Dave's Imaginary Sound Space

Windows Live Writer Beta 2 Released

Fri, 01 Jun 2007 17:25:30 GMT

Microsoft have released a new version of Windows Live Writer, the desktop application that makes it easy to publish rich content to your blog. Having created this post immediately after a smooth upgrade installation, first impressions are good.

Some of the new authoring features include:

Comprehensive table creation and editing tools
Auto spell checking as you write
Improved hyperlinking and image insertion
Full synchronization between online and offline applications
Paste Special - Plain Text or HTML (Embed Tags, YouTube etc)
Support for categories, Blogger labels and back-dated posting
Excerpts and extended entries

Writer can now publish to Windows Live Spaces, Sharepoint, WordPress, Blogger, LiveJournal, TypePad, Moveable Type, Community Server, and other weblog services.

Customization

With just a mouse click the feel and look of the application can be changed instantly to any color you like using the new colorize button on the menu bar.

New image editing options allow rotation and contrast adjustment and it's now possible to automatically link to a previous post via the insert hyperlink menu.

Other useful Writer capabilities include back-dated posting - you select any date for the post to appear, easy insertion of maps from Virtual Earth, and rich media plug-ins like audio and video tools available from Windows Live Gallery and reviewed at Windows Live Writer Plugins. Just Select Add a Plugin from the app sidebar to launch the Live Gallery site.

Good Things Coming...

Having been nine months in the making, this is a worthwhile update for existing users with a range of very usable improvements. The open plug-in platform and API-driven building tools make further customization ongoing and easy to implement. Judging by developments at Popfly the future looks very promising indeed, watch the video below.

The above video was inserted using Paste Special.

If you're upgrading from a previous installation remember to update your account settings to ensure you're getting all the latest features (Tools/Accounts). As usual with beta software releases, reporting and solving application problems is part of the process so don't expect perfection.

Further details of this release and developer information can be found at the Windows Live Writer team blog - Writer Zone. For more Live news, free applications and Vista resources see Windows Live Tools.

Technorati tags: blogging, live spaces, web publishing, tools, windows live writer

Videos of Harp Guitar Performances

Thu, 17 May 2007 22:33:56 GMT

Three videos of harp guitar performances by Andy Mckee, Don Alder and the late Michael Hedges.

Andy McKee - "Gates to Gnomeria"

Don Alder - "Sayonara Calm"

Michael Hedges - "Because It's There"

More Recordings

YouTube has a selection of harp guitar performances by several exponents of the instrument.

Recordings of these performances under Creative Commons licenses are rare but Swedish composer/guitarist Thomas Almqvist ( right) is sharing a cool live recording of a 16-string harp guitar at MacJams.com called Embla. Thanks Thomas!

Albums on Amazon

Reference

Tags: acoustic guitar, Andy McKee, Don Alder, harp guitar, guitar, guitarists, Michael Hedges, music, videos, YouTube

Free Cartoons and Webcomics from XKCD.com

Thu, 10 May 2007 03:02:31 GMT

xkcd is a webcomic created by former NASA roboticist Randall Munroe. His drawings are published under a Creative Commons license and you need no permission to reuse them for non-commercial purposes, just provide attribution to xkcd.com. New comics are published on the site at midnight every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Here are some samples from the collection archives, click on the images to visit the source.

Digital Rights Management

"If you think the purveyors of DRM simply want to protect artists, check out chapters 13 and 14 in Free Culture, by Lawrence Lessig. Their goal is the elimination of all culture they don't control."

Content Protection

"How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity" Lessig.

XKCD Linkage

There's more info about the characters, themes and content style (Nerd/Romance Humor) at Wikipedia xkcd

You can also find lots of interesting things to see and do in the Forums including other artists sharing works under Creative Commons.

Here's the Comic Feed: http://xkcd.com/rss.xml

Here's the Blag Blog and check out the Store for things that you can wear or put on your wall, like this Map of Online Communities -->

"I'm waiting for the day when, if you tell someone 'I'm from the internet', instead of laughing they just ask 'oh, what part?"

Resources for Drawing, Cartoons, and Webcomics

Technorati tags: art, cartoons, comics, creative commons, copyleft, drawing, illustration, webcomics, xkcd

Ourmedia Relaunches with Channels of Creativity

Tue, 24 Apr 2007 18:45:43 GMT

Ourmedia has relaunched with a minimalist look and new focus on media channels. There is now more emphasis on the social interaction around media and ways to draw attention to the good stuff. Here are some of the features available.

Channels @ channels.ourmedia.org

Channels are media streams categorized by subject or interest that include content such as music, podcasts and video. People can highlight media hosted anywhere on the Web and group media together into themes. Ourmedia members can now easily create their own social broadcast networks and post items to their channels using the special browser tools mentioned below. Each item is a bundled document of media data; on posting you simply enter the relevant details into the template fields and click submit. The fields include:

Media URL
Media Page URL (source)
Thumbnail URL
Screen Shot URL
Artist Name
Artist Homepage URL
Comments URL
License (option menu)
Player (type)

Here's an example that took just a few minutes to create: Chill Channel

RSS Feeds

Available feeds are split across two domains with the new user-created channels residing at channels.ourmedia.org.

Ourmedia.org

Has four main channels that are currently enabled for media streaming:

Audio

Images

Text

Video

Channels.ourmedia.org

All user-created channels have RSS feeds although at the time of writing these were not media-enabled for streaming files via widgets. Hopefully this will change as the new features are rolled out.

You can also view related news feeds using the aggregated News Reader.

