Fanatic Attack

The Creative Commons recently released LiveContent 2.0 a Free Live DVD. We checked it out and wanted to give you an overview of what it’s all about. Basically, it’s a Fedora Live DVD with free and open source content that comes loaded with Creative Commons’ (CC) licensed material. CC allows creators like artists, scientists, authors, etc. to share their works with the world so that you can reuse and remix this work legally.

The CC content on the DVD includes text, audio, video, image and educational resources. The files have a CC license associated with them, which tells you how you can use the content. Some content only requires attribution while other files’ licenses may require attribution as well as the requirement to use the content verbatim with no derivative works based upon it. There are 6 CC licenses and you can search for media based upon the license that fits your needs.

You can download the Live Content DVD at the Fedora website and then torrent the files using the torrent client of your choice. The file size is 2.3 GB. Check out the walk through shown below:

After you boot the Live DVD, you see a Creative Commons boot screen which then boots up a Fedora desktop.

BOOT SCREENSHOT

INITIAL SCREEN

DESKTOP

The desktop contains audio, educational, image, text, and video files loaded, as well as the following applications:

• TuxPaint – an award winning, image editor
• Mozilla Firefox browser
• Open Office – an office suite with Writer for word processing, Calc for spreadsheets, and Impress for presentations
• Totem – free software media player (audio and video) for the GNOME desktop environment
• Jokosher – a multi track studio for recording, editing, mixing and exporting audio
• Inkscape – a vector graphics editor similar to Adobe Illustrator
• Gimp – a photo editor similar to Adobe Photoshop for photo retouching and image authoring

Audio

The audio file on the desktop contains a sampler of music from various artists sourced from Jamendo and Simuze. Jamendo features music that is free and legal to download. Simuze, a site from the Netherlands, has content that is licensed by CC entirely.

AUDIO SCREENSHOT

Note: You may have to adjust your sound settings to get the right level for your system. To do this, go to the System tab in the status bar, click preferences, then hardware, and then sound. You can ramp up the sound level accordingly if necessary.

SOUND SCREENSHOT

The audio folder in Firefox has a handful of music sites bookmarked for you to explore, such as:

• Magnatune – music streaming and download site with CC licensing. Proceeds from downloads is split 50/50 with musicians.
• SectionZ – collaborative effort between independent electronica artists who port music daily for peer review.
• Jamglue – online community for creating, remixing and sharing audio files.
• Freesound – collaborative database of CC licensed sounds, as in sound samplings, not songs.
• Ccmixter – community music site featuring remixes licensed under CC.

CCMIXTER SCREENSHOT

Education

When you click on the Education folder on the desktop, you get a treasure trove of documents from MIT’s Open Courseware, and if you are ambitious enough to read through all of them, then pat yourself on the back and give yourself an honorary degree. Items you may not yet have on your summer reading list include: Single Variable Calculus, Physics 1, Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, and Linear Algebra.

If MIT courses aren’t your cup of joe, you might be inspired to check out other open educational resources that fit your tastes. To do this, just click on the education folder in the Firefox browser and you can select from Open Source Movies, MIT Open Courseware, and Open of Course, to name a few of the featured sites. You’ll be surprised at everything you can find from learning Hindi to lesson plans for primary school students.

OER SCREENSHOT

Images

After you’ve earned your advanced degree, you can move onto the Image folder on the desktop which features a nice sampling of JPEG images under various CC licenses from Flickr and Wikimedia Commons. The breadth of the content is extensive and it will just whet your appetite to do an intense online search for more images.

FLICKR SCREENSHOT

KATHMANDU SCREENSHOT

As you might have guessed, you can go to the Firefox folder in the browser named Image, and there are good sites for you to hunt for images. There’s the well known Flickr, but there’s a few that may have missed your radar screen like Yotophoto, an image site where some of the images are in the Public Domain, but most are licensed under CC. There’s also Open Photo – of which all of the images are licensed under CC as well.

