BBC Releases Program under Creative Commons License

by Jordan Yerman | April 15, 2009 at 09:14 am

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BBC is taking a bold new approach with a new program called R&D TV: the show will be released under a Creative Commons license, so viewers will not only be able to watch the show, but remix and redistribute it as well.

The BBC is a public channel, but this is the very first time that a truly public show has been produced: once it's out in the wild (i.e. now), the Beeb no longer truly owns it. Who knows which version compiled from the various filmed elements will be the best?

While UK residents pay a licensing fee which funds BBC productions, the rest of us do not, so we literally get it for free! (I am able to access the FTP sites referenced below with no problem)

However, it's not free for BBC, as it's the one hosting these rather large files, which will be downloaded many, many times.

The content comes in 3 forms.

* A brief 5 minute video, containing all the very best bits
* A longer 30 minute video, containing deeper conversations
* The Asset Bundle, containing everything we used and didn't use to make the videos above

Episode one can be downloaded from a BBC FTP server, where Flash, Quicktime, and Ogg versions are available, either as a five minute series of excerpts or in its full, half hour glory. The blog post suggests that Windows Media versions should be made available as well but, so far, these have not materialized. The files will also be made available through YouTube and Blip.TV.

(found via boingboing)