This post by Lucie Guibault was first published on the Kluwer Copyright Blog and is reproduced here with kind permission of the author. The New Year’s festivities are just behind us and with these the celebrations around Public Domain Day 2012 that took place in different cities in and outside Europe (Warsaw, Zurich, Turin, Rome, […]
Every January a growing number of people throughout the world gathers to celebrate the new year. But not for the usual reasons. They meet because every January 1st the works of authors who had died decades before – typically, seventy years before – enter the public domain, that is, their copyright protection expires. Why a […]
Every January a growing number of people throughout the world gathers to celebrate the new year. But not for the usual reasons. They meet because every January 1st the works of authors who had died decades before – typically, seventy years before – enter the public domain, that is, their copyright protection expires. Why a […]
On the 28th of October the European Commission has adopted a recommendation on digitisation and digital preservation. This recommendation is following up on a similar recommendation from 2006. At the core of the recommendation is the request to the member states to step up their digitization efforts, pool their resources and involve private actors in […]
Beyond the wall between what is protected… and what is not. The question was raised in Berlin. The 1st Berlin Symposium on Internet and Society was held last week (October 25-28, 2011), on the occasion of the inauguration of the Humboldt University’s new multi-disciplinary Research Institute on Internet and Society (IIC, Institut für Internet and […]
Works that have fallen into the public domain after their term of copyright protection has elapsed can be freely used by everybody. In theory that means that these works can be reused by anyone for any purpose which includes commercial exploitation. In theory the public domain status increases access to our shared knowledge and culture […]
After almost four years of activities, the COMMUNIA Project is closing down. But many members, willing to pursue its overall goals, decided to form of an International Non-Profit Association based in Brussels. The Association’s mission is to educate about, advocate for, offer expertise and research about the public domain in the digital age within society […]
16 June 2011 (from 21:00 onwards) Venue: THE MONK CAFÉ Rue Ste-Catherine, 42 (BRUSSELS) Programme: Open discussion about the public domain in the digital world, the future challenges Prospectives on the future activity of Communia Drinks and networking
The Europeana Foundation has published a policy statement, the Public Domain Charter, to highlight the value of public domain content in the knowledge economy. It alerts Europe’s museums, libraries, archives and audiovisual collections to the fact that digitization of Public Domain content does not create new rights in it. The document highlights the Public Domain […]
Developed within the COMMUNIA network during the last two years, we are pleased to announce the official launch of The Public Domain Manifesto. The document outlines a series of general principles (opening with: the Public Domain is the rule, copyright protection is the exception), then addresses various issues relevant to today’s cultural landscape finally provides […]
