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Annotated Digital Culture Links: January 15th 2009
Links for January 14th 2009 through January 15th 2009:
- Gurunomics – Crowdsourcing the “Social Media Revolution” Revolution – Gurunomics – the social media revolution (satire) you had to have. I think.
- Turning Down Uploads at Google Video [Official Google Video Blog] – Google finally gets around to the slow, painful, drawn out murder of Google Video (why it’s still active today I have no idea): “In a few months, we will discontinue support for uploads to Google Video. Don’t worry, we’re not removing any content hosted on Google Video — this just means you will no longer be able to upload new content to the service. We’ve always maintained that Google Video’s strength is in the search technology that makes it possible for people to search videos from across the web, regardless of where they may be hosted. And this move will enable us to focus on developing these technologies further to the benefit of searchers worldwide.” (They’re also killing Jaiku, apparently.)
- Doctor Who Opening Credits, Firefly Style [YouTube] – When fandoms collide, creativity can result!
- Weak Password Brings ‘Happiness’ to Twitter Hacker [Threat Level from Wired.com] – “An 18-year-old hacker with a history of celebrity pranks has admitted to Monday’s hijacking of multiple high-profile Twitter accounts, including President-Elect Barack Obama’s, and the official feed for Fox News. The hacker, who goes by the handle GMZ, told Threat Level on Tuesday he gained entry to Twitter’s administrative control panel by pointing an automated password-guesser at a popular user’s account. The user turned out to be a member of Twitter’s support staff, who’d chosen the weak password “happiness.” Cracking the site was easy, because Twitter allowed an unlimited number of rapid-fire log-in attempts. “I feel it’s another case of administrators not putting forth effort toward one of the most obvious and overused security flaws,” he wrote in an IM interview. “I’m sure they find it difficult to admit it.””
- Ten things every journalist should know in 2009 [Journalism.co.uk – Editors’ Blog] – “1. How to use Twitter to build communities, cover your beat, instigate and engage in conversations.
2. How to use RSS feeds to gather news …
3. That there is a difference between link journalism and ‘cut and paste’ journalism (aka plagiarism). …
4. That your readers are smarter than you think. …
5. That churnalism is much easier to spot online. …
6. Google is your friend. But if you are not using advanced search techniques, you really have no idea what it is capable of.
7. You do not have to own, or even host, the technology to innovate in journalism and engage your readers. …
8. Multimedia for multimedia’s sake rarely works, and is often embarrassing. If you are going to do it, either do it well enough so it works as a standalone item or do …
9. How to write search engine friendly journalism. …
10. Learn more about privacy.” - Report Finds Online Threats to Children Overblown [NYTimes.com] – “The Internet may not be such a dangerous place for children after all. A high-profile task force created by 49 state attorneys general to find a solution to the problem of sexual solicitation of children online has concluded that there really is not a significant problem, despite years of parental anxieties and media hype. The Internet Safety Technical Task Force was charged with examining the extent of the threats children face on social networks like MySpace and Facebook, amid widespread fears that older adults were using these popular sites to deceive and prey on children. But the report compared such fears to a “moral panic” and concluded that the problem of child-on-child bullying, both online and offline, poses a far more serious challenge than the sexual solicitation of minors by adults. “
Annotated Digital Culture Links: January 11th 2009
Links for January 11th 2009:
- let the remixes begin (UPDATED) [Lessig Blog] – Lawrence Lessig appears on The Colbert Report promoting his new book, Remix… remixes ensue!
- tiltshiftmaker.com – Transform your photos into tilt-shift style miniatures – “Tilt-shift miniature style photos are pictures of real-life scenes that are manipulated to look like model photographs. Now you can easily transform your existing digital camera photos into tilt-shift style miniatures using tiltshiftmaker.com.” (A fairly minimal setup, but with the right photographs, these can look impressive.)
- Mouthwash linked with increased cancer risk [ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)] – “Dental experts are warning mouthwash could cause oral cancer and should be made available on prescription only. A review published in the Australian Dental Journal has linked mouthwash containing alcohol to an increased risk of developing the deadly disease. The alcohol in mouthwash is believed to allow cancer causing compounds to attack the lining of the mouth more easily. The review author, Michael McCullough, is an Associate Professor in Oral medicine at Melbourne University.”
- Whopper® Sacrifice – Sacrifice 10 friends from Facebook for a free WHOPPER® – Latest Burger King promotion is pretty web-savy: use Burger King Facebook application, delete 10 Facebook friends (and the application tells them you’ve done so) and get a free burger.