Browser Tools

Toolbar Buttons - Let you post and view channels from within your browser.

Two bookmarklets can be dragged to your browser bookmarks toolbar:

Post to Ourmedia Channels - This button allows you to post your current page to your Ourmedia channels.
My Ourmedia Channels - This button allows you to quickly view your Ourmedia channels.

These provide a useful way to populate your Channels with media just discovered or when revisiting favorite sites.

Open Media Search

Located at the top left-hand corner of all ourmedia.org pages is the new Google powered search engine. This makes it easy to search for 'open' media by source, media type and license. Searchable domains include:

Creative Support

The Learning Center provides help with key aspects of media creation and distribution through a series of how-to guides and tutorials. Everything is published under Creative Commons.

The Open Media Directory is a list of free and legal media hubs, highlighting cool sources of audio, music and video that's safe to share or remix. The list may be republished under the CC license terms, an example being the recent Creative Commons UK Mix and Mash Film Competition which used it to provide support for Video Resources.

Putting Ourmedia to Work

Along with the social functionality of Ourmedia, the features I've outlined above make it easy for people to create and share legal media in an open environment.

The Search Engine and Open Media Directory both help you locate free and legal media which in turn can be posted directly to your Channels using the browser buttons. Overall a clean and tidy package without all the clutter and commercialization of other media sharing destinations.

Related DISS Media

Free Sounds - Legal Audio Samples, Loops, Software, Music and Video Downloads.

OpenSonics - Open Music Community News and Copyleft Media Resources.

Open Music Search - A Google Custom Search Engine for exploring the Open Music Ecosystem. Grab the widget and spread free music!

Technorati tags: audio, channels, creative commons, creativity, images, multimedia, music, open learning, open media, ourmedia, podcasting, rss, search engines, social media, social networks, social web, text, video

Convert RSS Feeds to Banner, Javascript or PHP

Thu, 08 Mar 2007 21:41:50 GMT

Blog Signature Generator allows you to create a dynamically updating news banner (signature) that links to the original feed source. It also generates a Gravatar connected to your email address - "an 80×80 pixel avatar image that follows you from weblog to weblog appearing beside your name when you comment on gravatar enabled sites."

RSSConverters.com has an online wizard that converts RSS news feeds and podcasts into Javascript or PHP code. The wizard can batch convert multiple feeds and apply blanket customization features for display options and style.

Mash and Grab RSS Feeds

You can find a good selection of RSS feeds via the Mediaspheres Grazr - Right click on any list title to grab the feed (copy shortcut).

You can also grab a selection of pre-mashed RSS feeds via Dave's FeedRaider. Each single-page aggregator has RSS, OPML and Embed options at the bottom of the page.

The FeedRaider RSS feeds can be pasted into the Grazr address field (open View on menu, choose Address Bar), then select the refresh icon on the right of the browser to view the combined feed mashup.

For more RSS resources and web widgets see Feed Pitstop and Widget Finder.

Technorati tags: blogs, feeds, gravatar, javasript, php, podcasts, RSS, tools, widgets

ccMixter Adds Dynamic Audio Playlists

Mon, 12 Feb 2007 18:31:26 GMT

The state of online music remixing and Open Music distribution took a significant step forward recently with the release of ccMixter's new audio Playlist feature at ccMixter.org. A community-driven playlist tool for sharing Creative Commons sound samples and music.

About

The application combines several key areas for creators that make it easy to find, share and promote legal audio and music works:

Collaboration - It's about connectivity, creativity, distribution and interaction. Social media at the heart of Web 2.0 - Web4
Creative Commons Licenses - Open, flexible, copyright options designed to foster freedom of ideas. Ranging from some rights reserved to public domain.
RSS Feeds and Social Syndication - Preview and create dynamic audio playlists - grab RSS feeds for your web-mashups, podcasts and social networking websites.

Killer Features

There are currently four tabbed views for managing Playlists:

Hot Playlists - Create - Popular Remixes - New

Multiple playlists can be opened simultaneously in the 'Hot' and 'New' browse modes.

Create Dynamic Playlists

In the 'Create' view you can quickly make customized, automatically updating playlists using the simple online interface. There's a choice of parameters to choose from that allow you to locate and filter media files for fine-tuning the list.

These include: Playlist Types, Artists (users), Tags, License Type, Ratings, Time Period and more.

Free Registration

Registered users can save and share their playlists including individual list items such as songs and samples. Full integration between community lists make it a breeze to add media items from one list to another with a single mouse click.

New playlists can be created on the fly instantaneously, for example when browsing and listening to audio, in a seamless listening environment. Each list you create is automatically added to your community profile area.

RSS feeds are generated for all your playlists. You can also edit important elements in your list such as dynamic parameters, the order of list items, tags, playlist title and description.

Simple html formatting is allowed in the description so you can include links to websites, contact information or the location of a web page widget that uses the playlist feed.

The ability to dynamically create playlists/podcast feeds by licence type, combined tags and other key factors makes it easy to create hybrid audio channels including sound sample based feeds as well as music playlists.

For example here's a dynamic RSS feed for a capella melodies based on user ratings:

http://ccmixter.org/media/api/query?tags=melody&reqtags=acappella&type=all&limit=50&f=rss

Click on this icon to view and listen to the feed in a Grazr widget

There are also filtering options for Popular Remixes, which shows the audio media most frequently included in playlists.

Further details and upcoming features can be found at How to use PLAYLISTS

CC Music 2.0 Fueling Web 2.0

Make no mistake, ccMixter is the complete package. No other remix site commands the same level of respect amongst musicians, producers and content creators.

