complete press contact list for creative commons

[Mia Garlick <mia AT creativecommons.org>]

PDF attached; text below.

Attachment: IndiaLaunchPR.pdf
Description: Adobe PDF document

CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES LAUNCH IN INDIA

Silicon-Valley-based NGO now offers licenses in 35 jurisdictions  
around the world

San Francisco, CA, USA and Berlin, Germany — January 26, 2006 —  
Creative Commons, a nonprofit dedicated to building a body of  
creative work free to share and build upon, today unveiled a  
localized version of its innovative licensing system in India.

Creative Commons copyright licenses are available free of charge from  
the group’s website (http://creativecommons.org). The licenses allow  
authors and artists to mark their works as free to copy or transform  
under certain conditions—to declare “some rights reserved,” in  
contrast to the traditional “all rights reserved”—thereby enabling  
others to access a growing pool of raw materials without legal friction.

With Creative Commons India joining the effort, Creative Commons is  
proud to announce that its licenses now are offered in localized  
versions in a total of 35 jurisdictions around the world.

Staff at Creative Commons’ offices in San Francisco and Berlin worked  
with project leads Lawrence Liang from the Alternative Law Forum  
(ALF) in Bangalore and Shishir K.Jha from the Indian Institute of  
Technology Bombay (IIT Bombay) to adapt the standardized copyright  
licenses to Indian law.

Today the Indian versions of the Creative Commons licenses will be  
launched in the IIT Bombay’s auditorium in Mumbai, at a ceremony held  
as part of the ‘IIT Techfest’, IIT Bombay's Annual International  
Science and Technology festival. The Techfest with its lectures,  
workshops and exhibitions offers students a platform to explore the  
realms of science and technology in the 21st Century.

At the launch Joichi Ito, Chairman of Creative Commons, will give the  
keynote address. Speakers Nandu Pradhan, President and Managing  
Director of Red Hat India, film director Anurag Kashyap, Professor  
Deepak Phatak of IIT Bombay, project lead Lawrence Liang as well as  
Catharina Maracke, Creative Commons International Coordinator, will  
speak about topics related to culture, law and technology.

Says Project Lead Shishir Jha, “Creative Commons India will seek to  
inspire everyone to share the subcontinent’s abundant wealth of  
visions and ideas by standing tall on the shoulders of her  
intellectual and creative giants.”
About IIT Bombay

IIT Bombay, set up by an Act of Parliament, was established in 1958,  
at Powai, a northern suburb of Mumbai. Today the Institute is  
recognised as one of the centers of academic excellence in the  
country. The institute has 12 departments of engineering, basic  
sciences and the humanities, 11 research centers, 3 postgraduate  
degree schools and 5 interdisciplinary programs. IIT Bombay is  
largely a residential institution with over 4 thousand students and  
over 400 faculty. It offers undergraduate, postgraduate and doctoral  
degrees. Over the years, there has been dynamic progress at IIT  
Bombay in all academic and research activities, and a parallel  
improvement in facilities and infrastructure, to keep it on par with  
the best institutions in the world.

For more information, visit http://www.iitb.ac.in/
 About Creative Commons

Creative Commons is a not-for-profit organization, founded in 2001,  
that promotes the creative re-use of intellectual and artistic works— 
whether owned or in the public domain. Creative Commons licences  
provide a flexible range of protections and freedoms for authors,  
artists, and educators that build upon the "all rights reserved"  
concept of traditional copyright to offer a voluntary "some rights  
reserved" approach. It is sustained by the generous support of  
various organizations including the John D. and Catherine T.  
MacArthur Foundation, Omidyar Network, the Hewlett Foundation, and  
the Rockefeller Foundation as well as members of the public.

For general information, visit http://creativecommons.org

Contact

Catharina Maracke
International Coordinator
Creative Commons International, Creative Commons
catharina AT creativecommons.org
+49.30.280.93.909

Press Kit
http://creativecommons.org/presskit/