The UvA’s work forms part of the project Rethinking Digital Copyright Law for a Culturally Diverse, Accessible, Creative Europe (reCreating Europe). The project is being coordinated by the Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies (Italy). The reCreating Europe project as a whole will receive 3.1million euros.

Technological developments have led to an unprecedented democratisation of cultural production - think of Instagram, where photographers, whether professional or non-professional, share their work with the world, or Spotify, where every musician or producer can upload their own music or podcast. The production and use of copyrighted works increases with every new technology.

An effective system of future-proof digital copyright norms – with attention paid to cultural diversity and access to culture – is therefore of great importance. This is not easily achieved, however, due to a number of phenomena: the complexity of copyright, diversity of interests, divergent regulations, and a lack of knowledge and awareness when it comes to copyright. The reCreating Europe project focuses on the influence of digitisation and the Digital Single Market on cultural diversity, access to culture and the creation of culture in Europe. The ultimate goal is to contribute to a regulatory framework that promotes culturally diverse production and optimises inclusive access and consumption.

In reCreating Europe, the focus is on five main groups of stakeholders: individual makers / performers, the creative industry, cultural and heritage institutions, intermediaries (for example, a platform such as YouTube) and end users. This allows researchers to investigate the various bottlenecks and needs in a coherent and multidisciplinary manner.

IViR will be engaged – partly in collaboration with other partners in the consortium – in five subprojects:

• A study based on an EU-wide survey of the views and experiences of makers and performers with regard to digitisation, copyright and the Digital Single Market;
• A study into the growing role of artificial intelligence as a producer of cultural work and the challenges that it poses for human authorship;
• An investigation into the role of territoriality in copyright;
• A study aimed at developing ‘best practices’ for legitimate use of material in specific cultural sectors;
• A study looking at the role of automatic removal of content by platforms and the effect of this on access to cultural products.

Coordination from the IViR will be overseen by Joost Poort. In addition, Mireille van Eechoud, João Quintais, Stef van Gompel and Daniel Gervais among others, will take part in the various projects.