David Bollier

Viral Spiral - How the Commoners Built a Digital Republic of Their Own David Bollier copy @ viralspiral.cc © 2008 by David Bollier All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, in any form, without written permission from the publisher. The author has made an online version of the book available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license. It can be accessed at ‹http://www.viralspiral.cc› and ‹http://www.onthecommons.org›. Requests for permission to reproduce selections from this book should be mailed to: Permissions Department, The New Press, 38 Greene Street, New York, NY 10013. Published in the United States by The New Press, New York, 2008 Distributed by W. W. Norton <=amp> Company, Inc., New York ISBN 978-1-59558-396-3 (hc.) CIP data available The New Press was established in 1990 as a not-for-profit alternative to the large, commercial publishing houses currently dominating the book publishing industry. The New Press operates in the public interest rather than for private gain, and is committed to publishing, in innovative ways, works of educational, cultural, and community value that are often deemed insufficiently profitable. www.thenewpress.com A Caravan book. For more information, visit www.caravanbooks.org.; License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license. SiSU viralspiral.cc ii Contents Contents “You Have No Sovereignty Where We Gather” .............. 61 3 WHEN LARRY LESSIG MET ERIC ELDRED 64 Viral Spiral - How the Commoners Built a Digital Larry Lessig's Improbable Journey ... 69 Republic of Their Own, Waging the Eldred Case ......... 74 David Bollier 1 A Movement Is Born ........... 80 Attribution ..................... 1 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ............. 2 PART II 84 INTRODUCTION ................. 3 The Rise of Socially Created Value ... 7 The Rise of Free Culture 85 The Commoners Build a Digital Republic [Intro] ....................... 85 of Their Own ........... 9 4 INVENTING THE CREATIVE COMMONS .. 87 The Rise of the Commoners ....... 12 What If . ? ............... 89 A New Type of Emergent Democracy? . 19 Crafting the Licenses ........... 101 Branding the Public Domain in Code .. 105 PART I 21 The Action Shifts to Palo Alto ...... 107 5 NAVIGATING THE GREAT VALUE SHIFT .. 113 Harbingers of the Sharing Economy 22 The Great Value Shift ........... 116 [Intro] ....................... 22 The Endangered Economics of Central- 1 IN THE BEGINNING WAS FREE SOFTWARE 24 ized Media ............. 118 2 THE DISCOVERY OF THE PUBLIC DOMAIN 41 The Economic Advantages of Open Me- The Elusive Quest for “Balance” ..... 43 dia ................. 121 The Great Expansion of Intellectual Prop- Web 2.0: A New Breed of Participatory erty ................. 48 Media ............... 123 Confronting the Proprietarian Juggernaut 52 Open Networks and the Long Tail .... 127 A New Story About the Public Domain . 56 Another Vehicle for Niche Communities: What Is “Authorship”? .......... 57 The Commons .......... 129 SiSU viralspiral.cc iii Contents 6 CREATORS TAKE CHARGE ......... 133 Share the Wealth, Grow a Commercial DIY Videos and Film ........... 138 Ecosystem ............ 216 Letting the Music Flow .......... 142 Open Content as a Gateway to Commer- Music as Remix .............. 147 cial Opportunities ......... 218 7 THE MACHINE AND THE MOVEMENT ... 154 Commoners as Co-creators of Value .. 225 Building the CC Machine ......... 157 Reintegrating the Sharing and Commer- 8 FREE CULTURE GOES GLOBAL .. 164 cial Economies .......... 230 Brazil, the First Free Culture Nation ... 167 11 SCIENCE AS A COMMONS ......... 231 National Variations of a Global Idea ... 173 The Viral Spiral in Science ........ 235 Laboratories of Free Culture ....... 176 The Open-Access Movement ...... 239 The Developing Nations License .... 179 The Scholar's Copyright Project ..... 244 The iCommons Network ......... 181 The Neurocommons ........... 250 9 THE MANY FACES OF THE COMMONS .. 185 Open Physical Tools ........... 253 Individual Choice Versus the Commons 189 12 OPEN EDUCATION AND LEARNING ... 257 Freedom, the Commons, and Movement MIT's OpenCourseWare Initiative .... 260 Building .............. 191 The Rise of the Open Educational Re- The Splintering of the Free World? ... 193 sources Movement ........ 263 CONCLUSION: THE DIGITAL REPUBLIC Criticism from the Left and from the South 198 AND THE FUTURE OF DEMOCRATIC Fair Use and the Creative Commons .. 201 CULTURE .................. 268 PART III 206 A New Species of Citizenship ...... 269 A Long-Term Power Shift? ........ 276 A Viral Spiral of New Commons 207 Index 283 [Intro] ....................... 207 10 THE NEW OPEN BUSINESS MODELS .. 209 Metadata 300 Open Networks Spur New Business Mod- SiSU Metadata, document information ..... 300 els ................. 