Hi Gang,
It's been a week since we adjourned, so before any more time flies by I better get you my notes from our discussion. Please regard this as a starting point. Hopefully I captured the essence, but if I missed or mis-stated something please point out my errors.
I hope we can keep the discussion going, and actually get something done. I'm pretty darn certain I won't give up. Here goes:
Suggested Agenda: (What we started with over dinner)
1) Initiate discussion of methods for nationwide content sharing
2) Metadata standards
3) Open Source principles
4) Interface design to get at content
5) Methods of ongoing collaboration
Open Content Management System: (The big project we began to outline)
A digital media collaboration system for sharing content throughout public broadcasting.
Purpose:
To facilitate sharing of produced content and content elements between local and national producers for online publishing.
Principles:
Open source design.
Creative Commons-like licensing. (see
http://creativecommons.org)
Ground-up organizational model.
Means:
Sharing is based on a universal metadata standard for describing content.
Content can be stored anywhere, just like the Internet.
Interface design allows producer access to whole features, or feature elements.
Extension of interface to user public would allow for "power searches" of public broadcasting content.
OK, a little discussion. I deliberately left it sparse and simple, hopefully even clear. But one might wonder what the heck "ground-up organization model" means. It doesn't mean we turn ourselves into hamburger, but that we build the pieces of this system at the local level. If we can be consistent about how we describe our bits as we create them, they can then interact coherently on a larger scale. Then we don't need a big expensive (and proprietary) CMS or a national command structure.
We do need a common metadata language, and a shared understanding of how to use basic tools like a local CMS.
Another feature of our discussion is Bill and Dale's content management system at North Country Public Radio, and their work to share it as an open source solution. (Note to Bill: Please sign me up.)
And probably the most essential immediate thing is to set up a space for online collaboration. Email is great but we need something with less noise. I believe Bill agreed to establish some webboards on a server he's got. (Hey Bill, while you're doing all this work, can you redesign my site for free?)
I'll leave it there for now, except to say, was anyone else totally astonished that the conference wrap-up featured so many of the ideas we talked about? Almost spooky...
Cheers,
Jack Brighton
WILL AM-FM-TV
