Wrap Up: EJC/Innovation Journalism Conference

On November 13, the European Journalism Centre (EJC) and Innovation Journalism put on a joint conference entitled “Innovation Journalism: Copyright and the Use of Creative Commons”.

The conference, which was held in Maastricht, Netherlands (which is in the southernmost part of the country) and I was fortunate enough to be one of the ones invited to speak. The event was packed with great thinkers in the copyright world including, David Nordfors, the founder of Innovation Journalism, Anthony Falzone, the director of the Stanford Fair Use Project, and Richard Allan Horning, a well-known copyright and technology attorney.

The focus of the event was on technology challenges to the existing copyright regime and how journalists can survive in the current age of sharing. There was a heavy focus on both Creative Commons and sharing strategies as well as putting the current copyright crisis in perspective, looking at how historical challenges have been overcome.

All in all, it was a very powerful conference and one that I think both raised some great issues and came up with some interesting answers. The EJC, on their site, has a great wrap up of all of the talks as well as video from the event. They did a far better job of summarizing the event than what I could hope to do here.

For those who are interested in my talk, I’ve embedded a copy of my presentation as well as a Flickr slideshow of my stay in Maastricht as well as the day trip I took to Aachen, Germany. It was truly a beautiful part of the world on both sides of the border. If you’re interested in the other talks, which you definitely should at least look at, you can find the slides and video above.

Personal Notes

I want to take a moment to thank everyone at the EJC, especially Kathlyn Clore and Arne Grauls, whom I have been working with for well over a year on a freelance basis, as well as Bianca Lemming, who was responsible for much of the organization of the event, and Anniek Reintjens, who handled much of the technology issues and ensured that the event went off without a hitch (perhaps the first completely glitch-free event I have ever been to!).

Thanks also goes to Wilfried Rütten and David Nordfors for organizing and putting on the event. It was a wonderful event and I truly enjoyed both the conference and my stay in Maastricht.

Clearly, the EJC and Innovation Journalism are two organizations that journalists around the world need to pay attention to as they are some of the brightest minds and hardest workers in the field right now.

Presentation

Photos