andromeda.hyte.de

This is a reprint of an original Article on Wizards of OS 3 News Blog. I want to post it here on andromeda because I enjoyed its short and propper conclusion and think it describes the Ideas behind our work in an impressive way.

12-06-04 Where does the future of the Digital Commons lie? In a high profile wrap-up session of the Wizards of OS 3 conference, Charlotte Hess of the Digital Library of the Commons, kicked off the discussion with the question how we can allow the Commons of knowledge to be appropriated by some private companies.

David Bollier, author of “Silent Theft: The Private Plunder of Our Common Wealth”, asserted that the idea of the Commons can help start a new kind of discussion, help confer new cultural meanings, and help to inspire collaborative work in communities. The widespread embrace of the idea, he said, shows a deep human yearning to explore new kinds of collaboration in a time where markets and nation states are eager to separate people.

Creative Commons founder Lawrence Lessig asked the audience to insist upon a distinction that literature often ignores – that there are different instances of “the Commons”. The pasture to graze cattle is finite – the knowledge Commons is not. The idea of a “tradegy of the commons” induces cattle-thought when thinking about the Commons. But some Commons present no such tragedy, more is good in the cultural Commons. The more is used, the more there is. “We have to get the cattle-thought idiocy out of the discussion of the Commons,” Lessig said.

The FSF’s Eben Moglen, in a declamatory speech, invited the audience to keep expecting property to anihilate itself. “It is as with the wall, which no one heared crack – until it fell,” he compared the impact of the liberalization movements in the field of the Digital Commons with the fall of the Berlin Wall. “The tanks are not coming back this time,” he invoked memories of the Prague Spring uprising in 1968, “this time we win.”

Thanks to all beeings who participiate to the WOS 2004, I think we had a great time, hope to see ya next year!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 15th, 2004 at 12:11 and is filed under Datenreise. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.