April 23 is a symbolic date in world literature. It is the date on which several important authors, William Shakespeare, Miguel de Cervantes, and Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, died. This date was a natural choice for the General Conference of UNESCO, held in Paris in 1995, to pay a global tribute to books and authors on this date, encouraging everyone to access books.
UNESCO supports the publishing sector and the power of reading through its network of World Book Capitals, designed to strengthen literacy education and promote the protection of copyright and freedom of expression. Strasbourg, France, has been designated the World Book Capital for 2024. The goal is to make the book the preferred medium for communicating the environmental concerns of our time and for sharing the related scientific knowledge. Finally, we are committed to supporting the fair remuneration of all those involved in the book industry, starting with the authors. After all, behind every book, there is an entire chain of knowledge and skills that led to its creation.
By supporting books and copyright, UNESCO stands for creativity, diversity, and equal access to knowledge, with cross-cutting work—from the network of Creative Cities of Literature to the promotion of literacy and mobile learning, to the promotion of open access to scientific knowledge and educational resources. With the active involvement of all stakeholders: authors, publishers, teachers, librarians, public and private institutions, humanitarian NGOs, and the media, and everyone who feels motivated to work together in this global celebration of books and authors, World Book and Copyright Day has become a platform to bring together millions of people around the world.
However, there is no protection without the tools that, in the increasingly computerized and digitized world we live in, must be updated and capable of competing with the challenges posed by an ever-accelerating technological evolution. In this sense, for authors and writers, blockchain technology offers an extremely effective and cutting-edge response, as it allows going beyond the criterion of trust, which has been the essential element of protection until now. Through constant and complete reliance on mathematics, it enables the persistence and preservation over time of the information accompanying a digital file, mostly without revealing its content.
The digital asset format known as a non-fungible token, or NFT, is the ideal tool for assigning any literary work a clear and inviolable attribution, always traceable and demonstrable over time. Maenoox is the service designed for all authors so that they have an extra lever to assert their rights over their works.