www.johndbritton.com

Open Education Conference 2009 Vancouver, Canada - Scholarship Application

johndbritton — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 03:40:28 +0000

This blog post is my application for a travel scholarship to attend OpenEd 2009.

Last year I applied for, and was awarded a scholarship to attend OpenEd in Logan, Utah. I came all the way from Hong Kong, and I'm tremendously glad that I did. My experience at OpenEd has made an enormous impact on my life. I met some great people, found a great project, and subsequently landed an excellent job in Open Education.

There are four main reasons I plan to attend OpenEd 2009:

P2PU - Most (if not all) the people from the Peer2Peer University will be there, it's a perfect time to meet up and move forward.
Open Everything - I'm facilitating the organization of Open Everything unconferences in more than 10 cities around the world. OpenEd will be a great place to find more people to get involved. Open Everything NYC featured an entire Open Education track.
Flat World Knowledge - I've recently taken a position at this innovative Open textbook publishing company. I'll be there to share and answer questions.
Open Sessions - I thrive on Open sessions. I'm sure I'll lead at least one, and will be active in many.

There are plenty more good reasons for me to be there, who knows what new things I'll discover.

The most important issue I'm currently facing relates to the commercialization of the Open Education field. If I'm selected to attend OpenEd 2009, I'll be there to gather information and discuss the topic of for-profit commercialization of Open Education. Important decisions lie ahead and I want to be sure to do the right thing. It will be valuable to interact with people who have experience in commercializing Open and building sustainable business models.

Thanks for reading, feel free to contact me. I appreciate your consideration for this opportunity and I hope to see you all at OpenEd 2009.

Couch Surfing Day 2009 - Beijingers Featured in Wanderlust

johndbritton — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 21:58:52 +0000

Last year I organized a gathering in Beijing's Beihai Park for Couch Surfing Day 2008. This year we were featured in the Wanderlust Newsletter. Check it out!

CAKE, Live at Terminal 5 in NYC

johndbritton — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 02:23:09 +0000

This past Friday a few friends and I ventured in to New York City to see a live performance by CAKE (Official Site, Wikipedia). It was everything I could have hoped for. Back during my freshman year at RPI, CAKE came to Albany and I've been kicking myself ever since I missed my chance to see them live.

The show was sold out, but I was able to snag a couple tickets off eBay. The crowd was good fun, I could tell there were tons of die-hard fans there. They played a good variety of tunes, but I was disappointed they didn't play "Mr. Mastodon Farm" even though I knew it was unlikely.

I streamed a few live videos of the show from my iPhone using the Qik application. Check them out, and keep an eye out for my future live streams.

Open Everything NYC Tentative Schedule

johndbritton — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 19:51:52 +0000

Open Everything NYC is less than 48 hours away. Before giving the schedule there are a couple of announcements:

There hasn't been much use of the Open Everything NYC Wiki, feel free to dive in and add content before, during, and after the event.
As per Philip Ashlock's suggestion, there is now a page on the Open Everything Wiki to post suggested topics for Open Everything NYC - Thanks Phil!
For United Nations security reasons, we will stop accepting new registrations for Open Everything NYC as of noon, Friday 17 April. As of now there are 200 registered attendees, we're capping attendance at 250. Please register as soon as possible.

Doors to the event open at 8:00AM, the program will begin promptly at 9:00AM. We'll start with a welcome and introduction to the event and a short talk by Schuyler Erle who is working with UNICEF Innovation on RapidSMS.

After the brief introduction, we'll dive right into planning the open sessions. The vast majority of the Open Everything event will be crowd generated, so please come prepared to participate. In an organized, but uncontrolled, fashion we'll scribble down ideas for various sessions and create our schedule for the day. We have space for five concurrent sessions (maybe more if necessary) and there will be eight open session slots for a total of 40 possible topics.

Projectors, dry erase boards, and wireless internet access will be available.

The first open session slot will begin at 10:00AM, with a total of three slots before lunch. Just past noon, we'll serve a free lunch followed by a talk by Robert Steele on Open Source Intelligence. After the OSI talk we'll jump back into open sessions.

The last open session will end just before 5:00PM. Leslie Hawthorn from Google, Inc. will give her talk on "Common Sense" followed by a brief recap of the day.

Immediately following the closing talk, there will be a guided walk to the post event socializing venue. We've negotiated a deal for half off all drinks and appetizers from 6-9:00PM. At 7:00PM we'll start the screening of "RIP: A REMIX MANIFESTO" at McFadden's.

Should be an excellent day, see you there.

Questions/Comments/Concerns: Please contact me.

Full Schedule

08:00	Doors Open & Open Session Planning
09:00	Welcome - John Britton
09:20	UNICEF - Schuyler Erle
09:40	Open Session Planning
10:00	Open Sessions - Slot 1
10:40	5 Minute Break
10:45	Open Sessions - Slot 2
11:25	5 Minute Break
11:30	Open Sessions - Slot 3
12:10	Free Lunch
12:50	Open Source Intelligence - Robert Steele
13:10	5 Minute Break
13:15	Open Sessions - Slot 4
13:55	5 Minute Break
14:00	Open Sessions - Slot 5
14:40	5 Minute Break
14:45	Open Sessions - Slot 6
15:25	5 Minute Break
15:30	Open Sessions - Slot 7
16:10	5 Minute Break
16:15	Open Sessions - Slot 8
16:55	5 Minute Break
17:00	Common Sense - Leslie Hawthorn
17:40	Closing - John Britton
18:00	Group walk to McFadden's Pub, 800 2^nd Avenue - 1/2 off all drinks and appetizers for Open Everything participants
19:00	Screening of "RIP: A REMIX MANIFESTO" at McFadden's

Free Book: "The New Craft of Intelligence: Personal, Public, & Politcal"

johndbritton — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 17:52:34 +0000

Robert David Steele, one of the featured speakers at Open Everything NYC, has decided to distribute copies of his book "The New Craft of Intelligence: Personal, Public, & Political" to all registered attendees free of charge.