A Very CC Year …
As the Creative Commons movement celebrates a birthday this week, I thought I’d take the opportunity to reflect on my year in CC terms, as well as showing off some very impressive CC-licensed work by my honours students. It has already been a pretty big year in Creative Commons terms for me and the students I teach; in the first semester my Digital Media class experimented with Creative Commons licenses on a lot of their output, including many of their Student News reports and almost all of their outstanding Digital Media Projects; I’ve also enjoyed being part of an education panel at the Building an Australasian Commons conference in July, as well as presenting on my talk ‘Building Open Education Resources from the Bottom Up’ at the Open Education Resources Free Seminar in Brisbane in September.
As the year’s drawing to a close, I’m delighted to highlight one last effort, this time from the honours students in my iGeneration: Digital Communication and Participatory Culture course. The course, as in past years, has been a collaborative effort between the students and myself; I’ve provided the framing narrative and opening and closing weeks, while the students, in consultation, have written the central seminars in the course. Moreover, all course content from the seminars to the curriculum, from the students’ audio podcasts to their amazing remix videos, has been released under a Creative Commons license as both an exemplar of their fine work and an Open Educational Resource which, hopefully, will be something other teachers, students and creative citizens can draw upon for their own purposes. Moreover, given that I first ran iGeneration in 2005, this year’s students already built upon the work of that first cohort, learning from their peers and, hopefully, sharing so future peers can build on this work, too.
I also thought I’d take this opportunity to showcase some of the specific media projects created this year. The first is a really impressive podcast by Kiri Falls which looked at the Babelswarm art installation in Second Life …
[audio:http://igeneration.edublogs.org/files/2008/09/babelswarm.mp3][Full Sources & Exegesis] [CC BY NC SA]
Kiri’s final project for the unit, this time a remix video, takes quite literally the idea that creativity builds upon the past, with this enjoyable video which mashes together a plenitude of videos and photographs …
[Full Sources & Exegesis] [CC BY NC SA]
The second remix project I wanted to showcase is by Alex Pond; Alex has created a short but very poignant video which takes issue with the monolith that is copyright law, but celebrates the freedoms which are shared via the Creative Commons …
[Full Sources & Exegesis] [CC BY NC SA]
The final remix I wanted to highlight is a bit different. This one, by Chris Ardley, includes art and music from creators who’ve explicitly given Chris permission to re-use their work and share it under a CC license. This animation, created in Flash, explores remix more metaphorically, and tells a tale of worldly creation …
[Full Sources & Exegesis] [CC BY NC SA]
I think all of these projects are quite impressive, and I was delighted at how seriously this year’s students took the idea of remix and how many of them embraced everything that the Creative Commons has to offer, as well as giving back something of their own. I’ve also finally written iGeneration up as an educational example in the CC Case Studies Wiki, something I’ve been meaning to do for a while!
So, Happy 6th Birthday to the Creative Commons! In the next six years, I hope you’ll consider sharing work under a CC license if you haven’t already; a shared culture can help us all be a lot more creative. I know my students have benefitted from the generosity of the Creative Commons, and have, in turn, added a few quite impressive ideas and artefacts back into the creative stream.
Annotated Digital Culture Links: November 25th 2008
Links for November 23rd 2008 through November 25th 2008:
- Film studios to become ‘police, judge, executioner’ [The Age] – “Internet users would have their connections terminated summarily on the whim of the film and TV industry should it win its landmark legal battle against iiNet, legal experts have warned. Seven of the world’s biggest film studios and the Seven Network last week filed suit against iiNet, Australia’s third largest ISP, in the Federal Court. They claim iiNet authorised copyright infringement by failing to prevent its users from downloading pirated movies and TV shows. iiNet, and the industry body, the Internet Industry Association, say ISPs should not be required to take action against any customers until they have been found guilty of an offence by the courts. ISPs argue that, like Australia Post with letters, they are just providing a service and should not be forced to become copyright police.” (No, they really shouldn’t!)
- de_vangogh – A Van Gogh Counterstrike Mod [YouTube] – Running around in a level of Counterstrike entirely made out of Van Gogh paintings? Tripping, and actually visually quite amazing! [Via]
- Journalists warned of two years of carnage ahead [The Australian] – “Journalists have been warned they cannot be spectators if they are to survive the new world of media fragmentation and digitalisation … . “A report, Life in the Clickstream: The Future of Journalism, released today by the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance, warns that the Western media industry faces “two years of carnage”, squeezed by the global economic meltdown and the unravelling of traditional economic models. The report reveals that more than 12,000 journalists worldwide have lost their jobs so far this year…. While newspaper circulation in Australia is “holding up remarkably well” with aggregate circulation of metropolitan dailies falling only slightly in the past six years, television remained the dominant source of news for most Australians. The country also boasts one of the highest percentages of online news visitors in the world. … new technology and shrinking workforces has resulted in more than 70 per cent of journalists reporting increased workloads…”
- SF Sunday: Happy 45th Anniversary, Doctor Who! [Hoyden About Town] – “Yes, it’s 45 years since the world first saw a man travelling through time in a wooden box.” (Happy Birthday Doctor Who! I hate to think how many hours I’ve spent watching, discussing and generally being a fan of the good Dr … although I’ve enjoyed every minute. Well, except a few of the Colin Baker hours … :P) io9 also have an amusing (if a bit random) top 45 moments in Dr Who … 33 was, to say the least, amusing!
