collaboration

Today Google announced the gPhone ... sort of. Actually, what it announced is an open source platform for mobile phone companies and other technology sectors to use when developing new high tech phones. Here's a preview video:

This kind of open source, collaborative, information sharing is nothing new. This site is built on the open source software known as Drupal and I'm a fan of creative commons licensing which basically allows a content creator to give others permission to use what they've created in another project as long as certain guidelines are kept.

In some ways, I think the church needs to adopt more of an open source mentality. As I've mentioned before, I'm writing Lent devotions right now for Lutheran Hour Ministries. Early on in this process I had a great idea for the devotions but wanted to use my work on another project later on, so I requested a change in the author agreement that would give them "first use" of the content, but would allow me to maintain ownership. They said no so I'm writing something else.

As another Lutheran Hour example, a friend of mine wrote some music that they recorded with a verbal agreement that he'd keep the rights to the music (he wanted to make it available to the masses under a CCLI license), but ended up having to hire a lawyer when they claimed ownership.

This kind of old school, non-collaborative mentality not only hurts ministry in that it restricts content accessibility, but it also limits intellectual and creative power that goes into various projects. This is part of the reason I wonder if LHM's days are numbered.

At the same time, I've noticed a serious increase in attempts at what I'd call an open source theology, where everybody gets to drop in their opinion and all opinions carry the same weight. This is, quite simply, stupid, and akin to me thinking that I could develop one of the new gPhones or should have access to the Drupal kernel. The reality is, as much as I might like to think I'm a geek, I have no where near the knowledge or skill necessary to do these things. The same holds true for theology.

By the way, Lutheran Hour does seem to be open to some shifts in their approach as they're open to being a partner of The Fishbowl ... assuming this post doesn't kill our discussions.