Open Wireless vs. Licensed Spectrum: Evidence from Market Adoption
26(1) Harvard Journal of Law and Technology (Fall 2012)
Yochai Benkler | Berkman Center
Showing posts with label Berkman Center. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Berkman Center. Show all posts
Friday, February 08, 2013
Sunday, June 17, 2012
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Berkman Center and Pew Internet release first in-depth study of mobile giving - atansug@gmail.com - Gmail
The Berkman Center for Internet & Society and the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project, in partnership with the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the mGive Foundation, is pleased to share the results of the first-ever, in-depth study on mobile donors which analyzed the “Text to Haiti” campaign after the 2010 earthquake.
The report is available online and for download here: http://pewinternet.org/
More information and a press release can be found below; the announcement can be accessed online at the link within the caption!
The report is available online and for download here: http://pewinternet.org/
More information and a press release can be found below; the announcement can be accessed online at the link within the caption!
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Monday, November 10, 2008
BERKMAN CENTER'S CITIZEN MEDIA LAW PROJECT AND CYBERLAW CLINIC URGE BROAD READING OF MASSACHUSETTS ANTI-SLAPP STATUTE
Cambridge, MA – November 10, 2008 – The Berkman Center for Internet and Society's Citizen Media Law Project (CMLP), together with the Online News Association, Media Bloggers Association, New England Press Association, and Globe Newspaper Company, publisher of The Boston Globe and Boston.com, this week urged a broad reading of Massachusetts' anti-SLAPP law in a friend-of-the-court filing.
The amici curiae brief was filed in the case of Dugas v. Robbins, Case No. BACV2008-491, pending in Massachusetts Superior Court in
The coalition of amici, led by the CMLP and represented by
More information about the case and about the Massachusetts anti-SLAPP statute is available on the CMLP's website, http://www.citmedialaw.org.
About the Berkman Center for Internet & Society:
The Berkman Center for Internet & Society is proud to celebrate its tenth year as a research program founded to explore cyberspace, share in its study and help pioneer its development. Founded in 1997, through a generous gift from Jack N. and Lillian R. Berkman, the Center is now home to an ever-growing community of faculty, fellows, staff and affiliates working on projects that span the broad range of intersections between cyberspace, technology and society. More information can be found at http://cyber.law.harvard.edu.
About the Citizen Media Law Project:
The Citizen Media Law Project, which is jointly affiliated with the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School and the Center for Citizen Media, has five primary objectives: legal education and training; collection and analysis of legal threats; litigation referral, consultation, and representation; community building; and advocacy on behalf of citizen media. It was the recipient of a 2007 John S. and James L. Knight Foundation News Challenge grant. For more information, visit http://www.citmedialaw.org.
------------
Contact: Chris Bavitz
617-495-9125
cbavitz@cyber.law.harvard.edu
Friday, August 22, 2008
RESEARCH ASSISTANT to BENKLER & "The Cooperation Research Group"
Janet Moran sent this:
---------------
Hello all,
As we gear up for the fall semester, Research Assistant positions are starting to spring up! Many opportunities will be announced in the coming weeks, and we have an early announcement now: researching with Professor Yochai Benkler and his cooperation group.
Details about the position are below, and an information session about the cooperation group will be held in the Berkman Center's conference room on September 4th at 6:00 p.m. (The Berkman Center is located at 23 Everett Street, 2nd Floor, Cambridge, MA). Snacks will be provided.
Keep an eye on our Internship page for listings as they arise:
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/getinvolved/internships. You can apply to the positions as they are posted, and we will hold our Fall Open House on the evening of September 24th, location TBD, where you can learn about the research and meet members of the Berkman community.
As always, please feel free to send this announcement to your friends and colleagues who may have interest in the exciting opportunity with Professor Benkler.
All best,
Becca
**********************************************************************************************************************************
Please submit all required materials to Janet Moran at jmoran@law.harvard.edu no later than August 28, 2008 at 5pm.
