Monday, March 29, 2004

Free Culture spoken. This has amazed even me. AKMA asked whether a free audio version of Free Culture can be built. Joi seconded the idea, and one day later, ten chapters are claimed. Doug Kaye of ITConversations has already recorded chapter one — Creators. Noncommercial derivative works, and maybe even a competition in versions (I want to record a chapter!). Very cool. [Lessig Blog]  Free Culture formats. The free Free Culture was released as a pdf under a Creative Commons attribution-noncommercial license. Some complained about the format. Others, relying upon the freedom granted, created derivative works in other formats. So far, 36 hours after the book was released, I know of 9 versions available, including: MS-reader, Rocket e-Book, zipped, iSilo, Mobipocket, EasyRead, PostScript, Plain Text, html. Most of these are from Blackmask, but thanks to Firas, Mike and Josh as well. [Lessig Blog] Herein lies the true power of the Internet in relation to distribution and adaption of knowledge and information.  An author releases a work onto the net in a sinlge format and within days it has been rendered into multiple file formats and MP3.  All, I'm sure without a significant loss of sales of the dead trees version.  Media publishers should see this as a beacon shining through the current noise of P2P, piracy, and infringement.  You can release works onto the net in a way that is beneficial to all parties involved. 9:42:31 AM    comment []  trackback []