Intro Interactive – ICM501a

I posted this in response to Well Comm’s post, but I thought I’d repeat it here…

…it’s important to make clear that most people who are critical of the current intellectual property regime (myself included) are not anti-copyright. In fact, most–including Larry Lessig–are staunch defenders of copyright. The devil is in the details.

Most, for example, argue that the current term of copyright is out of whack. If you protect a copyright for 21 years–the original term of the Statute of Anne–that’s plenty if you are trying to encourage creativity. It means that if you write a book, you should probably write and publish another one sometime in the next two decades. People still get to protect a temporary monopoly, with out it getting (Happy Birthday, Mickey Mouse) stupid.

Likewise, when a kid on YouTube does a funny dance because a Prince song comes on, it shouldn’t result in the artist suing the parents. Again: that’s stupid.

And you shouldn’t be issuing patents for how to swing on a swing, or how to click on a link. Stupid.

And you shouldn’t sue teachers who show movies in a class, or artists who create new music based on old.

So, the battle here is not whether copyright should exist. Creative Commons REQUIRES copyright if it is to exist at all! The issue is getting rid of the stupid parts. To suggest that we can either have intellectual property the way it is today or not at all is disingenuous.

So, new tech happens every day. If we want to be able to know what future products are in 3 years, we need to look at what labs are prototyping today. So, how about augmented teality in a worn pendant, that follows what you do with your hands and layers data from the internet onto your world.

No? How about LED tattoos?

So, in the spring I’m on the hook for a few courses–most likely some sections of 501 and 505. However, I’m considering taking on a small number of students for a small group to either:

1. Do a bit of a deep dive in reading recent digital social theory and trying to make sense of it.

2. Doing a deep dive on the other side of things, and developing some cool geo-located (and possibly gaming) based stuff for the Android platform.

If you have an interest in this, drop me a note. In either case, I suspect it would count as an ICM elective. However, I’m going to be picky about who’s working in the group, and you should be aware that it (a) will be difficult and (b) won’t be a traditional course.

All this presupposes I actually have time to do it, which I won’t know for a little while yet.

This is a DARPA funded project for a military robot that can squeeze through cracks and ooze into your living room, from our friends at iRobot.

I may of mentioned that I don’t keep up with my aggregator as much as I used to. Part of the reason for that is that I use my friends as filters. Those I know pass along things I may be interested in via Twitter. And I can get at the larger communities interest through something like popurls.

For example, Thursday night’s popurls contained a treasure trove of materials relevant to 501 (not to mention a bunch of stuff–like the potential discovery of water on the moon) that was interesting but not as directly relevant.

• HOW TO: Launch Your Own Indie Journalism Site is an article written for Mashable by two recently laid off reporters.
• 10 Sites to Learn Something New in 10 Minutes a Day – I think that one of the least understood pieces of the social web is what it is doing to learning. This is another great post on Mashable about several sources of online, bite-sized learning.
• 30 Great Sites Using Wordpress as a CMS – As I’ve mentioned, I think Wordpress can be a great alternative CMS. Here’s a round up of organizations, including places like WSJ Magazine, Texas Tech, and Ford, who are making use of it that way.
• How I Got 294 Comments is an article on how to build buzz for a blog post.
• 50 Beautiful & Unique Twitter Profile Designs is one of those inspiring posts. I’ve now got a plan for my new Twitter background.
• Bionic Eye story in Wired.com describes this impressive iPhone app that is dragging us finally into Augmented Reality at the consumer level.
• 37 Signals Valuation Tops $100 Billion leaves me little doubt that I, too, can be a ridiculously successful entrepreneur.

Interesting piece over in Ad Age about the major networks ganging up to try to come up with a better system for measuring audiences. The issue is that it becomes really difficult to measure integrated and cross-media approaches, but these are the marketing approaches that seem to matter most.

Have a solution? Frankly, this is one of those cases where someone with a good idea and a willingness to really plow some time into a solution could have a real effect on the industry.

You will recall from the initial lecture that one of the most important thinkers of the 20th Century, Alan Turing, was chemically castrated by the British government after being convicted of being gay. He subsequently killed himself.

Today, UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown had this to say:

While Mr Turing was dealt with under the law of the time and we can’t put the clock back, his treatment was of course utterly unfair and I am pleased to have the chance to say how deeply sorry I and we all are for what happened to him.

So on behalf of the British government, and all those who live freely thanks to Alan’s work I am very proud to say: we’re sorry, you deserved so much better.

(BBC)

I mentioned in class on Wednesday the use of genetic algorithms to generate non-deterministic (and unpredicted) behaviors from systems. Here’s one example, and many others may be found on YouTube.

Used to be the web was considered a feeder for entertainment talent in “legitimate” media. How long before it goes the other way?