Project Description:
What makes Wikipedia or digg succeed? What makes other collaborative efforts fail? Peer production?large scale cooperation among human participants?has become an increasingly important mechanism for the creation of information, knowledge, and culture. Civil society organizations like the Sunlight Foundation are building collaborative platforms to expose government abuses. Businesses like Threadless T- Shirts and Amazon Mechanical Turk are using it to harness distributed intelligence and work capabilities. The intelligence community has set up an internal Intellipedia, and the Army, Company Commander. Some diffuse social networks like CouchSurfing or BookCrossing are using it to
share sleeping accommodations or books, while others, like DailyKos, harness political mobilization.
The Cooperation Research Group, led by Professor Yochai Benkler, analyzes the design of cooperative human systems through a combination of interdisciplinary observational, experimental, and theoretical studies. As part of this project, the group is embarking on a new effort to provide a map of commons-based and cooperative peer production today. The purpose of the study is to offer a systematic analysis of a wide range of information and knowledge production sectors, to identify practices, list them, describe them, and categorize them.
To learn more, watch Prof. Benkler's TED talk on collaboration here:
Job Task/Responsibilities:
Research Assistants will have the opportunity to contribute substantively to this project, conducting and writing case studies as well as providing input on overall research design and execution.
As part of this position, you will need to:
* Conduct in-depth research on commons-based peer-production using
online resources, library databases and secondary sources,
ethnographic participant observation of online communities, as
well as statistical and/or computational data collection.
* Write-up findings on a regular, iterative basis, conforming to
research protocols and deadlines laid out by Professor Benkler and
project leaders.
* Submit written results to online repositories in a timely and
organized fashion.
* Present results to the rest of the research group on a bi-weekly
basis.
* Critically and constructively engage with group members' research;
collaborate openly on all projects; integrate feedback & criticism
of your own work.
The position will begin in mid-September. The required commitment is approximately 15 hours per week (including weekly case study research group meetings) through December 15.
---------------
Hello all,
As we gear up for the fall semester, Research Assistant positions are starting to spring up! Many opportunities will be announced in the coming weeks, and we have an early announcement now: researching with Professor Yochai Benkler and his cooperation group.
Details about the position are below, and an information session about the cooperation group will be held in the Berkman Center's conference room on September 4th at 6:00 p.m. (The Berkman Center is located at 23 Everett Street, 2nd Floor, Cambridge, MA). Snacks will be provided.
Keep an eye on our Internship page for listings as they arise:
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/getinvolved/internships. You can apply to the positions as they are posted, and we will hold our Fall Open House on the evening of September 24th, location TBD, where you can learn about the research and meet members of the Berkman community.
As always, please feel free to send this announcement to your friends and colleagues who may have interest in the exciting opportunity with Professor Benkler.
All best,
Becca
**********************************************************************************************************************************
Please submit all required materials to Janet Moran at jmoran@law.harvard.edu no later than August 28, 2008 at 5pm.
Project Description:
What makes Wikipedia or digg succeed? What makes other collaborative efforts fail? Peer production?large scale cooperation among human participants?has become an increasingly important mechanism for the creation of information, knowledge, and culture. Civil society organizations like the Sunlight Foundation are building collaborative platforms to expose government abuses. Businesses like Threadless T- Shirts and Amazon Mechanical Turk are using it to harness distributed intelligence and work capabilities. The intelligence community has set up an internal Intellipedia, and the Army, Company Commander. Some diffuse social networks like CouchSurfing or BookCrossing are using it to
share sleeping accommodations or books, while others, like DailyKos, harness political mobilization.
The Cooperation Research Group, led by Professor Yochai Benkler, analyzes the design of cooperative human systems through a combination of interdisciplinary observational, experimental, and theoretical studies. As part of this project, the group is embarking on a new effort to provide a map of commons-based and cooperative peer production today. The purpose of the study is to offer a systematic analysis of a wide range of information and knowledge production sectors, to identify practices, list them, describe them, and categorize them.
To learn more, watch Prof. Benkler's TED talk on collaboration here:
Job Task/Responsibilities:
Research Assistants will have the opportunity to contribute substantively to this project, conducting and writing case studies as well as providing input on overall research design and execution.