Annotated Digital Culture Links: November 22nd 2008
Links of interest for November 21st 2008 through November 22nd 2008:
- EFA concerned about movie industry lawsuit against iiNet [Electronic Frontiers Australia (EFA)] – “Electronic Frontiers Australa (EFA) today expressed concern about a lawsuit filed against Internet Service Provider iiNet in the Federal Court. A consortium of media companies have sued the ISP for allegedly allowing its users to download infringing movies and TV shows by failing to terminate their accounts after allegations of infringement by the copyright industry. “This lawsuit is the latest attempt by the movie industry to bully Internet Service Providers into becoming copyright police,” said EFA spokesperson Nicolas Suzor. “ISPs are not in a position to monitor and terminate internet access to users based upon unsubstantiated threats from copyright owners, and should not be asked to do so.””
- Kraftwerk sample case overturned [BBC NEWS | Entertainment] – “A court in Germany has told electronic band Kraftwerk that a producer who sampled one of their songs was not violating copyright. The ruling overturns an earlier decision against Moses Pelham’s use of a short sample from Metal on Metal. Judges in Berlin said the two second extract did not infringe copyright, as his song was substantially different. The move will come as a blow to artists who object to rivals using samples of their work to create new songs. ” (Bring on the legal remixes and mashups!)
- Immersion [The New York Times – Video Library] – A fascinating video by Robbie Cooper which captures the faces of young people as they play videogames – watch that concentration! (There are photos, too.)
- ‘The Dark Knight’ Conquers BitTorrent [TorrentFreak] – This week, in another round of leaks, DVD-rips of ‘The Dark Knight’ found their way to BitTorrent. Unsurprisingly, given the commercial success of the movie, <em>these were downloaded well over a million times in just a few days</em>. From the looks of it, Batman will crush Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk and Transformers, as it will easily become this year’s most pirated movie.
- Star Trek [Apple – Trailers] – Young James T Kirk … the beginnings of the Enterprise … angry Spock … and sex in outer space. The Star Trek reboot will either be amazing or utterly wrong!
- 19-Year-Old Lifecaster Commits Suicide on Justin.TV [smcb] – “In a tragic story from NewTeeVee, we learn that a 19-year-old user of the online live-streaming video service Justin.TV has apparently commit suicide in front of an audience of fellow forum dwellers egging him on during the process. The death has been confirmed with the Broward County medical examiner and the timeline has been pieced together from several different forums that have chronicled the unfortunate series of events.”
New Media Literacies
Check out this articulate, straight-forward and succinct little video highlighting the key skills which are part of digital literacy (or, as the producers prefer, new media literacies):
[Via Howard Rheingold @ Smartmobs]
Star Wars & John Williams A Capella Style!
Wow: you simply must watch the uber-cool "Star Wars" – an a capella tribute to John Williams …
I love every single one of these scores! Check out the lyrics here (“Kiss you brother …” :P).
Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in a Hybrid Economy
Lawrence Lessig’s latest, and reportedly last, Creative Commons related book, Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in a Hybrid Economy, has been released and it looks very impressive! Here’s the blurb :
For more than a decade, we’ve been waging a war on our kids in the name of the 20th Century’s model of “copyright law.” In this, the last of his books about copyright, Lawrence Lessig maps both a way back to the 19th century, and to the promise of the 21st. Our past teaches us about the value in “remix.” We need to relearn the lesson. The present teaches us about the potential in a new “hybrid economy” — one where commercial entities leverage value from sharing economies. That future will benefit both commerce and community. If the lawyers could get out of the way, it could be a future we could celebrate.
As the founder and leading light of the Creative Commons movement, Lessig is ideally situate to comment on these matters. Indeed, as I wait for my copy to arrive in the mail, my only disappointment is that the book didn’t come out a few months earlier – my honours students are currently completing their own remix projects and this would have been the perfect companion text (you can see the chapter breakdown to get an idea of the content). As with all of Lessig’s books, a freely redistributable version will be released shortly, this time under the Bloomsbury Academic imprint, a new line of academic books which will release all of their titles under CC or similar licenses allowing free redistribution (if you’re interested, you can read an interview with Bloomsbury Academic’s publisher Frances Pinter about this new line).
As well as the book, you’ll definitely want to watch out for Brett Gaylor’s new documentary RiP: A Remix Manifesto which takes a look a remix culture via interviews with the usual suspects (Lessig, Doctorow), but with mashup and remix artist Girl Talk as the focal story. Here’s the trailer:
Barackbar
He knows when it’s a trap!
Guess who I’d vote for if I lived in the US? 😉 [Via]
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