May

July 28th, 2004
Transcription by Volunteer Citizen Journalist Cathryn Brown

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Okay, so why don’t you go ahead and introduce yourself.
CLIFF MAY: I’m Cliff May. I’m the president of something called The Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. It’s a policy institute -- a think tank sometimes called -- on terrorism and was formed almost immediately after 9-11, 2001...

[AMBIENT NOISE REDUCTION]

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Okay, why don’t you go ahead and introduce yourself again.
MAY: I’m Cliff May. I’m the president of something called the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, which is a policy institute -- sometimes called a think tank. It was formed almost immediately after 9-11, 2001 to focus specifically on the issue of terrorism and democracy -- in creating the institutions of democratic government.

I'm interested in trying to apply the principles of open source development to the process of producing The Echo Chamber documentary. So far, I've been using EchoChamberProject.com and its blog as the primary mediums to facilitate this integration.

I'd like share my thoughts for how the integration of the Internet and Filmmaking mediums could leverage the power of open source to find new methods to:

* Recruit volunteer help for post-production tasks
* Develop film content throughout the post-production process
* Recruit post-production expertise
* Market independent documentary films
* Create new economic competitive advantages through meaning creation
* Handle complexity and defy media logic
* Integrate objectivity and subjective judgments
* Reach new audiences