Greetings all,

I first wanted to say hello -- I've been lurking a bit on the list, and
happy to have an opportunity to jump in.   I'm currently involved in several
collaboration projects and I can see right away it will be useful to write
about them and also, to engage in a dialog with folks here.

I thought I would compile a quick list of things I've been working on, as
relate to collaboration and then try to answer the questions posed by sarah
and refer to them if I can..   I don't mean this to sound like a CV or
anything, just wanted to try to identify things in these projects that are
interesting and see if I can relate them:

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a) interactivos workshop -- organized by medialab prado (formerly medialab
madrid) this workshop, as sarah mentioned, is centered around creating new
works from young artists and more specifically, about trying to foster
collaboration.  there is a short video from last years event here (it's half
english / spanish).  The theme of that interactivos was magic and
technology:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=CPZb9EJkK9M

I've been teaching the last two years and this year teaching and organizing
several of the workshops (NY, mexico and bogota)

b) personal artwork, including collaborations with Golan Levin (tmema) and
Theo Watson - such as :

tmema.org/messa
tmema.org/mis
openframeworks.cc/liners

c) working with experts, such as choregraphers or magicians:

http://thesystemis.com/rotosketch
http://thesystemis.com/opensourcery

d) doing a fellowship in the Eyebeam openlab --

good description here:
http://lunchbuffet.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!880F7BACD6654F3C!388.entry

e) working with theo watson on an open source toolkit in c++ for making
creative works called openframeworks --
info & movie is here:
openframeworks.cc

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> * Can collaboration exist without openness?


I think it can, but I've found that openness is often times helpful, since
it means the work is better understood by all parties.  For example, in (c)
above, I made a performance with a magician, and he was very reluctant to
open up his tricks -- he wouldn't explain to me how things worked.
Obviously, he had to tell me some things, but in general, there was a code
of secrecy about how his magic worked.  Sometimes, actually, I would figure
out tricks on my own, and the moment I told him he'd be totally relieved,
and show me everything, but we worked together in a sort of open/closed
way.  My stuff / software, etc was all open source, and I tried to bring him
in as much as I could.

I've pesonally found the best way of collaborating with other artists (b) is
to be as open as possible, just because the more we trust each other and can
evaluate each others work, the better the quality is.  We often times
program over each other's shoulder -- peer coding I think it's called - and
that level of flexibility and comfort has helped immensely.


* Is collaboration 'hardcoded' into the lab model, and what are the
implications when the lab's philosophy embodies open source-ness or
releasing work into the public domain? (as is the case with the Eyebeam R&D
OpenLab)

One thing about this, is that I'm not entirely sure that focusing a lab
entirely about open source is a good thing.  from my experience with (e),
I've seen that community and the public is way more important then just
dumping your code somewhere.  if it's not maintained, if it's not shown that
it's really a living growing thing with love from above (sound cheesy, but
it's true) then I don't think people will find it that useful.  The net
(sourceforge, for example) is full of abandoned open source projects, and
thought I'm not a curator, I'm sure there are tons of abandoned open-source
models, etc, which really serve little value but just to be remnants of
older energy.  I'm not a fan of that as a model for publishing.

I do think it's great to open source / open-ness as one of the goals /
motivations of the lab, but others things in addition, like public outreach,
community building, etc seem to me to be as, or more important.

* Is it necessary or helpful to have a creative commons mentality when
> engaged in collaborative projects?


I'm not sure what a creative commons mentality really is ?  for me, I see
open-ness and creative commons as parallel, and somewhat overlapping, but
not entirely sure about this.  One thing I've felt with OF (e) especially is
a sort of apathy as it relates to copyright, gpl, licensing, etc.  I believe
in public domain, and trying to get people to do good, etc, but the license
stuff really bores me I think.  Maybe I am of the generation that is tired
of license debates?  We put it up, and let people do what they want.   for
me, it seems to slow things down to geek out about licenses.

I would argue that there is a public domain mentality -- like, this stuff
should be free and open -- and a legislate to freedom mentality, like, lets
make sure it's free but with clauses.  I can understand both, but my heart
is really with the former.  anyway, I think this is a may conversation, not
june.

 I do think it's helpful to imagine the projects going into public domain,
or least in some sense getting into a dialogue with people, so that things
can be maintained. The problem is that these collaborations range from
artists works (b) to tools (e) and there level of open-ness I think in some
way ought to be proportional by the amount of annoyance you might have with
someone saying "I think it should do this" or "here's my patch".  Part of
making work is stimulating brains and if you can use openness as a tool to
get other peoples brains into your work, it can be very helpful.

also, some works, like the liners project (b) are centered about open-ness
and bringing people in -- for me these kinds of projects are great because
they are a nice way to engage a community to make a larger work.  It's also
just fun to be able to work with people you don't know.

hope that's helpful start -- look forward to hearing more and jumping in
when I can.  Thanks sarah for getting this topic going....

take care!
zach