Thank you for coming for our session. We will be talking about the power to the public
stack governing Europe's digital commons, specifically talking about the newly established
digital commons' edict. I don't need to go over, I think, what will need to be
needed many times in this room, but we know that digital sovereignty is on the
cards, there's a lot of political momentum around it, and we think that open
source, but specifically digital commons are the way forward. So talk briefly
about the work that we do and then like pass it on to Leia and Emma and then
we get into the edict, but I wanted to kind of set some context around where we
think the edict can play some important roles for the ecosystem. So the work that we do
at open future and as partly and supported by the NGI commons consortium, we think of
digital commons as the way forward, digital commons in the sense not just the technical
artifacts and the licensing around open source, but the communities and the practices
of governing that sustain these infrastructures. So we want to put forward a progressive
vision, both of digital sovereignty, not based on the regionalistic or nationalistic
interpretations, but also a progressive, progressive vision of the commons, and we
think enough people in this room will recognize that open source is the way forward
in terms of a more resilient form of sovereignty. So that's why we advocate for this
framing of the digital commons, not just as a way to move away from a dependence on
American technologies, but moving away entirely from proprietary and extractive ecosystems.
So as part of this work, we've been Jordan, if I can. Just one back. As part of this
work, we're looking at a few different ideas and a few different sort of policy interventions
that erick being one of them, but we're also looking broadly at how we build, how we fund,
and how we govern technologies. So this looks like aligning the broader research and innovation,
funding architectures that we have to sort of the dynamics and the realities of the digital
commons. So this also looks like funding critical infrastructures, that funding commons
that underlie critical infrastructures, but also looking at the choices that are made upstream
that shape technology trajectories downstream across the European Union and how public
funding is channeled towards funding research and innovation. We're also looking at
procurement as a way to generalize investments strategically towards open source
digital commons, but also thinking about that as a market shaping tool and as a way as someone
in the previous panel also said to make sure that procurement practices also make sure that the
ecosystem itself remains sustainable and that we don't have extractive forms of procurement from
open source and the commons. So as part of these interventions, we're also looking at cloud
and social media because we recognize that these are all elements that are important
back to us with threats to sovereignty. And finally, I think moving on to the digital commons
ELEC and this is where I will pass on to I think Leia first where we think that where we want
to discuss how the role that the digital commons ELEC can play in terms of its stewardship
of the community and support for the open source ecosystem. So our interventions today,
I think are primarily about sort of opening up the floor towards questions from the community
and understanding how this architecture can kind of interface with all of the stakeholders
that have an interest in it. So that I'll pass on to Leia.
Thank you. I see if we can turn this into kind of might we can pass around.
Yeah, like that.
Okay, hi everyone. I'm Leia Biaman. Thanks for the kind introduction. I'm from Zendus
from the German Center for Digital sovereignty. To those of us, to those of you who don't
know us, we are a state-owned company, we are kind of associated with the German digital
ministry and our main mission is to make sure that the public sector is less dependent
on individual IT providers. There was a study conducted a few years ago that showed that
the German public sector, but not only the German, I suppose, is very dependent on just a few
IT providers and this is very risky, of course. So we were set up as an entity to do something
about that. We offer open source solutions alternative solutions to the public sector, but we also
take care of securing software supply chains, for example. I could have a look at open code
for that. So that's what we do. From the beginning, from the very beginning, it was very clear
to us that what we do, it doesn't stop at the borders of Germany. The problems we are dealing
with, they go beyond Germany. We need to look to Europe and cooperate with other European countries
to really achieve our mission. So in 2024, we started collaborating with France, with
Denim, MRC, from Denim. So we go way back to use back. So we started collaborating in 2024,
and then a little later, the Netherlands joined the Netherlands, Ministry of the Interior joined
and we had this three-way collaboration, and we've been doing mostly what we call 100-day
challenges. So we collaborate on several projects ranging from AI and video conferencing to
also things really also collaborating on how we want to collaborate. So we also published guidelines
for example on how to do that, and we worked together on docs. We're just quite well known,
I think, note taking application to integrate in our various work space solutions. So we've been doing
lot of good things, but also, I think we noticed that we'd like to scale, we'd like to involve more
partners in our collaboration, and the question is, how can we do that? Because we also notice that it
takes work to work together, a lot of effort, and money and resources that people, and I hope
really for this unique is that it can make this collaboration easier, it can help us scale.
I think of it as a kind of tent that we can put up to give us shelter, to give us funding
and people, and maybe also a strategy and some common ground rules for collaborating, and then
from there we have, or in the kind of tent we have the same space to collaborate and involve more partners.
