How can equitable access to heritage help solve global challenges? That is the question we addressed during our Exploratory Dialogue, a major event we hosted on 29 April, 2026, at UNESCO House in Paris, France, to celebrate the Open Heritage Statement and explore its synergies with UNESCO’s priorities in tackling the most urgent problems facing the world today. 

In this blog post, we set the event in its wider context, look back at some of the highlights from the discussions, report on our key takeaways, and pave the way for what comes next. 

The Dialogue in Context

This Dialogue was the culmination of years of research and consultations, policy analysis, movement building, and community mobilization, as well as global advocacy efforts towards more equitable access to public domain heritage in the digital environment. You can read more about the journey that took us from shared vision to global action. A remarkable milestone, the Dialogue brought together over 100 participants, including UNESCO staff, Permanent Delegation representatives, National Commissions, cultural heritage practitioners, funders, and open heritage advocates and enthusiasts from around the world.

Our aim by convening this Dialogue was twofold. It was an opportune moment to recognize the joint efforts of the Open Heritage Coalition and its global network of ambassadors in elaborating the Open Heritage Statement, a declaration of principles anchored in our shared belief in the positive potential of equitable access to heritage. This event was dedicated to the hard work, energy, and collaborative spirit that turned shared ideals into a tangible plea to fill an enormous international policy gap. Indeed, despite open heritage’s clear potential for achieving UNESCO’s key policy objectives, there are still multiple undue, unfair barriers to access to heritage in the public domain, and the Coalition was convinced that greater awareness, mobilization, and political will were needed among UNESCO Member States. 

Hence the Dialogue was also a favorable occasion to explore how access to heritage in all its forms can make a significant contribution to achieving UNESCO’s mandate of addressing global challenges. Specifically, it was a critical opportunity to sensitize UNESCO stakeholders to the relevance of the Open Heritage Statement as a foundation for further discussions across diverse areas of UNESCO’s mandate and in a cross-sectoral, transversal approach, spanning areas of heritage protection, preservation, and sharing, of course, but also access to education, to the fight against climate change, all the way to artistic creativity and cultural diversity, social inclusion, ethical artificial intelligence, and more. 

Key Takeaways

The discussion brought together diverse experts from across the world and showcased various real-life examples in which equitable access to public domain heritage can make a positive impact in many of UNESCO’s priorities, in line with its mandate and in support of the fundamental right to participate in cultural life. Their perspectives helped us understand how access to heritage is vital in the digital environment as well as how unfair barriers keep impeding such access.

For more information, you can see the full program, read the detailed summary of each session, and watch the recordings in English and French.

A resounding message united these interventions into a coherent narrative: there is an urgent need to lower the barriers that unfairly hamper access and prevent us from sustaining resilient and connected societies. Open heritage is a means to advance cultural policy goals aiming to remove unfair socio-economic barriers to access to heritage in the digital environment, in accordance, notably, with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Global collective action is now more important than ever, because without global policy alignment, the full potential of open heritage remains largely unrealized.

Future Outlook: From Dialogue to Recommendation 

Sign the Open Heritage Statement

We are very proud of what the Open Heritage Coalition has accomplished. Well before its deadline, it reached its objectives of developing the Open Heritage Statement alongside a comprehensive advocacy strategy and campaign. As our movement evolves into its next phase, the Coalition is no longer accepting new members. As the new anchor point in this dynamic initiative, we encourage organizations and institutions to sign the Open Heritage Statement and join the momentum built by close to 100 signatories to date in order to show broad alignment and global support. To add your voice to the call, visit openheritagestatement.org and sign the Statement today. 

Explore the Feasibility of an Open Heritage Recommendation

We call on UNESCO Member States to join the dialogue towards additional action by UNESCO to ensure equitable access to public domain heritage in the digital environment, possibly even by co-creating a new normative instrument, in accordance with UNESCO’s existing normative framework. Recently, UNESCO has demonstrated a strong commitment to open through the 2019 Recommendation on Open Educational Resources (OER) and the 2021 Recommendation on Open Science. These recommendations were game changers. A UNESCO Recommendation on Open Heritage would be the next logical step.

To achieve this, UNESCO Member States should explore the feasibility of elaborating a standard-setting instrument (a Recommendation) that would proactively promote and encourage open solutions to removing barriers to accessing heritage in the public domain, being mindful of the various governance frameworks that determine the ways in which heritage is shared and used. 

We believe this Dialogue, and new initiatives to be taken in its wake, will further strengthen cooperation between UNESCO and Creative Commons, harnessing the obvious synergies and setting the stage for international discussions aiming to consolidate best practices and enshrine our common aspiration: ensuring equitable access to heritage.

The post How can Equitable Access to Heritage Help Solve Global Challenges? An Exploratory Dialogue appeared first on Creative Commons.

We are proud to announce that we are now established as an official NGO partner to UNESCO (consultative status). UNESCO stands for “United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization” and is the UN’s specialized agency that aims to foster international cooperation in the fields of education, science, culture, and communication. 

