Unfortunately sometimes first things must come first. Which for me right now means, I have to focus on finishing my thesis. It is a lot of fun as well, but still, I can’t resist at least mentioning two events that are highly interesting in the area of knowledge production and free culture.
Two weeks ago the Critical Point of View conference in Leipzig (Germany) focused on critical approaches to the study of wikipedia. It brought together international speakers from scientists to Wikipedia authors and practioners in the realm of knowledge preservation. Two major themes were the role of academics in authorship and quality control on the one and the role of the readers and the way they use knowledge on the other. The latter theme, of course, being of particular interest to me. Overall, the lively mixture and the varying formats of the conference made it a thoroughly enjoyable and informative experience. I would hope that kind of conference and dialogue becomes and example for the all too often closed up world of social science.
The second event has not yet taken place but will start tomorrow. The 3rd Free Culture Research Conference assembles resarchers and practitioners in Berlin and centres around issues relating business and free culture, knowledge production, copyright and licensing. The programme sounds very promising and also contains innovative formats such as lightening talks and break.out sessions. I will try to come back with a little report on what I liked best. Maybe I should take the netbook and do that on site….
Tags: conference, critique, free culture, knowledge, scientific community, wiki