Creative Boom London kindly wrote a fantastic review of the workshop which covers all of these points (and more) in detail.

Thanks to Andrew for the link!

Delivered in Beta from KS12 on Vimeo.

A group of writers have set themselves up with the task to write and publish a book in just 24 hours using online tools to work together.  The group has been using Google Docs to write and edit the document, as well as using Skype and face-to-face conversation to communicate, and have been updating us on their progress through their twitter profile.

The 24-hour book project

The group consists of one lead writer and ten other participants, and they also opened up part of the book on Google Docs to invite contributions from the wider public.  As well as this, they’ve been gathering photos, illustrations and other snippets of media for use in the book or inspiration over on their Ning platform (Ning enables you to create your own social networks).

The final book will be available online and in hard-copy (produced by web-based print-on-demand services) and sold at £4.99 a piece, with profits going towards future collaborations.

Briefly looking at the elements that contributed to getting this project going.  The team:

1. agreed on the focus of the story (“based around a group of city centre allotments and the story will explore ideas of shared and private space and the real and imaginary barriers between a range of different city characters”)
2. identified the desired outcome (an online and printed novel)
3. gave themselves a clear deadline within which to complete the project – they have a launch party on Monday 5^th October.
4. clearly outlined the tasks that need to be completed – writing, editing, proofreading, images, publishing etc – and who will do them – lead writer, participants, professional volunteers and the public.

(Check out Bracket’s toolkit for collaborative projects to see how it matches up)

And the intellectual property?  The group have been careful to inform the public contributors that they must own any material they submit, and will retain ownership but give permission for it to be used within the project.  The book itself will be distributed under a Creative Commons license.

A great example of what online creative collaboration can achieve!

(Okay, so this post has been a long time coming!)

A while back, ‘Mixing it up: adding new intellectual property models to your creative practice – part 1’ and ‘part 2’ looked at some of the reasons why a creative practitioner may or may not share intellectual property (IP) , and the Creative Commons framework that can be used to manage this. The use of Creative Commons is straightforward for incremental creative production, where an existing version is taken and developed or improved, but not so much for live collaborative projects where a group of people are working to develop something together at the same time. It’s also not possible to release something under Creative Commons to a specified community, so what might be the solution?

Two ways of looking at this are from a ‘protection’ and ‘sharing’ viewpoint. Social Innovation Camp is an example where sharing is the default. This is a weekend where web developers, web designers, entrepreneurs and others get together to work on pre-selected web-based ideas that address a social issue. Project teams are formed, and after approximately 48 hours each team has something tangible to show – a working web prototype.

Social Innovation Camp 08. Image by codepo8 on flickr

Social Innovation Camp is a live example of where people donate their skills, knowledge and talent, without concern of intellectual property, to work towards a greater good. Because of this goodwill and enthusiasm, results are achieved extremely quickly. Furthermore, those involved make new contacts, develop their own knowledge, learn from others and become associated with an interesting project. Financial gain is not the primary goal for any of the projects in Social Innovation Camp (although the ideas do need a sustainable business model), nor for the people involved. The non-monetary benefits – networking, learning etc – are enough for people to feel comfortable giving up their time.

Is it possible to apply these principles to creative and truly collaborative projects, where temporary teams are formed from those with the best skills for the job? And how can creative practitioners feel comfortable enough with sharing their IP to initiate and manage these kinds of projects themselves?

The example above shows that it’s not so much an IP framework that is needed, but more a ‘frame of mind’. When working collaboratively, project members will need to be less protective over ideas, and there needs to be a high level of trust between those involved. This becomes much harder in ad-hoc temporary teams and current approaches in place might be to use a non-disclosure or collaborative agreement, which are important if any disputes arise. But we also need to be wary of being too heavy-handed or prescriptive which could stifle some of the amazing creativity and innovation that could arise.

Perhaps there needs to be a transition, when working collaboratively, from ‘me’ to ‘us’ and from ‘my IP’ to ‘our IP’ -  this may not be easy for the individual creative practitioner who is used to working alone. It requires a mindset and approach where project members feel confident about how to make decisions between sharing and protecting in their own practice/business. This starts from knowledge of basic IP principles, seeing examples – both successful and unsuccessful – and first-hand experience of this way of working.

• to protect the integrity of a creative idea – preventing someone else from modifying or altering means that it will always stay as you intended
• emotional attachment – if you have worked on an idea for so long, investing time and perhaps money, it may be more difficult to part with it
• to gain personal recognition – self-promotion as an individual creative practitioner is vital, and being associated with strong ideas and work helps this.

In contrast, there may also be good reasons to share your IP such as:

• to spread an idea quickly – sometimes the fastest way to get an idea known is to encourage replication of it
• to create awareness of what you do, and even lead people to you paid-for work – if you share your IP, someone may use your work in another context, credit you and find you a whole new audience
• to encourage development and innovation – you may have taken an idea as far as it can go and need some fresh insight.  Allowing someone else to modify your work can take it further
• for the greater good – sometimes an idea has social benefit rather than financial.  Opening up your IP could mean that you achieve greater impact where its needed most
• and, of course, to collaborate – when you share your IP can often achieve more than you could do alone.