Screening "RIP: A REMIX MANIFESTO" at Open Everything NYC Afterparty

johndbritton — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 09:59:09 +0000

We'll be screening "RIP: A REMIX MANIFESTO", an open source documentary about copyright and remix culture at the Open Everything NYC after party.

From the RIP REMIX website:

In RiP: A remix manifesto, Web activist and filmmaker Brett Gaylor explores issues of copyright in the information age, mashing up the media landscape of the 20th century and shattering the wall between users and producers.

The film’s central protagonist is Girl Talk, a mash-up musician topping the charts with his sample-based songs. But is Girl Talk a paragon of people power or the Pied Piper of piracy? Creative Commons founder, Lawrence Lessig, Brazil’s Minister of Culture Gilberto Gil and pop culture critic Cory Doctorow are also along for the ride.

A participatory media experiment, from day one, Brett shares his raw footage at opensourcecinema.org, for anyone to remix. This movie-as-mash-up method allows these remixes to become an integral part of the film. With RiP: A remix manifesto, Gaylor and Girl Talk sound an urgent alarm and draw the lines of battle.

Which side of the ideas war are you on?

Wikipedia License Update - GNU FDL + CC-BY-SA

johndbritton — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 16:03:28 +0000

CC-BY 2.0 - Theresa Thompson

The Wikimedia Foundation is currently holding a vote on the possibility of dual licensing the content of the various Wikipedias. To qualify to vote you must hold a Wikipedia account with at least 25 edits prior to March 15. If the vote passes, there will no longer be a licensing conflict between Wikipedia and CC licensed works.

You should vote. I did and here's the proof:

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Open Everything NYC 2009 Featured Speaker: Robert David Steele - OSS.net

johndbritton — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 14:53:25 +0000

I'm happy to announce the second featured speaker for Open Everything NYC 2009. We've got just over one week before the big day; space is going quickly. Spread the word and register now!

Robert David Steele Vivas, 56, is a former US spy, co-founder of the US Marine Corps Intelligence Center (today a Command), and CEO of Open Source Solutions Network (OSS.Net, Inc.) as well as pro bono CEO and angel funder of Earth Intelligence Network, a 501c3 Public Charity that creates public intelligence (decision-support) in the public interest. For 20 years he has been the foremost international proponent for Open Source Intelligence (OSINT), and offers 30,000 pages of free information online from 750 international authorities, all easily accessed via www.oss.net/BASIC and www.oss.net/LIBRARY. Since 2002 he has helped pioneer peace intelligence and is the originator of he proposal for a United Nations Open-Source Decision-Support Information Network (UNODIN) to be funded by the United States of America, and to include an Assistant Secretary General for Decision-Support, a Multinational Decision-Support Centre that relies exclusively on open sources of information that can be easily shared with Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO) and other stakeholders, and a diplomatic Office of Information Sharing Treaties and Agreements.

He is the author of ON INTELLIGENCE: Spies and Secrecy in an Open World; THE NEW CRAFT OF INTELLIGENCE: Personal, Public, & Political; INFORMATION OPERATIONS: All Information, All Languages, All the Time; THE SMART NATION ACT: Public Intelligence in the Public Interest; and ELECTION 2008: Lipstick on the Pig. He is the contributing editor of PEACEKEEPING INTELLIGENCE: Emerging Concepts for the Future and is the contributing publisher of COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace, and of PEACE INTELLIGENCE: Assuring a Good Life for All (forthcoming, raw material at www.oss.net/PEACE). All of his books are available at both Amazon in hard-copy, and free online at www.oss.net. His vision for the future of Earth Intelligence can be reviewed at www.earth-intelligence.net.

Open Everything NYC Updates

johndbritton — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 14:17:25 +0000

Outline

Volunteers needed
Arrive on time
Free lunch
T-Shirts
Spread the word
Suggestions

We need between three and five volunteers to take notes directly onto the wiki during the event. It's very important we record the success of the event. Aside from taking notes, you will be responsible for collecting slides and other materials to post on the wiki. Volunteers will receive a free Open Everything NYC T-shirt! Contact me to volunteer.
Please arrive on time, the doors open for registration at 8:00AM and the first session will start promptly at 9:00AM. The event will come to a close at 6:00PM. A designated food/drinking establishment will be announced - we're currently seeking group deals in the vicinity of UNICEF HQ. contact me with suggestions.
Free lunch will be provided for all registered attendees. A vegetarian option will be available.
We still haven't found sponsorship to provide free T-shirts. A limited quantity of shirts will be available for sale for $10 (cash only) at the event. Volunteers will receive a free T-shirt. If you or your company would like to sponsor free T-shirts please contact me.
Open Everything NYC is just nine short days away, please help get the word out by blogging, tweeting, denting, facebooking, emailing, sending to lists, calling, and talking about the event. We're depending on you to reach the best people in New York, we know you'll do fine. Make sure to note that registration is required at (http://nyc.openeverything.us).
If you have ideas or suggestions, please send them my way.

One Year Anniversary

johndbritton — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 13:00:00 +0000

It has been exactly one year since I re-launched this site using Drupal. That's one year of blogging, and quite a lot has happened.

localhost:~ whois johndbritton.com
 
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Whois Server: whois.godaddy.com
Referral URL: http://registrar.godaddy.com
Name Server: NS1.HOSTGROWN.COM
Name Server: NS2.HOSTGROWN.COM
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
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Updated Date: 04-dec-2008
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