endorsed by UNESCO - or at least its Communication and Information Sector.

Earlier this week, the UNESCO Communication and Information Sector officially launched its Open Training Platform. It aims to increase access to training and non-formal education resources that have been developed by a range of organisations, including the UN, development agencies and NGOs. It also aims to promote the open content movement and the use of open content licensing among contributors from these organisations, by providing information on and actively encouraging the use of open content licences - including the Creative Commons licences.

Open Content Licensing: Cultivating the Creative Commons

jess — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 01:56:29 -0500

It is my great pleasure to announce the publication of ‘Open Content Licensing: Cultivating the Creative Commons’, a collection of essays on open content licensing and the Creative Commons, edited by Creative Commons Australia’s own project lead, Professor Brian Fitzgerald.

Drawing on the proceedings of the QUT conference of the same name in early 2005, the book brings together papers by more than 30 leading experts, including CC founder Professor Lawrence Lessig and Futurist Richard Neville, on the internet, copyright and the importance of open access to knowledge, from an Australian perspective.

The book is available for purchase in hardcopy form from Sydney University Press. It is also available for download under a Creative Commons Australia Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivatives licence from QUT’s ePrints Archive. Individual articles can be downloaded from the University of Sydney’s eScholarship Repository.

More information on the book and its contents is available from here

Barcamp Australia

jess — Tue, 16 Jan 2007 22:53:54 -0600

The amazing Barcamp initiative has finally made it to Australia. A Barcamp is (in the main wiki’s words) ‘an ad-hoc unconference born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment’. They’ve been around for the last couple of years and have been held at dozens, if not hundreds, of locations worldwide. They’re mainly aimed at free-culture and open-access enthusiasts, but everyone’s welcome, as long as they’re ready to give a presentation, run a session or contribute in some other way.

The first Australian Barcamps are scheduled to be held in Sydney, Adelaide, Melbourne and Canberra on 3-4 March, and should be an exciting chance to get to meet other people with common interests and exchange ideas. They’re looking for volunteers, too - sign up on the wiki.

Want to spice up your PBX system?

jess — Thu, 16 Nov 2006 01:01:09 -0600

We came across this commoner while we were poking around the internet, and just had to share it with all of you. Definitely one of the more interesting CC licensors we’ve seen in a while.

OpenVoice, a small Australian business specialising in voice prompting services for the Asterisk™ Open Source PBX system, have released a whole lot of Australian PBX voice prompts/messages available for free download under an Australian v2.1 Attribution-ShareAlike licence. The prompts feature the voice of Alex Dalrymple, who is a regular announcer at a major Sydney radio station, and include everything from the standard (“I’m sorry, that number is not valid”) to the wacky (“We’re off gambling and getting drunk”). They have some great MP3 demos that you can listen to on the site - or you can download the whole set to use with your Asterisk PBX system.

Check them out here.

CC Willits Remix competition

jess — Wed, 15 Nov 2006 20:58:45 -0600

Our CC compatriots in the US have announced a new competition on the ccMixter site. The contest, which is being run in conjunction with XLR8R Magazine and Ghostly International, encourages the general public to remix the audio source files from the song “Colors Shifting”, which has been donated by its creator, Ghostly International artist Christopher Willits. The winning remix will be selected by Willits himself, and will be included on an XLR8R Incite CD compilation, which will be included in copies of a future issue of XLR8R Magazine.

Visit http://ccmixter.org/ghostly for contest information, rules, and audio sources.

More on British and Australian copyright debates

jess — Sun, 05 Nov 2006 20:01:34 -0600

Following on from our article below about the potential extension of the copyright term in the UK, Boing Boing has an entry today about a report by The Institute for Public Policy Research proposing more amendments to UK copyright law.

Interestingly, the Boing Boing article quotes one of the Report’s authors, Kay Withers, as saying: “The idea of all-rights reserved doesn’t make sense for the digital era.”

As well as the proposed copyright term extension, the Report also discusses possible new exceptions to allow “format shifting” ie the transferring of songs from CDs to iPods - an amendment that is also being proposed in Australia as part of the huge Copyright Amendment Bill 2006.

The Bill was tabled by Attorney General Phillip Ruddock on 19 October, and is currently the subject of an extremely short inquiry by the Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs. The Bill contains some new exceptions designed to assist consumers, like the format shifting amendment, but overall is a massive win for copyright owners.

