Timeline
Experts agree that artificial intelligence is the next frontier of market concentration in the Internet economy. The democratization of AI development hinges on public investment in AI infrastructure.
Analysis of the European Commission’s proposal for a Digital Euro that argues that in order to meet its objectives, the Digital Euro must be built on top of public digital infrastructure.
The purpose of this primer is to explain the concept of digital public spaces as a central tenet of European digital policies. It shows why digital public spaces are a necessity for the full realization of digital rights and how the European Union should support digital public spaces by investing in public digital infrastructure.
This paper takes a close look at digital rights, examining them as a framework playing a role in shaping the dynamics of online ecosystems. It considers the feasibility of a holistic rights-based approach to building genuine digital public spaces.
In the paper, Krzysztof investigates the characteristics of initiatives the Fund should support to create a solid foundation for the operation of the digital public space(s). He also looks into existing funding sources and how they could be used to support public digital infrastructure.
Meta's entry into the space and the fact that they have chosen to be interoperable with the existing fediverse could be a good thing, as it paves the way for public institutions to enter the space and reduce their dependence on private communication platforms.
Today, together with more than 40 civil society organizations, we released a Statement on Democratic Digital Infrastructure. In the statement, we call on the EU and Member States to support alternatives to commercial digital infrastructure and promote interoperable, transparent digital spaces that respect privacy, democratic governance, and net neutrality by creating a European Public Digital Infrastructure Fund.
Open Future submitted a response concerning the European Commission's call for evidence on "An EU initiative on virtual worlds: a head start towards the next technological transition". In the submission, we showed why policymakers should consider virtual worlds as Digital Public Spaces where the public interest takes precedence over corporate objectives.
The Initiative for Digital Public Infrastructure published the Three-Legged Stool manifesto, outlining three pillars for building digital public infrastructure.
This White Paper identifies the need for a consolidated European approach to support Public Digital Infrastructures and the development of Digital Public Spaces in Europe. It argues that efforts to build digital public spaces will contribute to ensuring Europe's digital sovereignty while providing a blueprint for a digital space that allows free, open, and democratic societies to flourish.
The 2030 Policy Programme 'Path to the Digital Decade' allows Member States to collaborate in developing the services and platforms that are essential building blocks of Digital Public Space.
Today, as a request for comments, we publish a white paper proposing a European Public Digital Infrastructure Fund to build Digital Public Spaces in Europe.
The migration from Twitter to Mastodon offers a unique opportunity to build digital public space. In an article in Tech Policy Press, Alek Tarkowski points to the obstacles to materializing such an opportunity and proposes ways to overcome them.
The European Declaration on Digital Rights and Principles for the Digital Decade is a good starting point for directing the EU Digital Strategy's emphasis toward societal goals, but an action plan to fulfill these promises is still lacking, says Zuzanna Warso.
The EC has proposed a new regulation to safeguard media independence and plurality in the EU. Unfortunately, the European Media Freedom Act fails to support public interest-driven alternatives to commercial platforms.
Instead of focusing only on fixing the platforms, the EU must introduce measures that would allow the emergence of alternatives to the current fundamentally flawed system of “online malls.”
This new report "Towards a sovereign digital infrastructure of Commons" published by the French Council presidency makes a powerful argument for putting digital commons at the heart of efforts to build sovereign digital infrastructures.
We have teamed up with a number of organizations working on building Digital Commons and published an op-ed encouraging French and European policy makers to put Digital Commons at the center of the EU’s digital strategy.
The problem with Elon Musk's bid to take over Twitter is not so much that he is turning a public company private, but that it illustrates that having public spaces run by companies is a bad idea no matter how the company is structured.
France is promoting a very specific approach to digital sovereignty by stressing the importance of the Digital Commons as one of its building blocks and declaring the intention to use its presidency to propose a European Initiative for Digital Commons.
EU regulation for the digital environment is full of carve outs and exceptions for public institutions and non-profit civic initiatives. Instead of treating them as anomalies we should start treating public institutions as corner stones of a digital public sphere and develop a positive vision for them.
Comment on the recommendation on a common European data space for cultural heritage and the Digital Europe Work Programme 2021-2022
In conversation with Lyam Wyatt and Lane Becker about Wikimedia Enterprise the paid service targeted at commercial users of Wikimedia that was launched on the 26th of October by the Wikimedia Foundation.
A first look at the “Path to the Digital Decade” 2030 Policy Programme that was presented by the European Commission on 15 of September.
The coalition for a Shared Digital European Public Sphere – SDEPS –aims to bring together different types of organizations who are united in their determination to build a European Digital Public Sphere while providing a European coordination layer for developing alternative online infrastructures.
A critical take on the European Commission's Communication "2030 Digital Compass" which defines the policy objectives for Europe's Digital Decade.
A first look at the 2030 Digital Compass: the European Commission presented its long term (10 year) strategy for shaping the digital transformation in Europe. In this post we take a first critical look at the Commission's ambitions.
