Cory Doctorow is an author, essayist, activist and public intellectual I admire greatly. His musings on copyright and creative culture are of particular interest, as is his advocacy for the rights of young people. Educators should be, IMHO, cognisant of his ideas.
The fact that Doctorow operates in a traditionally commercial way, as an author who makes the bestseller lists, while simultaneously using the internet to help distribute his works for free – hosting the remixes, audio versions from fans and various version formats at his site – is more than just inspirational, it is viable!
Doctorow was formerly the European Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. He is currently the co-editor and co-owner of boing boing, a wonderfully eclectic site that fills my reader each day with entertaining, stimulating articles. His wikipedia entry is particularly good overview.
His novel, Little Brother is a ‘must read’ for…well…everyone interested in our contemporary world, especially teenagers, parents and educators. I love the opening pages, as a deputy principal myself, where our protagonist Winston ”w1n5t0n” is in the “…clueless disciplinary officer far enough behind the curve…” vice-principal’s office, for hacking into steal ”last year’s standardized test”. It is a very amusing scene.
His new novel, For the Win, is on my insanely lengthy ‘to read’ list and likely to float to the top on arrival (even though I find it frustrating that Australian Kindle owners cannot purchase it).
Here is a recent and brief interview with Doctorow, that will interest those familiar with is work and the uninitiated, that covers a few of his concerns and some interesting family background.
I would love for Doctorow to speak at a conference for Australian educators or English teachers, any chance if invited, Cory?
Credit: The image of Cory Doctor is reproduced under a creative commons licence with thanks to Jonathan Worth
Jeanette Lans
Thanks for the introduction to Doctorow. A very interesting and insightful man who has not forgotten what a youth experience is. I enjoyed listening to the interview and would love to hear him in person. Cheers.