Here’s some commentary on the proposed amendments by Brian Fitzgerald and Kim Weatherall. The Electronic Frontiers Foundation also has information up about the Bill, and an Action Page on users can get their concerns about the Bill heard.

The most concerning amendments proposed by the Bill include:

an extension of Australia’s Technological Protection Measure provisions, which significantly broadens the rights of copyright owners to control how people can use legitimately bought products;
a whole swathe of new criminal offences, which will significantly lower the bar for criminal prosection for copyright infringement in Australia, increasing the chances of people being held criminally liable for actions they undertake in their own home; and
changes to Australia’s exception for fair dealings for the purpose of research and study which replaces the current flexible exception with a strict quantitative test, taking away rights Australian researchers and students have always enjoyed without any explanation or justification.

cc @ tina

elliott — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 20:35:34 -0500

Cooking pancakes and mixing sounds as part of Radio National’s Night Air program, performed live during Electrofringe. Photo by Nick Moraitis.

Elliott Bledsoe recently represented CC Australia at This is not Art festival. Held annually in Newcastle, TINA is comprised of five festivals including Electrofringe, National Young Writers’ Festival, National Student and Emerging Media Conference, Sound Summit, Critical Animals and Earthling.

CC was asked to speak on three panels exploring CC licensing as a tool for artists and creators. The first panel was Online Investigations, which focused on online content production, online audiences and the opportunities for independent media. Elliott spoke about CC as a way of promoting and distributing content.

On the DIY Publishing: the future panel about the future of independent and self-publishing Elliott spoke about CC as a promotion and distribution model and CC as a way of getting low-cost, and low-hassle content for use in independently produced content.

The final panel was Copyright, Copywrong, Copyleft Jam!. It aimed to explore the bounds of existing copyright laws and its affect on creativity. Elliott spoke about CC in Australia, its potential and some of the setbacks.

thisisnotart.org

Australian TPM Review

nic — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 00:13:26 -0500

As you may be aware, the Attorney-General’s Department (AGD) recently released an exposure draft of proposed amendments to the Australian Copyright Act provisions dealing with technological protection measures (TPM). These amendments are designed to implement Australia’s final commitments under the United States Free Trade Agreement, which require Australia to significantly tighten its legal protection of TPMs. The new laws have to be in place by 1 January 2007.

As part of the release, the AGD called for public submissions to be provided by 22 September. We here at Creative Commons Australia got together with a number of other open access advocates (including representatives of the OAK Law project) to comment on the proposed amendments. You can find our submission here.

All in all, the draft legislation isn’t as bad as it could have been, and certainly isn’t as strong as the US probably wanted - but it still includes few safeguards to prevent copyright owners from using TPMs to extend their control in the digital environment. All we can do now is wait and see whether the Government takes the public comments on board, or if the deal with the US has already been cemented behind the scenes.

Interestingly, at the same time as they released the exposure draft, the Government also called for submissions as part of a separate review of additional exceptions to the TPM provisions that are to be included in the regulations. They’ve published the initial submissions for the exceptions review (but not the broader TPM provisions) online, and are currently inviting reply comments on these submissions.

Down with DRM video contest announced

jess — Tue, 19 Sep 2006 00:20:36 -0500

Freeculture.org has announced the Down with DRM video contest in conjunction with Defective by Design’s October 3rd Declared “Day Against DRM”. Enter your short, anti-DRM themed, video, animation or remix for a chance to win a portable digital VCR or have your video aired on DefectiveByDesign.org. Preference will be given to submissions under free content licenses such as Creative Commons BY-SA.
Deadline for submissions is Sunday October 1 at 11:59pm EDT.

More details are available at the Free Culture website

ccHost 3.0

jess — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 23:23:14 -0500

The Creative Commons head office in San Francisco, along with the Creative Commons Developer Community, has today released an updated version of ccHost, its Open Source web-based media sharing software. ccHost provides a range of packages that anyone may download that enable collaboration, sharing, and storage of multi-media material on-line using the different Creative Commons licenses and metadata. This comes on the heals of ccHost winning the Linux Journal Linux World Expo Award for “Best Open Source Solution”. Congratulations ccHost!