This new, formal status is an important recognition of the synergies between our two organizations and of our shared commitment to openness as a means to benefit everyone worldwide.  As an official NGO partner, Creative Commons (CC) will now have the opportunity to contribute to UNESCO’s program and to interact with other official partner NGOs with common goals. In particular, we look forward to: 

• Participating in UNESCO meetings and consultations on various subjects core to CC’s mission. This will give us a seat at the table to advocate for the communities we serve and share our expertise on openness, the commons, and access to knowledge.
• Participating in UNESCO’s governing bodies in an observer capacity. This will enable us to deliver official statements on matters within our sphere of expertise and contribute to determining UNESCO’s policies and main lines of work, including its programs and budget. 
• Taking part in consultations about UNESCO’s strategy and program and being involved in UNESCO’s programming cycle. This will give us opportunities to communicate our views and suggestions on proposals by the Director-General.  

Becoming an official partner is a testament to our rich and long-standing collaboration with UNESCO over the past 24 years. Over this time, CC and our community have developed trusted relationships with UNESCO staff and Member State representatives, yielding many opportunities to engage and collaborate effectively.

For example, CC was deeply involved with and supported the development of UNESCO’s 2019 Recommendation on Open Educational Resources (OER), and continues to play an important role in its implementation. CC participated in the 3rd UNESCO World OER Congress in November 2024 as well as in the UNESCO Dynamic OER Coalition meeting to make final recommendations on the Dubai Declaration on OER. 

Likewise, CC contributed to the development of the UNESCO 2021 Recommendation on Open Science and advised UNESCO in adopting its open access policy, where CC licenses are a core component. 

At the International Conference of the Memory of the World Programme: Memory of the World: at the Crossroads of International Understanding and Cooperation in October 2024, we engaged in conversations about the importance of preserving and supporting access to heritage, as well as the many challenges archives, libraries, and museums face in ensuring intercultural collaboration on a global scale. 

These achievements are a testament to the dedication of CC community members promoting openness globally and to the many open champions within UNESCO.

Today, as we steer the Towards a Recommendation on Open Cultural Heritage (TAROCH) Coalition, we draw inspiration from UNESCO’s Memory of the World Program and 2015 Recommendation concerning the preservation of, and access to, documentary heritage, including in digital form, to advance equitable access to public domain heritage. In 2020, we collaborated with the Memory of the World Regional Committee for Asia-Pacific (MOWCAP) and UNESCO Bangkok in a webinar series to promote universal access to documentary heritage. 

As we continue to advance TAROCH, we know that the role of open solutions in removing unfair economic, legal, technological, and sociocultural barriers to access heritage, while fostering creative reuse and telling the stories of our shared humanity, is more important than ever. 

Looking Ahead

We look forward to the exciting new opportunities for strategic collaboration on the horizon. 

With Mondiacult 2025, the world’s biggest cultural policy conference, taking place soon, we look forward to assisting UNESCO in delivering on its key priority of “ensuring equitable access to heritage,” as indicated in the Mondiacult 2025 concept note. CC’s efforts through TAROCH to remove barriers, support interoperability, and create and share heritage with open licenses and tools can strengthen equitable access to heritage. Once heritage is accessible, we collectively have the opportunity to build more connected, resilient, and sustainable societies. Make sure to join us at our Mondiacult virtual side event on September 17, 2025.

For more information:

• Contact us at info@creativecommons.org   
• Join the TAROCH Coalition 

The post Creative Commons Becomes an Official UNESCO NGO Partner appeared first on Creative Commons.

The CC Open Education community had a busy 2023!  Five project teams, spanning nine countries, worked on open education projects ranging from developing STEAM, interactive, and climate change-related OER, to international curriculum alignment and translation work. Community members also worked on multimedia resources supporting the UNESCO Recommendation on OER, and presented in CC’s biannual Open Education Lightning Talks. Community members reflect on their accomplishments, lessons learned and what is next below. CC staff lightly edited text for clarity.

Building a K-12 Interactive Open Textbook

Update from Werner Westermann: This project developed a K-12 Open Textbook in the subject of Civics and Citizenship subject for 11th and 12th Grade, aligned to the official K-12 curriculum of Chile. With the CC funding, we made 60% progress on one Open Textbook for 11th grade, surpassing our initial goal. We worked with teachers, creators of the interactive resources and a graphic designer on all four learning units of the 11th grade Open Textbook, as defined by Chile’s official curriculum for Civics and Citizenship. To help others’ open education projects, we share some lessons we encountered:

• This type of community engagement requires specific and explicit guidelines and benchmarks for quality. Like any book development, this Open Textbook required a general editor to orchestrate community contributions, manage expectations, and enforce quality guidelines and benchmarks. 
• Standardized workflows are necessary.  It was most efficient to load content, then follow up with graphic and interactive resources, rather than focus on those specifics first. We tested an AI Smart Import tool that creates H5P interactive resources in seconds, in order to save up to 50% development time.  
• Community adoption of a tech tool (the H5P editor in our case) requires flexibility to adapt to the tool for mastery. We had a lot of discussions about what H5P could and could not achieve. For better results, postpone specific expectations and work on what is editor enabled.

