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Rh Panton Principles for Open Data in Science in February 2010, to endorse the concept that “data related to published science should be explicitly placed in the public domain”.

Triggered by a forward-looking approach of the European institutions, Europe is putting together a very diversified and multi-sector network of projects for the promotion of the public domain and open access. The European public domain project is emerging in a strong multi-tiered fashion. Together with Communia, as part of the i2010 policy strategy, the EU launched the Europeana digital library network to digitize Europe’s cultural and scientific heritage. The LAPSI project was started to build a network covering policy discussions and strategic action on all legal issues related to access and the reuse of public sector information in the digital environment. Further, to assess the value and to define the scope and the nature of the public domain, the European Commission has promoted the Economic and Social Impact of the Public Domain in the Information Society project. The project, together with its methodology, was presented at the first Communia conference in 2008.

Again, many other projects focus on extracting value from our scientific and cultural riches in the digital environment. The European DRIVER project, presented at the first Communia conference and the first Communia workshop, builds a repository infrastructure, combined with a search portal, for all of the openly available European scientific communications. The project ARROW (Accessible Registries of Rights