I got a note from JD that Ourmedia is live today! The timing is great. There’s a lot of attention going into podcasting and videoblogging, and I think a free platform for sharable and reusable media could potentially help to shift the attention away from traditional broadcast and into the realm of peer-produced content. Elle and I both helped out on the metadata definition parts during the early stages as well as some early testing (I’m user number 7). The project is meant to provide a place for people to store the media they want to share with others. Some of the most compelling examples I heard were citizen jounalism and politcal ads. They have both video and audio content up, and if you sign up for an account you can upload your own. A lot of the ideas that Larry Lessig talks about in Free Culture really helped to drive my motivation in paying attention to and helping out with projects like this. Curious what those ideas are? Check out a free copy of Free Culture or one of the movies explaining the importance of having works out in public and available for reuse.

Tags: OurMedia