OpenForum Europe

OFE wants to bring the European open source communities and Member States more into conversation with global discourses around DPGs and their value in achieving the SDGs. We will use our expertise and presence in European communities focused on open technologies to centre and promote relevant DPGs/DPG-related thinking, as well as advocate for more European open source projects to register as DPGs via the DPG Registry. We will do this by discussing DPGs more in our events, including the EU Open Source Policy Summit, and by engaging more with governments and development partners working on these issues through our communities of practice. Where possible (and appropriate), we will also centre discussions of DPGs in relevant blogs and publications related to our work around open source in the European community.

Open Source Programme Offices (OSPOs) are a proven way to create healthy open source ecosystems through policymaking, ones where the use of open source by businesses and the government is highly incentivized. OFE has strong relationships with many networks doing work on OSPOs, including the OSPO Alliance, OSPO++, Germany’s ZenDiS, and more. To this end, we aim to double down on our advocacy efforts around OSPOs and include DPGs as part of the conversation around how OSPOs are helping to build thriving open source communities. We will do this through policy-advocacy and research work, continuing to engage with the annual OSPOs for Good conference at the UN, helping to start an OSPO-related community of practice (COP), and finding new opportunities to do research related to OSPOs. Throughout all of this, we will seek to connect the OSPO opportunity to the DPG agenda and create new understandings around the role of open source in DPG ecosystems.

In Europe, the French Presidency in 2022 has led to a new policy push from France and other EU Member States around digital commons - non-rivalrous and non-exclusive digital resources defined by shared production, maintenance and governance. Given that Europe likes to define digital commons in terms of rules and governance structures in decentralised communities, it is worth continuing to build policy alignment around different terms and approaches, especially given their complementarity. As part of this activity, OFE will involve the DPGA in European-led policy discussions around digital commons and the potential for DPGs as digital commons, in order to help create shared understanding around the rules and structures that govern open source communities and their contribution to the public interest. OFE will in turn aim to involve itself more in global policy discussions around DPGs and discuss the complementarity with digital commons thinking.