Keynote: Can open technology, society, and culture remove barriers to human sharing and create a thriving commons-based future?
Alanna Irving
Public
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We are posting a series of Loomio discussions about sessions and talks coming up at the conference, so participants can have a chance to discuss the topics, ask questions, and interact with the presenters.
Libraries have long been seen as the gatekeepers to knowledge, can they truly live up to this promise when they use proprietary software, riddled with DRM provisions? If we free Libraries, can we flow this on into archives, galleries and museums? If we want an open society, our cultural institutions must be open too. What if the gate keepers opened their gates?
Christopher Cormack has a BSc in Computer Science and a BA in Mathematics and Māori Studies. While working for Katipo Communications he was the lead developer of the original version of Koha, which went live at Horowhenua Library Trust on January 5, 2000. Since then he has served various roles in the community: Release manager, QA manager and Translation manager. He is the elected release maintainer for 3.18. Christopher currently works for Catalyst IT in Wellington. Christopher believes in Free Software and allowing users the freedom to innovate.
Charles Hett Mon 13 Apr 2015 11:44PM
I'm not sure libraries are the only starting point for knowledge, mostly they hold/share books. Historically knowledge resided in people and shared orally (so synchronous), since the advent of printing and literacy (only 600 years ago) institutions emerged that "credentialised" written material (this knowledge/thinking was now asynchronous; you needed institutions including libraries to help identify useful/valid knowledge.
Modern technology now potentially enables more/better synchronous communication and knowledge than at any time in the past. To me this is the challenge for us all - to help technology, our cultures & society provide a base for open, sharing of authentic knowledge.
Chris Cormack Sat 18 Apr 2015 9:27PM
As you will have noticed, I decided not to go the talking about the GLAM sector. Happy to take any feedback, right decision? wrong decision? Would you have liked to hear about something different?
David Cohen Sat 18 Apr 2015 10:49PM
How is the authenticity of knowledge to be determined? There is a colossal amount of mis-/dys-/simply wrong information out there that is lobbying very hard for legitimacy.
How do we gate-keep information for simple validity if these very fast information flows are unedited, un-curated and not peer reviewed?
Alanna Irving · Mon 13 Apr 2015 6:13AM
Post any questions or comments for @chriscormack :)