We've been involved in the EDIC as a kind of project partner of the digital ministry to help implement these projects.
That's my little vision for the EDIC and I'll pass it on to Emma with that.
Thank you, Leo. Hello, everyone. So there is no my picture on the slides, so just a short introduction
to heal my ego today. So I'm in charge of the French Ospo, which is located at the Newman
France. We're having lots of activities in this Ospo, which I will be really happy to talk to you
about in another discussion, and I'm in charge with the cabinet of our director to follow this topic,
which is about the EDIC, and I had the pleasure to work on the topic starting like about
24 months ago, which is not so long, because I don't know if there are some people who in the room
participated in the very early days of the EDIC construction. At this time it was a foundation for digital comments,
because during the French presidency of the EU back in 2022, and there were lots of consultations
with the actors to ask to the communities exactly what you said. I mean, you said we need collaboration
as member states, but communities need also to give, I mean, to express what they need, so that the EDIC can be also constructed with what they think is important.
So there were lots of talking, and a few years later, work actually accelerated a lot,
because we had a little issue. We started understanding that in a long wider policy-makers circle
about our digital sovereignty, because the political context changed, and we thought, oh,
maybe we need to regain some digital sovereignty about, I mean, or public stack, and what we believe
with Zendes and with other EDIC, DC-edic partners, is that sovereignty should be open,
some sovereignty is not something that you restrain to the borders of France, to the borders of Europe,
it should not be closed, it should be open to communities and open with open source.
And this is basically the history behind the digital commons' edict, so what is the edict is about
regaining digital sovereignty with the help of digital commons. We will probably not reach open digital sovereignty
if we do not have a strong digital commons ecosystem. And so very concretely,
the edict was designed to address two things. The first is to strengthen the work on supply,
what we call supply. So let's think it's all of a market to simplify things,
so you have supply of digital commons. And behind that, this is code, this is people, very important,
and the edict will be providing guidance, expertise, funding, expertise which can be legal,
which can be, I mean, as many kinds of expertise this is needed to really strengthen
this digital commons project, but it's good to have supply, right? It's good to reinforce the capacity of people
to develop good projects. It's also very important to work on demand, because in my opinion,
this is my opinion, right? We really need to work on demand. Who is demanding digital commons now?
It's so much easier to just buy as an enterprise or as a government solution that's
proprietary. And it's safe, not as much right now, and people are starting to realize it.
But it's so we need to also work to really advocate, among with lots of people who are doing it here.
I know in the room partners, I know the Open Forum Europe is doing that.
And this is doing that many people between it also to coordinate that, and to really keep doing this,
so that we can also shape the capacity of public agents in the administration of people and enterprises
to really realize that this is important to also use digital commons tools. And the edict can be a tool,
will be a tool to coordinate also this energy that many people are already doing at the,
I mean, in several organizations to work on this.
So this is basically work on demand, work on supply, and develop programs and activities with communities,
with members to do that. So the edict is basically a tool for member states.
I mean, for members of the DC edict, which can only be a member states, as we will see just later.
But it's also a home for projects and a home for digital commons.
And this is how it was built from the very beginning, and this is, we hope, how it will continue to be built in the future.
So we can switch to the set set, just because I don't, I want to leave some room for,
come in, so I hope you, yeah, yeah, exactly, thank you.
So this drawing was actually made by the diplomats.
So please forgive, I mean, give us mercy for this, right?
I know it's very bad, and we will probably work to improve it.
But yeah, you know, diplomats are not so good at drawing.
So what's important here is the information that is on screen,
and that I will try to also explain.
A little was behind all these words.
So this is the edict's governance,
seen by a diplomat, who gave so much to the project, so I don't want to burden him too much.
So you can see here, that's, it's the first time, actually, that we disclose this information, how does it work?
Because it wasn't believable for us, now that the edict has been created back in November,
not to talk at first, about this, because I mean technical communities, communities, of course,
are, I guess, eager, you know, more about how this will function.
So this is kind of the writing of the rules of how it works,
and then I guess the functioning will probably evolve when it's actually operational.
What's important to understand is that the main body of the edict is the assembly of members.
So who can be member, member states?
And only member states, I'm sorry to tell you this.
And right now, there are four member states, which are members, five member states, which are members,
so friends Italy, Netherlands, Germany, and Luxembourg, which joined recently, and we're really happy of this.
And we have another category of persons who participate in what could be seen as an administration consult.
So I don't know if you are involved in NGOs and enterprises, you have administration consult.