What’s next? The next step is to complete the 11th grade Open Textbook development and publish it, pending funding.  We also await an AI tool for Spanish support to speed up production.

Popularization of OER in Ukraine: Small steps to a big goal

Update from Tetiana Kolesnykova: Polytechnic University of Milan and the Ukrainian State University of Science and Technologies (USUST) partnered to translate and localize a MOOC on OER: “Using Open Educational Resources in Teaching.” This OER provides equitable and inclusive access to education amidst full-scale war in Ukraine. Despite the war, the project achieved its aim: there is now a version of the MOOC for Ukrainian learners. Our lessons from this work included: listening to each other, negotiating where needed, and compromise. We were not looking for perfection but for a good result to be achieved within all limitations. With teamwork and strong motivation, we solved the challenges of the project together; and the end result exceeded our expectations. As a result: All MOOC subtitles for each video, the course description and all tests were made available in Ukrainian, ensuring participants gain a better understanding and support with the final assessment. We also created eight additional instructions and illustrations in Ukrainian. We developed a mock-up of the Certificate of Completion of the course “Using Open Educational Resources in Teaching” adapted into Ukrainian. Several faculty and librarians tested the MOOC in Ukrainian.

We started promoting the Ukrainian localisation of the MOOC “Using Open Educational Resources in Teaching” in October. Politecnico di Milano (METID) and the Scientific Library of the Ukrainian State University of Science and Technologies (USUST) presented our collaborative project at international conferences, national webinars, publications, and on the website of the USUST Scientific Library.

While it is too early to measure the success of the Ukrainian MOOC “Using Open Educational Resources in Teaching,” we know it is already raising awareness of OER opportunities among the wider Ukrainian academic community. 

What’s next?  We will continue our teamwork, and ignite new OER adaptations in a sustainable way.

STEAM Ahead with OER in South Africa project

Update from Dan McGuire: This collaborative project between Ghana, South Africa and the US created, curated, and sourced OER content aligned to Ghanaian and South African education standards.  

Our colleague, Peter Amoabil observed that using the MoodleBox and OER materials provided learning opportunities for students without the need to rely on the internet, which is very useful in Ghana where over 95% of schools don’t have internet access. Students were able to use the digital content for all subjects and especially for reading in their mother tongue, Dagbani. Reading materials in Dagbani have previously been very hard to acquire.

In South Africa, we were able to translate both reading materials and math assessments from English into isiXhosa for students in grades Pre-K through 1st grade. Students were excited to learn using WIFI devices.

What’s next? Translating educational materials into the students’ mother tongue is especially valuable and innovative. We plan to expand the professional development for use of digital OER materials aligned to national standards to more teachers in both Ghana and South Africa. This project helped us establish a process to create and deliver learning materials to Pre-K — 6th grade students. We will also be making the OER professional development courses and instructional content available via open repositories.

Climate Change: OER integrating SDG components in Education in two Southeast Asian Countries

Update from Dr. Suma Parahakaran: This project worked with the Malaysian Ministry of Education as well as Malaysian and Laotian schools, creating OER and experiential learning activities. Primary and Secondary school students engaged in cross disciplinary, technical, and integrated learning activities, such as setting up solar panels on rooftops. They got to attend workshops and brainstorms with international experts and teachers. Students also created videos, brochures and other resources focused on ethics, climate change and sustainable development education. Finally, students then entered a competition related to Climate Change and Sustainable Development OER. For more information and results of the competition, view the project website. 

What’s next? While there are private Youtube links to the videos, they will be made public soon. Project lead: Dr. Suma Parahakaran

Alquimetricos

Update from Fernando Daguanno: Alquimétricos is an OER project that uses connectors and sticks to build geometric structures for STEAM education. Through experiential learning, the project develops students’ spatial, mathematical and kinetic understanding. The Alquimétricos Kit Zero is already published online and available to purchase: see our repositories for ready-to-print and fully editable CC BY files, including content, packaging and labeling. 

During 2023 we developed a new product line of elementary-school-oriented kits, drawing from eight years of experiences and research. The kits include a deck of cards with guidelines, a bunch of hubs and sticks that help educators make Alquimétricos’ activities dynamic in the classroom. The new kit was developed and introduced as part of the (FADU-UBA) DiJu post degree “Toys and Games Design” course 2023. It was launched in Argentina at the Open Education Meeting in Bariloche – Argentinian Patagonia, presented at the OpenEd Conference 2023 and displayed at the CC Global Summit in Mexico City.

What’s next? Next steps include translation to Portuguese and English and sharing the project in global OER repositories. We will seek support proofreading and sharking Kit Zero in a community call in early 2024. 

Global Commons: Unlocking Open Education with Creative Commons

Update from Lisa Di Valentino and John Okewole: This project developed a short animated video describing Creative Commons and how CC licenses support the implementation of the United Nations Recommendation on OER. We currently have a first version of the video created by Brainboxx Studios for which we will re-record the English narration. We have also solicited translations of the transcript from other subgroup members in the nine other UNESCO languages, and have offers for translation in Arabic, Chinese, Hindi, Italian (of which we now have a draft), and Spanish. 

