P2P Foundation joins the FTA

[Michel Bauwens]

The FTA is proud to announce the incorporation of the Foundation for P2P Alternatives (P2P-F) to its Associate Network. The P2P-F is the organisation behind the most extensive research platform on peer production topics around the world.

Its founder, Michel Bauwens, says about the FTA:

"It is extremely important that the knowledge and practical know-how about the new peer production practices, which results in real and important social artefacts and 'products' that can potentially be used by all humankind. Thus the importance of courses that are both free, but also of a professional standards and that can be learned globally, through an infrastructure of teachers and mentors, and can result in recognized academic credit."

The P2P-F will contribute to the FTA in various ways, such as providing Guest Lectures to FTA courses and communicating FTA news through their networks. Feedback is expected on course materials, and advise and help with improving the FTA curriculum. One particular joint project the P2P-F will be working on together with the Free Knowledge Institute is the development of a course on "Peer Production and Commons Theory". This course will be developed following the peer production model and will be open for contributions by peers and other organisations. The resulting course will be hosted by the Free Technology Academy and its partners.

Bauwens about the P2P Course under construction:

"For this reason, we believe this first ever course on peer production has a historical significance, and we are extremely proud to participate in this effort with the FTA, a recognized and pioneering quality player in this emergent field."

More details will be revealed in the upcoming weeks, but we recommend you already to bookmark http://www.p2pcourse.cc!

FTA founding director Wouter Tebbens about the joining of the P2P-F:

"Peer production is one of most interesting forms of social production that have already shown tremendous results, such as Free Software and Wikipedia. It is at the heart of the paradigm shift towards a knowledge society. The P2P Foundation is one of the important networks that tries to understand and conceptualise these changes in philosophical, sociological and political terms. In that respect I see the P2P-F joining the FTA network as a very welcome complement to the current group of partners. In my view the plans to jointly develop a course on Peer Production are an important step towards a broader FTA. An FTA curriculum that not only caters for learners interested in technology but also prepares people to understand these social changes and put them in perspective."

About the Free Technology Academy

A Consortium formed by the Open University of Catalonia (Spain), the Open University of the Netherlands and the University of Agder (Norway) and led by the Free Knowledge Institute (FKI), the FTA has received the support from the EC's Lifelong Learning Programme to set up an international educational programme on Free Software. The courses are taught completely online in a virtual campus based on the Campus Project interoperability framework.

Following the Open Educational Resources movement, all learning materials are freely available through the Internet. The use of Free Software (also referred to as Open Source software or Libre Software) is rapidly expanding in governmental and private organisations. However, still only a limited number of ICT professionals, teachers and decision makers have sufficient knowledge and expertise in these new fields. The Free Technology Academy aims to address this gap by providing high level courses that fit into larger Master Programmes at the participating universities.

More information: http://www.ftacademy.org
Contact information: contact[AT]ftacademy.org

About the Foundation for P2P Alternatives

Is a multi-disciplinary research network exploring peer-to-peer based practices across all fields, from economics and politics to religion and developments in civil society. The Foundation's principal activities are research, events and serving as a platform for sharing information and community.

More information: http://p2pfoundation.net/