The tight social networking fabric combined with a philosophy of open media creation provides a truly creative environment for users of all levels and musical styles. In this community everyone works together; sharing, rating, reviewing, mixing, promoting, distributing, learning - Forums

ccMixter playlists utilize the power of citizen DJ distribution, contributing to the growing culture of shared media networks and social tribes.

Artists, bloggers, filmmakers, listeners, and podcasters can all interact to create collaborative resources and original compositions. Anyone can use these compositions to build new, derivative works, be they music, video or other media forms like web-mashups, in accordance with the licensing terms.

Widgets, Pipes and Tubes are the plumbing through which these rich media creations can flow using URLs and RSS feeds.

These intelligent crowdsourcing activities are becoming increasingly prevalent as the need for media filtering and recommendation prevails. Musically and culturally speaking, DJs have always provided the editorial factor so important to informing the wider music community. Todays web DJs are restricted only by the technologies they use and their knowledge of Social Media. To learn more about this topic read the online ebook What is Social Media?

Given the emergence of social mediaspheres and widgetized connective tools, now anyone can be part Data Jockey - Data Carrier.

Widget Action: Take a look at some of the ways ccMixter and CC music are connecting in the Web 2.0 world.

ROYALTY FREE MUSIC DOWNLOADS: ATTENTION ALL METACAFE PRODUCERS - video powered by Metacafe

How to create personalized ringtones using ccMixter

Web 2.0 in Five Minutes

Related Sites

Audio 2.0 - List of music, p2p, podcast, sound, and radio sites.

Opensonics - Open Music Community News and Resources.

Swik Playlists - Open source projects wiki.

Technorati tags: audio, ccmixter, creative commons, music, open music, playlists, podsafe, samples, social media, sound, remix, web 2.0

Creative Commons Video Sharing Sites and Social Media Tools

Sat, 03 Feb 2007 05:22:15 GMT

A roundup of online video hosting services and related tools that support publishing under Creative Commons. These are services for sharing documentaries, movies and short video clips that can be legally downloaded and freely distributed under the terms of license.

Further resources for distributing and finding CC video works and Public Domain films are also provided. The list of sites includes Catalogs, Search Engines, Open Source Software, Social Video Applications, Creative Commons Help and related video reference materials. All of the sites and tools are free to use or download.

A word on Terms of Service

Video capture, storage and transmission is gradually becoming more accessible, enabled by low cost devices like camcorders, mobile phones, webcams, free software and falling broadband/storage costs. The creation and distribution of social media has become widespread due to the abundance of Internet technologies and new online media services (Web 2.0).

However, the sites used to host and distribute video online differ widely in their end user agreements and Terms of Service. Therefore some video sites are 'friendlier' than others for content creators, depending on how the creator/copyright holder permits the work to be used and whether or not they get paid for their creations.

It's important to recognize that major video sharing sites like Google, Yahoo! and YouTube can sell or license uploaded videos to third parties without financial compensation to the creator. This may change in the future and YouTube founder Chad Hurley has hinted that YouTube plans to share revenue with original content creators.

For people using Creative Commons licenses this is extremely important because their choice of license is often determined by requirements involving pre-cleared authorization, user flexibility, and various copyright protections, including non-commercial use. These copyrights can be superceded or nullified by agreeing to the TOS of the video hosting service. Superceded terms may be perpetual, royalty-free, irrevocable and transferable so it's helpful to know what the user may be giving up before accepting the terms (See links under Comparison Surveys below).

Most video sharing sites have some kind of involvement with commercial partners such as advertisers, licensees, sponsors, affiliates and the like. This includes aggregators and search engines that spider, index and display videos elsewhere.

When choosing a host it's often a case of finding a balance between the features on offer and the Terms of Service, especially in the grey area of non-commercial use licenses. When using a third-party hosting service it's worth remembering the role partnership deals play in the financing of their operations. It's wise to read the TOS, privacy policy and copyright policy first to determine the reputation and suitability of the service. An alternative is to host the files on your own server or use a suitable paid web hosting provider.

Embrace or Embargo?

Frequently people share media on popular video sites to gain high visibility for their works. For example, the independent record label Magnatune encourages the use of music in non-commercial, user-created videos uploaded to most video sites, see 100% Legal Music for YouTube, Revver, Blip TV. All music available from Magnatune is licensed under Creative Commons and the label's Open Music approach is well suited to new media developments like podcasting, Second Life and viral video promotion (PureVideo search). By increasing the avenues of supply Magnatune is making it easy for people to find and use their licensed music through a process involving ubiquity rather than scarcity. This flexibility is one of the main benefits of Creative Commons and the ability to legally share, reuse, and remix content embraces the idea of social media.

On the other hand many indie labels using more traditional copyrights are very concerned about the illegal use of copyrighted works on social media sites like YouTube and MySpace. For recent developments see Indie music labels create Merlin to conjure licensing deals and YouTube Indie Label Talks Falter. Cease & Desist Orders Fly.

About the Resources Listed Here

The sites and tools below have been selected for their open participation, support and recognition of Creative Commons licenses. The list is designed to make it easier for people to locate video hosts, video content and useful resources for working with CC video materials.

People interested in CC video resources fall broadly into two overlapping groups:

People releasing works under Creative Commons (content creators)

You, artists, educators, indie-filmmakers, license holders, musicians, netlabels, production companies, VJs, etc

People looking for works made available under Creative Commons (content users)

You, bloggers, content distributors, educational departments, fans, podcasters, remixers, students, teachers, etc

Generally people are common to both groups - content creators and content users - although it's useful to differentiate for the purposes of categorizing resources for easier browsing.

