SPARC, the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition is calling for entries into their 2008 Sparky Awards, an online video contest to promote the open exchange of information.

Host a video on SciVee, then enter it into the Sparky contest. Your video on SciVee will need to meet the following criteria in order to be considered for the contest:

1. Be submitted by November 30, 2008.
2. Examine one of Sparky themes (listed below).
3. Be no more than 2 minutes in length.
4. Have been completed between January 1 and November 30, 2008.
5. Be narrated or subtitled in English.
6. Be posted on the Internet and available for public use under a Creative Commons license. (SciVee video content is hosted under a Creative Commons license.)

Here is a listing of the Sparky themes with suggestions that might inspire you:

• Access to research - Why is it important for researchers, students, and the public to have access to scholarly literature? What happens when they don’t have full access to the work of others?
• New opportunities - The Web and other digital technologies have created unprecedented opportunities for sharing and using information. How might technology revolutionize the way that students, researchers and scholars work? What previously unreachable goal might be possible as a result of sharing science and data online?
• Information equity - Students and researchers at small colleges and in developing countries, as well as the general public, often have limited access to scientific and scholarly research results. What are the some of the effects of inequitable access to knowledge? What can we do about it?
• Taxpayer access - Taxpayers fund more than $50 billion in U.S. research each year. Do taxpayers have a right to expect access to the results of the research they paid for? What might happen if this was possible?
• Knowledge as a public good - The purpose of scholarship and scientific endeavor is to advance the welfare of society. Should scientific and scholarly knowledge be available to anyone who wants to learn? What might be possible if access to this knowledge becomes the norm?

For further details about the contest see the Sparky Details Page: The Value of Information Sharing