OVERVIEW

We all agree open sourcing hardware is important, and as practitioners, many of us have been involved in work, research and talks about it. To date, no universal "right solution" exists. While Creative Commons licenses are widely used for software, there is a growing number of groups using the licenses for hardware, without necessarily accounting for the difficulties and restrictions hardware imposes. In short, open source for hardware is not like open source for software, and thus cannot use the same legal tools.

The purpose of this workshop is to create a direct dialogue between Creative Commons and some of the most significant players in the Open Source Hardware Community . CC representatives will be sharing their perspectives while listening to the needs and perspectives of this community, in order to help form more appropriate licensing options for open hardware.

ORGANIZERS

littleBits is an opensource library of discrete electronic components pre-assembled in tiny circuit boards. Just as Legos allow you to create complex structures with very little engineering knowledge, littleBits are simple, intuitive, space-sensitive blocks that make prototyping with sophisticated electronics a matter of snapping small magnets together. With a growing number of available modules, littleBits aims to move electronics from late stages of the design process to its earliest ones, and from the hands of experts, to those of artists, makers and designers.