Similarly, most of the video hosts listed here offer comparable and overlapping features but some provide specialized or notable options such as revenue sharing or educational materials and courses.

As a rough guide the more general resources appear towards the top of the list with the more specialized resources appearing towards the bottom in a loose, broad to narrow list structure.

General Video Sharing Sites

Hosts, repositories and blogs for sharing all types of video content under Creative Commons.

Internet Archive

A non-profit digital library offering permanent free video hosting for anyone wishing to share files in the Public Domain or under Creative Commons. Thousands of short films, documentaries, video clips and other footage can be found in the Moving Images Archive.

What's New at the Internet Archive

A blog started by the Internet Archive’s Collections Team to highlight new collections and interesting items from the Movies, Audio, and Education collections.

Ourmedia.org

A free repository and open media community supported by the Internet Archive which provides hosting and bandwidth for uploaded files. Thousands of user-created videos are available under Creative Commons licenses. You can browse content by media type or use the search engine to find videos. Created by volunteers, Ourmedia is an open-source project and to use the service you should be willing to share your works with a global audience. Payments to video producers is planned.

Podcast Spot

An audio and video podcast host with support for shows released under Creative Commons. Browse Creative Commons Licensed Episodes. Limited free hosting is available for testing the service but users require prepaid accounts for Storage or Professional levels.

Videobloggers.org

A free video hosting project and vlogosphere content aggregator supported by ibiblio.org. Intended as a mirror service for existing videoblogs, only Public Domain/Creative Commons licensed media are allowed. The Videoblog Directory provides access to categorized vodcasts for easy viewing.

vSocial.com

An online social networking service and video platform that helps community members to communicate and share content. Users can choose from a number of Creative Commons licenses during the upload process.

Revenue Sharing Sites

These are video hosting services that also offer creators the option of earning money for sharing their videos.

Blip.TV

A free videoblogging, podcasting and video sharing service with thousands of grassroots videos, many of which are licensed under Creative Commons. There's an optional advertising revenue plan that offers a 50/50 split.

Cruxy

Allows content creators to upload, promote and sell media using widgetized distribution with support for Creative Commons. Primarily a digital content marketplace for buying and selling media.

Lulu TV

A video site where creators share their works under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs license. Videos can easily be embedded in blogs and web pages using the supplied code. Content creators may register a Shareholder account and get paid based on the amount of traffic a video receives. No advertising is used on the site or in videos.

Revver

A website for users to upload and share video clips. All videos use a Creative Commons Share-Alike license which permits redistribution. Clips can be embedded into blogs or websites using the automatically generated code. Short advertisements are attached to the end of videos as part of a revenue sharing model for users.

Independent CC Video Productions

Some highlighted projects and sources of indie video productions under Creative Commons.

Hive - NTT ICC open archive

A Tokyo based open video archive initiative dedicated to the fields of media art and informational arts. Archived video content is provided to users under a Creative Commons License.

Internet Archive: VJ Loops & Performances

Aggregates VJ video contributions by Archive users.

LegalTorrents

Provides a collection of Creative Commons licensed video by independent producers distributed via BitTorrent.

Maker Faire VJ Clips (2006)

A collection of short clips created for live video mixing. Shot on April 22, 2006 at the Maker Faire in San Mateo, they are now available under a CC Attribution 2.5 license.

NerdTV

A weekly technology show from PBS.org columnist Robert X Cringely. Featuring one hour interviews with leading technology experts. The NerdTV mpeg-4 video, mp3, ogg vorbis, aac audio, and text transcripts are distributed under a Creative Commons license so viewers can legally copy, redistribute, extract, edit and modify the shows.

Open Source VJ Loops & Performances

This is a collaborative collection of VJ clips and visual works hosted at the Internet Archive. Most of the works are pre-cleared for creative use or issued under CC licenses. A useful resource for VJs, DJs, musicians and artists seeking visual content and materials.

PIXnMIX Candy Jar

A collection of video clips produced mainly by VJs for VJs. The clips are licensed for non-commercial use under Creative Commons. They can be used live but may not be sold in commercial productions. A Channel4.com microsite.

Video.indymedia.org - Indymedia Video Distribution Network

Allows independent producers to publish high quality videos under Creative Commons.

WGBH Lab: Video Sandbox

An online destination and initiative designed to help independent media makers. Selected video clips from the WGBH Media Library are being cleared for copyright and made available for people to cut, loop and mashup via the Lab Sandbox. All clips are made available in QuickTime’s native .mov format under Creative Commons license Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike 2.5.

Recent History of Independent CC Movies

BBS: The Documentary

Written and directed by Jason Scott Sadofsky, the 8 episode series was the result of over 200 interviews about all aspects of the history of the dial-up Bulletin Board System. Released in 2005 under a Creative Commons Attribute-Sharealike 2.0 license, the project took around 3 years and $50,000 of investment to make. This was a bold move at the time and you can read about Jason's thinking on copyright and distribution in this inspiring essay that explains all: Why the BBS Documentary is Creative Commons.

ASCII Jason Scott's Weblog

IMDb Entry

BloodSpell

A feature-length Machinima animated film from Strange Company. The magical fantasy, released in 2006 under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License, comes in a series of 14, 5-10 minute episodes. They are available for streaming online or as free downloads in versions with foreign language subtitles.

Boy Who Never Slept

A free full length comedy-romance movie by Solomon Rothman released in 2006. Anyone can watch, share, edit and use the work in their own derivative works (open source). The entire movie, including source files, is available for download under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License.

