The article discusses a study of the restrictive practices of cultural institutions in controlling digital copies of public domain artworks. Some institutions claim new rights over reproduction images, thereby limiting their use in education and research and prioritizing income over open access. This seemingly conflicts with the institutions’ public missions, and constitutes a form of censorship. The study criticizes the UK’s cultural institutions for lagging in global open access efforts, and proposes a new framework to better assess copyright rights in digital reproductions. This framework aims to balance open access with protections of legitimate IP. It also discusses the importance of open datasets for uses in research.

https://illinoisjltp.com/file/213/Wallace_2023_Issue%202.pdf AND https://phys.org/news/2024-01-wrongly-digital-surrogates-museums-censors.html