Dr Laura James's writings

Things I’ve discussed and read, more than done. Open knowledge, infrastructure, public goods, energy, organisations. More interesting posts later this week ;) Last week started with the first  Open Intellectual Property Models of Emerging Technologies  meetup of the academic year. The name isn’t perfect; because it’s so long I think most of us just call it  Open IP . We’re a  research network  at  CRASSH , meaning we meet every couple of weeks during term and discuss papers, articles or talks; anyone is welcome, you don’t have to be in the University. Our guiding question is  the extent to which open technologies result in equitable sharing of knowledge and cognitive or technology justice ; I think many of the convenors are motivated to explore how new technologies can help address global challenges, and the ways in which openness could accelerate this or make it more democratic and effective.  Last year , we had a lot of fascinat...

This article was originally posted  over on Maker Assembly . Reposting here with permission. Deeply grateful for  Maker Assembly ’s encouragement and support of the Festival! I was  inspired  to create the  Festival of Maintenance  last December during the  Maker Assembly  Summit. The Summit brought together a community of people interested in critical discussion about maker culture: its meaning, politics, history and future. We talked about how a lot of maker culture is about making new things, and in many Western contexts, that’s making gadgets and gizmos that are fun for a while but generally then gather dust until eventually thrown away. The Summit also discussed the sustainability of makerspaces, and how they are maintained past initial capital and enthusiasm; local manufacturing, and the unrealised potential for repair, reuse and recycling. These issues lead us to think about business and capital models, and their relationship to sust...