[okfn-coord] Little book of openness?

Wed Apr 8 07:16:23 UTC 2009

Great idea Jonathan!

On Tue, Apr 07, 2009 at 09:08:28PM +0100, Jonathan Gray wrote:
> It would try to cut to the chase about what excites people about open
> knowledge - and present evidence, arguments, anecdotes and metaphors
> aimed at the general public.

It sounds like the Little Red Book of Openness - which is not a bad
marketing ploy.

Perhaps it could be little and red, and decorated with this free
wallpaper: http://chinabone.theps.net/~saul/docs/stuff/openpaper.png

I think it would also be useful to have some level of critical approach
to the subject.

This doesn't need to be the browbleating neighsaying of people like
Andrew Keeen (who recently tried, unsuccessfully, to friend me on fb!)
it can be more sophisticated clarifications of and ruminations on
Openness in political, social, economic terms. 

The pliability of the term (Open markets, open source (rather than FS),
emotional openness) all these are reasons that the term is so 'sticky',
but also why it's often misunderstood or misappropriated for
distracting causes.

So the little red book of openness could tackle that head-on, and find
critical voices to explain and play with this mess, rather than just
sampling from the same hymnal.

Cheers,

Saul.

-- 
The People Speak   | 17-25 Cremer St.  London E2 8HD | http://theps.net
studio +44 (0)20 71007915 | saul: +44 (0)7941 255210 | ms at theps.net