Creative Commons and Photosharing - my thoughts - week 8

WOW – The concept of Creative Commons is quite complex – even if you use something that someone has allowed you to, you must give attribution (credit, I'm guessing) to that person. Good to know!

There is a lot of stuff that people are willing to share – does make for an enriched information world out there, doesn’t it?

I guess people see it more as exposure for their work that they might not get otherwise. I guess the same goes for Youtube. A student I know recorded his dance routine and put it on Youtube - he says it's for exposure. It’s funny, I’ve never really thought about it this way, but it makes sense. For me, it’s more about protecting my privacy and not wanting to put myself out there. But for people who want to be discovered, technology has really opened the door.

As much as I don't want to put myself out there, I do enjoy looking at my friends' photos. It is a way to stay connected and I appreciate that they are sharing a piece of their life with me. This is what I would use Flickr and Picasa for - a way to share and connect with my friends and family, especially the ones that live far away. We'll see, I'll have to just get over my need for privacy and share some more photos...or at least start taking more so I'll have something to share! : )

I'm glad that this week's lesson is on Creative Commons because a colleague and I have been trying to figure out how to teach our students about intellectual freedom.
Lee (my colleague) and I worked on creating an assignment that has students looking into this issue.

Many of our students use images from the Internet (in their projects) with no regards to this aspect at all. I've made some progress this year with getting them to cite their image sources in their bibliography, but many of them think this is unnecessary for some reason.

As they start to create more blogs, wikis, and technology-based projects, intellectual property becomes a significant issue that we have to address. Most of the students obtain images from Google, not realizing that many, if not all, are not free for the taking. As Lee and I researched a bit on our own, we found that most websites had information (sometimes very difficult to understand) about the usage of their images. It was clear, we were not allowed to use their image in a simple cut and paste fashion – rather, it always required either filling out a form or writing an email asking for persmission of use. From our digging, we created an assignment that had students digging deeper themselves.

We have to provide opportunities in the classroom for assignments such as this if we want them to understand and respect intellectual freedom. As well, we have to point out to them that even if they do use images from the Creative Commons, they still have to give credit where credit is due, otherwise, people will not be happy either. (I learned this from a post in the Creative Commons section of Flickr)

A lot of the legal language we encountered was difficult – Lee and I found ourselves puzzled by the terminology and procedures at times. So we worked in a vocabulary section in our assignment so students could write down words they didn't understand (for further investigation).

We were hoping that by providing this assignment with our guidance, students will acquire some of the language and concepts of intellectual property.

We're both pretty excited about this project and hope the students will find it worthwhile. Now that I've learned a bit more about Creative Commons, I think I'll work that into the assignment as well.

We'll need to talk to students about searching for images in the “Creative Commons” rather than just Googling. But whatever they find, they still need to dig further to learn about the “properties” of the photo.

Personally, I feel that I need to learn more about the legal jargon so that I can make sense of it for the students. Most of the time, they don't even realize that they're being unethical when they take images without asking or giving attribution. We just have to take the time to educate them on this.


I think there are a couple of good websites to use with students when it comes to this topic:
Creativecommons.org – this short video gives a pretty good description of Creative Commons. I think it would be a good starting place for a lesson on Intellectual freedom.

Wikimedia Commons – there is information about the usage of each photo when you click on them. We need to teach students to go through this process before they cut and paste!

However, I am confused a bit about giving attribution – what if no names are given, how do we give proper attribution? Something I need to look into so that I can pass on the correct information to them.