Libraires’ ability to fulfil their missions fully depends strongly on the copyright laws they need to work with. The Copyright and Public Interest conference, held in Johannesburg and Cape Town, will be an opportunity to share experiences with allies and build an agenda for change.

The conference builds on the understanding that there needs to be a strong voice in support of the interests of the public, including their rights to knowledge, education and research.

Too often, this comes second to the arguments made by different actors focused on exploiting the economic potential of content, be they publishers, collecting societies, internet platforms or others.

This requires libraries, researchers, educators and others to raise their voices and get involved in discussion and advocacy. This is what the Conference on Copyright and the Public Interest looks to achieve.

With a split programme over two cities and four days, it will discuss updates about recent and ongoing copyright reforms (including South Africa’s hugely drawn-out one), and hot topics such as AI.

A dedicated IFLA programme on 5 February will underline the need for libraries to have a say in the policy environment in which they work, while libraries will also join a wider panel talking about our work at the World Intellectual Property Organization on 6 February.

Thanks to a grant from the Programme on Information Justice and Intellectual Property (PIJIP), we are able to bring more African librarians to this event – we are grateful to PIJIP for this support.