User:Dominic/Sandbox

Open Access Statement

Archives, libraries, museums, and other institutions, as stewards of cultural heritage, have a duty to promote free access and use of cultural works they preserve. In particular, the advent of the Internet and the rise of a digital information commons demands that institutions strive to produce digital copies of their works, and that they do so while ensuring, through all legal and practical means, downstream use. The Public Domain Manifesto includes the following appeal:

"Cultural heritage institutions should take upon themselves a special role in the effective labeling and preserving of Public Domain works. Not-for-profit cultural heritage organizations have been entrusted with preservation of our shared knowledge and culture for centuries. As part of this role they need to ensure that works in the Public Domain are available to all of society, by labeling them, preserving them and making them freely available."

We seek to support this position and meet the challenges of providing fair access by adhering to this set of principles.

Principles

Free access

The National Archives seeks to always uphold the principle, as phrased in the ICA Code of Ethics, to "promote the widest possible access to archival material and provide an impartial service to all users". Library and museum professionals adhere to codes of ethics with similar language. We believe that all holdings should be freely accessible to the public, except where issues of privacy, confidentiality, or other ethical or legal concerns prevent that. It follows from this principle that institutions should:

• Allow photography or scanning of exhibits and collections for free, where the items' condition permits.
• Make digital copies available to the public free of charge, in their highest-quality version, and using open file formats.

Free use

It also follows from the principle of free and open access to holdings that institutions should encourage free downstream use of reproductions of their holdings. Institutions preserve works of cultural heritage so that they may be disseminated and used by the public and used by the public for the creation of new works. However many cultural institutions cultivate practices that stifle free use of their holdings, by providing low-resolution digital copies of works that are unsuitable for many possible uses or by using copyright to place onerous restrictions on uses, like prohibiting commercial uses. In order to best ensure the possibility of all potential downstream uses, we believe that:

• Institutions should not claim their own copyright on mechanical reproductions of works. Works in the public domain should never be allowed to reenter copyright through such means.
• Institutions should strive to mark the copyright status of their collections as clearly as possible, and make every reasonable effort to determine copyright statuses. Copyright ambiguity will cause many potential reusers to avoid a work.
• Institutions should not hold a copyright on their collections except under a free license like. Such licenses allow the institution to be given credit in derivative works, but are still copyright claims and would be inappropriate for works originally in the public domain.
• Educational content and metadata produced by the institution should be explicitly licensed freely.
• Institutions should seek always to encourage donors to release their material into the public domain or at least under a free license, before accepting donations.

The National Archives is in a unique position when compared to most cultural institutions globally because so much of its holdings, even 20th-century works, are in the public domain as works of the United States federal government. We believe that works of the government, at any level, should be in the public domain, since they have been created by and for the people.

The advent of a digital information commons and an online culture of collaboration and sharing has created tremendous new opportunities for the exchange of ideas and cultural heritage, but they also require us to rethink our traditional notions of access and freedom of information. We still have much work to do with respect to our own institutional practices and internal culture, but we are committed to these principles. We call upon all archives, libraries, museums, galleries, and other cultural institutions to join us in this effort.

Related statements

• ICA Code of Ethics: "Archivists should promote the widest possible access to archival material and provide an impartial service to all users."

• IFLA Statement on Open Access: "The International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) is committed to the principles of freedom of access to information and the belief that universal and equitable access to information is vital for the social, educational, cultural, democratic, and economic well-being of people, communities, and organizations."

• SAA Code of Ethics: "Archivists strive to promote open and equitable access to their services and the records in their care without discrimination or preferential treatment, and in accordance with legal requirements, cultural sensitivities, and institutional policies. Archivists recognize their responsibility to promote the use of records as a fundamental purpose of the keeping of archives."

• ALA Code of Ethics: "We significantly influence or control the selection, organization, preservation, and dissemination of information. In a political system grounded in an informed citizenry, we are members of a profession explicitly committed to intellectual freedom and the freedom of access to information. We have a special obligation to ensure the free flow of information and ideas to present and future generations."

• Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities: In order to realize the vision of a global and accessible representation of knowledge, the future Web has to be sustainable, interactive, and transparent. Content and software tools must be openly accessible and compatible. Establishing open access as a worthwhile procedure ideally requires the active commitment of each and every individual producer of scientific knowledge and holder of cultural heritage.

• Public Domain Manifesto: "Cultural heritage institutions should take upon themselves a special role in the effective labeling and preserving of Public Domain works. Not-for-profit cultural heritage organizations have been entrusted with preservation of our shared knowledge and culture for centuries. As part of this role they need to ensure that works in the Public Domain are available to all of society, by labeling them, preserving them and making them freely available."