#15 (WEEK 6) Copyright, Creative Commons, and What’s Coming Down the Web 2.0 Road

Putting the ‘social’ into social networks allows us to freely exchange information. But with the free exchange of information comes the responsibility of how we share it, and how we give credit to the author of that information. Check out this video, “A Fair(y) Use Tale” and learn some history of copyright.


In the workplace and the classroom, we are often faced with the copyright challenges. When is it acceptable to copy something and how much of an item [book, website, music etc] we can copy? Faced with declining budgets and little time, we are tempted to go ahead and make the copies. But with the advent of file sharing, downloading and RSS, we must acknowledge and teach the ethics of information gathering and sharing.

Creative Commons is a copyright license that allows us to choose to share our intellectual property. This course is designed under a Creative Commons license and is an example of how one can take a piece of information or a product and re-work it to make it fit your needs. By acknowledging the original authors, they have given permission for you to share. One place for good information about what's going on with the Creative Commons is Lawrence Lessig's blog. Lawrence Lessig is one of the Creative Commons developers and a Stanford University professor."


Discovery Exercises:

1. Try out the creative commons licensing tool. Which license did you end up choosing if any. Write a blog post on your preference and why you selected it. Is there a place for CC licenses in TAFE?
   
2. Browse the ccLearn pages. For bonus marks , create a blog post about your thoughts on the ccLearn initiative.
3. Take a look at the Flexible Learning Network's Copyright Kitchen, which breaks up copyright information into categories built around who you are, where you work and the task at hand.
4. Check out some of these 30 places to find creative commons media - put a link on a blog post to your favourite.
   

Discovery Resources:

• Online copyright comic book developed by students at Duke University Law School
• Creative Commons website
• “Wanna Work Together?” a short video about Creative Commons
• Read through the Official Guide to Copyright Issues for Australian Schools and TAFE

I hope you're enjoying all the exercises you've done so far. Keep having fun exploring and thinking about Web 2.0 in your training.