What’s next? We will finalize the English video and determine how to translate the video text.  We will also design handouts in the various languages explaining the benefits of using Creative Commons licensing for open educational resources.

CC Open Education Lightning Talks

Lightning Talks are seven-minute presentations on a given area of expertise or work. Based on community demand, CC hosted Open Education Lighting Talks online in February and in-person, at the CC Summit in October. Community members’  presentations ranged from explorations of OER for social justice to practical applications, such as using machine translation algorithms for OER translation and recommendations for digital publishing. CC also presented a forthcoming microcredential course on which we are partnering with the University of Nebraska Omaha, in effort to bring more open licensing expertise to new audiences. 

What’s next? We look forward to learning more from the open education community in future CC Open Education Lightning Talks!

Creative Commons extends our gratitude to the inspiring CC community members making a difference in their educational contexts. We look forward to continued open education collaborations in 2024! If you would like to join our Open Education community, visit the CC Open Education Platform site for more information.

The post CC Open Education Platform Activities: 2023 in Review appeared first on Creative Commons.

Today we celebrate the 20th anniversary of the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage. This convention was an important milestone in recognizing intangible cultural heritage or ICH — expressions of culture like performances, oral traditions, rituals and traditional knowledge — as an essential part of the world’s cultural heritage that deserves recognition and protection just like tangible heritage, such as sites and monuments. These cultural manifestations  keep heritage alive, and safeguarding them takes more than documentation — transmission from person to person and from generation to generation is key to their survival.

Over the last 20 years, hundreds of ICH elements have been officially recognized by UNESCO, offering them greater visibility and celebrating the diverse ways in which communities express, recreate and transmit their cultural heritage. In the Open Culture Program at Creative Commons, we believe that better sharing of ICH — i.e. making it available for broad access and reuse ethically, equitably, inclusively, respectfully, and responsibly — can be a catalyst for its safeguarding.

Through better sharing, ICH can be revitalized and expressed through new narratives with new voices, renewed, brought into modern contexts, and can be a part of today’s cultural landscape, sustaining dynamic evolution and transmission, in accordance with their bearers’ rights, wishes, needs, and aspirations. Better sharing helps to ensure that ICH manifestations can live beyond the database and continue to enrich the world’s diversity of cultural expressions. One example is the Wiki Loves Living Heritage project, supporting community work in documenting and sharing ICH around the world with the communities’ free, prior and informed consent. The initiative by Te Hiku Media to revitalize Te Reo Māori, the Māori language, as highlighted in Peter-Lucas Jones’s keynote at the CC Global Summit 2023, is a prime example of the importance of language as a vehicle for ICH transmission and safeguarding.

Better sharing to support safeguarding is one of the reasons why we are now leading a community initiative called “Towards a Recommendation on Open Culture” (TAROC), building upon the 2022 UNESCO Mondiacult Declaration’s recognition of culture as a global public good. This initiative aims to support the international community in developing a positive, affirmative, and influential international normative instrument (a “recommendation”) enshrining the values, objectives, and mechanisms for open culture to flourish. In the past few years, UNESCO adopted Recommendations for Open Educational Resources and Open Science, but there is currently no international instrument enshrining Open Culture. Such an instrument would recognize the importance of better sharing of culture as a means to activate and buttress wider cultural and information policy ambitions, including the safeguarding of ICH.

Learn more about the CC community’s TAROC initiative > Also in Shqiptare, Français, Español, 日本語.

Watch this space for more about TAROC and contact us at info@creativecommons.org to see how you can get involved in promoting open culture around the world.

The post CC Celebrates 20 Years of the UNESCO Convention on Safeguarding Intangible Heritage appeared first on Creative Commons.

“Group photo at CC’s Open Culture Roundtable in Lisbon” licensed CC BY 4.0

As part of our Open Culture Program, we at Creative Commons (CC) are exploring avenues to build momentum towards a UNESCO Recommendation on Open Culture. On 11 May, 2023, we hosted our first in-person Open Culture event, in Lisbon, Portugal. In this blog post, we look back at the day’s highlights and map out next steps.

Background

Over the past decade, the open movement has made incredible strides in the cultural sector — take a look at some of the pioneers — yet it is still facing major barriers and challenges. But challenges are opportunities in disguise. In September last year, UNESCO declared culture a global public good at Mondiacult 2022. With the successes of the 2019 UNESCO Recommendation on Open Educational Resources and 2021 Recommendation on Open Science, the world looks to UNESCO’s leadership to create the necessary international framework that would unlock the possibilities of equitable, ethical, and respectful sharing of cultural heritage in the digital age: a UNESCO Recommendation on Open Culture. For an explanation of useful terms related to open culture, take a look at the glossary developed by the CC open culture platform.

Meeting highlights

Recognizing that such an international instrument requires deliberative, inclusive community consultations, the in-person event focused on the foundational work of gathering community input. Structured around a co-created agenda and under the able guidance of Abdul Dube and Mona Ebdrup, facilitators at Visual Confidence, just under 40 experts gathered to exchange views and open initial discussions on the need to realize open culture as a global public good. 

