Open publishing is a term used by Matthew Arnison in March 2001 to describe the online process of creating text, audio and video news by methods that are fully transparent to the readers.
In the early 2000s, the term was widely associated with the online
Indymedia
The Independent Media Center, better known as Indymedia, is an open publishing network of activist journalist collectives that report on political and social issues. Following beginnings during the 1999 Carnival Against Capital and 1999 Seat ...
network.
History
The aim of open publishing described by Matthew Arnison was that anybody could contribute a story and see it instantly appear in the pool of stories publicly available.
Those stories are filtered as little as possible to help the readers find the stories they want. Readers can see editorial decisions being made by others. They can see how to get involved and help make editorial decisions. If they can think of a better way for the software to help shape editorial decisions, they can copy the software because it is
free and open source
Free and open-source software (FOSS) is software available under a license that grants users the right to use, modify, and distribute the software modified or not to everyone free of charge. FOSS is an inclusive umbrella term encompassing free ...
to change it and start their own site. If they want to redistribute the news, they can, preferably on an open publishing site.
Internet sites run on open publishing software allow anyone with Internet access to
visit the site and upload content directly without having to penetrate the filters of traditional media. Several fundamental principles tend to inform the organizations and sites dedicated to open publishing, though they do so to varying degrees. These principles include non-hierarchy, public participation, minimal editorial control, and transparency.
Related ideas
Arnison's idea of open publishing
can be compared to
Eric S. Raymond
Eric Steven Raymond (born December 4, 1957), often referred to as ESR, is an American software developer, open-source software advocate, and author of the 1997 essay and 1999 book ''The Cathedral and the Bazaar''. He wrote a guidebook for the R ...
's point of view in the
open source software
Open-source software (OSS) is Software, computer software that is released under a Open-source license, license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and Software distribution, distribute the software an ...
versus
free software
Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribut ...
debate. Given a large enough audience of peers, readers and/or commentators, supporters of open publishing hope or expect that almost all problematic content will quickly be noticed, highlighted and fixed.
Linus's law
In software development, Linus's law is the assertion that "given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow".
The law was formulated by Eric S. Raymond in his essay and book ''The Cathedral and the Bazaar'' (1999), and was named in honor of Linus To ...
could in this be context be described as Arnison's Law, reworded as, "Given enough eyeballs, problematic content is shallow".
The term "open publishing" is intended to be much more open than the more restricted idea of
open access publishing
Open access (OA) is a set of principles and a range of practices through which nominally copyrightable publications are delivered to readers free of access charges or other barriers. With open access strictly defined (according to the 2001 de ...
, in which the publishing of material organized in such a way that there is no financial or other barrier to the reader, but there is no claim for transparency in the methods and procedures of publishing. In other words, open publishing is
open access
Open access (OA) is a set of principles and a range of practices through which nominally copyrightable publications are delivered to readers free of access charges or other barriers. With open access strictly defined (according to the 2001 de ...
, but open access publishing is only sometimes "open publishing".
Examples
Online historical and existing networks typically associated with open publishing include the
Independent Media Center
The Independent Media Center, better known as Indymedia, is an open publishing network of activist journalist collectives that report on political and social issues. Following beginnings during the 1999 Carnival Against Capital and 1999 Seat ...
network,
Kuro5hin
Kuro5hin (K5; read "corrosion") was a collaborative discussion website founded by Rusty Foster in 1999, having been inspired by Slashdot. Articles were created and submitted by users and submitted to a queue for evaluation. Site members cou ...
,
Slashdot
''Slashdot'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''/.'') is a social news website that originally billed itself as "News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters". It features news stories on science, technology, and politics that are submitted and evaluated by site ...
,
Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a free content, free Online content, online encyclopedia that is written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and the wiki software MediaWiki. Founded by Jimmy Wales and La ...
and
Wikinews
Wikinews is a free-content news wiki and a Wikimedia project, project of the Wikimedia Foundation that works through collaborative journalism through user-created content. Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales has distinguished Wikinews from Wikipe ...
.
See also
*
Collaborative writing
Collaborative writing is a procedure in which two or more persons work together on a Writing, text of some kind (e.g., academic papers, reports, creative writing, projects, and business proposals). It is often the norm, rather than the exception, i ...
*
Fair Access to Science and Technology Research Act,
U.S. House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Article One of th ...
*
Free content
Free content, libre content, libre information, or free information is any kind of creative work, such as a work of art, a book, a software program, or any other creative content for which there are very minimal copyright and other legal limi ...
*
Open access
Open access (OA) is a set of principles and a range of practices through which nominally copyrightable publications are delivered to readers free of access charges or other barriers. With open access strictly defined (according to the 2001 de ...
*
Open content
Free content, libre content, libre information, or free information is any kind of creative work, such as a work of art, a book, a software, software program, or any other creative Media (communication), content for which there are very minimal ...
*
Open source journalism
*
Participatory economics
Participatory economics, often abbreviated parecon, is an economic system based on participatory decision making as the primary economic mechanism for allocation in society. In the system, the say in decision-making is proportional to the impa ...
*
Participatory journalism
Citizen journalism, also known as collaborative media, participatory journalism, democratic journalism, guerrilla journalism, grassroots journalism, or street journalism, is based upon members of the community playing an active role in the pro ...
*
Peer review
Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people with similar competencies as the producers of the work (:wiktionary:peer#Etymology 2, peers). It functions as a form of self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the ...
References
{{reflist, refs=
[{{cite web, last1 =Arnison , first1 =Matthew, title =Open publishing is the same as free software, publisher =Purple Bark, date =2003-06-09, url =http://www.purplebark.net/maffew/cat/openpub.html , archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20171225114724/http://purplebark.net/maffew/cat/openpub.html , archivedate=2017-12-25 , url-status=live]
Publishing
Citizen media
Collective intelligence
New media