A neat site for wildlife photos is DCNature.com. All of the photos there can be modified or altered as long as attribution is given. To be included on the site, the images are first peer reviewed and then, if accepted, they are posted. All of the photos must be of wildlife or habitats within the DC beltway, so if you’re looking for beach photos, you’ll definitely strike out here.

DCNATURE SCREENSHOT

A site that features images solely in the Public Domain and free for any use is Zorger.com.

If you’re into clip art, there’s Open Clip Art.org, a collection of vector clip art that is in the Public Domain and free to use. One downside is you can only search by tags – there’s no thumbnail search, which would make the search process infinitely more productive. A work around is to get Firefox’s Cooliris add-on. You’ll definitely be that much better off viewing the files.

Another interesting site is Design Reaction which features cause oriented posters available to non-profits to use in their efforts. The posters are licensed under CC and can be used for non-commercial work with attribution, and no modification.

DESIGN REACTION SCREENSHOT

Text

The desktop text folder contains several books for you to browse. There are in-depth books on open source concepts like “Free Culture,” by Lawrence Lessig and “Freedom of Expression – Over Zealous Copyright Bozos and Other Enemies of Creativity,” by Kembrew McLeod. And there’s lighter fare like “Weird Shorts,” by Ginae B. McDonald and Katie Maud Stephan, as well as a science fiction piece entitled, “Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom,” by Cory Doctorow. For the geek, “Producing Open Source Software,” by Karl Fogel, may inspire you to run a successful free software project.

FREE CULTURE SCREENSHOT

The text bookmark folder in Firefox contains links to sites that might prevent you from walking into a library ever again. Two library sites are featured including IntraText and Public Library of Science. IntraText is a digital library of texts in 36 languages from research, humanities and religions, with most content available under CC license. Texts are displayed based on a Tablet PC or touch screen interface.

Public Library of Science is a site devoted to providing medical and scientific literature available as a public resource. All content on the site is published under an open access license that allows unrestricted use provided appropriate attribution is given.

On the more fun side, be sure to check out Blast Magazine, an online magazine for the 18-35 crowd with content that ranges from culture/fashion, sports, technology to politics and gaming. Good, another magazine offering, provides commentary on culture and society.

GOOD SCREENSHOT

Another lighter offering is Irish Literary Revival, a site where you can read out-of-print or out-of-circulation Irish books under a CC license.

You can also check out Lulu – a site that provides tools for those who want to self publish. Unearth Travel is another option, as this is a free, editable travel guide.

Video

The video file on the desktop provides a nice sampling of videos that can introduce you to the concept of open source and free content. Some videos feature Lawrence Lessig, the founder of CC, as he explains how CC licensing frees up creativity by allowing collaboration to reuse and remix content for free. In essence, creativity is building upon past works and current copyright law can stifle this blossoming of ideas and growth.

CREATIVITY SCREENSHOT

When you go to the Firefox video tab, you can visit an assortment of open source video sites like Revver, Newteevee, Lulu.TV, and BlipTV. These resources are definitely a far cry from the mainstream fare you may be used to viewing, and they can put you in touch with what the best video sharing sites are all about.

LULU TV SCREENSHOT

Other Firefox bookmarks included on the DVD include Creative Commons and Fedora, the Linux based operating system. Also included is a World Label bookmark, a site where you can order laser and inkjet labels. World Label, a stalwart proponent of open standards and open source content, provided the necessary funding to make the Live Content DVD possible.

Open Source 101

Live Content is a great compilation of open source content. If you’re new to open source and want to explore the new possibilities available to you outside of proprietary software and mainstream media, as well as the concepts underpinning the free source movement, Live Content definitely serves it up in one convenient package. The beauty of the Live DVD allows you to take your operating system with you. Just bring your thumb drive with you so you can save whatever you create.

Read more information on Live Content DVD and get a leg up on the open source projects that can rock your world!