The EU has launched a consultation on European digital libraries. Excerpt:
The European Commission today [September 30] unveiled its strategy to make Europe’s written and audiovisual heritage available on the Internet. Turning Europe’s historic and cultural heritage into digital content will make it usable for European citizens for their studies, work or leisure and will give innovators, artists and entrepreneurs the raw material that they need. The Commission proposes a concerted drive by EU Member States to digitise, preserve, and make this heritage available to all. It presents a first set of actions at European level and invites comments on a series of issues in an online consultation (deadline for replies 20 January 2006). The replies will feed into a proposal for a Recommendation on digitisation and digital preservation, to be presented in June 2006.
The consultation documents include an FAQ on European digital libraries. Excerpt:
Initiatives that improve the accessibility and flow of information are good for the knowledge economy, and the digital libraries initiative has a considerable economic potential. Once digitised, our cultural and scientific heritage can be used as input for a wide range of information products and services....Google’s [Library] initiative is an example that shows the potential of the online environment for making information more accessible for all. The sheer size of the announced operation – 15 million books – appeals to the imagination. The initiative has certainly triggered a reflection on how to deal with our European cultural heritage in the digital age. It is also interesting in that it highlights the possibilities for public/private initiatives in this area. Public/private partnerships or sponsoring by private companies will accelerate digitisation....Under current legislation only public domain works (where there is no longer copyright) can be made available to the public online. For other works, digital libraries need to get the explicit agreement of rightholders. In practice this means that only works from the 1920s or before will be covered in a digital library, or works for which there is an agreement, on a case by case basis, with the rightholders.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 9/30/2005 10:38:00 AM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
