Berkman Buzz: March 11, 2011
What's being discussed...take your pick or browse below.
* Christian Sandvig adds context to "Internet freedom" debates.
* Ethan Zuckerman blogs an "informal conversation" with U.S. State Department's P.J. Crowley.
* CMLP asks for help with Software Best Practices and Open Source Derivative Works.
* David Weinberger reports on tensions between universities and journal publishers.
* Weekly Global Voices: "Cameroon: Netizens React to SMS-to-Tweet Ban"
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The full buzz.
"Over at the Huffington Post I have a new blog post co-authored with Dan Schiller that tries to flag the current and timely Internet Freedom / Free Flow of Information / Right to Connect debate with a little more context."
From Christian Sandvig's blog post There’s More to Internet Freedom, or, is Google the new United Press Syndicate?
"PJ Crowley is the U.S. Department of State Spokesman and Assistant Secretary of Public Affairs. In other words, as he explains to the audience at MIT’s Center for Future Civic Media, where he stopped by on March 10th for an 'informal conversation', he’s a representative of 'the old model of media, the one where I stand in front of a podium and answer questions from around the world.' Crowley, a veteran of the Clinton administration, where he advised the president on national security issues, is an enthusiastic fan of the idea that new media is transforming how the US government communicates, and is wrestling with questions of how to communicate to people in countries like Libya, armed with cellphones but far removed from the media channels the State Department has traditionally tried to use."
From Ethan Zuckerman's blog post PJ Crowley at Center for Civic Media: only 75,000 followers fewer than Castro
"...The first request was for best practices, procedures, and policies relating to management of the software development function. Of particular concern is situations where developers are writing original code, licensing commercial code, and using open source code in developing software that is redistributed to nonprofits. What recommendations are out there for such best practices in complying with the various licenses?"
From Arthur Bright's blog post for CMLP, Software Best Practices and Open Source Derivative Works
"Felix Online, the online news of Imperial College in the UK, reports (in an article by Kadhim Shubber) that Deborah Shorley, Director of the Imperial College London Library, is threatening to end the library’s subscriptions to journals published by Elsevier and Wiley Blackwell, two of the major publishers in the UK. Rather than giving into the bundling of journals with 6% annual subscription prices (well above inflation, and in the face of a growth in profits at Elsevier from £1B to £1.6B from 2005 to 2009), she is demanding a 15% reduction in fees, as well as other concessions."
From David Weinberger's blog post Imperial College in showdown with closed-access journals
"International Women's Day 2011 will be remembered in Cameroon for more technological reasons. Bouba Kaele, a marketing manager at the South African MTN telecom company in Cameroon, announced on social network Twitter that the Cameroonian Government banned access to twitter via SMS for MTN customers."
From Julie Owono's blog post for Global Voices Online, Cameroon: Netizens React to SMS-to-Tweet Ban
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Compiled by Seth Young.
The weekly Berkman Buzz is selected from the posts of Berkman Center people and projects and sometimes from the Center's wider network.
Suggestions and feedback about the Buzz are always welcome and can be emailed to buzz@cyber.harvard.edu.