211 SiSU viralspiral.cc iv Viral Spiral - How the Commoners Built a Digital Republic of Their Own 1 Viral Spiral - How the Commoners Built a Digital Attribution Republic of Their Own, David Bollier To Norman Lear, dear friend and intrepid explorer of the frontiers of democratic practice SiSU viralspiral.cc 1 Viral Spiral - How the Commoners Built a Digital Republic of Their Own 2 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS must single out Glenn Otis Brown, Mia Garlick, Joichi Ito, Heather Ford, Tomislav Medak, Ronaldo Lemos, and 3 In this book, as with any book, dozens of barely visi- Hal Abelson for their special assistance. ble means of support conspired to help me. It has been Since writing a book resembles parachuting into a 6 hard work, but any author with sufficient honesty and forest and then trying to find one's way out, I was self-awareness realizes the extent to which he or she is pleased to have many friends who recommended some a lens that refracts the experiences, insights, and writ- useful paths to follow. After reading some or all of ings of others. It is a pleasure to pay tribute to those who my manuscript, the following friends and colleagues have been helpful to me. offered many invaluable suggestions and criticisms: Charles Schweik, Elliot E. Maxwell, John Seely Brown, 4 I am grateful to Larry Lessig, a singular visionary in developing the commons as a new paradigm, for help- Emily Levine, Peter Suber, Julie Ristau, Jay Walljasper, ing to make this book possible. He submitted to sev- Jonathan Rowe, Kathryn Milun, Laurie Racine, and eral interviews, facilitated my research within the Cre- Gigi Sohn. It hardly requires saying that none of these ative Commons community, and, despite our shared in- astute readers bears any responsibility for the choices volvements in various projects over the years, scrupu- that I ultimately made. lously respected my independence. It is also a plea- For the past seven years, the Tomales Bay Institute, 7 sure to thank the Rockefeller Foundation for generously recently renamed On the Commons, has nurtured helping to cover my research, reporting, and travel ex- my thinking and commitment to the commons. (On penses. the Commons has no formal affiliation to the Creative Commons world, but it enthusiastically shares its 5 I interviewed or consulted with more than one hundred commitments to the commons.) I am grateful to my people in the course of writing this book. I want to thank colleagues Peter Barnes, Harriet Barlow, and Julie each of them for carving out some time to speak with Ristau for their unflagging support of my book over the me and openly sharing their thoughts. The Creative past three years, even when it impinged on my other Commons and iCommons staff were particularly helpful responsibilities. in making time for me, pointing me toward useful doc- uments and Web sites and sharing their expertise. I In the early stages of this book, Elaine Pagels was un- 8 SiSU viralspiral.cc 2 Viral Spiral - How the Commoners Built a Digital Republic of Their Own usually generous in offering her help, and my conversa- INTRODUCTION 11 tions with Nick Bromell helped pry loose some important insights used in my conclusion. Cherry Alvarado was of It started with that great leap forward in human history 12 extraordinary help to me as she transcribed scores of in- the Internet, which gave rise to free software in the terviews with unfailing good humor and precision. I also 1980s and then the World Wide Web in the early wish to thank Andrew Ryder for resourceful assistance 1990s. The shockingly open Internet, fortified by these in the early stages of my research. tools, began empowering a brash new culture of rank amateurs — you and me. And this began to reverse the 9 I have dedicated this book to my dear friend and men- tor Norman Lear. The zeal, imagination, and grace that fierce tide of twentieth-century media. Ordinary people he brings to the simple imperatives of citizenship have went online, if only to escape the incessant blare of been more instructive and inspirational than he perhaps television and radio, the intrusive ads and the narrow realizes. He has also been of incalculable support to me spectrum of expression. People started to discover in my headstrong explorations of the commons. their own voices . and their own capabilities . and one another. 10 Finally, at the end of the day, when I emerge from my writer's lair or return from yet another research and re- As the commoners began to take charge of their lives, 13 porting trip, it is Ellen and my sons Sam and Tom who they discovered anew that traditional markets, govern- indulge my absences, mental and physical, and reac- ments, and laws were often not serving their needs very quaint me with the things that matter most. I could not well. And so some pioneers had the audacity to in- wish for more. David Bollier Amherst, Massachusetts vent an infrastructure to host new alternatives: free and May 1, 2008 open-source software. Private licenses to enable sharing and bypass the oppressive complications of copyright law. A crazy quilt of Web applications. And new types of companies that thrive on servicing social communities on open platforms. At the dawn of the twenty-first century, the common- 14 ers began to make some headway.

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