Workbook on Digital Private Papers > Legal Issues > Intellectual Property Rights
Providing access to digital archives: copyright considerations
Obtaining explicit usage rights for copyrighted material
The right to use a copyrighted material can be obtained by three means
- Through an assignment or assignation of copyright in writing form the copyright owner
- With the permission/or licence from the copyright owner
- By obtaining a licence from a collective licensing organisations (e.g. Copyright Licensing Agency) to which the author has already made a specific agreement on terms and licensed use of the material
Generally speaking, rightsholders do not wish to sign away their rights, but may happily come to an arrangement whereby the Library administers rights on their behalf. This involves the Library taking responsibility for the interests of the rightsholder when approving requests to publish extracts, or requests to copy, etc. Such an arrangement should be incorporated in the acquisition phase.
Providing access in the reading room
Non-sensitive digital material, which is still in copyright, might be made available to registered readers in a secure search room if they have signed a condition of use form and the donor has given permission for the collection to be opened. Readers would be responsible for not breaching copyright in a similar fashion to current practice in a paper archive.
If born digital copyright material is provided for readers in a search room it would seem prudent to provide access copies in standard read-only formats and/or on specially configured PCs, as this would offer some protection against unlawful copying by readers.
The following practices would normally be regarded as 'fair and lawful' under guidelines on copying of electronic material under fair dealing and library privileges agreed by JISC and the Publishers Association.
Fair and Lawful
Extracted from Copyright for Archivists by Tim Padfield (section 6.1.4):
- Viewing part or all of an electronic work on screen, so long as any incidental copy made by the computer is deleted afterwards;
- Printing out of a copy or part (to a maximum of 5%) of an electronic publication;
- Copying a part of an electronic publication to disk where the disk is portable or is accessible by only one person at a time;
- Transmission across a computer network of part of an electronic publication to enable it to be printed out locally, so long as any incidental copies are then deleted;
- Transmission across a network of part an electronic publication for local storage and use, but not for onward transmission;
- Quotation from electronic material for the purposes of criticism, review or current news reporting, so long as the source is properly acknowledged.
Unfair and unlawful without prior permission
Extracted from Copyright for Archivists by Tim Padfield (section 6.1.5):
- The copying of a whole of an electronic work, except an incidental copy for use when viewing on screen;
- Transmission across a computer network of the whole of an electronic work, for any purpose;
- The posting of all or part of an electronic publication on a network or a website;
- The making of more than one copy;
- The copying of an artistic work on its own or of one that was not integral to the text;
International considerations
It is increasingly likely that personal archives will contain materials created by non-UK nationals, which could have different copyright protections. This could complicate the archivist's assessment of rights and rightsholders in a personal archive, and could make administering and using the archive more difficult. In practice, many countries have signed international treaties which attempt to harmonise intellectual property rights across countries. One example is the Berne Convention; its principle of 'national treatment' means that material created by a citizen of one state enjoys 'national treatment' in another state provided both states are signatories of the treaty. For example, Egypt and the UK are both signatories of the Berne Convention. This means that an email from Egypt in a personal archive in the UK is protected under UK law. For further information on international treaties and their signatories, visit the World Intellectual Property Right Organization (WIPO) website.
It is also increasingly true that readers expect digital resources to be provided across networks. On the face of it, it seems unreasonable that a researcher abroad must visit the Library in person to access the archives which could be accessed remotely in order to avoid breaching intellectual property rights. It is unclear whether existing Digital Rights Management techniques could be harnessed to provide remote reader access in accordance with the law and any agreements with rightsholders.
Previous section << Copyright and archival material
Next section >> Copyright legislation
Disclaimer: the guidance given in the Paradigm workbook is not legal advice. Legal advice from a solicitor with expertise in the appropriate field should be sought before taking action in relation to specific matters.
[Top]
