Project briefing proposals for the CNI Spring 2007 Task Force Meeting are due Monday, February 26. Information about project briefings and an online submission form are available at http://www.cni.org/tfms/2007a.spring/proposal.html. The spring meeting will be held April 16-17, 2007 in Phoenix, AZ.

If you have any questions about submitting a proposal, please feel free to contact Joan Lippincott (joan@cni.org) or me (diane@cni.org).

Diane Goldenberg-Hart Communications Coordinator Coalition for Networked Information 21 Dupont Circle, Suite 800 Washington, DC 20036 202-296-5098 202-872-0884 (Fax) diane@cni.org

The Center for Intellectual Property (CIP) at University of Maryland University College is excited to announce its Seventh Annual Symposium,

COPYRIGHT UTOPIA: Alternative Visions, Methods & Policies MAY 21-23, 2007 MARRIOTT INN & CONFERENCE CENTER ADELPHI, MARYLAND

For centuries philosophers, writers and artists have dreamed of perfect worlds. Monarchs by fiat and legislative bodies by bills have attempted to engineer perfect societies. But it matters not to what corner of the globe you travel...no one believes we have yet arrived in that perfect place. Perhaps just one reason we have not yet attained utopia is that people have such divergent views on what utopia should look like, which means, of course, that it can be a very complex and messy business to create one. But, nevertheless, we want to ask the question:

What would copyright utopia look like?

The following reports should be of interest to the CNI-announce readership. My thanks to Neil Beagrie for this announcement.

Clifford Lynch Director, CNI

Press release please feel free to circulate to other lists and interested individuals

The report of the first meeting of the technical committee of the Open Archives Object Reuse and Exchange initiative is now available at

as well as material from a presentation at the recent Open Repositories Conference providing an updated overview of the effort.

Clifford Lynch Director, CNI

The Center for Intellectual Property (CIP) at the University of Maryland University College is excited to announce the launch of a new blog portal addressing the cultural, political and legal context of copyright issues:

(c)ollectanea! http://chaucer.umuc.edu/blogcip/collectanea/

The new (c)ollectanea blog will serve as an online discussion platform for the current and future Center for Intellectual Property scholars. Today, join one of the leading copyright scholars in the country, GEORGIA HARPER as she provides insight and leads discussions with guest bloggers on issues relating to copyright generally, with a specific focus on issues facing the education and library communities. Georgia K. Harper serves as the CIP 2006-2008 Intellectual Property Virtual Scholar and the Scholarly Communications Advisor for the University of Texas at Austin Libraries. Previously, Ms. Harper specialized in copyright law and created the well known and widely used online publication, The Copyright Crash Course, for the University of Texas System

CIP is one of the leading online educational centers providing training, and solutions on copyright issues affecting the higher education community. This new blog, (c)ollectanea, furthers the Center's mission to provide timely copyright resources for educators. Although the blog will address the needs of the education and library communities, all are welcome to engage in the discussion and contribute.

Free Webcast Jan. 30 on Digital Libraries

On Tuesday, January 30, from 1-2pm Eastern Time, Peter Brantley will present an EDUCAUSE Live! Webcast:

"Architectures for Collaboration: Roles and Expectations for Digital Libraries".

Peter is currently Director of Strategic Technology for Academic Information Services in the University of California Office of the President. As of February 5, Peter will become Director of the Digital Library Federation.

There will be several opportunities to hear from CNI at the American Library Association midwinter meeting in Seattle, WA, January 19-24, 2007:

• On January 21, CNI Associate Executive Director Joan Lippincott will speak on assessing information commons at the EBSCO Executive Seminar.

• Joan Lippincott will facilitate the ACRL Information Commons Discussion Group, focusing on assessment, on January 20, 10:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m., at the Pan Pacific Hotel.

• Clifford Lynch, CNI Executive Director, will be part of a LITA panel discussing "Top Technology Trends" on Sunday, January 21, 8–10 a.m., at the Fairmont Hotel in the Spanish Ballroom.

The Spring 2007 CNI Task Force Meeting will be held on April 16-17 (Monday and Tuesday) at the Hyatt Regency Phoenix in Phoenix, AZ. Registration materials will be sent by the end of this month to designated Task Force representatives. Please note that the meeting and hotel registration deadline is Wednesday, March 7. For more information, see the meeting website:

We are now accepting proposals for project briefings, one hour breakout sessions which focus on a specific institutional project related to networked information or a discussion of a hot topic. Proposals may be submitted via a web form available at

Apologies for cross postings:

To accommodate busy holiday schedules and travel, we are moving the paper submission deadline to January 10, 2007.

DigCCurr2007: An International Symposium on Digital Curation

Interviews conducted during the Fall 2006 CNI Task Force Meeting are now online:

The podcasts include a conversation with CNI Executive Director Clifford Lynch, as well as discussions with several winners of the Mellon Awards for Technology Collaboration (MATC). These interviews are designed to function as an extension of the meeting, complementing the standard program, and providing an opportunity for the broader CNI community to hear from some of our key presenters and attendees.

Presentation materials for several project briefings are also available now from the project briefing pages on the Task Force Meeting website:

De Lange Conference VI Emerging Libraries

Date: March 5-7, 2007 Host: Rice University via the Fondren Library and Computer and Information Technology Institute (CITI) Site: Alice Pratt Brown Auditorium, Shepherd School, Rice University, 6100 Main St., Houston, Texas

Rice University's 2007 De Lange Conference Aims to Describe How Knowledge Will Be Accessed, Discovered, and Disseminated in the Age of Digital Information

Speakers will include John Seely Brown, Harold Varmus, James Duderstadt, Paul Ginsparg, and Donald Kennedy.