Cactuses

A 2006 motion picture created by the Arc2 Project for a student learning scheme. The movie is available as an authorized and legal download under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 license. Project MySpace.

For more like these see Wikipedia Open Source Movie and Wikipedia List of works available under a Creative Commons license.

Open Learning and Education Sites

These are sites that offer free learning materials and online courses under Creative Commons.

ADUni.org

Offers course materials and lectures from a one-year, intensive post-baccalaureate program in Computer Science (See also the Internet Archive Collection).

Berklee Shares

Provides a library of free music lessons in audio, video, and print-ready formats including: MP3 audio lessons, QuickTime video lessons, and PDF text/graphic/notation lessons. All content is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs-NonCommercial license. It can be used, copied, or distributed only for non-commercial educational purposes. No modifications or derivative works may be made.

Creative Commons Education

Featured creators, tools, and works.

Internet Archive: Open Educational Resources

Provides file hosting and distribution for some of the resources mentioned here and hundreds of other educational videos.

MIT OpenCourseWare: Video and Audio

Offers complete video and/or audio for a selection of courses under Creative Commons. Video and audio formats are .rm and .mp3 respectively. You can learn how to save the RealPlayer video files to a disk or to your hard drive. Course materials offered on the MIT OCW Web site may be used, copied, distributed, translated, and modified, but only for non-commercial, not-for-profit educational purposes that are made freely available to other users under the same terms defined by the MIT OCW legal notice (See also the Internet Archive Collection).

MSRI Math Lectures: Show Talks by Speaker Name

A list that gives you an alternate way to navigate through the many videos posted on the VMath Video Collection at the Internet Archive.

Ourmedia Learning Center

A personal media learning center with tutorials and guides for a wide range of user-generated media activities. Volunteers contribute to the open knowledge database and most materials are released under a Creative Commons license. Many contributions feature video tutorials and documentation.

University Channel

A collection of public affairs lectures, panels and events from academic institutions all over the world. Audio and video materials are available to the public for viewing, listening, streaming and downloading under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Sharelike 2.5 license (See also the Internet Archive Collection).

Related 'Open License' and Public Domain Video Resources

Initiatives and organizations for Open Content videos.

Creative Archive Licence Group

A UK initiative, set up by The BBC, the bfi, Channel 4 and the Open University, that allows UK citizens to share and re-use content, under the terms and conditions as set out in the Creative Archive Licence. The open archives and collections can be found via the "For download" link on the side menu. Materials include clips from programmes and still images.

Fifty Animated Short Films from the National Film Board of Canada

The collection includes several animation classics and spans 65 years of animation at the NFB. Pre-authorized licenses allow the works on the site to be used for non-commercial educational purposes.

Metavid

Archives public domain senate and house footage under a free-document license, facilitating collective reuse and annotation of metavid archived content. You can search video metadata using text queries to find keywords associated with the recording. To view the clips in a web browser you need firefox and annodex.

Public Domain Torrents

Offers free and legal public domain movies for download via BitTorrent technology. You can choose from hundreds of classic films, animations and B-movies sorted by category. There are versions available for PDA, IPOD, PSP and some movies can be streamed via Google Video.

Video Compilation on Free Digital Culture

A collection of educational, promotional and public performance videos about Free Culture and Free Software.

Wikimedia Commons Videos

A repository of animations and videos distributed under a free license or in the public domain, suitable for educational purposes.

Wikipedia: Open Source Movie

Examples and links to films using open licenses.

PD Movies Reference Sites

Information resources for public domain films.

The Public-Domain Movie Database

A Searchable DataBase of Public-Domain Movie Information, Episode Guides and More.

Wikipedia: Public Domain Films

Provides a list of articles about post-1923 theatrical-released films that are in the public domain. Useful for finding movies hosted at the Internet Archive (See external links at bottom of Wikipedia entries).

CC Video Directories and Search Tools

Directories and search engines you can use to discover CC videos and related media.

Common Content

An open catalog of all types of Creative Commons licensed content. The site has a category for movies including documentaries, narratives and stock footage, there's also a search engine for finding materials.

Creative Commons Search

Special CC search tools that allow you to scour the Blip.tv video database, Google and Yahoo web search, Flickr photos and OWL music search.

Open Media Directory

A clearinghouse for finding legal music and video content. Most of the sites listed distribute works in the Public Domain or under Copyleft style licenses like Creative Commons. Good for finding audio and music for use in video productions.

Podsafe Content Search

A search Swicki for finding legal, podsafe music and video sources. Including: Public Domain works, Creative Commons licensed material, Copyleft works and other forms of licensed content. Another useful starting point for general CC search queries and unearthing related links.

VlogMap Community

A resource for connecting and finding video bloggers. Use the search engine to find CC related information.

Creative Commons Help and Publishing Tools

Deep links to useful pages across the Creative Commons web site and associated domains.

CreativeCommons.org

Homepage of the main site.

Choosing a License and License your Work

Learn how Creative Commons works.

Creative Commons Frequently Asked Questions

Provides answers to common questions.

Content Curators

A list of CC content curators and media archives (audio, video, podcasts, etc). See Film for a list of feature-length or otherwise highly notable films under CC licenses.

ccLabs

Featured projects currently under development at Creative Commons.

CcPublisher

A freeware application that allows you to upload Creative Commons-licensed audio and video works to the Internet Archive for free hosting with the option of publishing to your own site. It also allows you to tag your audio and video files with information about your license.

Podcasting Tools

Provides links to podcasting legal guides, practical advice and mp3 promos to help podcasters inform listeners about their use of CC licenses.

