Public Domain’s Provisions for Open GLAM Activities in Indonesia
There are around 2.200 public domain’s digital files from Indonesia using the PD mark in Wikimedia Commons repository. Most of those files come from a volunteer editor, Cristopher Woodrich, and GLAM Indonesia’s project. These are beacons of hope towards creating a healthier public domain ecosystem in Indonesia, given the challenges that many institutions and communities face when releasing public domain collections. These challenges include a vague definition of the public domain and a lack of provisions to regulate important aspects of copyright law, such as Traditional Cultural Expressions. In this story, I share my own journey to understand more about Indonesia’s public domain provisions and their impact on Open GLAM activities.
The journey of an independent researcher to enrich the public domain of Indonesia
Christopher Woodrich is an independent researcher that spent some years studying film history in Indonesia, and he started contributing to Wikimedia Commons in 2012, under the username Crisco 1492. He has digitized around 1,300 public domain objects, that range from books, film posters, pictures of people from Indonesia before the 60s. Cristopher acquired these objects from used booksellers, old photo studios, and networking. He early realized the importance of his research material as part of Indonesia’s history. He also realized how fragile these materials were, with some of them being a tiny piece of paper that is easy to lose. That got him interested in starting to digitize and restore some of these objects.
Chris was also motivated to start his own personal digitization project because he wanted some of these public domain files to illustrate the articles that he had written on Wikipedia. His motivation was very practical since he didn’t necessarily have an interest in a healthy domain public at that time. Chris says that
“I always thought that what I did should be in the public domain. Why should I ask for copyright from what I’ve done? Doing one digitization just took me 10 minutes or cost me less than 5 USD from a service to digitize larger formats. So, I decided not to claim new copyright over these objects, because that also means that it will take them decades to be again in the public domain.”
Chris's digital objects allow us to acknowledge, understand, and enrich our interpretations of Indonesia’s history. Some of the files he has uploaded tell the history of the development of the technology of studio photo equipment; feature the microphone that a singer from Indonesia used in the past; social etiquettes on dresses, from what was considered decent to fashionable. Some of these pictures can even show us the negotiation of the concept of “modernity” between the West and Indonesia, and even different beauty standards.
Chris hopes that what he has done serves others; he expects that what he has uploaded as high-quality pictures can be re-used in other contexts. Some of these files have helped filmmakers interested in reconstructing and researching Indonesia’s cultural trend before the ’50s. Chris is glad when he finds out that someone is using the public domain files he has uploaded. For example, the film’s poster and artist’s photographs (Farida Arriany and Chitra Dewi) were used as the stage design for the set of the movie Sweet 20. Chris is no longer living in Indonesia, but he feels proud of how he has helped to enrich the interpretation of Indonesia’s history, or even allow for people to experience the past of Indonesia on social media.
The institutional approach to the public domain: GLAM Indonesia
Wikimedia Indonesia is another great contributor to the public domain in Indonesia, through their project named GLAM Indonesia. They have around 900 files marked with the Public Domain Mark. Those files come from the Museum Pusat Dokumentasi dan Informasi Kebudayaan Minangkabau (PDIKM) digitalization collection in West Sumatra and the Sastra Lestari Foundation in Central Java.
Rachmat Wahidi, Manager of Internal Affairs and Partnerships at WMID, explains that at the beginning of the partnership, “we saw the possibility for the collections of those institutions to be used as references to Wikipedia Bahasa Indonesia’s articles. As we assessed the collection, we found that most of the collections in the Institutions had their copyright expired. These collections were prone to damage because of the conditions in which they were kept. That inspired GLAM Indonesia to digitize these works and mark them with the PD mark to make it easy for the public to understand and expand its uses.”
Digitizing and uploading the work in Wikimedia Commons is only the first step. For example, the Aboean Goeroe-Goeroe Magazine from the PDIKM’s digital collection is now being transcribed by volunteers on Wikisource Indonesia. Another transcription project is being carried with the Kajawen Magazine, a magazine published before 1935 with a Javanese script, currently stewarded by the Sastra Lestari Foundation.
These transcript projects can be used as a source of machine learning for the Javanese script OCR used by the TRAWACA Team, from UKDW Yogyakarta. But these digital files can also be used as research materials for cultural activists and students. For example, Risen Prasetyo used the digital collection of Sastra Lestari Foundation for doing his thesis. He was very grateful for finding these digital sources, since, according to him,
“digitization for some people may not be an important thing. For people like me looking for data for doing research, digitization is essential, because getting physical sources is more difficult than getting digital sources.”
Interrogating the Public Domain in Indonesia
Wikimedia Commons servers are based in the US, and the platform needs to follow US copyright laws. This has been sometimes a source of tension, because it means that digital objects have to be in the public domain both in the US and in the country of origin, in this case, Indonesia.
Wikimedia Commons has rules related to the need to establish that work is clearly in the public domain. Indonesia’s copyright law doesn’t define the concept of public domain, and several provisions around the public domain are vague, are not stated explicitly, or do not exist at all, for example, the public domain for government works. There are also questions arising around the status of works made before the ’50s, or before the Indonesian state existed. Indonesia’s copyright law dates back to 1982, with copyright before that being established in Dutch’s copyright laws.
