Archieven: Opiniestukken

10.000 Jamendo albums

Sinds jaren is Jamendo het grootste muziekplatform voor gratis, onder Creative Commons licentie verschenen muziek. Inmiddels is de mijlpaal van 10000 albums bereikt.

Digitaal gemeente genot

Trouwen is vaak een romantische daad, voor de initiatiefnemers van de verbintenis. Voor de overheid is het vooral een manier om te zorgen dat mensen hun eigen verantwoordelijkheid nemen. Zo kunnen partners elkaars IBG schuld aflossen en belastingvoordeel aan elkaar beleven. Dat alles moet natuurlijk wel goed gedocumenteerd zijn. In de ambtelijke procedure naar de mooiste dag van je leven toe zijn heel wat officiële stukken vereist. Echt schrikken wordt het als een geboorteakte vereist blijkt. Die je exclusief kunt krijgen in de gemeente waar je bent geboren. Veghel, here I come…

Ouders kunnen online vorderingen kind zien

De Zuidlandse basisschool De Bongerd gaat aan de slag met een nieuw Leerling-VolgSysteem (LVS) dat ouders inzage geeft in schoolresultaten, werkstukken en de mooiste tekeningen.

EU-ministers stemmen voor softwarepatenten

Afgelopen dinsdag hebben de EU-ministers massaal voor een omstreden softwarepatenten wet gestemd die het patenteren van software mogelijk maakt.

Belgische federale overheid zet 28000 ambtenaren over op IP-telefonie

‘Our Creative Capacity’

Last week the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science published a memorandum on creative industries in The Netherlands. The memorandum is titled ‘Ons Creatief Vermogen’ (something like ‘Our Creative Capacity’) and lists a number of policy measures that will be taken to strengthen the creative industries. A total amount of 15 million euros has been put aside for those measures. The memorandum is the first step towards a more structural approach to creative industries.

Free – as in bicycles

Over the past two days i have been attending an workshop on the ‘The Socio-Economic Impact of Social Computing: validation and policy options’ organized by the Institute for Prospective Technology Studies (IPTS) in Sevilla, Spain. The IPTS is one of the 7 research institutes of the Joint research directorate of the European Commission and researches issues related to technological innovation. Starting this summer Kennisland will collaborate with the IPTS in a new project that will investigate the opportunities for the integration of immigrants and ethnic minorities in Europe provided by ICT and social computing (more about that when the project starts).

A fresh view on collective management of copyright

Last Friday, at the Noorderslag Music Festival in Groningen Buma/Stemra (the principal Dutch organization that looks after the interests of composers, song writers and publishers of music in The Netherlands) announced it will start a project to develop more flexible forms of collective rights management.

NESTA report: Creating Innovation

Encouraging linkages between the creative industries and the wider economy to spur innovation.

P2P-Television Workshop in Amsterdam

Creative Industries and technology are growing further towards each other in Amsterdam today. Researchers from Delft University of Technology just presented the newest P2P-software, called Tribler.

Creative Commons in court #2

The first known court decision involving a Creative Commons license was handed down on March 9, 2006 by the District Court of Amsterdam. The case confirmed that the conditions of a Creative Commons license automatically apply to the content licensed under it.

‘Our creative potential’

In October last year I wrote about a Dutch policy report titled ‘Our creative capacity’. The report outlines the main ambitions of the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs, and the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science with respect to creative industries.

Book your trip to exotic virtual destinations

A couple of weeks ago someone asked me if I had ever been to Second Life. I nodded and the person then asked me if I knew about a travel agency in that world that could show her around. I have heard about travel agencies within virtual worlds. The uneasy thing about those agencies is that you’ll have to find them first. So why not start an agency that can be googled. A brilliant idea, and here it is: Synthravels. Launched by two Italians last week, Synthravels offers a variety of tours in virtual worlds (Second Life, Everquest, Horizons, The Sims Online, and a dozen more). The concept is simple. You just register with Synthravels, and choose your travel destination and travel date. At the arranged date you log in on the selected virtual world and an experienced guide will be waiting for you. Be cautious, from now the virtual world is no longer save from herds of tourists…

Creative Commons in court

Yesterday the verdict was published in the Dutch case of Curry vs. Weekend. What happened? Weekend (a Dutch tabloid) had taken taken images from Adam Curry’s Flickr.com page and used them to liven up one of their stories. Curry had licensed the images using the BY-NC-SA Creative Commons license.

Meanwhile in Europe…

KL travelled to Vienna this week as Creative industries rank high on the top-European political agenda.

Creative start-ups in The Netherlands

Earlier this year the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs asked KL to explore what kind of difficulties creative entrepreneurs run into when starting up their firms. Apart from studying a number of creative industries initiatives in different Dutch cities, KL also looked abroad to the UK, Finland, Belgium and Australia. Creative investor NESTA (UK) caught our special attention.

Goodbye knowledge economy? Welcome creativity economy

“The Knowlegde Economy as we know it is being eclipsed by something new – call it the Creativity Economy. Even as policymakers and pundits wring their hands over the outsourcing of engineering, software writing, accounting, and myriad other high-tech, high-end service jobs – not to mention the move of manufacturing to Asia – U.S. companies are evolving to the next level of economic activity.”

Creativity key to career hapiness

The doctor beats the famous footballer and movie star. Yet, in the overall score creative occupations are the most wanted ‘dream jobs’.

Nieuw Nine Inch Nails album ook onder Creative Commons licentie

“Thank you for your continued and loyal support over the years – this one’s on me”, is het bericht van frontman Trent Reznor op de site van Nine Inch Nails (NIN).

Creative Capital: final report

KL has just published the final report of the Creative Capital Conference it organized in March. The report includes an analysis of the Amsterdam Agenda for Creative Capital, reviews of the plenary sessions and workshops, and an evaluation of the conference.