BETA

Versio

n 0.9.1

EN

Thanks to their collaborative work, this dossier has been translated into English by Fionnuala Ní Eigeartaigh, @julioelpoeta, @DanielRozo_, @sam1118, John Kelley, @luispedraza, @GuiomarCampos, @dvdps1985, @nicointokio, Ana Prados and Isabel Provenza.

Revised and edited by Fionnuala Ní Eigeartaigh

15M.cc Version 0.9.1 BETAThe latest version of this document and the project can be found in http://www.15M.cc

Texts and photos are available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License(CC) 2012 some rights reserved | Creative Commons BY/SA 3.0 ES

1. PROJECT

1.1.- Description1.2.- Goals1.3.- Working method1.4.- Ways of participating

2. OUTPUTS

2.1.- Book - 15M.cc Digital revolution2.2.- Documentary - 15M.cc We were asleep, we woke up2.3.- Website - 15M.cc Bank of ideas

3. WORKING METHOD

3.1.- Book3.2.- Documentary3.3.- Website

4. WHAT MAKES THIS PROJECT DIFFERENT

4.1.- Transmedia project: website + book + movie4.2.- Funding4.3.- Audiovisual material 4.4.- Community4.5.- Licence: CC BY/SA 3.0

5. BEHIND THE PROJECT

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1. PROJECT

1.1.- DESCRIPTION

15M.cc is a transmedia, collaborative, copyleft and nonprofit project about the 15M citizens movement which started on May 15th 2011 in Spain. The aim is to publish a book, produce a docu-mentary and develop a web site (separate to the website informing about the project). These media will enable users to explore the origins of the movement which, through social networking, has taken root in our society and is here to stay.

On 15 May 2011, the demonstration organised by Real Democracy NOW! (¡Democracia Real YA!) gave birth to what has become known as the «15M movement» - a collective awakening without precedent in Spain. From that day on, hundreds of people became “regulars” at Puerta del Sol, the central Madrid square, and some, like us (Pablo Soto, Stéphane M. Grueso and Patricia Horrillo), began reporting on what was happening through social networks and blogs.

We had a common goal: to contribute to the movement in any way we could. That is why we have decided to devote a year of our lives to creating a transmedia, collaborative, not-for-profit project, with a copyleft licence (Creative Commons BY/SA 3.0). Next May 15th 2012, the documentary and book will be published and available for free download on an interactive website that will host more related content. After the launch, we will begin to disseminate the book and the documentary through translations to other languages, global distribution, and a presence in other forums, in order to create worldwide awareness of the 15M movement.

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In this project ,we are experimenting with collective creation and will apply some of the free culture principles. As a creative venture, we will try to adapt techniques from free software development and also document the experimental process. We will request community collaboration for the different outputs and establish a two-way communication flow, which will enrich the dialogue.

1.2.- GOALS

The main goal of this project is to make as many people as possible aware of the 15M movement, by translating the outputs into different languages and presenting 15M.cc in as many places as pos-sible, as well as through Internet.

The nature of this project - collaborative, copyleft, with the aim to make three outputs about the 15M movement available to everyone - will also enable us to investigate the pro-commons concept. By working collaboratively with the community, and allowing many individuals to participate in the project’s development, the process itself of creating ideas will be an experiment in how, not only the working process, but also collective creation, can be coordinated using different tools.

Although our initial idea is to invest our own money, time, and resources, we are not ruling out the possibility of recouping the economic outlay. Therefore, the project will also be an experiment in free culture financing and production. The project budget will be published, as well as any income we may get (donations + crowdfunding). If this income exceeds the project’s budget, it will be spent on distributing and publicising the outputs.

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1.3.- WORKING METHOD

We would like to establish ways of collaborating that are not limited to the online community, so that people who are not so involved in social networks or who do not work in the cloud can also take part. To this end, in addition to a series of online forums relating to each output, there will also be onsite meetings to facilitate communication between the project founders and the community.

1.3.1.- BOOK

When writing the book, the coordinator will create an ideas tree, and then the concepts will be developed by the community. Once the ideas have been defined, the texts will be “remixed” and this material will be used to create the book. The original texts, with the authors’ names, will all be published on the website (which has yet to be developed).