Weblog

The latest CC news, developments and announcements.

Wikipedia: Creative Commons

Shared community knowledge and useful links.

Free Open Source Software and Social Video Applications

Web-applications and downloadable software for all types of video requirements.

Audio and Video edition of NGO-in-a-box

A toolkit for DIY media makers that provides a collection of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) tools, documentation and tutorials.

Celtx

Software for making media - film, video, theatre, and animation. Celtx is a Media Pre-Production Suite combining all the tools you need for rich media productions in one application. Available in 20 languages on Windows, Mac and Linux, is open source, so available as a free download from the web site.

Creative Commons Software

Links to free and Open Source software resources.

Ohloh - Open Source Directory

Use the search engine to explore open source video projects.

ProgrammableWeb

A list of Web Mashups tagged video.

Social Source Commons

Tools tagged with 'video'.

SWiK Video

A community driven resource for sharing open source software.

Wikipedia: List of Open Source Software Packages

Includes links to video editing software.

Wikipedia: List of VJ Software

Live video performance software for all platforms.

Video Hosting Comparison Surveys

Useful information and site feature comparisons.

Comparing Terms of Service at Video Sites

A comparison of popular video hosting sites compiled by J.D. Lasica of Ourmedia and Brian Satterfield of Techsoup. Provides a breakdown of what you get and give up by consenting to the TOS at some of the major video sites. There is also a TOS comparison wiki for new contributions and amendments.

Sites that Pay for Web Video

A chart listing Web sites that enable independent video producers to make money from their work.

Wikipedia: Comparison of Video Services

Provides tables comparing general and technical information for a number of video hosts.

Web 2.0 Video Sites

There are now hundreds of video sharing sites online all using different Terms of Service and user license agreements. Here are some lists you can use to explore them. See the comparison surveys above for an indication of how some of them differ.

All Things Web 2.0 - Video 2.0 - list of services.

eConsultant: Web 2.0 Video Services - list of services also cross-posted to this Hubpage.

Everything 2.0: Video 2.0 - list of services.

MoMB - The Museum of Modern Betas - cataloged items tagged 'video'.

YouTube, Google Video and Others

These sites do not specifically support Creative Commons but due to their vast market share many users are uploading files of CC licensed videos/music soundtracks to gain greater visibility. Here are some tools you can use to track this material.

Complete List of Google Video Categories

Includes Hidden Google Video Categories, Google Video By Ordered Country, The Unofficial Google Video Sitemap and Search Tips.

Google Video: Link within a Video

Explains how to add a time location to the end of a video URL to create links to specific points inside a video. Example:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1267626298712917200#35m24s

Where #35m24s represents 35 minutes, 24 seconds. Useful for flagging CC music and conversations.

Podzinger

Allows you to search within the audio of videos on YouTube. Useful for digging conversations about Creative Commons.

PureVideo

A video meta-search engine that can pull in results from 100s of sites. Useful for finding CC content and generating search RSS feeds.

YouTube Online Feed Reader

Lets you quickly access and read all the main YouTube RSS feeds and search for videos. Also provides tools for easy subscription to feeds, bookmarking videos and tracking blog links to videos.

Forums and Groups

Community sites and tools you can use to get support and answers to questions.

Boardreader

A forum search engine useful for tracking conversations.

Google Groups

Has recently updated the site look and features. Use the group search option to find information.

Videoblogging | Google Groups
For videobloggers, vloggers, voggers, and anyone else creating video content for distribution online (Open).

Yahoo! Groups

Podcasters
A group for podcasters and podcast listeners to share information (Free membership required).

DISS-covered Media

More complimentary media creations by Dave.

Creative Commons Video Showcase - Learn how Creative Commons licenses can help you avoid the problems current copyright laws create for the sharing of information. Quickly access useful CC resources, news and developments for your own media projects.

Free Sounds - Audio samples, freeware, legal audio and video downloads using Open Licenses.

Opensonics - Open music community news and resources (Squidoo).

Podcast Hosting Services - A guide to companies early to the podcasting market.

Podsafe Content Lens - A guide to resources for legal audio and video focusing on CC, copyleft and public domain works (Squidoo).

Podsafe Music Resources - Where to find free and legal mp3 audio downloads (copyleft, creative commons, public domain resources).

Viral Video Directory - A tool for tracking viral video clips and popular movies (Squidoo).

Widget Finder - Connectivity accessories for social media applications.

Other video items can be found under DISS Movies and on the Media Distribution list.

You can share related sites and info in the comments area below or email me at daveholmesprojects (at) gmail.com

Technorati tags: archives, creative commons, education, film, google, hosting, learning, movies, open content, open source, podcasting, public domain, publishing recording, search engines, social media, tools, video, videoblogging, web 2.0, youtube

Music Legend James Brown Dies Aged 73

Mon, 25 Dec 2006 11:48:45 GMT

The "Godfather of Soul" James Brown has died today at the age of seventy three. He was admitted to hospital in Atlanta on Sunday suffering with pneumonia. His contribution to music is immeasurable and his influence on popular culture will continue to be felt long into the future. Having spent six decades in entertainment the singing star had 119 chart hit records, second only to Elvis Presley.

He had a tough childhood living in the deep south of America, having to pick cotton and shine shoes to support his family. By the age of sixteen he was convicted of armed robbery and served three years in a juvenile detention center. His musical career found its roots in Gospel music but his ideas were outside of the usual norm for popular artists of the time. Confronted with social hardships and a music business based on "popular conceptions" he often funded his own recordings. Believing in his own sound and sticking to his guns, he went on to transform Gospel into R&B, then Soul into Funk. These developments had profound effects, leading to new forms of music production and leaving a lasting legacy on what was to become the worlds biggest selling music genre, Hip Hop.