As part of this position, you will need to:
* Conduct in-depth research on commons-based peer-production using
online resources, library databases and secondary sources,
ethnographic participant observation of online communities, as
well as statistical and/or computational data collection.
* Write-up findings on a regular, iterative basis, conforming to
research protocols and deadlines laid out by Professor Benkler and
project leaders.
* Submit written results to online repositories in a timely and
organized fashion.
* Present results to the rest of the research group on a bi-weekly
basis.
* Critically and constructively engage with group members' research;
collaborate openly on all projects; integrate feedback & criticism
of your own work.
The position will begin in mid-September. The required commitment is approximately 15 hours per week (including weekly case study research group meetings) through December 15.
Friday, January 04, 2008
Thursday, December 06, 2007
Berkman@10: The Berkman Center Celebrates its 10th Year as a Research Center at Harvard Law School
The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School is proud to celebrate its tenth year as a research program founded to explore cyberspace, share in its study, and help pioneer its development. Founded in 1997, through a generous gift from Jack N. and Lillian R. Berkman, the Center is now home to an ever-growing community of faculty, fellows, staff, and affiliates working on projects that span the broad range of intersections between cyberspace, technology, and society.
Through research, events, and discussion, Berkman@10 considers "The Future of the Internet" - to celebrate the work we have done together over the past decade, and to look ahead to what we hope to accomplish collectively in the next.
If you would like to make a comment on this "birthday" go to Palfrey's special page!
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Breaking Down Digital Barriers:
International Study Examines the Issue of Interoperability Innovation, consumer choice and competition most important considerations Private sector well-suited to lead interoperability efforts
WASHINGTON, DC -- The findings of an international study released today by researchers from the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School and the Research Center for Information Law, University of St. Gallen indicate that private sector leadership, more so than government intervention, is the optimal method for ensuring that technologies work well together and innovation flourishes. The authors of "Breaking Down Digital Barriers: When and How ICT Interoperability Drives Innovation" found that interoperability is generally good for consumers and drives innovation, but determined that there is no "silver bullet" solution to the issue. Interoperability has increasingly become more important because computer users -- whether they be consumers, businesses, or governments -- now tend to obtain hardware and software from different vendors and expect everything to work together. One approach to the issue that has received attention advocates government-mandated adoption of specific technologies to compel interoperability.
This study suggests that such approaches are unlikely to be the optimal approach to interoperability. "Interoperability leads to innovation and many benefits for consumers," said co-principal investigator John Palfrey, Executive Director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society. "The case studies we investigated produced clear conclusions: The ICT industry is achieving considerable interoperability every day in response to the needs of customers. There is often more than one way to achieve interoperability. Market-driven initiatives tend to provide the most long-term promise." "This research demonstrates that there is no standard application to achieve ICT interoperability," said Urs Gasser, co-principal investigator and Director of the Research Center for Information Law. "Attempting to impose universal answers can produce unintended consequences such as curtailing innovation, limiting consumer choice and reducing competition. Instead, each situation needs to be analyzed on its own, to determine the best way to achieve interoperability. Nor can we forget that interoperability is simply a means to larger and more important goals, such as consumer choice, access to content, ease of use and diversity."
The key findings
The research focused on three case studies in which the issues of interoperability and innovation are uppermost: digital rights management in online and offline music distribution models; various models of digital identity systems (how computing systems identify users to provide the correct level of access and security); and web services (in which computer applications or programs connect with each other over the Internet to provide specific services to customers).
The core finding is that "increased levels of ICT interoperability generally foster innovation. But interoperability also contributes to other socially desirable outcomes. In our three case studies, we have studied its positive impact on consumer choice, ease of use, access to content, and diversity, among other things."
The investigation reached other, more nuanced conclusions:
* Interoperability does not mean the same thing in every context and as such, is not always good for everyone all the time. For example, if one wants completely secure software, then that software should probably have limited interoperability. In other words, there is no one-size-fits-all way to achieve interoperability in the ICT context.