Participants came from far and wide across the open movement and beyond, spanning the fields of law, library science, policy, design, anthropology, history, museum curation, international organizations, and many others. Attending from CC’s team were Brigitte Vézina, Director of Policy and Open Culture; Connor Benedict, Open Culture Coordinator; Jennryn Wetzler, Director of Learning and Training; and Jocelyn Miyara, Open Culture Manager. 

During convivial, engaged, polyphonous and cross-pollinating conversations, we exchanged our diverse perspectives; explored potential common grounds on backgrounds and contexts, core issues, and key principles; built a common understanding of what we collectively want to achieve; and elaborated a skeleton of a shared vision for “open culture.” Issues discussed included the role of copyright over access to cultural heritage, the impact of artificial intelligence, the “platformization” of culture, a sense of a generational shift in the open movement, the need to account for ethical sharing, the economics of open culture, open beyond “GLAMs” (galleries, libraries, archives and museums), the need for diversity and inclusivity in global and local contexts (including traditional knowledge and Indigenous rights), a vision for open culture in 100 years, and a lot more!

Take a look at the meeting’s graphic record, offering a visual summary of the diverse perspectives that felt most resonant within our breakout groups and that surfaced in plenary debriefs.

Our work together was organized in three flows or movements. Flow #1: Mapping our Collective Knowledge, Flow #2: Context Mapping, and Flow #3: Bold Steps. These movements were designed to help us gather our collective knowledge, and hold multiple perspectives and truths at the same time.

In our first flow, participants were divided into five groups to discuss the History of Open Culture, and then came back together to identify key themes. This is a visual representation of some themes that were discussed including ownership, western references and achievements, emerging opportunities in a quickly changing context, missing global south perspectives and the emergence of AI with its risks and benefits. © Creative Commons / Abdul Dube and Mona Ebdrup, CC BY 4.0

In our first flow, participants were divided into five groups to discuss the History of Open Culture, and then came back together to identify key themes. This is a visual representation of some themes that were discussed, including ownership, western references and achievements, emerging opportunities in a quickly changing context, missing global south perspectives and the emergence of AI with its risks and benefits.

In Flow #2, groups met again to discuss the context around open culture, including the political climate, internal and outside trends, economic climate, tech factors, stakeholder needs and uncertainties. A few major themes were the desire to build bridges, the need to accommodate diverse needs of diverse stakeholders, the desire to identify what our shared goals are and to better define the role of open culture. © Creative Commons / Abdul Dube and Mona Ebdrup, CC BY 4.0

In Flow #2, groups met again to discuss the context around open culture, including the political climate, internal and outside trends, economic climate, tech factors, stakeholder needs and uncertainties. A few major themes were the desire to build bridges, the need to accommodate diverse needs of diverse stakeholders, the desire to identify what our shared goals are and to better define the role of open culture.

In our third and final flow, we discussed “Bold Steps toward Open Culture”. By focusing on our values, supports, and challenges, we discussed what bold steps we might make toward our shared vision of the future of Open Culture. Major themes included discussions around partnerships between public and private actors; division between public and private interests and the need to build sustainable and reliable relationships, need for economic resources to support open, and the desire to meet with more diverse stakeholders. © Creative Commons / Abdul Dube and Mona Ebdrup, CC BY 4.0

In our third and final flow, we discussed “Bold Steps toward Open Culture”. By focusing on our values, supports, and challenges, we discussed what bold steps we might make toward our shared vision of the future of Open Culture. Major themes included discussions around partnerships between public and private actors; division between public and private interests and the need to build sustainable and reliable relationships, need for economic resources to support open, and the desire to meet with more diverse stakeholders.

Participants appreciated the opportunity to meet peers and build new relationships, and got a sense of the possibilities of going down a common path together. While in-person meetings such as this cannot include all of the perspectives needed, participants noted the value of in-person discussions to probe various approaches to open culture deeply. We aim to offer additional avenues to include more perspectives in follow-up activities.

Here’s what some of the participants shared about their experience: 

“The CC Open Culture Roundtable was an opportunity to meet and engage with open culture experts and advocates around the world and see how, despite the many contextual differences, there are meaningful ways for us to collaborate and shape nuanced, context-mindful perspectives for projects and policies aiming at a shared and open culture.”

— Mariana Valente, Assistant Professor in law, University of St. Gallen, Switzerland and Associate Director, InternetLab (Brazil).

“It was a great opportunity to hold first discussions about the initiative, and it allowed me to reflect on possible options further.” 

— Gašper Hrastelj, Secretary General, Slovenian National Commission for UNESCO

“The CC Open Culture Roundtable was a perfect opportunity to meet in person to discuss Open Culture, and it allowed me to enlarge my view and learn other perspectives.”

— Deborah de Angelis, Chapter Lead, Creative Commons Italy

“The CC Open Culture Roundtable was a great opportunity to meet people from diverse organizations and parts of the world, and it allowed me to see different perspectives on IP and ‘openness’ as a concept and movement.”

