(1 April 2015) In a bid for fair copyright laws that will benefit citizens and researchers across Europe, organisations including the Wellcome Trust, the National Library of Scotland, the National Library of Wales, the Chartered Institute of Library & Information Professionals, Royal Museums Greenwich and the Open Rights Group have called for much needed reforms.
The London Manifesto calls for fair copyright for libraries and archives across Europe. The manifesto outlines needed reforms that will better support research, innovation and growth and will help create a digital single market. It focuses on the important role of libraries and archives.
The reforms would bolster the rights of disabled people by supporting equal access to knowledge. They would mean that libraries can acquire and lend commercially available digital materials and, with archives, can continue to underpin knowledgeable societies in the digital age. The reforms would allow libraries and archives to better support research through modern text and data mining techniques. They would also create a more manageable system of harmonised copyright laws across EU member states.
Read the announcement and the manifesto here.