* Interoperability can be achieved by multiple means including the licensing of intellectual property, product design, collaboration with partners, development of standards and governmental intervention. The easiest way to make a product from one company work well with a product from another company, for instance, may be for the companies to cross license their technologies. But in a different situation, another approach (collaboration or open standards) may be more effective and efficient.
* The best path to interoperability depends greatly upon context and which subsidiary goals matter most, such as prompting further innovation, providing consumer choice or ease of use, and the spurring of competition in the field.
* The private sector generally should lead interoperability efforts. The public sector should stand by either to lend a supportive hand or to determine if its involvement is warranted.
Recommendations
The authors of the study propose a process constructed around a set of guidelines to help businesses and governments determine the best way to achieve interoperability in a given situation. This approach may have policy implications for governments.
* Identify what the actual end goal or goals are. The goal is not interoperability per se, but rather something to which interoperability can lead, such as innovation or consumer choice.
* Consider the facts of the situation. The key variables that should be considered include time, maturity of the relevant technologies and markets and user practices and norms.
* In light of these goals and facts of the situation, consider possible options against the benchmarks proposed by the study: effectiveness, efficiency and flexibility.
* Remain open to the possibility of one or more approaches to interoperability, which may also be combined with one another to accomplish interoperability that drives innovation.
* In some instances, it may be possible to convene all relevant stakeholders to participate in a collaborative, open standards process. In other instances, the relevant facts may suggest that a single firm can drive innovation by offering to others the chance to collaborate through an open API, such as Facebook?s recent success in permitting third-party applications to run on its platform. But long-term sustainability may be an issue where a single firm makes an open API available according to a contract that it can change at any time.
* In the vast majority of cases, the private sector can and does accomplish a high level of interoperability on its own. The state may help by playing a convening role, or even in mandating a standard on which there is widespread agreement within industry after a collaborative process. The state may need to play a role after the fact to ensure that market actors do not abuse their positions.
The report and case studies can be downloaded at http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/interop.
The research was sponsored by Microsoft Corporation. ### The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School is proud to celebrate its tenth year as a research program founded to explore cyberspace, share in its study, and help pioneer its development. Founded in 1997, through a generous gift from Jack N. and Lillian R. Berkman, the Center is now home to an ever-growing community of faculty, fellows, staff, and affiliates working on projects that span the broad range of intersections between cyberspace, technology, and society. More information can be found at http://cyber.law.harvard.edu.
The Research Center for Information Law, FIR-HSG, was established in 2000 by University of St. Gallen professors Jean Nicolas Druey, Herbert Burkert, and Rainer J. Schweizer. The research initiatives of the Center are aimed at analyzing and assessing legal frameworks and provisions that are regulating the creation, distribution, access, and usage of information in a given social subsystem such as the economic, cultural or political system; exploring the dynamic changes in information technologies and their impacts on the legal system. More information can be found at http://www.fir.unisg.ch/.
WASHINGTON, DC -- The findings of an international study released today by researchers from the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School and the Research Center for Information Law, University of St. Gallen indicate that private sector leadership, more so than government intervention, is the optimal method for ensuring that technologies work well together and innovation flourishes. The authors of "Breaking Down Digital Barriers: When and How ICT Interoperability Drives Innovation" found that interoperability is generally good for consumers and drives innovation, but determined that there is no "silver bullet" solution to the issue. Interoperability has increasingly become more important because computer users -- whether they be consumers, businesses, or governments -- now tend to obtain hardware and software from different vendors and expect everything to work together. One approach to the issue that has received attention advocates government-mandated adoption of specific technologies to compel interoperability.
