Will content evolve into an open-source universe? Here's my arguement, from the September issue of DOCUMENTARY Magazine

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Back in the good old days - productions were like families. People joined together with a common goal - to make a film, and they worked hard to make that goal into a finished film.

As pressure on costs has gone up, and the fees that freelancers earn in reality tv has risen, docu production has become a more complex economic arrangement.

But technology and passion has helped to re-light the content driven world of doc production. Now, thanks to the ubuiqueity of tools, there is a future just around the corner in which the key word is Collaboration. This future is exciting and empowering - and the elements are visible if you look for them.

Remote production teams used to be impossible (we've all fed ex'd tape back and forth to an editor who's been working remotely). That kind of long distance affair makes it difficult to keep a teams vision in focus. But today - net based collaboration tools are on the horizon. Crafty mac users have already figured out that you can hook your DV camera up to iChat and play rough cuts across the net in real time to a partner around the world. And that's just the
beginging. Many of the things that are the staple of current production are likely to change as travel is replaced by multi-camera shooter/producer teams being hired on location. This new form of peer production allows for a larger group of filmmakers to work in a collaboration fashion to help each other achieve their goals. This nascent movement allows a filmmaker in New York to reach out to a filmmaker in San Francisco and request help shooting a west coast interview for a film being completed in New York. That door swings both ways of course.

In the new work of peer production - the edit room will exist in a virtual space, a web based edit platform that invites multiple editors, shared rough cuts, and real-time collaboration among team members.

Every portion of the filmmaking process will move into this shared creative space, with tasks like logging quickly taken up by teams of screener/loggers. www.LogXchange is just one of the remote logging tools that is likely to add fuel to the fire of a remote filmmaker workplace.

At the same time shared storage and distribution on sites like www.Video.Google.com and www.OurMedia.org, as well as www.InternetArchive.org will make low cost, or no-cost storage available to media makers around the world.

The empowerment of a new community of media makers is likely to be scary to some. It does mean that the pond just got bigger. But think about how much time we as filmmakers spend selling, raising money, cutting corners, and thinking about the economics of what we do.

Imagine if we could add to our world the ethos that is currently exploding in the software community - as 'open source' software is created by teams of passionate volunteers. Within this community there is an understanding that work is done for a variety of reasons. Some work is done to fuel one's creative, social, or political passions. Other work is done to pay bills. And lastly, some work is bartered with others to help the community as a whole.

Imagine if you found that D.A. Pennybaker and Chris Hegedus needed a pick up shot of Al Franken's home town in Minneapolis? Would grab a camera, and shoot it for them? Sure you would - you'd be proud to have your name associated with them and their work. You're getting paid - just not in dollars. You're getting paid in karma, in credits, and in pride.

If you think this system doesn't work - just take a look at FireFox, Broadcast Machine, any Blog you like, or any piece of open source software that you use. Creative people create because it's what we do. Rethinking the economics of collaboration is one step toward an emerging world in which documentaries become and even larger part of the editorial fabric of our daily lives. And that's a future worth working toward.