1.3.2.- DOCuMENTARY

The documentary storyboard will be made public, so that the community can have the opportunity to assess it. Through a forum, both virtual and onsite, collaborators can raise issues that will help to define the documentary’s skeleton. To make this exchange of ideas productive, and to avoid running into dead-ends, the coordinator will set up a decision-making system over which he has the final say (benevolent dictator). As the project nears conclusion, a preview will be held prior to the final editing, so as to get feedback from collaborators before the finishing touches are made.

1.3.3.- WEBSITE

By means of mailing lists and onsite meetings at the Commons laboratory at Medialab Prado in Madrid, the requirements of the web application and the technology needed to develop it will be

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discussed and chosen. From then on, with public code repositories, anybody can take part in the development. Coordination of the development and production environment deployment will be the responsibility of aLabs and Pablo Soto.

1.3.4.- PROJECT

In the interests of transparency, we will make publicly available the project’s budget detailing the expenses involved in producing 15M.cc. Although it is a not-for-profit project, we do not rule out the possibility of recouping the investment we will be making. If we recover the outlay, any surplus will be used in a new project based on the same principles as 15M.cc – dealing with social issues and copyleft.

1.4.- WAYS OF PARTICIPATING

To achieve our goals, we will need many different types of collaboration during the three basic stages of the 15M.cc project: [1] publicising the project, [2] developing the outputs, and [3] disseminat-ing the outputs so they reach as many places and people as possible.

[1] Initially, there will be two main tasks: the compiling of audiovisual material of all types (videos, photos, music, etc), and the drafting of the concepts surrounding the movement which will appear on the ideas tree.

[2] Each output will need different types of collaborators which are detailed below. However, in all cases basic issues will need to be discussed such as: what concepts will appear on the ideas tree, what should be included or not in the storyboard, etc. To do this, we will create forums to channel community participation.

[3] When the book, documentary and website are ready, it will be vital for us to get help in dis-seminating the project, both in Spain and abroad. It would be very useful if people with con-

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tacts in organisations or bodies of any kind could help us to organise meetings to explain the underlying principles of the outputs and the 15M.cc project.

1.4.1.- BOOK

Once the ideas tree, which will form the basis of the book, has been created, we will need peo-ple who would like to write about these concepts. Regarding technical matters, experts will be sought who can help explain the more complex aspects (for example, lawyers specialised in intel-lectual property). A designer/layout person will be needed to create a suitable template for the book, together with the coordinator, both for the print and digital versions.

1.4.2.- DOCuMENTARY

The video and photographic material we are gathering has not all been created by audiovisual pro-fessionals, but by citizens who have made recordings or photos of events relating to the 15M movement. In addition to the raw video footage, a 3D computer graphics specialist will be needed to illustrate certain aspects of the movement, as well as a film editor or assistant editor who can help the coordinator to manage and classify the audiovisual material. We will also need to subtitle the documentary in many languages which involves two tasks: technicians who can upload subtitles and translators for each language.

1.4.3.- WEBSITE

In order to develop a wiki-based website, although somewhat more complex and interactive, we will initially need: HTML5/javascript animators, programmers and web developers. When the site goes live, it would be very useful to avail of documentalists who could help us to classify the material according to coherent criteria so that it is correctly stored in the cloud.

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2. OUTPUTS

2.1.- BOOK — 15M.cc Digital Revolution

In spring 2011, a revolutionary process of democratisation, which be-came known as the Arab spring, swept through many Mediterranean countries. On May 15th, as regime change was progressing to varying degrees in these countries, an unprecedented citizens movement com-menced in Spain: the 15M movement. In this text, we aim to contextu-alise the 15M movement, to define and explain it – at times through personal observation, at others as a reflection or conversation. Although we feel part of the movement, we are not “official members”, because one of the movement’s greatest strengths is the absence of a convening association. This book presents our opinions as citizens, our experiences

and reflections on what we consider to be the greatest revolution that our generation will ever witness: the digital revolution.

Coordinated by Patricia Horrillo, the book is conceived as an experimental collaborative proc-ess, which aims to be an analytical and contextualising reflection on the 15M movement. By main-taining the pro-commons spirit throughout the whole project, we will try to replicate techniques that have been successfully used in other environments such as free software development. We will use Creative Commons tools; the creative process will not be limited to simply sequencing texts by different authors. The core of the book is an ideas tree which will be worked on in a non-centralised way. By maintaining a continuum throughout the book, ideas will be encapsulated to form the basis of the reflections, interviews, and references in a book which will be consistent from start to finish.

