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Rh that can be used without copyright restrictions by virtue of current law. Specifically, the structural public domain is made up of two different classes of material:

"1. Works of authorship where the copyright protection has expired. Copyright is a temporary right granted to authors. Once this temporary protection has come to its end, all legal restrictions cease to exist, subject in some countries to the author’s perpetual moral rights."

"2. The essential commons of information that is not covered by copyright. Works that are not protected by copyright because they fail the test of originality, or are excluded from protection (such as data, facts, ideas, procedures, processes, systems, methods of operation, concepts, principles, or discoveries, regardless of the form in which they are described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in a work, as well as laws and judicial and administrative decisions). This essential commons is too important for the functioning of our societies to be burdened with legal restrictions of any nature even for a limited period."

The structural public domain is an historically grown balance to the rights of authors protected by copyright and it is essential to the cultural memory and knowledge base of our societies. In the second half of the twentieth century all two elements identified here have been strained by the extension of the term of copyright protection and the introduction of more copyright-like regimes of legal protection.

Voluntary commons and user prerogatives

In addition to this structural core of the public domain, there are other essential sources that enable individuals to freely interact with copyright protected works. These represent the “breathing space” of our current culture and knowledge, ensuring that copyright protection does not interfere with specific requirements of society and the voluntary choices of authors. While these sources increase access to protected works, some of them make this access conditional on certain forms of use or restrict access to certain classes of users:

"1. Works that are voluntarily shared by their rights holders. Creators can remove use restrictions from their works by either freely licensing them, or by using other legal tools to allow others to use their works without restrictions, or by dedicating them to the public domain."