This study suggests that such approaches are unlikely to be the optimal approach to interoperability. "Interoperability leads to innovation and many benefits for consumers," said co-principal investigator John Palfrey, Executive Director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society. "The case studies we investigated produced clear conclusions: The ICT industry is achieving considerable interoperability every day in response to the needs of customers. There is often more than one way to achieve interoperability. Market-driven initiatives tend to provide the most long-term promise." "This research demonstrates that there is no standard application to achieve ICT interoperability," said Urs Gasser, co-principal investigator and Director of the Research Center for Information Law. "Attempting to impose universal answers can produce unintended consequences such as curtailing innovation, limiting consumer choice and reducing competition. Instead, each situation needs to be analyzed on its own, to determine the best way to achieve interoperability. Nor can we forget that interoperability is simply a means to larger and more important goals, such as consumer choice, access to content, ease of use and diversity."
The key findings
The research focused on three case studies in which the issues of interoperability and innovation are uppermost: digital rights management in online and offline music distribution models; various models of digital identity systems (how computing systems identify users to provide the correct level of access and security); and web services (in which computer applications or programs connect with each other over the Internet to provide specific services to customers).
The core finding is that "increased levels of ICT interoperability generally foster innovation. But interoperability also contributes to other socially desirable outcomes. In our three case studies, we have studied its positive impact on consumer choice, ease of use, access to content, and diversity, among other things."
The investigation reached other, more nuanced conclusions:
* Interoperability does not mean the same thing in every context and as such, is not always good for everyone all the time. For example, if one wants completely secure software, then that software should probably have limited interoperability. In other words, there is no one-size-fits-all way to achieve interoperability in the ICT context.
* Interoperability can be achieved by multiple means including the licensing of intellectual property, product design, collaboration with partners, development of standards and governmental intervention. The easiest way to make a product from one company work well with a product from another company, for instance, may be for the companies to cross license their technologies. But in a different situation, another approach (collaboration or open standards) may be more effective and efficient.
* The best path to interoperability depends greatly upon context and which subsidiary goals matter most, such as prompting further innovation, providing consumer choice or ease of use, and the spurring of competition in the field.
* The private sector generally should lead interoperability efforts. The public sector should stand by either to lend a supportive hand or to determine if its involvement is warranted.
Recommendations
The authors of the study propose a process constructed around a set of guidelines to help businesses and governments determine the best way to achieve interoperability in a given situation. This approach may have policy implications for governments.
* Identify what the actual end goal or goals are. The goal is not interoperability per se, but rather something to which interoperability can lead, such as innovation or consumer choice.
* Consider the facts of the situation. The key variables that should be considered include time, maturity of the relevant technologies and markets and user practices and norms.
* In light of these goals and facts of the situation, consider possible options against the benchmarks proposed by the study: effectiveness, efficiency and flexibility.
* Remain open to the possibility of one or more approaches to interoperability, which may also be combined with one another to accomplish interoperability that drives innovation.
* In some instances, it may be possible to convene all relevant stakeholders to participate in a collaborative, open standards process. In other instances, the relevant facts may suggest that a single firm can drive innovation by offering to others the chance to collaborate through an open API, such as Facebook?s recent success in permitting third-party applications to run on its platform. But long-term sustainability may be an issue where a single firm makes an open API available according to a contract that it can change at any time.
* In the vast majority of cases, the private sector can and does accomplish a high level of interoperability on its own. The state may help by playing a convening role, or even in mandating a standard on which there is widespread agreement within industry after a collaborative process. The state may need to play a role after the fact to ensure that market actors do not abuse their positions.
The report and case studies can be downloaded at http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/interop.
The research was sponsored by Microsoft Corporation. ### The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School is proud to celebrate its tenth year as a research program founded to explore cyberspace, share in its study, and help pioneer its development. Founded in 1997, through a generous gift from Jack N. and Lillian R. Berkman, the Center is now home to an ever-growing community of faculty, fellows, staff, and affiliates working on projects that span the broad range of intersections between cyberspace, technology, and society. More information can be found at http://cyber.law.harvard.edu.
