Knowledge Rights 21 (KR21): 21st Century Access to Culture, Learning and Research in Europe Programme Formally Launches Today

From a Joint Launch Announcement (via International Federation of Library Associations – IFLA):

Knowledge Rights 21 (KR21) formally launches today. We are grateful to Arcadia, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin, for its grant of €3m over three years awarded to the Knowledge Rights 21 programme to Stichting IFLA Foundation (SIF). SIF will work with key partner associations – IFLA, LIBER, SPARC Europe as well as experts to strengthen the voice of libraries.

KR21 will be advocating for a 21st century copyright environment across Europe that is friendly to the modern delivery and use of education and research materials as well as the spread of culture and heritage in the digital age.

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Working with public, national, educational, health and research libraries, universities and the wider access to knowledge movement, we aim to build networks and promote copyright reform at the European and national levels, and through our work leave a lasting legacy that influences similar developments elsewhere in the world.

We shall work in the following key areas:

• Facilitating fair access to e-books for users of public, national, educational and research libraries;
• Protecting users’ rights under copyright legislation from contract override and technological protection measures that undermine statutory exceptions to copyright;
• Promoting the case for the introduction of open and flexible copyright norms in Europe to aid research, teaching and learning;
• Advocating for a legislated scholarly publication / secondary publishing right in laws;
• Accelerating the uptake of author rights retention activities and open licensing in Europe.

Read the Complete Launch Announcement

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