So basically, assembly of member is the governing supreme body of the edict.
But it also can welcome observers.
So right now, we have observers, which are mainly member states.
So there is, and there I will need your help there.
There is Poland, there is Slovenia, there is, I should have noted that.
Maybe someone knows in the room, but we have like, some member states, which are observers,
but my memory is really bad as I didn't skip so much over the past days.
And please forgive us if you are a member state observer and not cited.
You also can have municipalities.
So let's say, city of Barcelona, may one to join as an observer.
You can have regions.
So let's say, Shlesbik Holstein, in Germany, could join as an observer.
This is a possibility that is opened by the status.
And obviously also the European Commission is an observer.
So basically, when you are an observer, you can observe, meaning you can give your opinion.
You can participate to activities.
You can attend these administration consult meetings, but you cannot vote.
And that's it.
And in exchange, you don't pay anything, you just observe.
So this is the main body, which will actually be really, it's not really important body,
because it's, I mean, the assembly of members is in charge of setting up the
ADC activities, hiring the director, et cetera.
So now second thing is, there is an adversary board.
So the adversary board provides expertise and guidance to the member states, SMD.
So if I quote the status, this is an equitable distribution of stakeholders,
whose expertise in the field is relevant to digital comments, et cetera.
So it may be obviously people from the community.
And there will be a process that will be set up to select these experts,
which will be nominated for two years to advise the assembly of members.
And finally, there are ad hoc committees.
So this is a working group, so I will not take too much time to speak about it.
They can be set up.
If there is a need to design a program, there is a need to design a text.
If there is a need to organize an event, it's very basically a working group.
And it can be mixed with people from the communities and people who are institutional stakeholders.
So these are the main, let's say, it's governance structures.
So I hope this is a bit clearer.
Actually, it's quite classic.
And there is another one thing which is super important.
And it's in the states, although it's not a governance body.
It's the DCID community network.
So the fact that it lies, it is in the states,
shows that there will probably be no strong edict,
without a strong community.
And this is what it means to have a DC community network in the states.
And the edict will be in charge of working
to ally with the community networks.
That work on digital commands that develop digital and maintain digital commands
to organize events, organize activities, participate to it.
Because I mean, the edict is working at the EU scale.
And if we want to achieve a greater impact.
So I really try to help the European Union member states,
municipalities, etc.
Regain digital sovereignty with the help of digital commands.
Then we really need the community to do it and to spread all of our Europe to participate
and conduct activities.
So this is also something.
So the DC community network, so it's written events held on a regular basis.
I don't think it should be only events.
And it's not in the states, it's this word event.
So I guess it will be a little larger than just events.
But this was a very quick introduction.
And I think necessary introduction also to be transparent with the community with what is happening now.
At the EU level on the digital commands edict to inform you about this.
And we welcome with Lea and I did your questions.
Thank you.
So I choose who I can choose.
So maybe we can do a rule which is one woman, one man.
So Lea is also you can raise your hands.
And there you can raise your hands.
So I think this is one.
It will be second.
You don't have to ask me.
I spoke a lot about this.
Yeah, I mean it's a difficult question.
I need to ask them time to think about it.
But let me try.
Well, I mean we have this mechanism of becoming observer first.
of our first. And I think this is, I mean, first step you can take. So I would recommend
doing that. It's free of charge, if you will. So you can do that. And then, well, I think
personally my advice would be to give us some time to actually set up the idea. I mean,
it's been launched, but we're still waiting for the first employees for projects to kick
off and things like that. And I think from there we can gain more momentum and really show
that it's worth joining the e-dick. And if you are observed by them already, then attending
meetings and events and there will be more of that. Then I hope it can be very convincing
to join us as a full member. I think that's all I can say. And we've been working together
with friends with the Netherlands, the Ministry of the Interior. And we've had these challenges
build stuff. And I think that's been very, very convincing. I hope.
We should ask Luxembourg because they just joined the e-dick. And I'm sure they have good
reasons for this. But I fully agree with you. Once there will be activities launched,
community activities, funding activities, supporting activities. Then I guess it will also make
more sense because if you are the government of Poland and you have, I mean, you have such a strong
open source ecosystem in Poland. You now have a strategy. You now have people in the government.
I know who support this strategy at a high level, which is really amazing. Then if you have the
addition of the right people, plus interesting activities, I guess it can be a help. But my personal
opinion is also that we need people in the countries, open source and digital common communities
in the countries to take part to this discussion through Evan, to also ask their policy makers
and their political decision makers to make a move. And let's be honest, the context is
helping now, which is great. I mean, we have no opportunity because planners are aligned.