And what about the public domain when it comes to Traditional Cultural Expressions (TCE), recognized in Indonesia’s copyright law? For helping me with these questions, I looked at Ari Juliano Gema presentation for the Open Access and Copyrights webinar held by the Goethe-Institut Indonesien and then asked him follow-up questions with an interview. Ari is the first legal lead of CC Indonesia and the Senior Advisor to the Minister of Tourism and Creative Economy.
The public domain in Indonesia
Copyright law in Indonesia has a long history. The first copyright law was created after 37 years of independence¹, in 1982, replacing the copyright law made by the Netherlands. This first law established the term of copyright protection in 25 years after the author’s death and 15 years after it was published. The law was reformed several times after, in 1985, 1987, 1995, and 2002, expanding the term of protection in 50 years after the author’s death and 25 years since it first was announced. Finally, in 2014, the new term of 70 years after the creator’s death and 50 or 25 years after it was published.
In general, according to Indonesian Copyright law №28 of 2014, works in Indonesia enter the public domain in two ways: because copyright protection expired or because they were not protected by copyright, to begin with. For works protected by copyright, there are two rights, economic and moral rights. Moral rights don’t expire² and it remains attached to the works, even when the work is in the public domain.
I asked Ari Juliano if attribution still needs to be given in the case of foreign works in the public domain. Here’s Ari Juliano’s answer:
Ari Juliano: I recommend that the attribution is still applied, as a way to show appreciation to the Author and as a way to attest to the user’s honesty in stating that he or she might be re-using a PD’s work as part of his or her work.³
Fitriayu: And what about works created between 1945 and 1981, before the enactment of copyright law in Indonesia? Which copyright law should people refer to?
Ari Juliano: The reference is the latest Indonesian copyright law, reformed in 2014. For works that were previously public domain under the other existing laws, now have their copyright protection extended to follow the updated law.⁴
Government works
Works can also be in the public domain because they were never protected by copyright. Article 42 of Indonesia’s copyright law states that works created by the government fall under that category, including several categories of works, such as works created by state institutions which are limited to laws and regulations, state speeches or speeches of government officials, court decisions or judges’ orders, holy books, or religious symbols. Even though these works are not protected by copyright, Ari Juliano suggested to use them carefully. For example, it is important that the adaptation doesn’t change the meaning of a given work, like in a remixed speech.⁶
Ari Juliano strongly agrees with works produced by the government being in the public domain. The government created those works with taxes collected from the public, which means that the public should have free and open access to these works. The idea should also be done by the government so that the public can understand what permits can and cannot do of the government’s work.⁷ Using Creative Commons licenses for government works would make it easier for the public to understand the provisions regarding what can and cannot be done with works published by the government.
Traditional Cultural Expressions (TCE)
Indonesia’s copyright law grants protection to traditional cultural expressions, such as texts, music, motion pictures, theatrical works, fine arts, and traditional ceremonies. The states are the ones that hold copyright over the TCE. Ari Juliano Gema’s interpretation is that the authors of the TCE are communal, meaning that the work was created collectively by several people and was passed on from generation to generation by the traditional community. The state is obliged to make an inventory, to protect and maintain the TCE to be used for the benefits of traditional communities, but there is no clarity regarding how long the protection of TCE lasts or the terms of use by the government.
Fitriayu: How TCE should be used?
Ari Juliano: In my opinion, it is better for those who want to use TCE to consult or communicate with the traditional community that owns the work, particularly since there is no government regulation around it. The traditional community can state then that the user has already coordinated with them and they consented to the use if there is any problem. Besides, asking for permission from the traditional community is deemed necessary because of our limitations in understanding or interpreting the particular values that live in traditional communities or in these TCE objects. The use of TCE has to be done carefully, to avoid offending traditional communities. It is highly recommended to coordinate or consult with the traditional community that creates the TCE.⁸
Ari Juliano Gema also added that besides the TCE there are some other works that the government holds the copyright to, and therefore permission from the government is needed to use them, for example, works produced by a person under the employment of a civil service institution, works produced by a government agency whose author is unknown, and works that have not been published, where the state holds the copyright of the works for the author’s benefit.
Footnotes
¹ Indonesia became independent on 17 August 1945
² Article 5 paragraph 1 Indonesian Copyright law №28 of 2014
³ In the Goethe-Institut Indonesien webinar Open Access and Copyrights in the section on moral rights and usage of foreign PD objects, duration to 58:50–1:00:00
⁴ In the Goethe-Institut Indonesien webinar Open Access and Copyrights in the section on: “Does Indonesian Copyright law of 2014 extend the duration of copyright protection in the previous Copyright law”, duration to 1:37:04
⁵ Article 41–42 Indonesian Copyright law №28 of 2014
⁶In the Goethe-Institut Indonesien webinar Open Access and Copyrights in the section on the explanation of TCE, duration to 15:30
⁷ In the Goethe-Institut Indonesien webinar Open Access and Copyrights in the section regarding works published by the government, duration to 46:00–46: 25
⁸ In the Goethe-Institut Indonesien webinar Open Access and Copyrights in the section on the use of traditional cultural expressions, duration to 34:44–36:00
About this story
This story was written thanks to an open call funded by Creative Commons Open GLAM Platform. This is part of a series of articles that will be published in the Open GLAM Medium publication, that have been supported with the goal of showcasing stories around the world on Open GLAM. Find out more here.
