[open-humanities] [Open-humanities] mapping publicly funded content and data in the UK for a petition for open licensing

Wed Dec 3 15:31:22 UTC 2014

Hi,

I think this is a very interesting idea.

One thing I'm not clear on is what constitutes a Government funded work. 
I presume that it includes official publications under crown copyright; 
and also those released under the Open Govt License. But it sounds like 
it encompasses far more than that.

Best,

John

On 03/12/2014 12:35, John Cummings wrote:
> Hi All
>
> I met the staff at 38 Degrees a couple of months ago to talk about
> online communities. One thing that came up that was surprising to them
> was that government funded works in the UK are not in general available
> under an open license, it got me thinking, why hasn’t it happened yet?
>
>
> A stand out factor for me is that while the public good of open
> licensing can be at least in part demonstrated, the general public's
> awareness and want for open license for publicly funded content has not
> been quantified. This could lead to the government seeing open licensing
> as a niche topic pushed by special interest groups, not seen as a “vote
> winner”.
>
>
> I’m exploring the idea of starting a 38 Degrees campaign with both a
> public petition and endorsement by organisations to ask the government
> to mandate open licenses for publicly funded content and data. Something
> like:
>
>
> Publicly funded work to be reusable and shareable by the public:
>
>   *
>
>     Content to be released under a OGL/CC-BY license or CC0.
>
>   *
>
>     Data to be released under CC0
>
>
> One thing that would be immensely useful is to understand what content
> and data would be made available if this were to be enacted. Does anyone
> know of any way to find out this information?
>
> A similar project was attempted in Poland but it was challenged by the
> creative sector who saw it as an attempt to steal creators rights, any
> suggestions on how to add a caveat to avoid this would be greatly
> appreciated.
>
> I've started a proposal here for anyone interested in reading it, any
> comments or information would be greatly appreciated. If you'd like to
> share this with other lists please do.
> https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EO4vNPUEfIBIJFUBMWu36_FQRfy5GMiaps9OEQO_AqQ/edit?usp=sharing
>
> Many thanks
> John

-- 
John Levin
http://www.anterotesis.com
http://twitter.com/anterotesis