Prague, Czech Republic and Berlin, Germany

Creators in the Czech Republic can now publish and share their creative works using free Creative Commons (CC) tools adapted to Czech language and law.

The Czech Republic will become the fifty-second jurisdiction worldwide to offer localized Creative Commons licenses. Following extensive consultation with local and international legal experts and in close collaboration with Creative Commons International, Creative Commons Czech ported the licenses and will celebrate their launch on April 16 at an event during the Multiplace festival in Prague.

Already the Czech project is finding support from diverse content creators and curators keen to use the local licenses.

“Throughout the year it took to port the licenses, we established a strong coalition of people and groups from a range of backgrounds,” explains CC Czech Project Lead Marek Tichy. “The joint efforts of lawyers, librarians, musicians, teachers, artists, geeks, journalists and other specialists delivered not only what we were aiming for – the localized CC deeds and legal codes – but also proof that the ideas behind CC echo in many areas both professional and amateur. From archiving original Czech web content, to educational materials, to works from independent music producers and performers, CC opens up a wide spectrum of possibilities. There is no doubt the today’s launch is only the beginning of the Czech Creative Commons story.”

The launch event will be held in Prague’s DigiLab AVU on April 16 from 10:00am-4:00pm. It will feature a workshop on CC license usage, followed by a press conference and launch ceremony. Prominent speakers include Vít Richter (Deputy Director of the National Library of the Czech Republic), Jan Pavelka (Association of Independent Artists), Paul Keller (Creative Commons Netherlands), and Petr Kadlec (Wikimedia ČR).

Creative Commons Czech, led by Marek Tichy (Iuridicum Remedium), Lukáš Gruber (National Library of the Czech Republic), and Petr Jansa, was initiated as a part of Iuridicum Remedium’s project “Reclaim Your Rights in the Digital Age”, supported by CEE Trust. Creative Commons Czech has also received endorsement from the Copyright Department of the Ministry of Culture and Faculty of Philosophy and Arts, Charles University of Prague.

About Iuridicum Remedium

Iuridicum remedium (IuRe) is a non-governmental non-profit organization promoting human rights. It focuses on broad infringements of individual rights as a result of legislative action and also deals with specific cases of human rights violations. IuRe’s activities include current threats to human rights in the fields of Social Exclusion; Human Rights and Technologies; and Human Rights and Public Administration. IuRe is active in the areas of legislation and legal assistance, and disseminates information to both the professional community and the general public. Iuridicum Remedium is a member of EDRi, European Digital Rights network. For more information, visit http://www.iure.org/.

About the National Library of the Czech Republic

The National Library of the Czech Republic works on Creative Commons within its Webarchive. The Webarchive is a project which aims to archive the entire content of the Czech internet. Webarchive is dedicated to porting the Creative Commons licenses in order to resolve legal issues in making the archived content available to public. For more information, visit http://www.nkp.cz/ & http://www.webarchiv.cz/.

About Creative Commons

Creative Commons is a not-for-profit organization, founded in 2001, that promotes the creative re-use of intellectual and artistic works, whether owned or in the public domain. Through its free copyright licenses, Creative Commons offers authors, artists, scientists, and educators the choice of a flexible range of protections and freedoms that build upon the “all rights reserved” concept of traditional copyright to enable a voluntary “some rights reserved” approach. Creative Commons was built with and is sustained by the generous support of organizations including the Center for the Public Domain, Omidyar Network, The Rockefeller Foundation, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, and The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, as well as members of the public. For more information about Creative Commons, visit https://creativecommons.org.

Contact

Dr. Catharina Maracke
Director, Creative Commons International
catharina@creativecommons.org

Press Kit
https://creativecommons.org/presskit
https://creativecommons.org/international/cz