Understanding Knowledge As a Commons: From Theory to Practice

Knowledge in digital form offers unprecedented access to information through theInternet but at the same time is subject to ever-greater restrictions through intellectual propertylegislation, overpatenting, licensing, overpricing, and lack of preservation. Looking at knowledgeas a commons--as a shared resource--allows us to understand both its limitless possibilities andwhat threatens it. In Understanding Knowledge as a Commons, experts from a range of disciplinesdiscuss the knowledge commons in the digital era--how to conceptualize it, protect it, and buildit.Contributors consider the concept of the commons historically and offer an analytical frameworkfor understanding knowledge as a shared social-ecological system. They look at ways to guard againstenclosure of the knowledge commons, considering, among other topics, the role of research libraries,the advantages of making scholarly material available outside the academy, and the problem ofdisappearing Web pages. They discuss the role of intellectual property in a new knowledge commons,the open access movement (including possible funding models for scholarly publications), thedevelopment of associational commons, the application of a free/open source framework to scientificknowledge, and the effect on scholarly communication of collaborative communities within academia,and offer a case study of EconPort, an open access, open source digital library for students andresearchers in microeconomics. The essays clarify critical issues that arise within these new typesof commons--and offer guideposts for future theory and practice.Contributors:David Bollier, JamesBoyle, James C. Cox, Shubha Ghosh, Charlotte Hess, Nancy Kranich, Peter Levine, Wendy Pradt Lougee,Elinor Ostrom, Charles Schweik, Peter Suber, J. Todd Swarthout, Donald Waters

Charlotte Hess is Director of the Digital Library of the Commons at Indiana University.