DRM TECHNOLOGIES & Higher Education: an online workshop

Are you interested in learning more about digital rights management (DRM) technologies?  Would you like to learn more about the current state-of-the-art in DRM and its applicability to your campus?  Do you have concerns and questions about personal media, your students and your liability? What is the future of DRM?  What about open standards? Do they offer a future for the marketplace?  These and other questions will be reviewed, discussed and considered in the upcoming workshop:

DIGITIAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT (DRM) TECHNOLOGIES January 22 - February 2, 2007 http://www.umuc.edu/cip/ipa/

Moderators: Bill Rosenblatt, M.S., Founder, GiantSteps Media Technology Strategies Kimberly Kelley, M.L.S, Ph.D., Vice Provost and Dean, Academic Resources and Services, University of Maryland University College;

Here are the highlights from the upcoming Open Repositories conference, which I think will be of interest to many CNI-announce subscribers.

Clifford Lynch Director, CNI

Today at the Fall CNI Member meeting in Washington we officially released the 2006-2007 CNI Program Plan, which I discussed in the opening keynote. For those who could not attend the meeting, the Program Plan is also available on the web at

Program Plan

Prior to 2020, CNI unveiled a new program plan at the annual fall membership meeting, offering an overview of priorities and plans for the upcoming program year. These provide a rich record of the …

We'll be mailing printed copies to CNI member representatives early in the new year along with invitations to the Spring 2007 CNI meeting.

Comments on the new Program Plan are welcome.

For more information, contact: Christopher J. Mackie 609-924-9424 or cjm@mellon.org

Recipients of First Annual Mellon Awards for Technology Collaboration Announced

(WASHINGTON, DC) The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation awarded $650,000 in prizes to ten not-for- profit institutions in the first annual Mellon Awards for Technology Collaboration (MATC). The Mellon Awards honor not-for-profit organizations for leadership in the collaborative development of open source software tools with particular application to higher education and not-for-profit activities. More information on the awards ceremony, including podcast interviews with some of the recipients, will be available at www.cni.org beginning 5 December 2006.

The awards were presented December 4, 2006, at the Fall Task Force meeting of the Coalition for Networked Information by Sir Timothy Berners-Lee, Director of the World Wide Web Consortium and the inventor of the World Wide Web. The ten recipients were selected from among more than 200 nominees by the MATC Award Committee, which included Berners-Lee, Mitchell Baker (CEO, Mozilla Corporation), John Seely Brown (former Chief Scientist, Xerox Corp.), Vinton G. Cerf (Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist, Google, Inc.), John Gage (Chief Researcher and Director of the Science Office, Sun Microsystems, Inc.), and Tim O’Reilly (Founder and CEO, O’Reilly Media).

I want to share the following conference announcement from Brian Kahin of the University of Michigan describing a very relevant and exciting event to be held in Washington DC January 29-30, 2007. This conference builds on themes presented at an earlier conference held at the National Academies which I believe a number of CNI-announce subscribers were able to attend.

Full details are available through the links in Brian's message.

Clifford Lynch Director, CNI

A Guide to the Fall 2006 Coalition for Networked Information Task Force Meeting

The Fall 2006 CNI Task Force meeting, to be held at the Renaissance Washington Hotel in Washington, DC on December 4 and 5, offers a wide range of presentations that advance and report on CNI's programs, showcase projects underway at Task Force member institutions, and highlight important national and international developments. Here is the "roadmap" to the sessions at the meeting, which includes both plenary events and an extensive series of breakout sessions focusing on current developments in networked information. As always, we have strived to present sessions that reflect late-breaking developments and also take advantage of our venue in Washington DC to provide opportunities to interact with policy makers and funders.

As usual, the CNI meeting proper is preceded by an optional orientation session for new attendees - both representatives of new member organizations and new representatives or alternate delegates from existing member organizations -- at 11:30 AM; guests are also welcome. Refreshments are available for all at 12:15 PM on Monday, December 4. The opening plenary is at 1:15 PM and will be followed by two rounds of parallel breakout sessions. Tuesday, December 5, includes additional rounds of parallel breakout sessions, lunch and the closing keynote, concluding around 3:30 PM. Along with plenary and breakout sessions, the meeting includes generous break time for informal networking with colleagues and a reception which will run till 7:00 PM on the evening of Monday, December 4, after which participants can enjoy a wide range of dining opportunities in the Washington area.

In conjunction with the meeting, the Library of Congress is offering an information interchange session on developments with the National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP), which will run from 8:30 to 11:45AM on Monday morning. This is open to all CNI attendees, and no separate registration is necessary; the meeting will be in Meeting Room #2.

Last week I had the chance to attend the excellent 2nd Digitial Curation Conference in Glasgow. The presentations and posters from the meeting are now available online; you can find links to both, as well as other information about the meeting at:

The meeting also included a launch announcement for the new open-access International Journal of Digital Curation; as far as I know this is the first journal focusing specifically on digital preservation and curation issues. The journal home page is at:

Cni-announce subscribers - Cliff Lynch will be speaking at this event. The conference organizers encourage paper submissions - see below. --Joan Lippincott

FIRST CALL FOR PAPERS

The IDEA awards are a wonderful program that Internet2 launched last year to recognize and showcase innovation in advanced networking applications that advance research and education. Please consider nominating worthy work.

Clifford Lynch Director, CNI

Second Annual Internet2 IDEA Awards Submissions Now Being Accepted