“Culture can provide a kind of glue between technology and society”

Betterimagesofai.org artist: Georgina Leeuwendal

Digital commons thrive on sharing knowledge, culture and building communities, rather than innovation for its own sake. But as AI companies increasingly seek data to train their models, a key question emerges: how can these shared resources remain rooted in collective and democratic values?

”Digital commons was never about the tech industry. It’s a terrain created, maintained and cherished by grassroot communities, value-driven organisations and individuals”, says Rasa Bočytė who works as a Senior Advisor for Research Collaborations at the Netherlands Institute for Sound & Vision and is an ekip partner.

Digital commons were built on the idea that knowledge and culture grow when people share them. Innovation may follow, but “that is never the goal per se”. The real strength lies in the communities that form around shared resources. Now, as AI companies increasingly turn to these resources to feed their models, a question arises: what happens when a culture of sharing meets the commercial race for data?

Rasa Bočytė took part in ekip´s Policy Lab in Linz, Austria. Photo: Bodil Malmström

”This threw things off balance. Infrastructures that are maintained mainly by public money and volunteer efforts are now facing an onslaught of content crawling bots and “partnership” requests from some of the wealthiest companies in the world. This is not the reciprocal relationships that the commons were designed for”, says Rasa Bočytė.

AI risks stripping culture of context

AI companies are increasingly interested in heritage collections because archives classify and label cultural artefacts in ways that make them easier to process as data. But, unlike AI systems that rely on categorisation, digital commons and museum exhibitions place objects in context, revealing their provenance, significance and changing meanings over time.

”But regurgitated through generative algorithms, culture becomes flattened and decontextualised. That being said, the cultural heritage sector can learn a lot from the current moment. We need to ask ourselves if we are doing enough to provide the right contextual information, and if we provide it in meaningful ways,” says Rasa Bočytė.

Treating culture as raw material echoes the idea of data as the “new oil”. But do we really want to replicate the industrial exploitation of nature in the way we use our cultural heritage?

”We tend to forget that AI is not just generative AI, and there are many other ways of building AI that are much more aligned with the values of the commons. I for one am very interested in slow, small and frugal AI built around and for context-specificity, cultural protection and reciprocal value,” says Rasa Bočytė.

Backing the commons

Rather than focusing solely on regulating harmful actors, policymakers should strengthen those who maintain the digital commons.

“We need them to be strong enough financially, politically and socially and to negotiate fair terms with tech companies or refuse partnerships that deepen their dependence,” says Rasa Bočytė.

This requires recognising the commons not as a market failure, but as a pillar of democracy requiring sustained investment, governance and protection. Rasa Bočytė empasizes that policy should ensure that value flows back to the commons, for example by requiring commercial companies profiting from publicly funded infrastructures to reinvest part of their profits in them.

”For instance, Dutch Council for Culture is calling for an AI levy with proceeds going back to the cultural and creative industries.”

Regulation alone will not protect the digital commons, Rasa Bočytė  explains. Policymakers must also help build alternative AI systems that put public interest, democratic accountability and cultural participation first. The case for Public AI: making it happen with cultural heritage explores how this could become a reality.

Rewilding the web

The early internet offers a lesson: open protocols enabled decentralisation, whereas today’s digital services increasingly follow the logic of a few dominant platforms.

Against this centralisation, she sees a growing movement to decentralise and “rewild” the web — and AI.

“Decentralisation goes against monoculture and supports innovation and creativity at the edges, and shifts power and resources away from the centre and towards the commons.”

Shaping the digital society

Digital technologies increasingly shape access to public services, knowledge and culture. With AI accelerating the trend, digital commons have become a cultural and innovation  policy issue, not just a technological one.

“These are questions that matter, or should matter, to everybody,” says Barbara Lovrinic Higgins, Research Assistant at the Institute for Development and International Relations (IRMO) in Zagreb, Croatia.

She points to her country, where citizens increasingly rely on digital infrastructure to carry out everyday administrative tasks, while cultural heritage is also accessed through digital platforms.

“AI makes this more evident. It is simultaneously an issue of regulation, innovation, education, health, cultural production, and access to knowledge,” she says.

For Barbara Lovrinic Higgins the debate ultimately goes beyond technological possibilities to the kind of society people want to create.

“The important question is not only what technology allows us to do, but what kind of access to knowledge and culture we want these infrastructures to enable.”

When shared value becomes private profit

When shared resources feed commercial platforms, collective value risks becoming private profit.

Barbara Lovrinic Higgins warns: “When those resources become inputs for commercial systems that concentrate economic and technological power, there is a risk that value created collectively is captured privately,”

Yet public institutions can also restrict access. Italy’s dispute over the Uffizi Galleries’ control of commercial reproductions of Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus, including Jean Paul Gaultier’s use of the image on clothing, illustrates the tension. Although the painting is in the public domain, its commercial reuse can still be subject to institutional control.

As Barbara Lovrinic Higgins asks: “Who is able to control shared cultural resources, who is able to extract value from them, and how do we ensure that the commons remain genuinely common?”

Libraries, archives and museums have a key role in safeguarding access, but need resources and policy support to meet the demands of the digital age.

“Cultural institutions have considerable responsibility, but they also need resources and policy support,” she says.

Barbara Lovrinic Higgins participated at ekip´s Policy Lab in Linz, Austria. Photo: Bodil Malmström

A kind of glue 

Longterm investment in infrastructure, skills and digital preservation is essential.

“The commons may be open to everyone, but producing and maintaining them requires sustained investment. Beyond digitising cultural resources, we must ensure they remain genuinely accessible and useful to the public. Digital commons are an essential part of democratic cultural participation.”

The early internet’s emphasis on sharing and collaboration offers lessons for the future.

“Technological systems are not neutral or inevitable. They can be organised according to different values. As AI develops, culture can help bring diversity, participation and creativity  into the equation. Culture can provide a kind of glue between technology and society.”