The African Digital Commons
A Participant's Guide' 2005

NOW AVAILABLE!

A conceptual map of the people, projects and processes that contribute to the development of shared, networked knowledge across the African continent.

Thanks to those who submitted your details to the wiki! And if any of you want to be reflected in the 2006 edition, please email Chris Armstrong.

For more info, click here.

FRENCH, .doc
FRENCH, .PDF

ENGLISH, .doc
ENGLISH, .PDF

A Donors' Open Knowledge Alliance Campaign

Starting this year, we are going to be working with donors who want to adopt open content and FLOSS policies in their contracts with grantees. The Shuttleworth Foundation was the first to start using open-friendly contracts in early 2005. Says Mark Shuttleworth:

"The Shuttleworth Foundation prefers all content produced with the help of TSF funding to be licenced under an appropriate open content licence. We are committed to developing a body of work under open content licences, particularly content that is useful for education in South Africa, because we believe that a critical mass of open content will greatly improve access to knowledge for students here and globally. We would encourage other funders to consider similar policies, and are happy to share our experience with those who are interested in developing a similar best practice."

The open business model project

The Commons-sense project is collaborating with Creative Commons projects in the UK and Brazil to bring you case studies and tools for creating 'Open Business Models'. Anyone can add examples of open business elements to the website openbusiness.cc so join up today and find out about the great possibilities that open business models can offer.

Once upon a time' wins the Commons-sense Digital Arts Competition

The winner of the Commons-sense/Creative Commons South Africa Digital Arts Competition is Tessa Comrie with her 60-second video incorporating stop-frame and computer animation entitled, 'Once Upon a Time' (download mpeg here). Runner-up of the competition is Nicholas Nesbitt with his multimedia entry entitled, 'The Electronic Diary of Kidu' (view here).

More >>

A set of legal tools

Creative Commons South Africa was launched as the first African Creative Commons licence on the continent. Moving into our next phase, we're working with partners from the media, legal, educational and scientific fields in South Africa and beyond to provide ways for local creators to build and remix the culture around them. Use ccSA licences and we'll feature you on our growing showcase of the amazing digital creativity open to the world to share. Visit the ccSA website >>

A set of training materials

So you're thinking of using Creative Commons to licence your copyrighted material? How does it work? Who else is using it and why is it relevant here in Africa? The Commons-sense project team is working with filmmaker, Brian Quist, and a host of other developers to build training resources that are accessible and most of all fun to watch and engage with!

Launch date: February, 2006

A conference

25-27 May, 2005 | The LINK Centre | Graduate School of Public & Development Management (P&DM)
Wits University, Johannesburg, South Africa

At the Commons-sense conference in May 2005, people from around Africa and the world gathered together to discuss and celebrate the emergence of an African Digital Information Commons. Visit the conference pages for articles, conference presentations, media coverage and more >>

thanks to:

The LINK Centre
Graduate School of Public &
Development Management (P&DM)
Wits University, Johannesburg, South Africa


This project was made possible by a grant from the International Development Research Centre's Acacia Project