OA and commons projects in Africa

Frederick Noronha, 101 ideas on how to share knowledge... from Africa, DailyIndia, August 20, 2006. Excerpt:

An initiative called the Commons-sense Project in Africa looks at examples of how alternative approaches to copyrights and patents can help that continent meet its needs to access information and knowledge.

The Link Centre at Johannesburg's Wits University worked with the Commons-sense Project and recently published 'The African Digital Commons: A Participant's Guide', which suggests that knowledge-sharing has more relevance to cash-strapped, resource-poor regions of the planet.  Co-authored by Heather and Chris Armstrong, the 78-page book lists a wide range of existing African projects.

It attempts to 'map' a range of projects that build a 'digital information commons' - the sharing of online information in a way that allows traditional passive 'users' of the media to become active participants....

[The report] adds that there are also significant moves 'by the handful of traditional publishers to set up barriers that threaten the potential of the digital realm to level the playing field and create a truly universal medium for creative expression and technological transfer'.

Comment. This report deserves attention, but it's not new. It's dated 2005 and was released in January 2006. I blogged it on January 20.