— Matt Voigts, Copyright and Open Access Policy Officer, IFLA

“It was an excellent opportunity to bring different open culture stakeholders together and reignite and expand important discussions among them. And it allowed me to reflect on the possibilities in my reach to contribute more effectively to the progress of open culture, both locally and globally.”

— Fátima São Simão, Chapter Lead, Creative Commons Portugal

“It was an inspiring opportunity to share ideas of the open culture and notice that there are a lot of people trying to solve similar questions from different angles, and it allowed me to meet many new and interesting people and to enjoy working together.”

— Johanna Lilja, Director of Services, National Library of Finland, and IFLA Cultural Heritage Advisory Board

“For me, it was an opportunity to do a historical reflection exercise where we were able to look at how we have grown as a movement. And it allowed me to collaborate in the construction of a more or less common concept or idea of what is understood in different corners of the world as “open culture”. It also allowed me to connect with people who are doing amazing projects.”

— Ivan Martinez, Coordinator, Creative Commons Mexico

“The CC Open Culture Roundtable was a first step on a exploratory journey on how GLAMs could be better supported through open approaches to public domain material. It allowed me to understand the diversity of stakeholders’ perspectives on the issue.”

— Lutz Möller, Deputy Secretary-General, German National Commission for UNESCO

“The CC Open Culture Roundtable was a pitstop for ongoing discussions around the importance of open culture, and it allowed me to reconnect to the wider international community.”

— Maarten Zeinstra, Owner, IP Squared and Member, Creative Commons Netherlands

“It was firstly a chance to meet people who are actively involved in the movement, particularly from different contexts, it allowed me to better see somewhat paradoxically the boundaries of open culture, and have the space to start to think about what openness means for knowledges outside of the legal frameworks of IP.”

— Abira Hussein, Advisor, Whose (Digital) Archives? and Lab Partner, GLAM-E Lab

“The CC Open Culture Roundtable was a warm gathering of fellow travelers and it allowed us to imagine new ways to act together.”

— Fiona Romeo, Senior Manager, Culture and Heritage, Wikimedia Foundation 

Next steps

We are excited to take the outcomes of our Lisbon event forward. We are already planning to continue the conversation at the CC Summit in Mexico in October, and hopefully at GLAM Wiki 2023 in Montevideo, Uruguay in November this year. We will also organize multiple virtual opportunities to contribute as we engage more community members in our work on open culture.

Interested in knowing more about CC’s work in the field of open culture? Join our open culture platform or write to us at info@creativecommons.org. 

The post A look at CC’s Open Culture Roundtable in Lisbon appeared first on Creative Commons.

“Creative Commons a vessel ideas” by opensourceway is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0..

We ran a successful French translation, as well as the first ever Spanish language sprint for the CC Certificate course reading content. Thanks to the efforts of CC Certificate graduates and additional translators,² 569 million more people will have access to CC Certificate open educational resources (OER) in their native languages. These published works enable 493 million native Spanish speakers and 76 million native French speakers to access translations in their languages — not to mention others who have Spanish or French as a second language.

CC continued its partnership with InclusiveAccess.org, a community-driven initiative that launched in 2021, to raise awareness of the facts about textbook sales models that add the cost of digital course materials into students’ tuition and fees. Learn more about it in our Open Minds Podcast interview with Trudi Radke.

We interviewed Jennifer Miller about her Open Syllabus for Open Science project (see lightning talk below), which provides a complete but flexible way for early career researchers to learn about open science.

We ran CC Open Education Lightning Talks in March and August. Lightning talks are concise presentations that provide a specific update or story. During the talks, open education practitioners highlighted OER into capstone courses, discussed funding opportunities within open education, and explored how the CC Network can provide support for the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Practitioners also discussed leveraging tax legislation for open education funding, theories and practices around OER, fireside stories of open sharing, and even led a Texas Sing-a-long! 

• “Open Syllabus: UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science” by Jennifer Miller. 
• “More OER for Free!” by Jonathan Poritz.
• “Open Climate Campaign” by Dr. Cable Green, and Dr. Monica Granados
• “Building OER into Capstone Courses” by Dr. Carolyn Stevenson
• “Improve It Challenge” by Jamison Miller
• “Enabling OERs at no additional cost” by Kathryn Kure
• “Promoting Educational Equity through OERs and Open Degree Plans” by Carolyn Stevenson 
• “The Venn Diagram of OEP and Ungrading is a Circle” by Sybil Priebe 
• “Still Amazing: True Stories of Openness” by Alan Levine 
• “Student Scholars: Publishing Student OER Work” by Liza Long 
•  “Evolution of a state-wide OER Initiative” by Suzanne Wakim
• “Deep in the Open Heart of Texas” by Judith Sebesta 

CC continued to engage global partners and stakeholders in our work on Open Education.

CC staff and network colleagues presented at six regional UNESCO hosted meetings to support national governments and NGOs in understanding and implementing the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Education Resources. We highlighted the importance of using standard international CC open copyright licenses in open education policies and open educational resources (slides).

CC participated in the United Nations Transforming Education Summit, presenting sessions on effective educational ecosystems, approaches to implementing the UNESCO Recommendation on OER, and our recently launched Open Climate Campaign.

