Works and data produced by the public sector (such as official texts of a legislative, administrative, or legal nature) are part of an essential commons of information which is too important for the functioning of our societies to be burdened with copyright restrictions even for a limited period. To ensure a consistent and harmonised scope of the Public Domain, Europe needs to ensure that these materials are free from exclusive rights in all Member States.
A German version of our brochure A Digital Knowledge Act for Europe is now available (as a PDF file). In this publication, we provide an overview of the barriers that prevent libraries, archives, universities and other knowledge institutions from carrying out their public interest mission in the digital environment and present solutions. Like the English […]
This is the German version of our brochure A Digital Knowledge Act for Europe. In this publication, we lay out our ideas for a Digital Knowledge Act – a targeted legislative intervention that enables libraries, archives, universities and other knowledge institutions to offer the same services online as offline. Our booklet is structured along four […]
At the end of February, the European Commission adopted its proposal for a Council Recommendation on the European Research Area (ERA) Policy Agenda for 2025 to 2027. The proposal follows the previous ERA Policy Agenda which ran from 2022 to 2024 and will serve as a three-year roadmap for development goals in the European Research […]
On October 2, COMMUNIA hosted an in-person event in Brussels on why Europe needs a Digital Knowledge Act. A video recording of the event is now available (hosted on Vimeo). The event brought together academics, representatives of civil society and EU policymakers to discuss legislative measures that would enable knowledge institutions, such as libraries, archives, […]
Europe is investing heavily in research and innovation, and for good reason. But we have failed to support these interests by clearing the way for the digital transition of libraries, archives, universities and other knowledge institutions that are essential to promoting progress. We need to prioritise reform that focuses on the needs of these institutions. […]
In this publication, we lay out our ideas for a Digital Knowledge Act – a targeted legislative intervention that enables libraries, archives, universities and other knowledge institutions to offer the same services online as offline. Our booklet is structured along four actions to empower knowledge institutions in the digital age: Protect the Public Domain! Unlock […]
Since the beginning of the year, we have fleshed out proposals for measures that should be included in a Digital Knowledge Act — a targeted legislative intervention that enables libraries, archives, universities and other knowledge institutions to offer the same services online as offline. In a series of six policy papers, we identified the constraints […]
Join us on October 2nd, from 1500h to 1700h, for an in-person event on why Europe needs a Digital Knowledge Act at TownHall Europe, Brussels! What to expect The European Union is spending massively on research and innovation. Horizon Europe has a budget of €95.5 billion, up from a cool €80 billion for its predecessor program, […]
The argument in brief Published research outputs often end up locked behind paywalls, unavailable to many researchers and the broader public, impeding scientific – and human – progress. Despite progress in the area of open science, research funded by the European public is no exception to this. In many cases, European taxpayers are essentially asked […]
Access and use of public sector documents and political speeches are key to a thriving democracy and civil society as they ensure transparency and accountability. Furthermore, they provide society with important historical records about political decision making. Copyright and paywalls, however, can render access to these materials difficult or prohibitively expensive. Today, COMMUNIA is releasing […]
