#technologycommons

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#TechnologyCommons is there a future?

➛ Blogging about the technology commons has been great! I think that this course has created both assignments with structure and assignments with less formal structure that personally worked for me :) I chose this group of commons among the others because I had something to say and contribute. ➛ Technology will not always be free and more importantly it will not always be held in common with all regular consumers. And with big corporations as Sukhpal mentioned taking over different channels and avenues of technology to monitor and to become more financially stable from - I think that the commoning of technology is headed in a interesting path to say the least.  ➛ This blog has kept me aware of issues regarding copyright, sharing versus private usage and very importantly - the social impact that technology has on commoning and vice versa! It is up to users and those who are in a position of power to create positive and health outcomes {ultimately atleast} to help better where the #TechnologyCommons are headed! ➛ As I sign off I would like to give kudos to the rest of our blog's contributors! It was definitely fascinating to read everyone's contributions and gain some insight. An honorable set of mentions go out to our T.A & to Professor Andrea M. for being great mentors, teachers and a wealth of information to the class and to me! It's my last few days at UTM and this class certainly taught me plenty! Good luck to the rest of me peers! ~ Joseph A. Fernando

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My Conclusions on Blogging about Technology Commons

                    I wanted to conclude this blogging experience with my thoughts on the future of technology commons. Looking at all of my blog posts, I started off looking at legal battles that were happening in court with large corporations like Microsoft. I then went into what people were doing to fight against these enclosure movements that were sometimes being sanctioned by courts.   I discovered campaigns, conferences and also looked at who these people are exactly, who have the courage to go against this "second enclosure" movement (in another blog). I then continued on and divulged slightly into hackers. I finished off with some examples of corporations going against each other in this battle.   Overall, we see that the battle is ongoing and it is continuously happening as I post this.   It is a struggle. We now slowly see corporations, as discussed in another blog, taking over the channels we use to have discussion around not only about the technology commons but others. These companies are taking over these venues and monitoring what we post and blocking what they do not see value in maximizing THEIR profits.  I believe we should also take into consideration how the framing of these struggles are often portrayed by the media when we look at the future of the commons movement (since media is being slowly taken over by large corporations). When we read about these movements such as Occupy movements or a protest in general, we tend to see the framing of these stories become negative. For example, the strike by Canada Post workers a few years ago. The media tended to frame it as an INCONVIENCE to the broader public, by not being able  to receive their mail for example, and so on and the praising of things like the Back to Work Legislation. This Legislation forced the strike to be over.  But we see a difference when media covers stories involving companies. For example, when companies shut down a factory and it devastates a whole community of people, media tends to frame it as it just being a once in a lifetime case and that it is just part of the capitalist system.   With this in mind, going forward, I believe we should be aware of the taking over of these outlets that people use to become aware of these issues. As well as the framing of the issues of the commons in these outlets. Regardless of whether it is technology, culture, money commons and so on, we should self-consciously try to look past the framing and really see the struggles for what it really is and try to find out what exactly is happening and then try to do something about it, if we can.   With that, thank you for reading all my blogs.   -Sukhpal   

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The FOSS movement has spearheaded a broader free culture movement. It is not only about code and content of new media on the Internet, but it is also about rights and access to cultural materials. An example would be the fight against copyrighted music, video content and so on, which leads us to the culture commons.

An example of this fight against copyright starts with Lawrence Lessig and two other colleagues who created an alternative to copyrighted cultural materials in 2002. This alternative was called the CREATIVE COMMONS. Creative commons was an alternative to “all rights reserved” and now allows “some rights reserved,” if one wanted to. We use creative commons to get access to articles and it is thanks to the software movement that started it all. Creative commons is part of the “copy left” movement, the alternative to “copy right” (“copy right” mentioned in another blog).

I have attached the link to this blog.

Here is the mission stated on the website:

What is Creative Commons?

Creative Commons helps you share your knowledge and creativity with the world. Creative Commons develops, supports, and stewards legal and technical infrastructure that maximizes digital creativity, sharing, and innovation.

-Sukhpal

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#OpenHardware for the masses = Project Ara

➛ I've always wondered when open-source technology would meet hardware. What I mean is when would or when will hardware be as "open-source" as technology is? I spoke too soon....#ProjectAra is the answer to this dilemma by our good old tech-giant Google! ➛ Google's initiative entitled "Project Ara" is an open hardware platform for creating highly modular smartphones. The platform will include a structural frame that holds smartphone modules of the owner's choice + it allows  users to swap out malfunctioning modules or upgrade individual modules as innovations emerge, providing longer lifetime cycles for the handset, and potentially reducing electronic waste ➛ I think that Google has take a huge leap forward in the arena of open-hardware and has empowered the consumers of the future in mobile phones. I can totally admit that my phone doesn't have enough storage as I'd like it to have and this initiative by Google really gives users POWER. Power is a tough piece of muscle to keep control of but I think this move by Google is really propelling how consumers are given the right to choose! ➛I think that closed hardware only forces society and users all over the world to abide by a RULE - buy this and only this! Will all mobile phone developers be this accommodating as Google ? Probably not but I think #ProjectAra will create and stimulate change in this arena of "open-hardware". ~ Joseph A. Fernando