Okay, that we think this work is done seem to work.
Splendid. Dirk from Gullick, a part of our foundation. So a lot of the things this
edict and also the digital commons are trying to address, I think, are our issues of
governance, of policy, of industrial policy, of sovereignty, of all sorts of things industry and
society needs to fix. There are no technical issues at all. We've got the technology everything
else. We're here now in a room with lots of engineers. I mean, we write code. We fix things.
What is it that you're really expecting from us? Like what is expected basically?
Because these problems sound very long, technical to me.
If I take MasterDun, so we know we have a problem of cognitive influence by US platforms that are
or Chinese platform that are social networks on or youth and all populations. So we need
sovereign, open community, community alternatives to this. And the DC edict does not build this.
You build it and you build it greatly and probably that you need some help from policy makers
to build it better. If I take an example, send from the government, one problem that we are
having with that kind of platform is user experience. I know it's not a 100% engineer thing,
but I mean, it's a second problem is moderation. So I think that engineers should also,
I mean, we will succeed if there are a diversity of persons working on digital commons on a
pan on a stream that goes from policy makers to UX designers and in between people who are
up for moderation, translation, et cetera. So I emphasize a little on this, but I mean,
they are very good American or Chinese products or whatever private products, proprietary products
that are so good because they are diverse people working on it. So this would be my answer,
not really an answer, but I would expect you to work more widely with a diverse studio of experts
and stakeholders, hopefully with or help.
Yeah, maybe I can just quickly add to that because I realize that what we've been talking about
sounds very policy oriented and high level at times, but going back to those 100-day challenges
where we actually actually build products and build software during these challenges. And we did that
together with the block-note people, for example, so we've been working on docs together.
So you know, we are building technology, we need engineers to do that and to really help us with that.
And yeah, so we need all of you.
If you believe you're underrepresented and you have a question, please raise your hand.
And we have somebody? Yes? Yes, we'll go up there.
Thank you. I am not underrepresented, I'm just a male.
No, I might sound a little bit harsh with my series of questions, but allow me to make a few
questions instead of just one. Looking at this graph, I see that a lot of these advisory boards
are observers, which no participation knows say in it. The assembly of members is basically just
member states. So by implicitly, it's governments and these governments are being reelected.
Every single four years, five years, and they are subject to change of vision.
Also in case of censorship and what is being allowed into the public thinking.
We see the examples perfectly overseas. We might have just merely missed that chance in France
with Martin in the pen and so on. Mike, it's a little bit comfortable to please allow me
a little bit to track it all. So my question to you is how do other non-governmental entities have
certain power and means of directing this edict? I'm lacking the participation of for example in
NGOs, government and event entities like UNICEF and Human Rights Initiative and the EFF.
And also, lastly, it looks a lot like the community network and the ad hoc boards and events
the ones that actually do the work have to do all the work and no participation in it. So how are
you going to solve that? I just had this, I don't want to address the changing government
and how that can be difficult. Because I think what we've seen is that it can also be
quite an advantage because we have different election cycles and sometimes one government needs to
be convinced, again, after a re-election, we have a new government and maybe need to convince them
that this is worth doing. But then during that time, the other partners can carry on projects.
So this has been really helpful. But about including other actors and not just governments,
I think there will be a lot more happening in that space in the middle, as I mentioned,
and not just events, but we will establish mechanisms for feedback also. So just thank you for
a question because this is exactly the kind of feedback that we love to have. So thanks.
One thing I would add to what Leah said is that it's a tool from Member States to coordinate public
policies at the European level to support digital comments. And I mean, let's not hide.
This is, I mean, the statuses have been built in this direction. And it will probably remain
so, but as you can see also, we will conduct the work with the communities in a way that
it's an open-house for digital comments, an open-home for digital comments. So I think that I mean,
there are already many community foundations that, I mean, where the communities can participate
in a very different way. And the positioning of this edict is slightly different in the sense.
So I will not tell you, it's a tool designed by a community's for communities. No, it's been designed
by member states with the help of communities to serve the purpose of supporting digital sovereignty
with the help with the lever of digital comments in the EU to regain or digital sovereignty.
So this is also why we wanted to have this talk. It was to make that clear, but we will for sure
make all the improvements that you mentioned Leah and it's super important that we can really have
a place to grab it. And we are late. So yeah, thank you for all your questions and you can come
to Leah, Adita and me, for further discussions, we really would be happy to have them. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Josh Speakers.