The term "knowledge commons" refers to information, data, and content that is collectively owned
and managed by a community of users, particularly over the Internet.
What distinguishes a knowledge commons from a commons of shared physical resources is
that digital resources are non-subtractible; that is, multiple users can access the same
digital resources with no effect on their quantity or quality.
== Conceptual background == The term 'commons' is derived from the medieval
economic system the commons.
Today, the knowledge commons act as a frame of reference for a number of domains, including
Open Educational resources such as the MIT OpenCourseware, free digital media such as
Wikipedia, Creative commons–licensed art, open-source research, and open scientific
collections such as the Public Library of Science or the Science Commons, Free Software
and Open Design.
According to research by Charlotte Hess and Elinor Ostrom, the conceptual background of
the knowledge commons encompasses two intellectual histories: first, a European tradition of
battling the enclosure of the "intangible commons of the mind", threatened by expanding
intellectual property rights and privatization of knowledge.
Second, a tradition rooted in the United States, which sees the knowledge commons as a shared
space allowing for free speech and democratic practices, and which is in the tradition of
the town commons movement and commons-based production of scholarly work, open science,
open libraries, and collective action.The production of works in the knowledge commons
is often driven by collective intelligence respectively the wisdom of crowds and is related
to knowledge communism as it was defined by Robert K. Merton, according to whom scientists
give up intellectual property rights in exchange for recognition and esteem.
Ferenc Gyuris argues, that it is important to distinguish "information" from "knowledge"
in defining the term "knowledge commons".
He argues that "knowledge as a shared resource" requires that both information must become
accessible and potential recipients must become able and willing to internalize it as 'knowledge'.
"Therefore, knowledge cannot become a shared resource without a complex set of institutions
and practices that give the opportunity to potential recipients to gain the necessary
abilities and willingness".
== Copyleft == A main principle of the knowledge commons
is that the traditional "copyright" is being replaced by "copyleft".
Copyleft licenses grant licensees all necessary rights such as right to study, use, change
and redistribute—under the condition that all future works building on the license are
again kept in the commons.
The most popular applications of the 'copyleft' principle are the GNU Software Licenses (GPL,
LGPL and GFDL by Free Software Foundation) and the share-alike licenses under creative
commons.
== See also == Commons
Digital commons (economics) Information Commons
Noogenesis Open Knowledge
Open Content Public ownership
Open Source Open source appropriate technology
Open Design OpenCourseware
Robert K. Merton Commons-based peer production
== Notes ==
== External links == Commons in Action: Knowledge Commons.
International Association for the Study of the Commons.
3 September 2014 – via YouTube.
Ioannidis, Yannis (July 2006).
"From Digital Libraries to Knowledge Commons".
ERCIM News.
ERCIM (66).
Abrell, Elan; et al. (October 2009).
Dunlop, Scott, ed.
Imagining a Traditional Knowledge Commons: A community approach to sharing traditional
knowledge for non-commercial research (PDF).
Archived from the original (PDF) on 2013-10-17.
"Open Knowledge Commons".
KnowledgeCommons.org.
Archived from the original on 2012-12-31.
First Thematic Conference on the Knowledge Commons held in 2012 on the theme of "Governing
Pooled Knowledge Resources: Building Institutions for Sustainable Scientific, Cultural and Genetic
Resource Commons" Free/Libre Open Knowledge Society, designing
a world for the commons.: A Free, Libre, Open Knowledge society is about to be built in
Ecuador.