OURMEDIA

Interview by Neeru Paharia
July 2005

Ourmedia launched three months ago as a home for grassroots media. The site provides a place where anyone can upload video, music, photos, audio clips and other personal media and store it for free on ourmedia's servers forever. Uploaders have the option of making their works available under a Creative Commons license.

Recently, Ourmedia was nominated as the U.S. finalist for the UN World Summit Awards. The awards are an international competition created in 2003 to highlight the most innovative digital content being created around the world. The awards coincide with the 2005 UN World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), an international UN summit that will take place in Tunisia this November. Despite having only launching in early 2005, Ourmedia was nominated as a finalist in the e-inclusion category-the UN's term for initiatives that are helping bridge the digital divide, utilizing the Internet to empower the public.

Creative Commons' Executive Director Neeru Paharia spoke with J.D. Lasica, the co-founder and executive director of Ourmedia. J.D. is also author of the new book "Darknet: Hollywood's War Against the Digital Generation," which includes a profile of Creative Commons and its chairman, Lawrence Lessig.