On 14^th September 2026, the CommonsDB consortium (Open Future Foundation, Wikimedia Sverige, Europeana Foundation, Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision, the National Gallery of Denmark (SMK) and the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam) organised the project’s final conference, hosted by the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) in Alicante, Spain.

Upon invitation, the EWC and its Commissioner for Political Affairs, Nina George, took part as only authors’ representative. Participants included representatives from the European Commission and its Directorate DG CNECT, EUIPO Observatory representatives, AI developers (Black Forest Lab), CMOs (Pictoright, The Netherlands), copyright- and technical experts, e.g. the Copyright Infrastructure Task Force under the lead of the Finnish Ministry for Education and Culture and Anna Vuopala. 

The conference discussed the outcome of the CommonsDB pilot and the future of European copyright infrastructure – also related to the consideration by the European Commission, to establish an “Opt-Out Registry” for rights declarations by authors and further rights holders under the still not cleared text and data mining exception of the Copyright Directive (EU) 2019/790.

Krzysztof Nichczynski (European Commission – DG CNECT) presented key results from the Commission’s feasibility study on text and data mining (TDM) opt-outs under Article 4(3) CDSM Directive and Article 53(1)(c) of the AI Act. The Commission announced plans for an upcoming pilot in cooperation with the EUIPO, probably kicking off with publishing (news, books) and visual art. The new EUIPO initiative CopyrightView would be ready to company this project.

EWC’s main messages:

1) TDM is still not AI; any opt-out is only self-defense.

2) The term “Registry” gives us the itch: Any data base of rights declarations shall be voluntary & named “directory” or “data base”.

3) Authors are the majority of AI rights owners, so any data base must follow their needs.

4) Opt-outs make only sense with reliable confirmation by AI Tech. Which they avoid out of terrifying reasons several latest court documents revealed.

5) No full transparency? No future: Only title-specific documentation of usage for generative AI development closes the circle of information.

Related EWC sources

• EWC’s position on the impact of the CDSM Directive including the overinterpreted Text and Data Mining Exception

• EWC analysis of the adopted EP resolution on “Copyright and generative artificial intelligence – opportunities and challenges”, including the option of a “registry” / data base of rights reservations

• EWC’s demands for a sustainable future of the CCS in the era of (Gen)AI