The Research Center for Information Law, FIR-HSG, was established in 2000 by University of St. Gallen professors Jean Nicolas Druey, Herbert Burkert, and Rainer J. Schweizer. The research initiatives of the Center are aimed at analyzing and assessing legal frameworks and provisions that are regulating the creation, distribution, access, and usage of information in a given social subsystem such as the economic, cultural or political system; exploring the dynamic changes in information technologies and their impacts on the legal system. More information can be found at http://www.fir.unisg.ch/.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
BERKMAN INVESTIGATES INTERNET & DEMOCRACY PROJECT TO FOCUS ON MIDDLE EAST and OTHER GLOBAL COMMUNITIES
Cambridge, MA – The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School announces the Internet and Democracy Project, an initiative that will examine how the Internet influences democratic norms and modes, including its impact on civil society, citizen media, government transparency, and the rule of law, with a focus on the Middle East. Through a grant of $1.5 million from the US Department of State’s Middle East Partnership Initiative, the Berkman Center will undertake the study over the next two years in collaboration with its extended community and institutional partners. As with all its projects, the Berkman Center retains complete independence in its research and other efforts under this grant. The goal of this work is to support the rights of citizens to access, develop and share independent sources of information, to advocate responsibly, to strengthen online networks, and to debate ideas freely with both civil society and government. These subjects will be examined through a series of case studies in which new technologies and online resources have influenced democracy and civic engagement. The project will include original research and the identification and development of innovative web-based tools that support the goals of the project. The team, led by Project Director Bruce Etling, will draw on communities from around the world, with a focus on the Middle East. “Around the world, citizens are using the Internet to affect democracies in intriguing and important ways,” said co-Principal Investigator John Palfrey, Executive Director of the Berkman Center. “But we don’t have a precise view of how this dynamic works. With the Middle East as our primary focus, our goal is to shed light on this phenomenon in constructive ways.”
“We want to help develop and test simple, lightweight tools for civic engagement online – tools that facilitate coordination among people who share a common cause, and good faith dialogue among people who disagree,” said co-Principal Investigator, Jonathan Zittrain, co-founder of the Berkman Center and Professor of Internet Governance and Regulation at Oxford University. This project is building on the experience of diverse Berkman Center initiatives aimed at examining the extent to which the Internet is fostering or undermining democratic institutions and processes around the world.
Through the generous support of other donors, the Berkman Center has undertaken projects that include: the H2O Project, which promotes the wide accessibility of academic discourse and teaching materials online; the Citizen Media Law Project, whose mission is to provide legal training and resources for individuals and organizations involved in citizen media as well as provide research and advocacy on free speech, newsgathering, intellectual property, and other legal issues related to citizen media, and; the OpenNet Initiative, which analyzes and documents Internet censorship and surveillance regimes worldwide, jointly with the University of Cambridge, the Oxford Internet Institute, and the University of Toronto.
###
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Berkman Center Awarded Two Knight Grants for Media Projects
Success of "Global Voices" and "Potential of the Citizen Media Law Project" Recognized by Knight Foundation News Challenge
Cambridge, MA – The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School announced the award of two Knight Foundation News Challenge grants today – the only organization of the 24 winners to receive multiple grants – with both Global Voices and the Citizen Media Law Project acknowledged by the Knight Foundation at the Interactive Media Conference & Tradeshow in Miami.
“We are proud to receive these awards from the Knight Foundation, which not only help to affirm the importance of participatory media, but the need to articulate standards and level the playing field as citizen journalism quickly spreads across a largely unregulated space,” said Colin Maclay, Managing Director of the Berkman Center. Global Voices ( www.globalvoicesonline.org), a curator and aggregator of blogs from around the world, will receive $244,000 over two years to expand its coverage to underserved populations by training new authors in developing nations. Global Voices is an international effort to diversify the online conversation by showcasing speakers from around the world, and developing tools, institutions and relationships to help make these voices heard. Berkman Fellow and Global Voices co-founder Ethan Zuckerman thanked the Knight Foundation and praised their recognition of the value that international citizen journalism holds.
“Through all of the success that our project has experienced since it began in 2004, we have become more aware of the difficulties in creating a globally inclusive environment,” Zuckerman said. “We look forward to using this funding for the outreach, training, and technology vital to a more complete and dynamic international dialog,” he added. Global Voices was previously recognized by the Knight Foundation as the 2006 winner of the Knight-Batten award for innovations in journalism.
