Rowan Wilson from OSS Watch, based at OUCS, and Naomi Korn, a copyright consultant, offered a free-form clinic to explore issues surrounding licensing if data, content and software, and to address specific concerns raised by the workshop participants.

The discussion began with the issue of orphan works, where it is not clear who owns the right to a particular resource. Korn noted that it is becoming increasingly important to take a risk managed approach, particularly in the area of preservation, which is not covered by current copyright laws. She highlighted her work on the OER IPR Support Project’s Risk Management Calculator, which helps organisations understand the issues that may reduce, eliminate or increase the risks associated with the use or preservation of an artefact. She observed that if an orphaned work is a genuine orphan work, the rights holder may not know that they are the rights holder. She argued that if we have original works or digital surrogates where we don’t know who the rights holders are, we have an obligation to put them up online, as this can help reunite the work with its rights holder.

Korn demonstrated the Risk Management Calculator using an example from a member of the group and discussed how the tool calculates the indicative risk level. She argued that if we are using resources innovatively, there will be a degree of risk and institutions need to be risk aware.

Wilson discussed the implications of the Hargreaves Review, and the difference between fair dealing in the UK and fair use in the US. He also outlined the responsibilities of people using code libraries, who have to consider whether using a particular library makes your software a derivative use. This is an open debate, as there are two schools of thought as to whether using a code library constitutes borrowing sufficiently to make your software a derivative work. Both Korn and Wilson noted that GPL on libraries can make mash ups more problematic, as the full GPL can be seen to be forcing the agenda.

Wilson highlighted the issue of academics asking to put presentations which they have used internally up on the web, but may contain images that infringe copyright. He observed that it depends on the attitude of the institution: he described his own institution’s attitude as “intensely cowardly” but suggested that not all institutions will take this stance.

The workshop concluded with a broader discussion encompassing the effect of Creative Commons 4.0, the issue of managing backward compatibility and compatibility between licenses. Korn noted that the recommendation they have given to the JISC OER projects has been that if you are choosing a CC licence for inbound licensing, don’t specify a version, so you are free to nimbly change this at a later stage.

You can find our more about the event at the event webpage and read the full coverage from the event at on their live blog. Gabriel Hanganu also provides a useful overview of the issues in this blog post about the event.

The event led to a number of really useful conversations, including discussions with the OMELETTE project and John Wards from PhoneGap. We’d like to thank the organisers for gathering together such an interesting group of people and speakers.

It has been over a year since DevCSI last ran a mobile web hack event, and the discussions at Open Source Junction 3 have inspired us to revisit the area. Of particular interest is the growing strength of tools like PhoneGap that make mobile web development easier help those on the fringes of web development (with a knowledge of HTML and CSS) to build mobile sites.

We are in the early planning stages at the moment, but if you like to contribute by giving a lightning talk or suggesting particular issues you think it would be useful to cover at such an event, then please leave a comment or send a tweet to @devcsi.

OSS Watch will be holding two concurrent workshops on the theme of open development on December 7th in Oxford. One workshop will examine open development as a part of open innovation; the other will address building an open development community around a software project. Both workshops are free to UK higher and further education.

Individuals should register for the single workshop that interests them most. However, it should be possible to move between the two workshops on the day, so long as space allows. Links to further information, including registration, are given below.

Both workshops will be covered via live blogs, for those who cannot attend in person.

1. Open Source, Open Development, Open Innovation:

For more information and to register, please see: http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/events/2009-12-07_business/programme.xml

The central concept behind open innovation is that in a world of widely distributed knowledge, organisations cannot afford to rely entirely on their own research. Open innovation is a means by which companies can both collaborate on research and share outputs. Although originally defined by Chesbrough as being dependent on patented technologies made available under licence there is growing recognition that open source software provides an excellent means for sharing outputs in a controlled and managed way in order to facilitate further innovation.

This workshop will introduce open innovation as defined by Chesbrough and look at how it applies to software outputs from academic research institutions. We will look at how open innovation through open source and open development of software can result in more sustainable software outputs and increased opportunities for continued work. Finally, we will look at how these models allow for commercial or social exploitation of outputs whilst allowing the researcher to remain focused on research rather than business planning.

At the end of this workshop you will:

• Understand the basic models of open innovation
• Be able to apply open innovation concepts to open source software development in research environments
• Develop open innovation engagement plans for research software outputs

This workshop will be of interest to anyone conducting research that produces software outputs. Participants will either be engaged with non-academic partners or will be interested in engaging in an unobtrusive way. The primary audience for this workshop is:

• Principal investigators
• Funding bodies’ programme managers
• Technology transfer professionals

2. Open Development: Building an Engaged Community

For more information and to register, please see: http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/events/2009-12-07_community/programme.xml

Open development thrives on a diverse community of participants who engage in the project and also attract others with new skills and resources. Such a diverse community also increases project sustainability as the project can survive the exit of participants. However an engaged community does not just form itself, rather it requires active and continuous encouragement, particularly from the core project team. This workshop will help you understand how open development works and provide you with a practical appreciation of the skills, practices and mechanisms that encourage an engaged community.

At the end of this workshop you will:

• Understand how open development works and know the common community structures
• Be familiar with the skills and processes that encourage community participation
• Develop ideas for improving the community friendliness of a specific project

This workshop will be of interest to those involved in a development project and who wish to benefit from improved community engagement or wider participation through open development. For example you may wish to become sustainable past the current funding round or expand your user base into new areas. In particular we think the following will be most interested:

• project managers
• software developers
• researchers whose projects produce software outputs