COPYRIGHT ISSUES FOR REPOSITORIES Workshop for Repository Administrators, Oxford, 11/8/10 Professor Charles Oppenheim

MY ASSUMPTIONS The materials you are adding to your IR are text, and possibly images, multimedia, podcasts (e.g., of lectures or conference speeches) Those materials are research outputs and maybe also teaching materials They have been authored by your staff and/or students, or perhaps co-authored with people in other organisations Everything you are handling is in copyright because it was created relatively recently (out of copyright items pose no problems) That you know the basics of copyright law

THE RIGHTS YOU NEED TO BE AWARE OF Copyright – will apply to pretty much everything you handle Database right - may apply to collections of data, texts, images Performers’ rights – will apply to any recording of a performance, including musical, artistic, dance, lectures….. Moral rights – the right to object/sue if you fail to credit the creator/performer by name or if you subject their work to derogatory treatment One, some, or all these rights might apply to a particular item you are depositing

THE RIGHTS OWNERS YOU NEED TO BE AWARE OF Sometimes it is the creator him/herself If it is a journal article, book chapter, etc., the author(s) may well have assigned copyright to a publisher – in which case they have given up all their rights and you need the publisher’s permission to put the item on the repository – Bill will tell you all about how to use Romeo for this purpose shortly Also, you will encounter staff or student-created materials which include third party owned rights, e.g., embedded photos, diagrams, etc. Thus, any given item may have multiple types of rights and/or multiple rights owners associated with them

BY ADDING THE ITEM TO THE IR….. You are making a copy of the item, and you are ”communicating to the public” Both of these acts are potentially infringing copyright, db right, performers’ rights, and if you fail to give names of creators (in the metadata will do) or if you amend the work in a derogatory way, you could infringe Moral Rights as well N.B. “communicating to the public” includes any subset of the public.

FOUR BASIC SCENARIOS 1.Created by your staff/students, no third party materials 2.Created by your staff/students, includes third party materials 3.Created by your staff/students as well as people from other organisations, no third party materials 4.Created by your staff/students as well as people from other organisations, includes third party materials

ACTIONS NEEDED Scenario 1, 2 – they should have signed a form confirming that they own the IPR and confirming there is no third party copyright material present, or if there is, they have cleared it It’s probably OK for them to sign the form just once for all future deposits, but safest is to get them to sign each time Ideally, should be a handwritten signature – e mail or Web form less reliable legally, but I realise my advice here may be impractical Do this, make sure every author is named somewhere and that you have not amended the work in a derogatory way, and you are OK!

SCENARIO 3,4 – CO- AUTHORS FROM ELSEWHERE It depends on the nature of the item If the item is a journal article, etc., and if the authors have assigned copyright to the journal, and if the journal publisher has given permission to put the article on an IR (Romeo!), then the form signed by any one of your staff/student authors will do fine In all other cases, (journal articles where you have retained copyright, or all other types of items) you will need EACH co-author to sign the form. Again, do all this and you are OK

“I HAVE CLEARED ALL THIRD PARTY MATERIALS” You are entitled to believe them if they say they have cleared third party copyright, but if it is in your face that they are using third party materials, or if the item contains high risk items (see later), you should ask questions Remember, your staff may well have infringed copyright by including particular items in that journal article in the first place. If need be consult your manager/refuse to add the item

WHAT IF THE ITEM CONTAINS A PERFORMANCE? This includes: recordings of music, songs, dance, mime, theatre, lectures, etc., whether or not you can actually see the performers Unclear if sports are considered performances You then quite separately require each performer to sign a form clearing performers rights; if any one refuses ort does not reply, you cannot add the performance to the IR Make sure you name individual performers in metadata; however, no need to name every member of a choir or a large orchestra N.B. Background music is almost always a no-no

HIGH RISK ITEMS Journal articles where Romeo has not been checked Literary criticism with extensive use of original texts (James Joyce….) Copies of anything that is commercially available, e.g., software, music, films, books, music, art from high profile artists, broadcasts, magazines OS maps Anything with musical notations in it Anything to do with Andrew Lloyd Webber Personality tests, IQ tests…..

WHAT ABOUT THESES? The examination exception in UK copyright law allows the candidate to reproduce any third party he/she likes in the thesis But this exception no longer applies when the thesis is digitised and placed in the IR, on Ethos, etc. So, if they contain third party materials, you need to treat them as with any Scenario 2 material – created by a student/staff and containing third party materials – so the student needs to sign the form confirming they have cleared rights, and as before, you are entitled to trust them, but ask questions if it involves high risk materials Need to take an informed risk management approach to theses where the student is no longer in contact, e.g., if digitising old theses As before, if you have concerns, check with your manager/refuse to add the thesis

ABSTRACTS OF JOURNAL ARTICLES IN METADATA UK copyright law allows you to copy author abstracts of scientific or technical journal articles without having to ask permission Does this extend to social sciences/arts/humanities? Considerable debate on this. It seems social sciences are OK, but not arts/humanities. Even in sci/tech, don’t copy the abstract from a commercial service such as Science Direct or Thomson-Reuters; re-key it, or get the author him/herself to pass you it.

REPRINT REQUESTS If someone chooses to go to the repository and download materials, print them out, forward them onto colleagues, etc., that’s fine – they carry any risk, not you. Legally, you offering an electronic link to pro-actively send copies of papers to requestors is NOT the same. So do not set up a system with “request a copy” facilities. An e-copy can only be distributed in such a pro-active manner with the permission of the copyright owner, who may well still be a publisher. If someone e mails you and asks you to forward them a copy of an item in your repository, you should refer them to the repository and invite them to download it for themselves.

TIME FOR QUESTIONS/DISCUSSION!