Innovations constitute an essential element of modern society, a society that relies increasingly on digital assets and networks.
This is an environment in which innovations cannot work alone; they must communicate with the digital world around them. The study examines innovations as communication in this environment, in particular as the interplay of three sets of interests - those of the state, the market, and commons. All three must be taken into account if the operative framework is to become more collaborative. Here, commons offer an illustrative example of how free resources have traditionally been governed through communicative rules. The interests of the state, the market, and commons can be considered the basis of our society’s legal architecture. The study examines and exemplifies this architecture in several operations typical of the digital economy, drawing the conclusion that the traditional system of intellectual property rights has become ill-suited for governing the digitized framework. The system may easily become too strong and thus restrict proper innovativeness. Allowing innovativeness to proceed unhindered while governing it in keeping with the interests of the state, the market and commons has become crucial for our communication-based society. Building up and justifying a rights governance architecture to this end is the objective of this thesis.