More details on the release are available here

We went to Rio . . .

jess — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 22:45:56 -0500

The annual iCommons Summit was held this year in Rio de Janerio, Brazil, from 23-25 June - and, thanks partly to the generous assistance of the iCommons organisation, CC-AU team members Brian Fitzgerald and Jessica Coates (myself) were able to attend. The Summit brought together a wide range of individuals with an interest in the open access and commons movements worldwide for an exchange of ideas, information and enthusiasm. The three day event provided a great opportunity for us to learn about other open access projects worldwide and was extremely productive, from Brian's presentation on CC-AU's experiences with the Australian collecting societies to the first meeting of the newly formed Asia Commons. It was, in fact, so jam packed that we barely managed to make it outside to see the famous beaches right outside our doors - though we did squeeze in time to catch Australia's World Cup triumph over Croatia.

Read our full report on the conference here

Photo: Jessica Coates (second left), Brian Fitzgerald (far right),
and other Creative Commoners at the Rio iSummit.

Say hello to CC-AU 2.5

jess — Wed, 16 Aug 2006 04:23:00 -0500

We’re proud to announce that the Australian Creative Commons licences have officially been upgraded to v2.5, bringing the Australian-jurisdiction licences into line with the latest version of the Creative Commons licences worldwide.

The changes from the old v2.0 licences are mainly minor and technical in nature, but provide important clarification of the intent and legal effect of the licences.

The new licences are available through the publishing tool on the international Creative Commons site. Anyone publishing their material using the tool will automatically be taken to the latest versions. We also encourage those who already have material registered under one of the old licences to upgrade to v2.5, so they can get the benefits of the improved language, too.

And while I’m at it, I’d like to put in a plug for the Australian licences. If you’re an Australian, or see the primary market for your work as being Australia, the Australian licences provide far greater legal certainty, should you ever need to enforce them in a court of law. This goes for all of the jurisdiction-specific licences - with all the variation between the laws of different countries, a generic licence just isn’t going to be as clear. Remember, an ‘Australian’ licence (and any other jurisdiction-specific licences) is still enforcible anywhere in the world.

Happy licensing!

doctorow @ ideas festival

elliott — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 21:09:55 -0600

last night cory doctorow, of boingboing and electronic frontier foundation fame, gave a public lecture right here in brisbane as part of the ideas festival. naturally he was going to talk about something tech/internet related. but despite the predictablity of topics, it was a very good lecture.

he gave a fantastic overview of drm and the horrific potential future should the large ip holders – companies, collecting societies and the likes – get their way.

he talked about the lastest swag of measures being pushed by major ip owners in the drm war: broadcast flags. this marks the broadening of the drm concept beyound the internet and into any form of digital content (ever wondered why the DTV push is on?). built-in restrictions that tell your digital technology what it will allow you to do. for example, some programs on DTV won’t be able to be stored on a hard disk, or will automatically delete after expiration of a defined period. doctorow even when to far as to say that some digital technology will shut itself off to ensure contravention does not occur. he cites a child’s first steps as an example, saying imagine your child is taking thier first steps across the lounge room. you’re recording with your digital camera and as you pan past the television the camera recognises a broadcast flag which restricts copying the images on screen, and the camera shuts itself off.”

so how much freedom will new technology really give us?

animation badges

elliott — Mon, 21 Nov 2005 17:01:23 -0600

you can now get badges from the (in)famous creative commons australia animation film featuring the crazy duo mayer and bettle.

get yours here

creative commons feature in desktop magazine

elliott — Thu, 27 Oct 2005 18:31:29 -0500

creative commons australia team member elliott bledsoe has published a three page feature in desktop magazine called “Creative Commons: copyright for the digital age.”

the feature includes an analysis of the online regulatory environment and creative commons as an alternative to that. it offers information about what creative commons offers and how to use it. it discusses the practical uses of the sampling licences (yet to be launched in australia) and offers places to find cc licenced content.

it also includes three case studies around design organisation Black brow (who produced the cc-au animation), online music distributors MoSound and online journal On Line Opinion.

