Still cleaning out my inbox from a couple weeks on the road (and a few hectic weeks in general!) and ran across these goodies...

The Social Entrepreneurship Summit that was held on Dec 3-4, 2007 at the Centre for Social Innovation and the MaRS Collaboration Centre has posted the event proceedings online. Sounds like they've received some good feedback on the event, and there's momentum to keep it moving forward.

I wasn't able to make the event personally -- had to bail at the last minute (sorry!) -- so it's great to be able to skim through the presentations and some of video and photos from the event.

They close off their event summary with these helpful pointers:

Several members involved in organizing the Summit met recently to highlight some opportunities for action coming out of the Summit. We would like to direct you to the following areas of interest:

• Led by Causeway and the Tides Canada Foundation, Social Finance is receiving unprecedented interest in this country. Proceedings from the Social Finance Forum held October 15, 2007 at the MaRS Collaboration Centre can be found at: http://www.tidescanada.org/cms/page2655.cfm.

• The Centre for Social Innovation, in partnership with 9 funding partners, launched the Enterprising Nonprofits Program (ENP) pilot project in Toronto on February 29th. Information about this program can be found at http://www.socialinnovation.ca/enp.

• Social Venture Partners is holding an event for social entrepreneurs at the Kingsbridge Centre north of Toronto in April 17-20th, 2008 http://www.renewalpartners.com/svitoronto.html

• A BC Social Enterprise Conference is also being planned. Keep your eyes peeled to http://www.enterprisingnonprofits.ca/calendar/

Next up... the announcement for Copy Camp 2. The fearless team is back "after a long Winter watching the polar cap melt, and waiting for Copyright Reform." And have announced the date of April 29 and 30 for the next event in Toronto.

The talented Patrick Dinnen will take my spot on this year's CopyCamp organizing team.

The announcement continues:

The CopyCamp Team has been reviewing the input we had from you during and after CopyCamp in September 2006. We're making some changes, but sticking to the unconference mode, and expanding the role of the wiki.

We are open to new ideas, and looking forward to your contribution as participants and volunteers.

Meanwhile, we have put together a digest of the debates we had at CopyCamp. (Summary in French pending.) You can see it on the web site at http://copycamp.ca/copycamp-2006-digest-0.

Stay tuned and be involved. More news soon!

The CopyCamp Team, http://www.copycamp.ca/

Enjoy!

The days that we can continue to pretend, despite all evidence to the contrary in a world of rapidly increasing wealth stratification, that mankind will anyminutenow be emancipated by Ubuntu, Wikipedia and Facebook are over.

Just getting caught up on e-mail after two weeks on the road and ran across this enjoyable essay by a friend and colleague Dmytri Kleiner.

Regularly readers will recall that Dima and I penning an article on free software together some years ago, and that Dima is part of the team behind Dailstation.

For the past few weeks, I’ve been excited to announce what is sure to be one of the most dynamic conversations about copyright this year. Planning for the event really got under way in June, with the addition of several new team members, and has been racing forward at a break neck speed every since. With only six weeks to go until the event, we’re all anxious to get the word out and to get your ideas, suggestions, participant recommendations, and commitments to being there. Here’s the key info:

• Who will be there: people are confirming their attendance every day and it’s turning out to be an incredible list of people working in the arts, new media and technology, activists, and scholars (and a few beaurucrats). Just a few of the names that I can remember (and am excited about) are: Mark Hosler from Negativland, Michael Geist, and dub poet Lillian Allen.
• What to expect: The event will merge together the best things from unconferences, Open Space facilitation, and several of the quirkier convening approaches that Misha Glouberman is known for. Expect small groups, hands-on skill shares, unusual formats, inspiring conversations, and something to write home about.
• When is the event? When is the Wiki going to be online? The event is at the end of September (28th - 30th) and the Wiki should be online in the next two weeks. In addition to the wiki, we’re going to try some pre-event guest blogging and interviews to get the conversation started early.
• Where is my royalty payment? Yes, indeed, where is it? No, seriously, this event is going to show you where it is — now, and in the years to come — it going to open that conversation up and hold a big magnifying glass in front of it. This event aims to explore the new models of creativity, creation, and compensation in the age of the Internet.
• Why is this conversation important? Frankly, I was skeptical at first. This is the land of holy wars: copyright vs. copyleft. But Susan Crean is 110% genuine in her commitment to bringing together a diverse group of creators — people working in a variety of mediums, at different stages in their careers, and from different backgrounds — to have an honest, creator-to-creator, conversation about what the future of cultural production and distribution looks like.

So, as you can tell, this all has me very excited. After the (surprising) interest in the last copyright/copyleft event that I volunteered to organize earlier this year, I can only imagine what a serious event like this — with some resources and a bit more time — might achieve.

CopyCamp will take its cue from other unconferences, like FooCamp and BarCamp, and will add in a few elements of traditional (and less traditional) convening. It will be an intentionally hybrid event. And I expect that it will weave together some of Dave Pollard’s insight into “how to unconference” with the quirky magic of events like Trampoline Hall. Many aspects of the event’s format is being developed by veteran host Misha Glouberman, so it’s sure to be fun, chaotic, and to flip the expected on its head (in fact, I’ve already heard reference to a “Twenty Ideas You Didn’t Know You Were Interested in” session).

I was speaking with Misha last Tuesday and, over the next couple of weeks, we’re going to try to get the entire schedule into the Wiki — in a form where participants can have some impact on the actual logistics of the sessions (e.g.,: “Hey! How can you have session X at the same time as session Y? I really want to got to both… so I’m just going to move things around a bit”). All I can say is it’s going to be the most interesting event about copyright, and being a creator in the zero-decade, that I’ve ever been to. And, if you’re in Toronto — or able to make it here — I hope you can be there too.

Have ideas? Please send them directly to the CopyCamp team here.