It brought me to one, and started me on a journey of personal growth I never asked for, but one I’m very happy to be on!

Posted via email from Mundo’s posterous

There’s a new town in town

Since 19th February, lucky Amsterdam has Cineville.nl, a collector for all films on exhibition in the city’s 13 film theatres. The site contains synopses, trailers, reviews, and film news. But most importantly, it provides an overview of what’s on, where, and when – something we’ve all been sorely craving for.

Even better, €17,50 a month gets you into 550 exhibitions per week and 400 specials per year, in any of the cinemas, whenever you feel like it. So do away with the dissatisfaction of your monthly television subscription fee, and get something of real value.

The Cineville pass is already on sale online (click here), as well as at Cinecenter, Kriterion, and Rialto. But if you join the crew at Vive La Ville! – Cineville’s launch party on 27th February in Studio/K, you can have one made on the spot, in between your dance floor braveness.

(screen shot Cineville by de Balie, by me on Flickr)

Five-minute audiovisual teaser for Open Content

We stole and re-arranged some inspiring thoughts as we saw fit; I put them into sound and images.

To watch, click play on the screen below; for plot and (management) summary, read on.

What to do when your content can be infinitely copied by anyone with access to the Internet? How can you add value to your content when it’s be found anywhere, for free? Where’s the business in open content? How can you make it work for you – instead of against. How can users make open content work for you?

Summary

Today’s world is one of super-abundance: digital and/or digitized content will be found, sooner or later, by anyone prepared to look for it on the web. So what does this mean for people working with content?

Many – across different industries – are starting to realize that sealing it up, fighting something that’s turning into common practice, is futile. But the clever ones are seeing opportunities.

Actively freeing up content, dropping it into the web for everyone to see and share, hugely increases your potential audience. Better still, a small part of that audience is very eager to become a partner – or co-creator. This part fills in the blanks, places context and conversation around your content, passes it on, and adds value for thousands or millions of others in your potential audience.

Free doesn’t mean it’s being given away -  only that someone else is picking up the tab. And it doesn’t stop there. There are ways to turn your end-users into clients again; the trick is to build something around your content, something better than free.

(photo opencontent by jlori)

This workshop empowered the people who were there as much as it did me – and it left me with a lot of useful feedback.

The Digital Pioneers Academy coaches social, small-scale online enterprises looking to professionalize. For them, writing a business plan can be a daunting task. I wanted to simplify the business model concept by visualizing it – and to turn the prospect of working with it into a positive design challenge.

Below is the Slideshare presentation (some rights reserved – ). I adapted it after the workshop to give the pioneers a reference guide to flick through. Because I used their feedback to clarify some things, it’s as much theirs as mine.

(photo standing there – in a puddle by Auntie P)