CC is working with UNICEF and others to find OER curriculum and openly licensed psycho-social support materials to help Syrian and Turkish children and their teachers who have been displaced by the devastating earthquakes.

The CC team expanded our Certificate program. We ran 16 online courses in 2022, raising the total number of graduates to over 1255 from 65 countries by the end of 2022. We piloted two open pedagogy CC Certificate courses in September, which encouraged participants’ greater agency in the course and also as contributions to their larger communities.  

We also launched the CC Certificate for GLAM with three courses and 93 participants. With Evelin Heidel (nickname: Scann), we were able to also offer a facilitator training for this program, thereby certifying additional instructors to teach the course. We also offered 38 scholarships to Certificate participants, expanding the program’s global reach. The CC Certificate program also continued facilitation and evaluation measures, ensuring the CC Certificate program is on a trajectory of continuous improvement. Thanks to Jonathan Poritz’s analysis, we learned four key takeaways from evaluating the CC Certificate.

Aside from the CC Certificate courses, CC continued its training, including a workshop for the U.S. Department of State’s TechCamp Morocco, thanks to facilitation from Shanna Hollich; a workshop for the UK National Lottery Heritage Fund, and training for Open Education Fellows at Lafayette College, among others. 

In addition to these efforts, many more community members noted their work advancing open education in CC Open Education Platform meetings, ongoing conversations and collaborations. While we cannot cite everyone’s efforts here, we are honored to work with and learn from this community. Interested in joining us? If you are not yet a member, learn more about the CC Open Education Platform – we hope to hear from you! 

This work is essential. While Open Education Week has ended, our efforts in support of open education march on as strong as ever.  We believe access to knowledge is a human right, and CC is working hard to ensure that open educational opportunities are available to all.

…

The post Creative Commons Open Education Platform: 2022 in Review appeared first on Creative Commons.

This week, the international community celebrates

UNESCO’s work is important now more than ever, as climate change, global health crises, and violent conflicts are posing some of the greatest threats to documentary heritage and the memory institutions that hold it. For example:  

• The COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on the cultural sector: many institutions had to close their doors, reorganize their workforce, and face drastic drops in attendance and harsh declines in revenue. 
• On any given day, a site, a monument, or an artifact can be irremediably damaged or lost due to extreme weather conditions induced by global warming, something CC helps to address through our Open Climate Campaign. 
• Wars, armed conflicts, and violence in all its forms — notably in Ukraine, Ethiopia, Syria, Yemen and Myanmar — has heightened the importance of protecting cultural heritage, including GLAM collections, as embodiments of cultural identity and human spirit.

At CC, we believe that it is our collective duty and privilege to protect, preserve, safeguard, use and reuse, and celebrate heritage. That’s why through our Open Culture program, we influence policy, we maintain the world’s leading open infrastructure, made up of our licenses and tools, we support our community, and we build capacity to accompany open culture enthusiasts on their journey towards better sharing of cultural heritage. Our CC Certification in Open Culture offers professional development training for institutions or community groups engaged in cultural heritage. This course builds peoples’ capacity in opening access to cultural heritage ethically, and inclusively. Participants develop a deeper understanding of open licensing and copyright considerations with digitization projects, CC licenses and tools, Rights Statements, Traditional Knowledge Labels, working with the public domain, and more. 

As we work towards better sharing of cultural heritage and open culture, we will continue to be guided by UNESCO’s Memory of the World Program, as it fosters dialogue and mutual understanding between people and cultures. Here’s how you can join CC’s efforts: 

→ Register for a 2023 course with the following scholarship code, and receive 60% off course registration: Y2GLAMSCHOLAR60%. 

→ Join the Creative Commons Open Culture platform: https://network.creativecommons.org/cc-openculture-platform/ 

→ Become a member of the CC Global Network

→ Get in touch with us: info@creativecommons.org 

The post CC celebrates 30 years of UNESCO Memory of the World appeared first on Creative Commons.

It was in 1982 that the Mexico City Declaration on Cultural Policies defined a path for culture to become a fundamental pillar of development. 40 years on, culture now underpins all 17 of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and calls are being made to make culture a sustainable development goal in itself. We agree with UNESCO that “culture is the bridge between peoples and countries… and the key to unlocking mutual understanding and reinforcing global action based human rights and respect for diversity.”

Unfortunately, people everywhere are facing tremendous challenges in accessing, sharing, and (re)using culture, in large part due to unfit and outdated copyright rules. Culture is being locked away behind undue and unnecessary paywalls, entry and rental fees, or the walled-gardens of for-profit companies. Cultural heritage institutions too face difficulties in realizing their missions in the digital world. They struggle to conduct their legitimate activities, like digitizing collections to preserve them and make them available to the public. Furthermore, climate change, global health crises, and violent conflicts are posing great threats to culture and the institutions that make it accessible. 