Flickr is an example of a tool that enables content creators to showcase and distribute their work on a global platform.  It provides opportunities for, and even encourages distributors to share their IP thorugh the use of Creative Commons licenses.  With Creative Commons, practitioners can decide how to distribute and share their work using one of six licenses, based on a set of four conditions:

- attribution (ensuring you are credited)
- share alike (further work must also be released under the same license)
- non-commercial (not allowed to generate an income from your work)
- no derivative works (no modifications allowed to your work)

By choosing a license other than traditional copyright a creator opens up opportunities for their work to be used in various ways, potentially bringing the advantages listed above.
These ways of distributing work happen in the web/tech sector all the time – open source working – and enables individuals to modify and improve existing software.  Various versions of software are released into a community, on which anybody that has the necessary skills and knowledge can modify, improve and develop.  They then release their version back to the community for others to do the same.  What results is a cycle of innovation and improvement, much faster and more accurate than any individual could achieve on their own.  It’s a concept from which Wikipedia was born, where a wide range of individuals constantly update topics with their knowledge and latest information.  What results is, in theory (and generally), the most up-to-date article at any time.

However, the examples described above apply to content where incremental changes are made – where each individual builds on an available previous version.  Someone creates, releases it under Creative Commons or similar and another can develop it from there – pretty straightforward.  But what about when creative practitioners are generating ideas with other individuals?  When everyone is in the same room or online workspace freely exchanging ideas.  When the final outcome is the result of several individuals’ work and suggestions.  How do you get rewarded and/or recognised for your efforts when your input is melded with that of others and not immediately clear?  How can you feel comfortable in sharing your IP then?!  We’ll look into this in ‘Part 3′.

What is the solution?  It seems that there is no definitive answer – but my take on it is that you first need to understand the basics of intellectual property and where it exists in your business under traditional law, and then try to have the best of both worlds – share a bit, but also protect when necessary.

Two recent events looked at different ways of managing intellectual property in the web 2.0 world.  An event by Own-it in December 08 discussed Creative Commons, and a Disruptive Social Innovators meet-up in January focussed on how IP systems are evolving to encourage collaborative innovation.  I’ll be elaborating on these events in the next post, but in the meantime consider these questions: as a creative practitioner do you know enough about traditional IP frameworks to feel comfortable utilising new models for sharing your ideas and work? And do you know when you should share and when you should protect?

Bracket has been working on a toolkit that can be used by those hoping to work collaboratively on a project with others. The initial framework is here. It is intended to be a work in progress, inviting contributions and developed as the model is tested.  There are also some suggestions from facilitators/providers of social media, gathered from Social Media Camp London 08.

The model was developed with social designers hoping to initiate collaborative projects, at System Reload London. But maybe elements can be applied to other areas, ensuring that the specific characteristics and needs of the community are considered.

Why develop a toolkit for collaborative working? We’re in a collaborative age, where to make an impact it makes more sense to work together with others. Social designers cannot address all of the important issues on their own – collective action is necessary. We can share our knowledge, experience, resources and skills to get further than we could ever do individually. And whilst there are lots of online tools out there which enable people to interact and discuss, when people need to get actual ideas off the ground, how can they do this effectively? Online tools can facilitate the process, and support communication, but all the web 2.0 in the world can’t make things happen – people do.

BarCamp have brilliant guidelines for getting their grassroots events up and running, and it’s safe to say that they have contributed to a whole global movement of ‘unconferences’ in the tech-world. Wouldn’t it be great if we were able to do the same with other ideas and projects? It would be fantastic if everyone, if they needed it, were able to use various frameworks to make a real collective difference, or respond to opportunities that are too big for them on their own.  In the same way that you can find lots of business plan templates on the web and use the one that suits your needs, how about a template for collaborative action?  One might argue that people sometimes need support to understand the elements of a business plan, and maybe this means there needs to be more support around collaborative projects, which will empower individuals to continue themselves.

Similarly, it might be difficult to organise a BarCamp unless you have attended one yourself, and really experienced it (as I did last week).  So perhaps what we need are lots of examples/case studies of collaborative projects, as well as real-life opportunities for people to get involved and experience how it really works.  The ability to project manage collaborations effectively will play a large part in getting ideas out there.  But this needs to be approached carefully, so that it remains collaborative, where everyone involved has the opportunity to contribute and co-create.

“Turning ideas into action” seems to be a hot topic at the moment. David Wilcox is developing a wiki called ‘designingcollaboration’ intended to shed some light on the process. This will be an important and relevant resource for those working in this area. Chain Reaction, an upcoming event in November 2008, also provides a toolkit for ideas. There have been some interesting collaborative initiatives, like Social Innovation Camp and RSA Networks (both of which David Wilcox evaluates on his blog) and it seems like it’s the time to assess what makes them successful/unsuccessful so that we can use the knowledge to move forward.

Hopefully the toolkit on the Bracket site can be part of the ongoing contributions.