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2.2.- DOCUMENTARY — 15M.cc We were asleep, we woke up

What is the 15M movement? What are its influences and ori-gins? How have the protests developed? Who is taking part? How has civil society reacted? And the media? Politicians? How have these protests changed the relation of citizens with the new information technologies? Although we cannot answer all these questions, we propose to create a documentary which will throw light on some of them. The documentary will take us through the before, during and after of the 15M move-ment; we will revisit #acampadasol and try to understand and transmit the importance of this movement which has filled the lives of hundreds of thousands of people, including ours,

with hope – the emotion we seek to transmit in the film. And to do this, we will speak to the people who have lived and are living the 15M experience. We will also interview experts who will share their views on what is happening. To complete this patchwork a wide selection of videos and photographs from many different sources will be used, as well as beautifully-produced graphics to guide the viewer and help explain certain concepts and statistics. The original music soundtrack will unify the emotional experience of the film. And lastly, we will try to imagine what will happen to the 15M movement in the coming years.

The documentary will be coordinated by Stéphane M. Grueso and will also involve a process of reflection on collective or collaborative creation in an audiovisual project. Our research in this area has already led to the making of over 20 interviews. Ideally, we would prefer not to use footage shot by us (or at least keep it to a minimum) and we would rather use images provided by the com-munity (except the interviews we have made). We are sending out a call to the community to send in their videos, photos and sound files and allow us to use them in the film. using the blog forum, we

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will initiate debates on which situations, events and themes the community considers important and should be included in the film, and to what degree they should appear. We will also discuss which people should appear in the film and other issues. The documentary is a personal account of what happened and we wish to make it personal for as many people as possible.

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2.3.- WEBSITE — 15M.cc Bank of ideas

From the start of the project, we set up a website to describe the basic principles of 15M.cc, and have reported on the progress made in a blog. However, together with the book and the documentary, the third “leg” of the project is the development of an interactive website.

The purpose of the website is twofold: on the one hand, it will be a tool for gathering materials (texts, videos, audio files, photographs), and on the other, it will enable the viewing of contents so that users can “experience their own 15M”. It is called the «bank of ideas» because it will host an ideas tree which can hold an unlimited number of ideas. We will suggest a

number of interrelated tags to facilitate multi-way navigation. All these concepts will be linked in some way to the 15M movement, either as historical background or terms linked in some way to 15M.

The idea is that, from the outset, the programming of the website will be an open creation; the code will not be initiated by an individual but by the working group which will establish the framework. Collaborative programming will take place through onsite meetings, mailing lists, etherpads, etc, and the website source code will be freely distributed under an Affero GPL licence. In order to develop the code, we have set up a collaboration with free software experts from the cultural as-sociation aLabs, which will be coordinated by Pablo Soto.

After launching the site on 15 May 2012, it will host the documentary and book in different formats and thus keep the 15M experience alive. The idea is that this space will keep growing, even after the presentation of the book and the documentary.

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We will work on a model of interconnected concepts which could be based on a graphic something like the

conceptual map of Camp Sol, by Marga Padilla.

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3. WORKING METHOD

3.1.- BOOK

The book, «15M.cc Digital revolution», will be the result of selecting and editing articles which clearly explain the concepts in the bank of ideas, and which support the initial thesis: that the digital revolution has facilitated the 15M movement. Patricia Horrillo will be responsible for this process; the ideas tree on the website, which the community is invited to fill with their ideas and reflections, will be used to choose the concepts.

For the final version, any text posted on the website may be fully reproduced in the book, although there are other possibilities: parts of a text may be remixed with another text, or the main ideas may be taken and used as the basis for a completely new text. Original texts will also be written specifi-cally for the book.

3.2.- DOCUMENTARY

For the production of the documentary, «15M.cc We were asleep, we woke up», we would like to in-clude the opinions and use the collaboration of the community. We are not aware of other cases in which this type of process has been used to create an audiovisual production. The project itself will also involve an element of experimentation and trial and error. The budget and legal and logistical information will be published at a later date, but in this document we will focus on the creative aspect of the production.

We are going to use a variation of the “benevolent dictator” system, which has been widely used in the development of free software. It enables the collaboration of all individuals in the community who

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wish to be involved in the project, by seeking consensus or majority decisions, but the final decisions will be made by one person or groups of people, usually the initiators of the project. A definition of benevolent dictator is: “The final decision-making authority lies with one person, who is expected, by the force of his personality or experience, to use it wisely”. In other words, someone will have the last word.