James Brown had also been a political activist with a strong social agenda, lobbying for poor Afro Americans and sponsoring food stamps. He believed in black capitalism and managed to move with the times by using his exceptional music catalog to remain at the forefront of developments in the music and movie industries. Along with his sound recordings he'll be remembered for his distinctive vocal style, part sung - part spoken, and his energetic live stage performances. As the most sampled artist in recorded history he continues to be truly inspirational and influential.

tags: funk, gospel, James Brown, music, obituaries, performer, singer, R&B

Pump Audio Helps Indie Musicians Pump Up the Volume

Wed, 13 Dec 2006 18:59:06 GMT

Pump Audio is a music licensing agent that connects independent musicians and labels with buyers in the mainstream media. This is a new kind of digital marketplace that makes it easier for artists to make their music available to a wide range of media production outlets including television, radio, Internet, and film. Possible uses include: commercials, jingles, industry presentations, movie soundtracks, promotions, TV background music, video games, websites and any type of production that needs audio enhancement. The numerous avenues for sales means new music in every genre is required to maintain a catalog suitable for all purposes.

The 50/50 Deal

The Pump agreement pre-clears the music for potential licensing, full ownership of the music remains with the musician and the agreement is completely non-exclusive. This means musicians retain control over their original recording and publishing copyrights. A minimum 1 year commitment is expected. Musicians receive 50% of the license fees received by Pump Audio and also performance royalties where appropriate. Pump acts as the Administration Agent for royalties collected through a performing rights society such as ASCAP, BMI or SESAC (see the FAQ for more details).

Music Submission

All music must be submitted on a broadcast quality, 16bit, 44.1khz CD. No fees are required for submission. An A&R department auditions each song prior to acceptance in the catalog. Each CD sent is treated separately and requires a separate contract.

Pump Technology

Pump Audio have developed a portable music delivery service known as the PumpBox. There are webware and hardware versions of the PumpBox that provide comprehensive search capabilities for finding music in the catalog. Thousands of creative producers can search by genre, mood, instrument and tempo for music that is instantly available for use. Local desktop installations are placed with industry clients such as MTV, VH1, Comedy Central, the History Channel and some of the top ad agencies worldwide. Only the best Pump Audio artists are selected for the PumpBox although the larger catalog is still accessible to clients in other ways. Music that makes it into the PumpBox has the greatest chance of being seen and used.

Pump Audio and Creative Commons Partner on Commercial Licensing for Independent Artists - PR Newswire

Excerpts from the above press release:

"Pump Audio is offering a variety of Creative Commons copyright licenses to its independent musicians who want to allow various forms of non-commercial use of their music."
"As part of the partnership, Pump Audio has introduced an online badge for artists, allowing them to designate on any Web page, artist blog or MySpace profile that their music is available for commercial licensing through Pump Audio. Artists can pair their new Pump Audio badges with similar badges for their Creative Commons copyright licenses, enabling them to promote both their commercial and non-commercial licensing preferences. (Examples can be found at http://www.lovetheory.com/listenbuy.html and http://www.myspace.com/garynewvision )"
"Creative Commons copyright licenses allow authors and artists to mark their works as free to copy or transform under certain conditions -- to declare "some rights reserved," in contrast to the traditional "all rights reserved" -- thereby enabling others to access a growing pool of raw materials without legal friction. As musicians select a Creative Commons copyright license from the Creative Commons Web site, they also will be prompted to join Pump Audio for commercial licensing of their music."

This is part of the Creative Commons initiative to find and present ways that CC licensing models can be applied to commercial ventures.

Via The Digital Music Weblog

Technorati tags: audio, audio licensing, advertising, bands, composers, creative commons, distribution, film, Internet, media, music, musicians, production, publishing, pump audio, radio, recording, television

Social Media Buzz Tracking - Web Buzz Explorer

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 09:26:36 GMT

From humble beginnings to hyperlinked hubs - the blogger's path is long and winding. On the second birthday of DISS I thought it fitting to share some words of encouragement with today's new blog babies beginning the ever evolving journey into the realms of cyber-punk-publishing. May all your blogs burn brightly in the blogosphere constellation of Sagittarius.

Alternatively you can jump straight to the section below headed Web Buzz Explorer for a window on the buzzscape surrounding social media.

Blog Births (and deaths)

Everyday thousands of blogs and spaces are created, many quickly find their way into the blog graveyard but others grow into vibrant hubs of activity. Whether your blog withers and dies or blossoms and flies is ultimately up to you. With blogging, what you put into it is directly related to what you get out of it - more or less? - it's a shared journey that gradually tells your story.

Fear of Blogging

When you're new to blogging the linear time structure of blogs and the pressure to post frequently can be intimidating. Although it helps to be disciplined, setting artificial performance targets will make you a slave to your blog. It's better to aim for quality rather than quantity in your posts and let the process of growth come naturally. Unless you're already used to writing, gaining the confidence to express your thoughts and write clearly takes time. There are many stumbling blocks along the way from bloggers-block to information overload-paralysis, so it's good to know even the most experienced bloggers battle with feelings of guilt over lack of productivity. Don't despair, you'll get there.

However if you're unsure of the commitment involved you can always gather your ideas by creating a Hubpage or Squidoo lens first. These services let you create webpages in a non-linear format where you can add details bit by bit to build up a content rich webpage. They're a good way of focusing your ideas and some people prefer to create lots and lots of these pages rather than individual blog posts. I tend to use whatever tool or service I think works best to get the job done.

