Update: Please be sure to apply at the Google Policy Fellowship website. For the fifth year, Creative Commons will take part in the Google Policy Fellowship program. It’s fantastic to see that Google has expanded the number and diversity of groups involved in the fellowship program. This year there are participating organizations from Africa, Latin…

Today marks an historic step forward for public access to publicly funded research in the United States. The Fair Access to Science and Technology Research Act (FASTR) was introduced in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. FASTR requires federal agencies with annual extramural research budgets of $100 million or more to provide the…

In the UK, the House of Commons has asked for feedback on their Open Access Policy. One provision of that policy requires that articles funded through the Research Councils UK (RCUK) must be released under a CC BY license. Last year, CC submitted a short comment in support. And just last month, the House of…

Each year on January 1st, copyright protection expires for millions of creative works, allowing those works to be used by anyone without restriction or need for permission. On this Public Domain Day, we celebrate the rich creative works that have risen into the public domain, and mourn the massive number of works that could have…

UPDATE: As of 15 February 2013 this bill has been vetoed by the Governor of the State of Sao Paulo. Last year we wrote about the introduction of an OER bill in Brazil. Yesterday, the State of São Paulo approved PL 989/2011, which establishes a policy whereby educational resources developed or purchased with government funds…