Fundación Karisma | Crowdfunding campaign seeks to help Diego Gómez, a Colombian conservation biologist prosecuted for sharing a research online

"Karisma Foundation, a Colombian civil society organization, is launching a crowdfunding campaign to support Diego Gómez, a biologist accused of copyright infringement for sharing a scientific research online.

When he was a college student at Universidad del Quindío, Diego uploaded a thesis from a colleague at Universidad Nacional de Colombia on the document platform Scribd (citing the author’s name). He also shared it with several of his peers in social media.

[...]

The goal is to raise USD $40,000 during 4 weeks of campaigning. With this money, Karisma expects to cover the financial costs related to the appeal process on behalf of Diego and to seek legal ways to prevent cases like Diego’s from happen again. Likewise, the production of a case study, whose aim is to tell the story of Diego, and show the need for Open Access to knowledge will be covered. Finally, we expect to cover Diego’s accommodation and transportation when needed, so that he can take part in the appeal process and a case study production. He currently works at a natural reserve in Costa Rica so traveling is expensive.

The persecution of Diego is another example of the disproportionate consequences of copyright infringement in the digital age. Why are prosecuting students for sharing knowledge? That is not right, and we must take action."