Wings of Desire

When starting a blog the first few steps and weeks can be tricky as you begin to find your blogging feet. Once up and running, your feet leave the ground and you begin to fly. If your desires and passions are strong enough you'll find your wings.

DISS came into existence early December 2004 and the first post to the "soundblog" was on 6 December. Since that first step into the blogosphere I have made hundreds more posts with thousands of links and received hundreds of thousands of page views in return. One step is the first of many.

Celebrity gossip blog PerezHilton.com claims to have up to 3 million unique visitors a day! (note to self : Britney Spears :)

Evolutionary Leap

Blogging is the most important driving force in social media and there are hundreds of thousands of blog posts daily. These posts contain the ideas, views and opinions of their authors and increasingly, other media such as audio and video. Finding and contributing to these "conversations" is part of the fun and there are now lots of tools to help bloggers with the business of digging for interesting stuff and tracking the buzz on social networks. Knowing how and where to find these resources is one of the biggest evolutionary leaps a new blogger can take. Now jump!

Web Buzz Explorer

Web Buzz Explorer is a Hubpage with a list of tools and services for tracking social media. The hub sources allow you to scour online news, track personal projects, watch trends, discover new media and build your own social applications. Whether it's the best blog stories, music mashups or viral videos, these sites will help you find the most recent and most popular emergent data on social networks.

The hub is an extension of the Web Zeitgeist list on DISS that people have found useful for tracking news and web developments. Having a dedicated Hubpage means the new list can support more resources that are better annotated and grouped into categories for easier browsing. The list is available under a Creative Commons license for anyone to share and build upon so if you want to grab all or part of it go ahead. People can also share similar buzz sites and tools in the comments area of the hub.

There are currently almost 200 resources being sorting into topic areas and due to their nature there is obviously considerable overlap. The emphasis is on buzztracking tools and media aggregators that help you find cool and interesting stuff, quicker. The contents has been developing along these lines:

Hub Definitions
Apple Mac
Blogs & Blogging Tools
Bookmarks & Popular Media
Crowds & Memetracking
Digg Buzz Recent
Digg Views
Feed Singlegators Various
Gaming
Ideas & Intelligence
Librarian
Music
News Aggregation
Open Media
Podcasting
RSS & OPML
Search Trends & Markets
Software
Video
Web 2.0
Web Traffic
Zeitgeist Toolbox

The hub is a good place to start a surfing session when you need a bit of inspiration or want to dig deeper for data. It's also useful for researching online Internet phenomena and social media applications generally. If you're interested in building your own Hubpages, don't be put off by the minimal look, there's a design upgrade in the pipeworks which aims to make the pages look more attractive.

Most bloggers have their regular watering holes but sometimes it helps to break out of the usual patterns and travel elsewhere. The resources listed in the hub provide a quick way to switch crowds and get to what stories are most interesting to the masses.*

Creating Your Own Buzz Portal with FeedRaider

Once you've discovered lots of blogs and new sources of information, you need to organize these into manageable ways of reading them. You can use popular online feed readers like Bloglines or Google Reader and you can also use web-based applications to build your own news aggregators as mentioned in the "Zeitgeist Toolbox" at the Buzz Hub.

FeedRaider is a relatively new web application that allows you to create and edit your own RSS feed portal similar to Popurls. These single page aggregators are also known as "singlegators".

FeedRaider lets you organize and display your choice of news, audio and video feeds in flexible ways. Multiple pages can be created that display RSS feeds in a choice of Deck or River views. It's a fast and powerful way to aggregate the feeds you're most interested in. You simply paste the feeds or import OPML into your "singlegators" and arrange the overall display of each page as desired.

There are display control options for every feed you add including: text only, text plus audio/video buttons, thumbnails only, thumbnails plus title, video/audio player.

Any page of aggregated feeds can be linked to externally so you can build portals to fit your other online projects.

Here's one I'm building now so you can see what it looks like unfinished! Dave's FeedRaider - CC Music. Choose from the menu along the top to view the various feed topics, I've added more feeds to some topics than others but once I have everything in place I'll post a link at the top of DISS homepage.

Your singlegators can be exported as OPML or embedded in a webpage using JavaScript. You can also override the default CSS to style FeedRaider with your own graphics, colors and layout. Cool.

FeedRaider was created by Jussi Vaihia, Blog.

Check Out
Well that's about it for the anniversary post, here's some new stuff to check out along the lines of media discovery and aggregation.

Friends of ccMixter - Now bloggers focusing on Creative Commons music can get their news feed/fix on ccMixter thanks to Victor. A great idea and another reason to visit the premier CC music community on the planet.

REPROMAN - A new pet project with a reprogrammable philosophy and a remix, reuse, recycle mantra (preloaded Grazr browsing).

What's New at the Internet Archive - The Collection Team's Blog - another relatively new blog that highlights new collections and interesting items from the Movies, Audio and Education collections.

* Finally on the subject of crowdsourcing and social media aggregation, as Seth Godin says in his Unforgivable Manifesto: "Mass taste is rarely good taste".

Analysis and Stats

State of the Blogosphere, October 2006

State of the Blogosphere, August 2006

Why The Wisdom of Crowds Fails on Digg

300+ social network startups in less than 2 years

Blog Beginnings

Starting a Blog Part 1

Previously on DISS

Buzz Search Engines and Social Tools

Tag Exploration

http://del.icio.us/tag/socialmedia