ORG COMM

"Open Source" Legal Defense?

This is cool.

Help defend bloggers' rights to keep their sources secret: Cory Doctorow: As part of the appeal on Apple's legal action to force websites that report on its new products to reveal their sources, Boing Boing will be signing onto a bloggers' "amicus brief." Our lawyer is Stanford's Lauren Gelman, and she needs your help for the brief. She writes:

"I need links to news stories broken by bloggers-- things a court can look at and say 'this looks like what we traditionally think of as journalism.' I am particularly interested in examples of stories based on sources, but any news will do. I will use these both as facts for the brief and I want to attach printouts from the blogs as attachments to it. I'm looking for as many as 50 examples, but I need at least 10."

Email your comments with links to [email protected]. Link

(Via Boing Boing Blog)

Re-Writing a Book Within a Wiki Community

Stanford law professor Lawrence Lessig is revising his best selling book on digital media and the law with the help of a wiki. Lessig is pioneering a new form of authorship here, in which organizations, rather than lone authors (or editor-selected contributors), write books. If it works for the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, why not for a book?

Lessig Revises Book With Public Wiki: Silent_E writes "Always wanted to see your words in print? The San Jose Mercury News is reporting that Lawrence Lessig is revising his book 'Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace' using a wiki-based, public discussion. The proceeds from the sale of the book are being donated. . All royalties are going to Creative Commons, plus the advance. "

(Via Slashdot)

State of the Blogosphere

Interesting study released about the rise in blogging:

State of the Blogosphere: more posts more often: Cory Doctorow: David Sifry is continuing his excellent State of the Blogosphere report on what Technorati has discovered by indexing every blog extant. Yesterday he wrote about how many new blogs are being created, and today he writes about the increased frequency with which bloggers are posting: "On average, Technorati is tracking about 500,000 posts per day, which is about 5.8 posts per second. In October 2004, we were seeing about 400,000 posts per day. It is interesting to note that posting volume suffered a decline during the months of November and December, 2004. A large part of this decline is the reduction in postings about US politics after the election in early November. However, the growth of mainstream blogging services becomes apparent when looking at the rise in posting volume starting in December. This is congruent with the increase in the number of new blogs during those months as discussed in yesterday's entry." Link

(Via Boing Boing Blog)

All Study Blog Assignments Now Posted

I have posted all of the "study blog" assignments for the rest of the semester. Refer to my online course calendar to see them in a calendar-view (under my "materials" links list in the left sidebar of my blog). Further information about our final project (which is also part of your semester grade) will be discussed in class and posted on my blog in the coming weeks.

Assignment #9

Watch Revolution OS and Is Wal-Mart Good for America?

In a blog post, consider the following: How is Wal-Mart's relationship to its manufacturers different from GNU-Linux's relationship to its developers?

Length: at least 500 words.
Links: 4 (2 to classmates' posts; 2 to outside web sources).
Due Date: Thursday, April 28th.

[For instructions on how to make a graded blog post refer to this post.]

Assignment #8

Explain "The Long Tail." Start with the Wikipedia entry. Then look at my del.icio.us links. From there you can look at the links of other del.icio.us users who have tagged pages with LongTail. In your blog post, consider the following: How can organizations use the Comm strategies and technologies we've discussed this semester to access the vital information hidden in the "tail" of the organization?

Length: at least 500 words.
Links: 4 (2 to classmates' posts; 2 to outside web sources).
Due Date: Thursday, April 21st.

[For instructions on how to make a graded blog post refer to this post.]

Assignment #7

Define and explain the concept of "folksonomy." A good place to start is the Wikipedia entry. Also consult the links under my del.icio.us tag. In your blog post consider how folksonomies are useful (in general) to organizations.

Length: at least 500 words.
Links: 4 (2 to classmates' posts; 2 to outside web sources).
Due Date: Thursday, April 14th.

[For instructions on how to make a graded blog post refer to this post.]

Assignment #6

Read Ch. 3 of The Cluetrain Manifesto. Write a response to it in a blog post. In your response, deal thoughtfully and creatively with the concepts you find in Cluetrain.

Length: at least 500 words.
Links: 4 (2 to classmates' posts; 2 to outside web sources).
Due Date: Thursday, April 7th (by class time).

[For instructions on how to make a graded blog post refer to this post.]

Assignment #5

Read Ch. 2 of The Cluetrain Manifesto. Write a response to it in a blog post. In your response, deal thoughtfully and creatively with the concepts you find in Cluetrain.

Length: at least 500 words.
Links: 4 (2 to classmates' posts; 2 to outside web sources).
Due Date: Saturday, April 2nd.

[For instructions on how to make a graded blog post refer to this post.]

Assignment #4

Read the Introduction and Ch. 1 of The Cluetrain Manifesto. Write a response to it in a blog post. In your response, deal thoughtfully and creatively with the concepts you find in Cluetrain.

Length: at least 500 words.
Links: 4 (2 to classmates' posts; 2 to outside web sources).
Due Date: Tuesday, March 29th.

[For instructions on how to make a graded blog post refer to this post.]