Mohamed Nanabhay's Blog

The realisation of a project I've been working on for a long time. Head over to Al Jazeera's Creative Commons Repository.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Doha Qatar – January 13, 2009: Al Jazeera Network today announced the world's first repository of broadcast quality video footage released under the ‘Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution’ license. Select Al Jazeera video footage – at this time footage of the War on Gaza - will be available for free to be downloaded, shared, remixed, subtitled and eventually rebroadcasted by users and TV stations across the world with acknowledgement to Al Jazeera.

Al Jazeera will release its exclusive Arabic and English coverage produced by the Network’s correspondents and crews in the Gaza Strip online at http://cc.aljazeera.net. The ongoing war and crisis in Gaza, together with the scarcity of news footage available, make the repository a key resource for anyone producing content on the current situation.

This the first time that video footage produced by a news broadcaster is released under the ‘Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution’ license which allows for commercial and non-commercial use.

Mohamed Nanabhay who headed New Media at Al Jazeera and launched the project stated, “As one of the only international broadcasters in Gaza, our coverage of the war has been unsurpassed. The launch of Al Jazeera’s Creative Commons Repository means that our Gaza footage will be made available under the most permissive Creative Commons license (CC-BY). With the flexibility of the license we expect to introduce our outstanding coverage to an even wider audience across the world. This means that news outlets, filmmakers and bloggers will be able to easily share, remix and reuse our footage.”

Lawrence Lessig, the founder of Creative Commons organization and Professor of Law at Stanford University, stated, "Al Jazeera is teaching an important lesson about how free speech gets built and supported. By providing a free resource for the world, the network is encouraging wider debate, and a richer understanding".

Joichi Ito, CEO of Creative Commons and a world renowned Web 2.0 entrepreneur, added, "Video news footage is an essential part of modern journalism. Providing material under a Creative Commons license to allow commercial and amateur use is an enormous contribution to the global dialog around important events. Al Jazeera has set the example and the standard that we hope others will follow".

As a pioneer in news and media Al Jazeera is always looking for ways to make its unique content accessible to audiences across the world and the launch of Al Jazeera’s Creative Commons Repository is another concrete step in this direction.

My keynote from the iSummit in Sapporo, Japan.

The good folks at X|Media|Lab have posted my Media '08 slide deck online.

| View | Upload your own

Kevin Anderson blogged my session - his commentary will provide some context for some of the more visual slides.

You can also find the other great presentations from Media '08 here.

The Arab Information Ministers recent decree to "regulate" the content on satellite TV broadcasters has been the subject of much debate.

Yesterday Ahmed Mansour hosted Moroccan comedian Ahmed Senoussi on Al Jazeera's "Bila Hudud" to discuss the proposed regulations. Skip to about 8 minutes in where you'll find Senoussi "gagged and bound". This is followed by Mansour bringing out tools that are often associated with "making people speak"...

While the program is hilarious, this is of course no laughing matter - how can a discussion on why security police paint wooden poles red be funny? (it's to mask any blood in case you were wondering...)

One can't but wonder how serious people can even propose such regulations in 2008. Maybe if this was 1996 it would have stood a fighting chance but when the interweb and satellite TV has become so ubiquitous? Of course, the regulation is more about intent and intimidation rather than actual law. The chilling effect of shutting down the first station would be disastrous...

My colleague Abdurahman just blogged that our report on the Benazir Bhutto assassination has received over 500,000 views on YouTube.

The clip has also solicited over 3,500 comments and 55 video responses. This makes it the third most popular video after the two Ghida Fakhri clips which collectively gained over 1.5 million views.

For more online video from Al Jazeera, visit our YouTube pages (Arabic|English).