In 2022, two working groups (WGs) of the Creative Commons Copyright Platform collaborated on policy papers tackling issues related to copyright and access to knowledge. In this blog post, we highlight their insightful contributions to the CC copyright reform community.

Working Group on Digital Sharing Spaces

Led by Emine Yildirim, the WG on Digital Sharing Spaces was based on the idea that recent and upcoming legislative and policy instruments are likely to affect freedom to share. In 2022, the WG focused on how data sharing policies concerning publicly available data impact academic research and journalism in the public interest. While the group found that there are some safeguards in place, there are also several barriers for utilizing publicly available data by researchers and journalists. The main output of the WG was a position paper, encompassing two jurisdictions, the European Union and the United States. With this position paper, the group sought to provide some preliminary recommendations and to call for action and engagement to those who may be facing challenges and barriers in their respective jurisdictions. Watch the group’s January 2023 webinar recording. The WG hopes to use this position paper as a conversation starter for a bigger and more geographically inclusive debate. 

Working Group on User Rights

Led by André Houang, the WG on User Rights was based on the idea that these rights are an integral part of the copyright system. As such, the WG focused on exchanging thoughts on how copyright can be reshaped to better balance the interests of authors and rights holders with the public interest, so as to allow for the full exercise of fundamental rights, such as freedom of expression and access to knowledge, culture and information. The main output of the WG are its position papers, in which it puts forward some ideas for a better copyright system. The WG´s 2021 position paper focused on different types of user rights, which could help balance the interests of rights holders and of users. The 2022 position paper approached the topic of an international instrument for the global harmonization of user rights, and you can watch the group’s webinar recording to hear more about it. 

Do you also want to get involved? Don’t hesitate!

• Sign up to the CC Policy mailing list
• Join the #cc-copyrightreform Slack channel
• Participate in CC Copyright Platform calls — they are announced in the Slack channel and on the mailing list