We must not lose sight of the fact that we are making a documentary. Apart from issues such as how interesting a particular situation or person is, and whether they should appear briefly or extensively, etc, other considerations arise such as cinematographic language, narrative structure, rhythm, etc. After discussions with the community, the project initiators, Patricia, Pablo and Stéphane will discuss the options and decide. If there is any disagreement, Stéphane will have the last word, as he is the most experienced in audiovisual narration and is ultimately responsible for the documentary.

Making a film is not the same as programming software, and we are not going to use the same pro-cedures. We intend to create different communication channels and decision-making processes with the aim of involving the community. Among them are the following:

[1] The first refers to the material needed for the film. We are going to collect all the audiovisual material possible relevant to the project. We will also request explicit authorisation for all the material and, once the project has finished, we will provide a copy for the 15M Audiovisual Archive. In this way, we will ensure that everyone who wishes to do so can tell “their story” of the 15M movement. In addition, we will undertake to record interviews with people related to the movement and experts sharing their opinions.

[2] We will try to answer all queries and comments that we receive by email, depending on the number. We will later publish a summary of this correspondence in the blog. We will also take into account the comments on the blog, and will see about creating a mailing list if the number

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of comments requires it. By doing this, we hope to ensure a fluid and constant exchange of ideas and opinions on the project.

[3] The updated storyboard will be posted on Internet, so that everyone can see the current status of the work in progress, and make comments and contribute ideas. Communication channels include using online surveys and forms so that anyone who is interested can leave their opinion or even vote for different options of the narrative development of the film, or choose the people who should be interviewed.

[4] Once a month, onsite meetings will be held in Madrid. Everyone is welcome to attend and present their opinions in person about any aspect of the development and production of the documentary. We will stream these meetings so that people who cannot be present can also take part.

[5] Finally, as the project nears conclusion, we will hold a number of public previews of se-quences prior to the final editing, to identify problems and refine the final outcome.

3.3.- WEBSITE

In the production of this transmedia project (website, book and documentary), we are going to ex-periment with new forms of collaborative creation and the direct involvement of the community in the whole process. To achieve this we are developing collective forms of communication and creation. We are going to work around a “bank of ideas” with concepts that are interconnected but independent (independent conceptual units). These ideas will be structured in a complex conceptual map which will seek to frame and contextualise the origin and emergence of the 15M movement.

In order to create this ideas tree, we will develop a tool to visualise the cloud of concepts/ideas in a website interface. This site will also contain all the ideas, materials, videos and texts which people

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contribute. Each concept can be linked to one or more articles, photos, videos, etc, created by the community. We will also provide an accessible wiki-based (or similar) version, to which everyone can easily contribute. These data and content will be transported to an animation model which will enable users to navigate the 15M site and all the concepts. This could be something like a tag cloud, but interrelated. This website will be one of the three outputs of the project, which are independent of each other but complementary. When the project concludes, users will be able to read the book, see the documentary and navigate the website.

unlike the book or the documentary, the website experience will be “non-lineal”. The user will be able to navigate the concepts: when the cursor hovers over a concept, related content will appear – texts, photos, audio, video, links, and others, and also interrelated concepts. In this way, users will be able to navigate “their own” 15M experience, exploring whatever aspects they find most interesting.

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4. WHAT MAKES THIS PROJECT DIFFERENT

In the coming months, many different works about the 15M movement will appear, but a number of aspects make our project different:

4.1.- TRANSMEDIA PROJECT: WEBSITE + BOOK + DOCUMENTARY

This project will have multiple outputs: a book, a documentary film and an interactive website from which all materials can be downloaded. The site will also host “extra” material such as the com-plete interviews we have made for the documentary, alternative texts, photographs and other content.

4.2.- FUNDING

The project came about thanks to funding provided by the three founders. For the second phase – distribution, translation, promotion, etc – we hope to get economic support through crowdfunding from the viewers of the documentary and community members. The second phase will roll out when the book and the documentary have been produced – provided that the style and content of the outputs, and the project’s open licence, are not compromised in any way. Although the project is non-profit, we do not rule out the possibility of recovering the investment we have made as the project is also an attempt to make a living from free culture.

4.3.- AUDIOVISUAL MATERIAL

For the documentary, we prefer not to use our own material (except for the interviews we are record-ing): therefore we are calling on the community to supply their images of what happened. Lists

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of places, dates, concepts and combinations of these will be published, and the community will be asked to provide material according to these criteria.

