Hi folks. I thought you might be interested in the following online event
because a) it's happening on an entirely volunteer run, non-commercial
national youth website, and b) one of the forums is about the future of
ideas online - particularly the ways in which communities and activists will
use the net in future. Please feel free to email me if you'd like more
info - everyone's welcome to take part.

Cheers, Miriam.


Straight out of Brisbane and Vibewire present:
The Virtual Think-tank
18th-23rd November 2004
www.vibewire.net/soobideas

The virtual think-tank is an experiment in online ideas generation. Starting
on Thursday the 18th November, the virtual think-tank will open with three
forums, each featuring special guests posting their ideas, responding to
each others' comments, and answering questions by users. The forums will
then remain open to general discussion amongst all users for six days. At
the end of this time, the best comments and ideas will be edited into a
publication that will be distributed free at the SOOB Ideas Program. Your
comments and ideas will go from post to print in just over a week.

The forums are:

:: "You can't govern a nation by Google" The future of ideas online ::

How will new technologies affect the way we produce and distribute ideas? In
the 90s the rise of email & open publishing paved the way for campaigns
without consensus (like the anti-globalisation movement), and conferences
without conclusions (like the world social forum). What will new web
applications, P2P programs, & the rise of peer-edited websites bring? How
might universities, NGOs, activists and think-tanks react?

Chaired by: Daniel Mackinlay
Guests: Tim Parish, John Sutton, Sam da Silva, Alex Burns, Damien Lewis


:: Copywrite/Copywrong ::

Culture is a dynamic, evolving organism that should be freely interpreted
and reconfigured. How do exclusive rights on creativity effect the
development of art and science? Has copyright become an instrument for
censorship? This session will look at how ancient knowledge & new ideas get
fenced-off, injected with growth hormones, & sold to the highest bidder. Our
'speakers' will introduce the latest tactics for rescuing the warm & fluffy
creatures of intellectual capital. The big question: can you keep your
intellectual property rights & share them too?

Chaired by: Mark Fallu
Guests: Tim Parish, James Arvanitakis, and the QUT Creative Commons Project


:: What's on the cards? Long term agendas for change ::

With a royal flush of Liberals in both houses, Australian laws will be
changing faster than you can say "fold". Who has plans to change Australia
over the next three years and beyond? How are they going to make it happen?
How do political parties and lobby groups plan for the future? How can we
look over the shoulders of the men who are holding all the cards - or even
start dealing a few decks of our own? Is it time for the rest of us to start
coming up with our own twenty-year plans?

Chaired by: Miriam Lyons
Guests: Graham Young, Mark Davis, Hamish Alcorn, and James Arvanitakis


Straight out of Brisbane (SOOB) is a festival of emerging arts and culture,
happening in Fortitude Valley, Brisbane from the 2nd-12th December. The SOOB
Ideas program will explore issues emerging from Australia's intellectual
undergrowth, drawing on the energies of independent thinkers who don't mind
getting their hands (and minds) dirty putting great ideas into action. The
above online forums will also be happening face-to-face at SOOB - just a few
of the many panels, workshops, rants & creative collaborations that will
make up the SOOB Ideas program. You can check out the full ideas program at
http://www.straightoutofbrisbane.com/ideas/page_ideas_draftprogram.html.