<nettime-ann> [ann] FM10 CfP: Code, science and content - Making collaborative creativity sustainable

["Pieter Boeder" <pieter@networkcultures.org>]

Call for Papers: deadline 6 February 2006
FM10 Openness: Code, science and content
Making collaborative creativity sustainable
May 2006

Recent years have seen a strong interest among academics, policy makers,
activists, business and other practitioners on open collaboration and
access as a driver of creativity. In some areas, such as free software /
open source, sustainable business models have emerged that are holding
their own against more traditional, proprietary software industries. In
the sciences, the notions of open science and open data demonstrate the
strong tradition of openness in the academic community that, despite its
past successes, is increasingly under threat. And open access journals
and
other open content provide inspiring examples of collaborative
creativity
and participatory access, such as Wikipedia, while still in search of
models to ensure sustainability.

There are clear links between these areas of openness: open content
often
looks explicitly towards open source software for business models, and
open science provides through its history a glimpse of the potential of
openness, how it can work, as well as a warning of the threats it may
face. Finally, open collaboration is closely linked to access to
knowledge
issues, enabling active participation rather than passive consumption
especially in developing countries.

Despite these clear links, there has been surprisingly little thoughtful
analysis of this convergence, or of the real value of the common aspect
of
open collaboration. In particular, while open source software ? due to
its
strong impact on business and on bridging the digital divide ? has drawn
much attention, it may provide false hopes for the sustainability of
openness in other areas of content that need careful examination. The
conference FM10 Openness: Code, science and content ? Making
collaborative
creativity sustainable provides a platform for such analysis and
discussion, resulting in concrete proposals for sustainable models for
open collaboration in creative domains.

The conference will draw on the experience of First Monday as the
foremost
online, peer?reviewed academic journal covering these issues since May
1996. Not only has First Monday published numerous papers by leading
scholars on the topics of open collaboration, open access, and open
content in its various forms, it is itself an example of open
collaboration in practice: for nearly a decade, the journal has been
published on a purely voluntary basis, with no subscription fees,
advertising, sponsorship or other revenues. The success of First Monday
is
demonstrated by thousands of readers around the world, downloading
hundreds of thousands of papers each month. This conference celebrates
First Monday?s tenth anniversary.

We invite papers for the conference and for a very special issue of
First
Monday. These papers will be reviewed by a special conference editorial
committee. Authors of selected papers will be invited to the conference,
scheduled to take place in Chicago in May 2006. Other selected papers
will
be published in a special issue of First Monday, to appear in June 2006.
Papers should address the issues involved in building sustainable models
for openness in science, software and content. They can examine
technical,
sociological, economic/business and legal issues, and can be conceptual
or
practical in nature. Case studies by practitioners are welcome.

Submitting papers
Proposals for papers for the conference and the special issue can be
sent
to First Monday?s Chief Editor, Edward Valauskas by e?mail (ejv [at] uic
[dot] edu) no later than the first Monday of December 2005 (5 December
2005). You are advised, but not required, to send a paper proposal
before
sending your full paper.

Proposals will be reviewed and contributors will be notified in December
of the special editorial committee?s decision.
Completed papers must be received by the first Monday in February 2006
(6
February 2006). This includes papers for which no proposal was submitted
in advance.

By the first Monday of March 2006 (6 March 2006
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