“Creative Commons: copyright for the digital age” in desktop magazine, #211, november 2005, pp58-60

support cc

elliott — Thu, 06 Oct 2005 15:33:58 -0500

the first annual Creative Commons fundraising drive has started and CC needs your support. since inception the organisation has offered authors and creators simple tools to mark their content with the freedom they believe it should carry. these tools have helped build a movement. there are now over fifty-million objects on the web that link back to our licenses. there are hundreds of volunteers working to spread our free licenses across the globe (like us here in the cc-au office).

funding had traditionally come from the substantial support of major foundations. but now we need to show the world that our support reaches beyond foundation boardrooms.

we want to sustain our growth by building a core membership in CC. we need these members to help us to continue to offer free tools to enable a flexible range of protections and freedoms for artists, educators, scientists and writers. your contribution will make an important difference now (More about donations and deductions).

show your support

you can now also subscribe to lessig’s regular email to address all things cc

fancy yourself a bit of a VJ then gov'ner?

elliott — Thu, 08 Sep 2005 10:45:20 -0500

BBC Radio 1 and 1Xtra have today launched a competition for VJs to build a three minute mix from the BBC clips available on the BBC Creative Archive. Shouldn’t be too hard given that the Archive has hundreds of video clips to download!

The best mix will win £250 to spend on VJing equipment and the chance to VJ live to a mix of their choice on these radio stations.

more information about the competition here

[please note: the comp is UK only]

ccMixter goes open source

elliott — Wed, 31 Aug 2005 17:12:04 -0500

recently creative commons’ online music community, ccMixter switched over to the GPL-licensed ccHost codebase, with soruce now available from SourceForge.

Like all celebs, the site has had a face lift, and she’s looking hot. There are new features and better functionality based on careful studies of how it was being used in its first year.

And don’t worry, all the music, reviews and profile info is still there. for full details of the change over go to the forum post

now you can run your own remix contest (and remix context—ccHost tracks remix sources and derivatives) site out of the box.

BBC Creative Archive trial a success

elliott — Wed, 17 Aug 2005 19:02:12 -0500

The BBC Creative Archive started thier first trial with Radio 1 and Radio 1Xtra this week, opening its archives to make programme extracts available for download, manipulation and sharing under the terms of the Creative Archive Licence (based on the Creative Commons archive).

The footage is taken from a whole host of BBC programmes and includes a wealth of material covering natural history, wildlife, science, locations, art and more. Gems include shots of cityscapes, sunsets, seascapes and other stunning visuals with, importantly, many more clips to come over the next few months.

Unfortunately the content is limited only to the UK public. People within the UK can download this material now from the Radio 1 Superstar VJs site.

PBS launches Creative Commons TV series - NerdTV

nic — Wed, 13 Jul 2005 21:33:19 -0500

From 6 September 2005, PBS will make available a 13-part series of one hour shows, featuring PBS technology columnist and industry insider Robert X. Cringely’s interviews with personalities from the ever-changing world of technology. The shows will be available exclusively on the Internet at (http://www.pbs.org/nerdtv), under a Creative Commons licence.

From the article:

Said Cringely, “NerdTV will have an uninterrupted hour with the smartest, funniest and sometimes nerdiest people in high tech. These are people who have changed our lives whether we know it or not. Through NerdTV a broad audience of enthusiasts and students will gain a much greater understanding of these techies and the context of their lives and work.” Cringely is the author of the best-selling book Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition, and Still Can’t Get a Date.

Cindy Johanson, Senior Vice President, PBS Interactive Learning, said, “Over the past ten years, PBS and its member stations have led the way with some of the most innovative, meaningful multimedia experiences available. Bob Cringely’s NerdTV illustrates our unwavering commitment to bring audiences clever, on-demand, participatory programming.” She added, “This ground-breaking series will be distributed under a Creative Commons license, so if viewers like what they see, they can redistribute the shows or even edit their own non-commercial version. Further, NerdTV offers a cost-effective production model that may transform how programming is made in the future.”

Viewers will be able to choose which content or format they download to their computer: MP4 video of the whole program, MP4 video of the “juicy” excerpt (for a more general audience wanting just a nugget) and MP4 video of the “nerdy” excerpt (for a more technical audience wanting just a nugget). In addition, a variety of audio-only formats will be available, including AAC, MP3 and ogg vorbis.

Cringely noted, “With more than half of American homes with Internet access now using broadband, computer video - especially downloaded computer video - has become a viable but still little-used option for TV distribution. The strength of this new medium can be found in how it serves niche audiences. This is where Internet distribution shines.”

Thanks to Neeru for the link.

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