Free Knowledge Advocacy Group EU

[The same text is also submitted as PDF for reader convenience.] Wikimedia Europe (WMEU) is a Brussels-based nonprofit association that unites the European groups of the Wikimedia movement. Wikimedia is a global community of people, projects and activities working together to create and share knowledge freely.

Wikimedia operates a number of online platforms that offer access to and re-use of the world's largest freely available datasets. These are used widely as training data for machine learning algorithms. Wikimedia also develops and operates machine learning algorithms, mainly with the goal to make volunteer editors' work more efficient.

Wikimedia Europe (WMEU) is an association dedicated to advocating for free knowledge, access to information, and freedom of expression. WMEU is part of the Wikimedia movement, a network of free knowledge projects, organisations, and communities that champion the ideals of sharing joint responsibility over a public-interest internet. WMEU is pleased to submit its feedback in the attached PDF file.

Wikimedia Europe represents Wikimedia movement affiliates across Europe. The Wikimedia movement is made up of a network of organisations and volunteer communities that write, curate and maintain free and open knowledge projects like Wikipedia, Wikidata, and Wikimedia Commons.

The EU is one of the very few regions in the world that recognises an additional layer of intellectual property protection on non-original databases. In 2015, the European Commission carried out an initial evaluation of the "Database Directive" and the new sui generis right. The Commission states: "Is sui generis protection therefore necessary for a thriving database industry?

As a global movement that, among others, develops and runs the world's largest free knowledge base Wikidata (made in the EU!) we acknowledge and welcome the hard work of the Data Policy and Innovation unit in freeing up data and making it re-usable over the past years. Thank you! In this feedback round we have decided to remain laser-focused on the issue that is the sui generis database right.

Free Knowledge Advocacy Group EU welcome the debate on the responsibilities of digital services. We believe that a regulatory framework must preserve and promote the freedom of imparting and receiving information without interference by public authority; promote freedom of expression; and protect users from harmful and illegal activities.

Wikimedia in Brussels (Free Knowledge Advocacy Group EU) Wikimedia believes that an online public space that is inclusive, accessible and competitive will depend on the existence of a variety of platform models and business models to choose from.

Free Knowledge Advocacy Group welcomes the initiative to supplement the Digital Services Act with the proposal for a Regulation on contestable and fair markets in the digital sector (Digital Markets Act). The online ecosystem has been lacking an adequate framework, in which there is a differentiation between platforms considered to be the gatekeepers and other models of online intermediation.

Free Knowledge Advocacy Group, welcomes the initiative of devising ex ante rules to ensure that markets characterised by large online platforms remain fair and contestable for innovators, businesses, and new market entrants.

1. Any dataset that was financed entirely or predominantly with EU funds should be reusable. The easiest way to ensure this currently is to categorise them as high-value datasets. 2. The “Companies and company ownership” datasets should be expanded to include beneficiary owners, residency and past ownership. All this should be available in a machine-and-human-readable format 3.

In previous consultations Wikimedia has communicated to the Commission what criteria datasets should contain to be considered High Value Datasets. Therefore, we are taking the liberty to simply share a list of public datasets with the Commission that we believe should be open. We encourage the Commission to take the necessary steps to achieve this and offer public and technical support.

Free Knowledge Advocacy Group EU considers that the Policy Programme "Path to the Digital Decade" is based on worthy goals and enables a wide mandate to use any tools to reach them. Then, unfortunately, the ideas get more and more narrow.

Free Knowledge Advocacy Group EU looks into the provisions of the Digital Compass Policy Programme with interest. We believe that delivery and commitment towards the common digital targets can only be effectuated if there is a clear and consistent framework of adoption and implementation across the EU.