And I say “shit” in the article!

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Fredericton’s creative commons
Harnessing the powers of the Internet to build a community.

While self-publishing and self-broadcasting phenomena such as blogs, My Space and You Tube become ubiquitous, some Frederictonians are helping to redefine and apply the concept locally by creating the Civic Fidelity, or Ci-Fi, Co-operative.

The site is designed for Frederictonians (or Fredericton ex-pats) to share their work, whether it be music, videos, or words, with other Frederictonians.

One of the people behind the site is Greg LeBlanc. He said this is different than current sites because it’s limited to people in the Fredericton area.

“The people who are talking online can talk face to face as well by going down the street and meeting in a coffee shop,” he said.

The site’s creators aren’t just encouraging self-publication. They’re inviting people to collaborate on content, remixing and changing it.

Right now, the site is set up for people to blog and to post music and short videos (limited to 8 MB for now) in the media commons, built on a ‘creative commons’ model.

With the creative commons aspect, Frederictonians can share their work with more rights than You Tube and My Space provide, but allow more flexibility than copyright.

Chaffic Haddad, another of the site’s originators, said copyright demands payment for using material.

“With copyright, you’re saying ‘don’t steal my shit,’” he said.

With creative commons, a work’s creator can give different levels of permission to download content and to build on it. Members can choose from five different levels of ‘rights.’ They are combinations of different labels. All but one label requires people who modify a file to give credit to the original creator. Non-commercial levels ask the material not be used to make money. A public domain level allows free for all use of a file. All the labels are legal ones.

Haddad said creative commons is not a new concept. There are several sites already which use the creative commons model.

“It’s part of a movement,” he said. “We’re pushing the movement here in Fredericton.” However, many of the creative commons sites are like the other online phenomena - they create a global community instead of a local one.

LeBlanc said the site’s creators may expand to Saint John and Moncton later, but would have separate sites and have people in those cities to administrate the sites.

“Not every community has the same needs,” he said.

The site’s creators say this localizing of online resources is filling a void in the Internet world. According to co-creator John-Paul Arp, it allows people to have a centre place for connections between local artists, musicians, filmmakers, bloggers, and so on.

“What I say is I’m trying to make it easy for artists, designers, videographers to make a living at what they’re doing,” said Arp.

For example, if a local filmmaker makes a feature length film, they need music. Instead of scouring the town to find a band or a composer, the filmmaker could go to the site and find a musician they like and contact him or her from there.

Haddad said he’s looking to add a “classifieds” section soon. A drummer looking for a band could post an ad and post a two-minute video of him playing.

“It’s almost like an online audition,” said Haddad.

The site will follow a co-operative model. People who post content will direct how the site improves and changes and elect its administrators.

“Everyone who takes part, takes ownership,” said LeBlanc.

The content, however, is open to the public - anyone can view or download the content without being a member.

Arp said there are some limits to what content can be uploaded to the site.

“We’ll take content down if it’s illegal or profane,” he said. There’s a no-porn rule too.

However, those behind the site are encouraging a wide variety of content.

“It’s so versatile I think there’s something for anybody,” said LeBlanc.

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Filed under: Ci-Fi