At CC, we promote open culture and aim to help cultural heritage institutions and their users make the most out of CC licenses and tools to open up their collections online in the public interest. Many institutions have successfully harnessed CC tools to release nearly five million digital open images. But while our tools support global sharing of culture, they cannot erase all barriers. That’s why with our Open Culture Program, we work to drive global policy discussion in support of better sharing, i.e. sharing that is contextual, ethical, inclusive, sustainable, purposeful and prosocial: sharing that builds a commons of knowledge and culture that is just and that inspires reciprocity — a commons that serves the public interest. 

Today, we look to UNESCO’s leadership to build momentum for open culture and to champion better sharing. MONDIACULT offers an opportunity to rethink how policy can truly promote equitable access to culture, bolster creativity, and restore balance in a copyright system unfit for the digital age. With new technologies on the horizon, like artificial intelligence and blockchain-based conveyances, we need to build new models based on collaboration, freedom to reuse, and generative sharing of culture. 

Now, more than ever, UNESCO and its Member States need to take action to protect the public domain and recalibrate copyright to support public interests in tune with the evolving sharing possibilities of our complex world. MONDIACULT 2022 is the starting point to explore how we can empower creators, liberate and celebrate culture as a global public good, and build a sustainable future for all. As the world of culture meets at MONDIACULT, with over 160 ministers and multiple actors of culture joining forces in México, let us reiterate our call: there is an urgent need to realize open culture for all.

Want to get involved? Join us!

• Become a member of the CC Global Network
• Become a member of the CC Open Culture Platform
• Sign up to the CC Open Culture mailing list
• Join our Open Culture working groups
• Join the #cc-openglam Slack channel
• Participate in CC Open Culture Platform calls — they are announced in the Slack channel and on the mailing list

The post UNESCO MONDIACULT2022: A Starting Point for Open Culture appeared first on Creative Commons.

In 2020, we entered the last Decade of Action to implement the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). As the target date for achieving the SDGs draws closer, UNESCO is engaging its Member States and the international community in a renewed reflection on cultural policies to address global challenges and set immediate and future priorities to shape a more robust and resilient cultural sector fully anchored in sustainable development prospects.

In preparation for the UNESCO World Conference on Cultural Policies and Sustainable Development — Mondiacult 2022, Creative Commons participated in the ResiliArt x Mondiacult initiative and hosted a webinar on Wednesday, 23 February 2022 to explore how open access to cultural heritage materials encourages artists to discover, share, and remix such materials.

Our ResiliArt x Mondiacult webinar brought together artists and heritage professionals to share their vision for better sharing of cultural heritage to support contemporary creativity in the digital space. The panelists discussed, among other things, the power of open licensing and the importance of Creative Commons infrastructure as a catalyst for the dissemination and revitalization of culture.

Panelists include: 

• Brigitte Vézina | Director of Policy, Open Culture, and GLAM at Creative Commons (Moderator)
• Hessel van Oorschot | Founder & “Chief of Noise” at Tribe of Noise
• Eddie Grey | Los Angeles-based composer, arranger, songwriter, and sound designer 
• Iván Martínez | Free knowledge activist and human rights defender at R3D 
• Jesica Pullo | Founding Director at BIOTICO & Co-creator of Wiki meets Sustainable Fashion 

We plan to continue these conversations throughout the year — visit CC’s Open Culture Program page to learn more and for the latest updates >>

The post Webinar Recording: ResiliArt x Mondiacult – From Access to Culture to Contemporary Creativity appeared first on Creative Commons.

Join us on Wednesday, 23 February for an online panel discussion, as we explore how open access to cultural heritage materials encourages artists to discover, share, and remix such materials. 

In advance of the UNESCO World Conference on Cultural Policies and Sustainable Development — Mondiacult 2022, Creative Commons is pleased to participate in the ResiliArt x Mondiacult initiative to celebrate better access to culture and allow artists and creators to participate in a generative creative cycle. 

Our upcoming ResiliArt x Mondiacult webinar will explore how open access to cultural heritage materials encourages artists to discover, share, and remix such materials. We will hear from artists and heritage professionals firsthand as they share their vision for better sharing of cultural heritage to support contemporary creativity in the digital space. They will also consider how better sharing can act as an engine for sustainable cultural development, through fair remuneration and open business models. Our panelists will examine the power of open licensing and the importance of Creative Commons’ infrastructure as a catalyst for the dissemination and revitalization of culture.

Panelists include: 

• Brigitte Vézina | Director of Policy, Open Culture, and GLAM at Creative Commons (Moderator)
• Hessel van Oorschot | Founder & “Chief of Noise” at Tribe of Noise
• Eddie Grey | Los Angeles-based composer, arranger, songwriter, and sound designer 
• Eline de Graaf | Curator of Collections at Het Nieuwe Instituut
• Iván Martínez | Free knowledge activist and human rights defender at R3D 
• Jesica Pullo | Founding Director at BIOTICO & Co-creator of Wiki meets Sustainable Fashion 

Date: Wednesday 23 February 2022
Time: 16:00 – 17:30 UTC / 11:00 – 12:30 EST / 8:00 – 9:30 PST | View your local time zone
Location: Join us from wherever you are based! We’ll be using Zoom to host the event.

The post Panel: ResiliArt x Mondiacult – From Access to Culture to Contemporary Creativity appeared first on Creative Commons.