Copyrighting the Copies

摘要

How free is the public domain? What protocols govern its access and use? While debating the rights in traditional culture at the World Intellectual Property Organization in Geneva, delegates from developed countries have countered calls by Indigenous representatives for stronger access controls on Indigenous heritage, citing the importance of the public domain. In this article I critically assess this argument in light of how heritage institutions manage access to and reuse of public domain materials. In particular, looking at the recent digitization of heritage assets, heritage institutions often establish protocols for using the resources thus made available. With these protocols in place, it is difficult to maintain that the public domain preserved in Western heritage institutions is really a resource that is free for all.