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Technology + Sharing Houses

∗ Tumbleweed is a brand dedicated to helping consumers live in tiny and affordable housing. They allow consumers to purchase housing plans in different sizes that contain all the necessary information to build a house. ∗ Tumbleweed provides training materials, workshops, full plans and support for thousands of people looking to downsize into a #Tumbleweed dwelling. ∗ I believe that #Tumbleweed is helping propel and shift the commoning of technology in a healthy and positive direction. Often technology is viewed as knowledge that contains a purpose meant to be private and given to a specific market. #Tumbleweed is changing this conception and diversifying the dynamic and impact of what sharing knowledge can do. ∗ By allowing consumers to purchase PDF plans to different housing layouts on wheels, this changed the culture and ideology regarding privatization and benefits for the masses. iTunes once digitally protected their media library so that purchased media from their database could not be transferred to another person's digital device unless they too had purchased the same content. This promoted idea, had to do mainly with preventing illegal shared copies and decreasing the value of digital media. However, they ended up changing this shortly after. Sharing knowledge can be associated with sharing knowledge. ∗ While some building contractors won't do the same as #Tumbleweed and allow access to fine blueprints to housing plans in an effort to help the masses benefit - Tumbleweed sees the benefit. Although consumers still have to purchase layouts to housing plans at a small premium - the cost is still lower than what traditional methods of obtaining these layouts is equal to. ∗ Tumbleweed in my opinion is helping consumers create affordable dwellings while also giving them access to benefits like construction, electrical, plumbing and overall helping empower them. This really reminded me of the prisoner's game. When two people and in this case Tumbleweed and consumers can find a resolution - everyone benefits. ~ Joseph A. Fernando

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Facts/Assumptions/Things to know about #OpenSourceTechnology

∗ Open Source is less secure than most believe ∗ Open Source is free ∗ Open Source isn’t {officially} licensed ∗ Open Source is a fad **more to this list will be added between today and the end of the term! ~ Joseph A. Fernando

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Examples of #OpenSourceTechnology in the University-Student world!

∗ While open source technology is great & is a step in the right direction to help propel the future of creative-user applications. Technology and its applications are not 100% great if they're not practical. I wanted to investigate and examine general and everyday examples of open source technology that I've been able to use as a university student.

➸ Open Office I've been forced to use to Open Office when I first didn't have access to a working laptop or when applications like Microsoft Office weren't available to use! This application is very similar to the Microsoft Office suite of applications {word, excel, powerpoint etc}. ➸ Firefox & Google Chrome These two browsers are every university student's best or worst nightmare. I've come across situations where one browser just works better than the other. Sure enough, UofT's #blackboard application has had its moments where it hasn't been too friendly with either browser. With both browsers being an a product of #opensourcetechnology this really proves that this technology has transformed but affected my university experience. ➸BitTorrent In between exams, papers and anything academic related - I've always wanted and needed to watch the last episode of #GreysAnatomy or #TwoandaHalfMen. BitTorrent is a peer2peer file sharing application that many university students along with myself have used to download a variety of media in an instant. What's great about this concept is that major corporations have caught on to sharing files over this network. This to me desmonstrates just how valuable open source technology is and how it promotes efficiency and easy access! ➸MySQL & Java While I'm not too familiar with MySQL in short it's a database management sysytem in code. Java helps run and accelerate applications like games, loading graphics friendly content (quizzes, games, social networks), spreadsheets and more. /// ∗ I sometimes get the feeling that #OpenSourceTechnology is a term that isn't too everyday-user-friendly and almost sounds too corporate/professional. After doing some basic research I was able to discover that in addition to catering to professional and complex tasks, #OpenSource technologies are all around me - the average university student. I never really paid attention to it but it's been the backbone to a lot of my university assignments! ~ Joseph A. Fernando

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The Evolution of the BOOK #Booktype

I've always wondered what the battle for written books growing old & digitally-new published books, would look like - turns out it's shaping up to be pretty positive & effective! 

Booktype, the open source publishing platform. from Sourcefabric on Vimeo. ⧭ Open Source Technology's first and major mandate is that the actual source code to a program or interface is made available for modification and customization. What's great is that software developers who support the #OPENSOURCE idea believe that modifying source code will create applications that will become more useful and error-free over the long term. ⧭Booktype has transformed the meaning of open source-publishing on a HUGE scale! They've take the #SDK (Software Development Kit) for platforms like E-Readers, tablets, phones and the Internet and made it commonly usable for everyday writers!  ⧭Booktype has also changed the playing field for "new vs old books". Their platform allow for typos and corrections in books to be made quickly, accurately and efficiently delivered to users as soon as a change is made. ⧭This is exactly what open source technology is really about! Modifying the user experience to become more useful and error free. More importantly I think that Booktype has paved a great path & is growing with the change of how books are consumed along with how "old revisions" of books (in the digital form) will cease to exist.  ~ Joseph A. Fernando