A little while ago I made a promise that I would try to restrict my blogging about Wikipedia (see that here), but looking at the April 2007 edition of the online refereed journal First Monday, I felt compelled to blog. The articles in this edition of First Monday focus on a lot of issues that we discuss here at the House of Commons (and, more generally, as part of the Unlocking IP project). Here's a summary:

Wikipedia: Different aspects of Wikipedia are considered in three articles. Dennis Wilkinson and Bernando Huberman assess the value of cooperation in Wikipedia here; Anselm Spoerri has created a qualitative study on the 100 most visited Wikipedia pages between September 2006 - January 2007 here; and Spoerri also asks, in a separate article here, what is popular on Wikipedia and why?

Open Access/Content/Source: Four articles address different aspects of the "open" revolution. After my discussion last week on open source cinema (and Snakes on a Plane!) I found Stefan Gorling's article Open Source Athletes particularly interesting - see that here. Peter Kaufman looks at open content, education and videos here; Paul Stacey look at open educational resources in a global context here ; and finally, Anna Winterbottom and James North combine a lot of issues, discussing the creation of an open access African repository based on Web 2.0 principles here.

Labels: catherine, open content, open source, wikis

The Sydney Morning Herald yesterday picked up an article from the Telegraph about the rise in "open source cinema", or films where the audience has a certain degree of control over what happens in the story. The term "open source cinema" was inspired, obviously, by open source software.

The prime example of this, of course, is last year's classic thriller Snakes on a Plane (or "SoaP"). New Line Cinema intended to change the name of this film from Snakes on a Plane to Pacific Air Flight 121 but outrage on blogs meant they kept the original title (although really, couldn't execs think of a better title than 'Pacific Air Flight 121'?) Following other demands, a certain line which, because this is a family-friendly blog will not be mentioned, was also inserted into the film. You can read more about open source cinema, and that particular Samuel L. Jackson line, at the Sydney Morning Herald article here.

When we started this blog I never, ever, thought that I would get to mention Snakes on a Plane. The House of Commons is now part of SoaP history.

Labels: catherine, Fun, open source

Some Friday fun...open source style.



(Pictured: "Open Source", Randall Munroe - via his excellent webcomic xkcd, available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.5 license)

Labels: abi, open source

Well, all good things must come to an end and linux.conf.au 2007 must too. There has been a definite open source-vibe on the University of New South Wales Kensington campus this week and so, to commemorate this event, I've compiled a list of 5 ways to tell that linux.conf.au has arrived...

1) Everyone you see is carrying a laptop...

2) Said laptops and laptop bags are covered in stickers, displaying the owner’s software affiliations

3) You see more people wearing baseball caps and t-shirts with obscure software company logos (as opposed to the more usual obscure streetwear logos often found on a university campus)

4) Occasionally, from anywhere in the campus, you hear Jeff Waugh proclaim, "Good afternoon, freedom lovers!"

5) Instead of people on the bus coming to university talking about what happened on last night's episode of Lost or 24, the conversation is abuzz about Tivoisation: a big bad or something that's actually pretty useful?

And to finish off, in the words of Jeff Waugh, so long freedom lovers! I'll be posting about the excellent linux.conf.au Open Day within the next couple of days (stay tuned for Robopuppies, segways and how to solder using a toaster oven in order to create your own aircraft - kids, don't try this at home.)

Labels: catherine, open source