In 2016, Creative Commons launched a small grant program called “The Awesome Fund.” In total, 19 grants funded a wide range of creative projects led by members of the CC network.

The Long Road to the Hall of Fame

One of the grant recipients was Réda Zine, an author, director, and producer based in Italy. Zine used the grant to help complete his feature length documentary, The Long Road to the Hall of Fame, which tells the story of Tony King (a.k.a. Malik Farrakhan).

Tony King is a former National Football League player, model, and actor—he appeared in films such as Shaft and Gordon’s War. In the 1980s, however, King transitioned from actor to political activist by joining the Nation of Islam and changing his name to Malik Farrakhan. Eventually, he became chief of security for the hip-hop group Public Enemy. 

By documenting the life and work of Tony King (a.k.a. Malik Farrakhan), the film explores how King’s life “is a parable spanning the last 40 years of African-American history.”

Released under CC BY-NC, you can now watch the full documentary on Vimeo.

 

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Good news for people and groups working on ways to empower creators: Today, Coil announced Grant for the Web, a new $100 million fund to benefit creators and promote the open Web Monetization standard.

Grant for the Web is funded and led by Coil, in collaboration with Creative Commons and Mozilla. The fund hopes to address some of the most serious problems facing the Web, including privacy abuses related to ads and unethical sponsored content, by fixing web monetization and disrupting content subscription services.

The program will fund individuals, projects, and global communities that contribute to a privacy-centric, open, and accessible web monetization ecosystem. Specifically, the Grant for the Web program encourages content creators and software developers to develop and test new business models using Web Monetization, an open web standard that has been proposed to the W3C Web Incubator Community Group. 

Grant for the Web is committed to awarding at least 50% of all grant dollars to proposed software projects and content projects that will be openly licensed. Special consideration will be given to projects that reflect the values of the global commons, such as: 

• Increasing users’ autonomy, privacy, and control over their own data 
• Promoting diversity and inclusion on the internet 
• Increasing access to the full capacity of the internet, both for content consumption and content creation, for historically marginalized or disadvantaged communities and individuals

Representatives from Coil, Creative Commons, and Mozilla will make up the initial Grant for the Web Advisory Council, which governs the fund’s activities. Additionally, Coil, Creative Commons, and Mozilla will each designate an advisor to serve on a Technical Advisory Group. The purpose of this group will be to guide the direction of the program, and to review grant applications from a technical perspective and in turn provide recommendations to the Advisory Council.

As collaborators on this project, we’re excited to help foster new and innovative business models that will address issues facing the Web today.  For more information and updates about Grant for the Web, including upcoming calls for proposals, visit http://grantfortheweb.org/. 

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Creative Commons is delighted to welcome Cable Green as the organization’s interim Chief Executive Officer. As we recently announced, Ryan Merkley has stepped down after five years of service as CEO to start a new position at Wikimedia. We are thankful to Ryan for his leadership at CC and excited for him and the Commons that he will continue as a leader in the open knowledge community.

Interim CEO Cable Green has been a key member of the Creative Commons staff for the past eight and a half years. As CC’s Director of Open Education, he has been one of the world’s most effective advocates for open licensing policies, and has worked extensively with the global open education community to improve access to effective open educational resources. Cable will continue to spearhead our efforts to advance open education as he takes on this new interim leadership role at CC.

The rest of the Creative Commons board of directors and I are very grateful to Cable for stepping into this new role. He is the perfect person to lead CC during this crucial transition period. He knows and understands the organization, the community, and the important work we do better than anyone. We couldn’t be more confident in him and the rest of the CC staff.

We are also excited to announce that we have launched a CEO search process to identify our next permanent CEO. This process will include outreach to the global Creative Commons community for insights about the future of CC and its leadership.

The Commons is ever-changing and resilient. It is my great honor to cultivate it along with Creative Commons staff, our global network, and supporters.

Share alike, friends!

Molly Van Houweling
Creative Commons Board Chair

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Creative Commons gets letters and phone calls and emails from all around the world. People write to share their work, call to get advice on how to use the licenses, and email to complain and to say thank you. Recently, we got a series of hand-written letters from a number of students in a US-based 5th-grade class, including this one:

We get letters. "I want to congratulate you on the drastic changes you've made to The People's Republic of Copyright. As a 5th grader, what can I do to help?"

Clearly we have to make People's Republic of Copyright t-shirts. pic.twitter.com/njwOz7UX7k

— Ryan Merkley (@ryanmerkley) June 10, 2019

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“I want to congratulate you on the drastic changes you’ve made to The People’s Republic of Copyright. As a 5th grader, what can I do to help?”

The Wikipedia article on “Republic” says, “A republic (Latin: res publica, meaning “public affair”) is a form of government in which the country is considered a “public matter”, not the private concern or property of the rulers.”

The commons is definitely a “public matter,” and we thought the idea deserved a little creative expression. As some of you may know, today is my last day as CEO at CC, and as a bit of a parting gift, CC’s Creative Director Eric Steuer and I collaborated with Toronto designer Cat Wood to turn the letter into a t-shirt. Available in grey, blue, and red.

In Solidarity,
Ryan Merkley
Former CEO, Creative Commons
Citizen, The People’s Republic of Copyright

The post New CC T-Shirt Inspired by a Letter from a 5th Grader appeared first on Creative Commons.

Over the past year, we’ve expanded our tech team at CC, welcoming four new staff members to help support the global commons through CC’s licenses and tools. Timid Robot Zehta joined us in October of 2018 as CC’s Core Systems Manager; Hugo Solar signed on in January as CC’s Web Developer; Bruno Ferreira also began in January as CC’s Front End Engineer; and our newest member, Anna Tumadottir joined us this week as CC’s Director of Product. We’re very excited to be able to work with these incredible individuals!

Timid Robot Zehta, Core Systems Manager

Timid Robot brings 15 years of professional experience empowering others’ use of technology and digital infrastructure. Timid Robot loves cats, open source, systems and giving back to the communities around them. They have a BA in Liberal Arts from Sarah Lawrence College.

 
 
 

Hugo Solar, Web Developer

Hugo brings more than 10 years of experience as a web developer. He spent the last four years as a full stack developer and interface designer, working with local NGOs and institutions supporting social movements and labor unions. He lives in a quiet and small town in Chile with his lovely son; cooking, drinking coffee, and taking care of his orchard. In his free time, he likes to achieve a zen-like state by practicing Karate and Kickboxing.

 

Bruno Ferreira, Front End Engineer

Breno has 10 years of experience in software development working in various industries, from investment banking to oil engineering, to payment systems. Outside work, Breno spends his time in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where he enjoys running, eating açaí, and paying an occasional visit to the beach. Breno can sometimes be spotted in other corners of the globe on his travels.

 

Anna Tumadottir, Director of Product

Anna spent a decade building out all aspects of the operations of three distributed performance marketing start-ups. She is constantly considering opportunities for expansion and improvement. Anna grew up in Iceland, Scotland, and Malawi, and now calls Austin, Texas her home. Sharing information and resources is central to how Anna operates, as she is convinced it leads to a better existence for everyone.

 

Please join us in welcoming the newest members of our tech team!

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