Washington Declaration on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest

"Copyrights and patents are time-limited rights because the public interest requires that creative and innovative works ultimately become free for all to use as part of the public domain. The public domain serves as a foundation of cultural heritage and scientific knowledge from which future creators and inventors necessarily draw. A group of related civil society movements has emerged to promote the benefits of the public domain or openness, including through open licensing, open access, open educational resources, open data, open standards, open government, and related open information policies...."