4.4.- COMMUNITY

Our aim is for the book, documentary and website to be collaborative and to achieve this we are ask-ing the community to participate in the creative process. In addition to onsite meetings, working groups will be set up so that anyone who so wishes can contribute ideas to the project.

4.5.- LICENCE: CC BY/SA 3.0

The documentary, book and website will all be published under a copyleft licence, specifically Crea-tive Commons BY/SA 3.0 ES (or BY/NC/SA if the first option is not possible). The intention is to achieve the broadest possible distribution through Internet. The book and the documentary will be initially translated into English and French, although we will try to translate them into other languages. On the website, the documentary will be available for free download in HD format, and the book in pdf, epub and other formats. After receiving the explicit written authorisation of the authors, a copy of the audiovisual material collected for the documentary will be sent to the 15M Audiovisual Archive so it can be accessed by the community according to the Archive’s licence.

(CC) 2012 some rights reservedCreative Commons BY/SA 3.0 ES

(Attribution-ShareAlike)

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5. BEHIND THE PROJECT

The founders of this venture are three entrepreneurs from different backgrounds. See below for a brief description of their careers.

Pablo Soto

Entrepreneur and developer, Madrid (Spain) 1979@pablomp2p | pablo@15M.cc | http://www.pablosoto.com

Considered one of the so-called “fathers of P2P”, to-gether with Justin Frankel (Gnutella) and Shawn Fan-ning (Napster), Pablo is one of the 25 most influential Spaniards in the world of Internet, according to the Spanish newspaper El Mundo. He frequently takes part in national and international forums and has taught as a guest lecturer at several Spanish universities. He has won prizes both in Spain and internationally, and in 2009 he received the Pioneer Award of the Distributed Com-puting Industry Association (DCIA). Pablo has been ac-tive for many years in promoting free culture and is particularly interested in the role new technologies have played in the Arab spring. Since May 15th 2011, he has followed the 15M movement closely, attending demon-strations and collaborating on social networks – his natu-ral medium.

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Stéphane M. Grueso

Filmmaker, Seville (Spain) 1973@fanetin | stephane@15M.cc | http://stephanegrueso.blogspot.com

As far back as he can remember, Stéphane has al-ways been interested in cinema and television. He has pursued his career in Spain and Germany where he lived and worked for seven years. He had a wonderful time travelling all over Europe filming news and reports for the Berlin office of TVE, the Spanish national tel-evision network. He has directed documentaries about life in prison and the 11th March 2004 train bombings in Madrid, among many others. His latest film, ¡Copi-ad, malditos! («Copyright, or the right to copy»), is a project combining a documentary film, and a web-site, on intellectual property, copyleft, and free cul-ture. It was the first co-production in Spain with a major television network (TVE) under a Creative Commons li-cence. On the 15th May 2011 he assumed the role of “narrator”, using Twitter and #acampadasol and #15M, acting as a “news link” between those in the camps, and in other protest actions, and those who could not be present. Stéphane and Pablo were two of the “top 100 twitterers to follow in Spanish in 2011”, according to the blog ALT1040.

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Patricia Horrillo

Journalist, Madrid (Spain) 1977@patrihorrillo | patricia@15M.cc | http://patrihorrillo.blogspot.com

Fascinated by communication and social networks, Patricia has a multi-disciplinary background. Holding a degree in international relations, she became proficient in graphic design and layout in order to set up her own design company in Barcelona. Some years later, she gained a degree in journalism and worked for several newspapers as a journalist. Currently she is an inde-pendent journalist and collaborates with digital me-dia. Since May 15th 2011, she has been in the front lines of the 15M movement, reporting on many demon-strations and popular assemblies via Twitter and posts on her blog and on ZonaRetiro.com.

The three founders of the project combine the potential to reach a huge audience, both online and in traditional media. In addition to users who follow their writings and videos in the press and on televi-sion, Patricia, Stéphane and Pablo receive thousands of visits to their blogs and views of their videos, and millions of downloads of their contents.

www.15M.cc | contact@15M.ccTwitter @15M_cc

Facebook http://cos.as/154Office telephone (in Spain) [+34] 910 059 045

PHOTOS: Julio Albarrán @soulseekers | Creative Commons BY/NC/SA | http://cos.as/1wk

NOTE: The 15M.cc project and its authors are not related in any way to Creative Commons or Creative Commons España, other than the use made of their licences.

(CC) 2012 some rights reservedCreative Commons BY/SA 3.0 ES