The Hague Declaration: official launch

On May 6, the The Hague Declaration on Knowledge Discovery in the Digital Age was officially launched by LIBER at the Science Europe offices in Brussels.

[caption id="attachment_248" align="alignright" width="215"] Paul Ayris, Lars Björnshauge, Caroline Sutton, Jean-François Dechamp and Kristiina Hormia-Poutanen


Coinciding with the launch of the Digital Single Market strategy by the European Commission, LIBER’s Paul Ayris and Susan Reilly did not neglect to stress the fact that this declaration aligns with the plans of the European Commission to facilitate the cross-border sharing of knowledge in the Digital Age. As data sharing and text, data & content content mining play a pivotal role in current research practices (see for example the results of the Science 2.0 consultation), the need for a Europe-wide legislative framework is obvious. Now, the fragmented copyright and IP-laws in the EU prove not being in line anymore with researchers’ needs and the pace of technological progress, limiting the full potential of scientific research.

 
The five principles of the Hague Declaration are:

1. Intellectual property was not designed to regulate the free flow of facts, data and ideas, but has as a key objective the promotion of research activity
2. People should have the freedom to analyse and pursue intellectual curiosity without fear of monitoring or repercussions
3. Licenses and contract terms should not restrict individuals from using facts, data and ideas
4. Ethics around the use of content mining techniques will need to continue to evolve in response to changing technology
5. Innovation and commercial research based on the use of facts, data, and ideas should not be restricted by intellectual property law

OpenAIRE is among the original signatories of the Hague Declaration together with three other projects partners: COAR: Confederation of Open Access Repositories, European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and EIFL (Electronic Information for Libraries). And three other project partners signed the declaration during the launch day: Izmir Institute of Technology,  Kosson and UCL (University College London).

More about text mining services in OpenAIRE : https://blogs.openaire.eu/?p=88
 
You can read and sign the declaration here: http://thehaguedeclaration.com/
 
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