The project is sustained through foundation and corporate funding, including support from media company Reuters, the MacArthur Foundation, and Hivos, a Dutch foundation.The Citizen Media Law Project (CMLP, http://www.citmedialaw.org/) – a joint Berkman venture with the Center for Citizen Media – will receive a News Challenge award of $250,000 to support the first stage of the project, including conducting research and producing legal guides addressing legal issues faced by citizen journalists such as free speech, libel, newsgathering and intellectual property. The CMLP seeks to build a community of lawyers, academics, journalists, and others who are interested in facilitating citizen participation in online media and in protecting the legal rights of those engaged in speech on the Internet. Berkman Fellow and project director David Ardia noted: “We are excited to get started on what will be an important resource for citizen journalists.” “We are eager to see the CMLP become part of a wider effort to promote journalism generally and hope our work will help to ensure that our legal system fosters an environment suitable for open and robust speech,” he added. The emerging field of citizen media has been a major focus for the Berkman Center since 2003, when weblogging pioneer Dave Winer joined the center as a Berkman Fellow. Since that time, Berkman fellows have included citizen media luminaries such as Doc Searls, David Weinberger, CMLP co-founder Dan Gillmor and Global Voices co-founder Rebecca MacKinnon.
More: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu
Cambridge, MA – The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School announced the award of two Knight Foundation News Challenge grants today – the only organization of the 24 winners to receive multiple grants – with both Global Voices and the Citizen Media Law Project acknowledged by the Knight Foundation at the Interactive Media Conference & Tradeshow in Miami.
“We are proud to receive these awards from the Knight Foundation, which not only help to affirm the importance of participatory media, but the need to articulate standards and level the playing field as citizen journalism quickly spreads across a largely unregulated space,” said Colin Maclay, Managing Director of the Berkman Center. Global Voices ( www.globalvoicesonline.org), a curator and aggregator of blogs from around the world, will receive $244,000 over two years to expand its coverage to underserved populations by training new authors in developing nations. Global Voices is an international effort to diversify the online conversation by showcasing speakers from around the world, and developing tools, institutions and relationships to help make these voices heard. Berkman Fellow and Global Voices co-founder Ethan Zuckerman thanked the Knight Foundation and praised their recognition of the value that international citizen journalism holds.
“Through all of the success that our project has experienced since it began in 2004, we have become more aware of the difficulties in creating a globally inclusive environment,” Zuckerman said. “We look forward to using this funding for the outreach, training, and technology vital to a more complete and dynamic international dialog,” he added. Global Voices was previously recognized by the Knight Foundation as the 2006 winner of the Knight-Batten award for innovations in journalism.
The project is sustained through foundation and corporate funding, including support from media company Reuters, the MacArthur Foundation, and Hivos, a Dutch foundation.The Citizen Media Law Project (CMLP, http://www.citmedialaw.org/) – a joint Berkman venture with the Center for Citizen Media – will receive a News Challenge award of $250,000 to support the first stage of the project, including conducting research and producing legal guides addressing legal issues faced by citizen journalists such as free speech, libel, newsgathering and intellectual property. The CMLP seeks to build a community of lawyers, academics, journalists, and others who are interested in facilitating citizen participation in online media and in protecting the legal rights of those engaged in speech on the Internet. Berkman Fellow and project director David Ardia noted: “We are excited to get started on what will be an important resource for citizen journalists.” “We are eager to see the CMLP become part of a wider effort to promote journalism generally and hope our work will help to ensure that our legal system fosters an environment suitable for open and robust speech,” he added. The emerging field of citizen media has been a major focus for the Berkman Center since 2003, when weblogging pioneer Dave Winer joined the center as a Berkman Fellow. Since that time, Berkman fellows have included citizen media luminaries such as Doc Searls, David Weinberger, CMLP co-founder Dan Gillmor and Global Voices co-founder Rebecca MacKinnon.
More: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu
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