WIPO To Use Creative Commons Licences For All Of Its Publications

The UN World Intellectual Property Organization, the foremost international body for intellectual property rights, today announced that it will make all of its publications available under Creative Commons licences – which said it helped to develop along with other organisations. The move, made along with a wide range of other major international organisations, is an effort to make its publications as widely accessible as possible, an indirect nod to the limiting nature of copyright.

The announcement comes during the weeklong meeting of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR).

The WIPO press release is reprinted below:

WIPO Adopts Open Access Policy for its Publications
Geneva, November 16, 2016
PR/2016/801

The World Intellectual Property Organization today announced its new Open Access policy to promote the widest possible public access to its publications, furthering the Organization’s commitment to the dissemination and sharing of knowledge.

As the world reference source for intellectual property-related information, WIPO houses extensive collections of publications that include studies, reports, guides, and other learning resources. The Open Access policy will facilitate access for policy-makers, researchers, practitioners and anyone else seeking to use and build upon these resources.

“WIPO’s publications are unique collections of valuable information,” said WIPO Director General Francis Gurry. “Our Open Access policy formalizes our efforts to ensure that this wealth of knowledge is ever-more readily available for use by everyone.”

To support the implementation of the Open Access Policy, WIPO will use the suite of Creative Commons Intergovernmental Organizations (IGO) licenses, which it helped develop with a group of international organizations in 2013. Creative Commons licenses are a widely used and easily understood set of copyright tools and model agreements that facilitate access to and use of creative content.

From now, new publications created and wholly owned by WIPO, as well as a selection of existing publications, will be licensed under the CC-BY 3.0 IGO license or one of the other licenses in the Creative Commons IGO suite.  WIPO publications available under Creative Commons licenses will be clearly identified and searchable within the publications area of the WIPO website.

Through these widely used tools, WIPO is supporting open archive initiatives that promote the dissemination of content through interoperability standards and efficient licensing schemes.