Day July 12, 2018

PIJIP Professor Carroll Co-authors National Academies of Science Report: Open Science by Design

PIJIP Director Michael Carroll served on an ad hoc committee under the N.A.S. Board on Research Data and Information which has completed a study on the challenges of broadening access to the results of scientific research, described as “open science.” The study, Open Science by Design: Realizing a Vision for 21st Century Research, will be formally released on Tuesday, July 17 at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine Keck Center.

The European Commission’s New Proposal for Re-Use of Public Sector Information: Improving But Some Fixes Still Required

[Katarzyna Strycharz] Today, Communia submitted feedback to the European Commission on its proposal to amend the Directive on the re-use of public sector information. This is the second time the Commission has proposed to update the legal framework for access to and re-use of Public Sector Information (PSI) since the Directive was adopted in 2003. The most important changes from the previous amendment (2013) was the introduction of a genuine right to re-use by making  all content that can be accessed under national access to documents laws reusable, and expanding the scope of the Directive to cover libraries, museums, and archives. This time, the European Commission has proposed to make more research data available, extends the scope to public undertakings (including transportation data), and further limits the scenarios in which public entities may charge for data. This proposal was preceded by public consultations (see COMMUNIA’s response). We support the proposal to amend Directive, but at the same time we want to draw attention to some issues where the proposal should be improved.