Copyright is one of the intellectual property rights (others include patents & trademarks) designed to protect the “expression of ideas”. It aims to protect and reward original creator(s) of works for the investment of their time, effort and skill.
UK Copyright Law protects the commercial rights of authors, creators and publishers of written works (including their typographical arrangement), music (both composition and performance), works of art and computer programmes. In simple terms, it allows them to control who copies the material they have created so that they retain the right to exploit its commercial potential.
Further information about copyright and how it applies to Higher Education can be found on the Copyright Licensing Agency's website.
In summary:
- Written, music and art works: covers a work until 70 years after the death of the originator
- Computer programmes: 50 years from date of creation
Sound recordings/broadcasts: 70 years from the end of the year recorded/broadcasted– this applies to music performers’ royalties
- Typographical arrangement of published editions: 25 years from first year of publication
Copyright responsibilities
Adherence to copyright legislation and licences is a university-wide responsibility. All members of staff have a responsibility to familiarise themselves with and abide by the current copyright licensing arrangements.
You are responsible for ensuring that anything you copy for your individual use or copy / distribute to students complies with licensing arrangements and the law.
Distributing material that is in breach of copyright, whether physically or electronically could lead to the University facing significant financial penalties and/or legal action.
Copying material
You can legally copy very little for your own use. However, copyright law makes exceptions that allow individuals to copy a very limited amount of material to enable them to undertake:
- Private study
- Non-commercial research
- Criticism and review (provided the work has been lawfully made available to the public and the work must be sufficiently acknowledged)
This is known as ‘Fair Dealing’
The amount that can be copied under Fair Dealing has never been legally defined. However, it is by convention accepted to mean a general permission to copy as long as what is copied does not harm or prejudice the interests of the rights holder. The amounts to copy stated below should therefore be treated as guidelines:
What can I copy for my personal use?
Books and print journals
You must copy no more than one chapter of a book, or one journal article from an issue of a journal. You must only make a single copy and it must be for your individual use.
Journal articles from library online resources
You must only download articles for your own personal use. They must not be emailed to anyone else (including colleagues). They must not be saved anywhere that other people can access including onto shared network drives.
Newspapers
You must only copy one article from an issue of a print newspaper and it must be for your individual use.
Websites and web pages
Don’t assume that because material is freely available on the web that you are free to copy it. Always check the permissions of the website you are using and check whether or not it explicitly states that you may copy material. This includes images that you have found from Google Image Search and other free search engines.
Protecting copyright
Who owns the copyright of your work?
- Copyright is automatically assigned to a work once it is in a fixed state.
- You do not need to register copyright.
- Copyright ownership always rests with the author(s) in the first instance.
- In the case of material you submit to commercial publishers you will often be asked to assign copyright to the publisher
Hope and your copyright
The university has a clearly defined policy on the copyright interest it will assert in work that you produce in the course of your employment.
- Copyright of “scholarly work” such as journal articles and books written whilst employed at Hope is retained by individual lecturers.
- Academics however may have assigned copyright to commercial publishers on signing publisher agreements.
- If academics carry out externally funded research, copyright of written outputs may be retained by funding bodies –contractual agreements should be scrutinised.
- Be mindful of collaborative works with other authors:
- Copyright ownership will be shared between academic colleagues
- May have other restrictions on their copyright ownership complicating matter
- Exception in terms of copyright ownership is copyright of teaching materials which is retained by Hope:
- “the copyright in course materials produced by the lecturer in the course of his/her employment for the purposes of the curriculum of a course run by Liverpool Hope University and produced, used or disseminated by the employer shall belong to Liverpool Hope University” (Academic Employment Contract)
Negotiating with publishers
In the case of commercially published work, publishers’ will also assert a copyright interest in your work.
- Commercial publishers will often require academics to assign all or a significant proportion of their copyright over to them when they submit manuscripts.
- Academics cannot assume that just because they wrote something, they retain the right to copy at will. This includes making their own work available to students, which if copyright has been assigned to the publisher, they will lose the right to do so.
- Always scrutinise the terms of your contract, or look for copyright terms on the journal website you are submitting to.
Third party copyright - other copyright interests in your work
You will often use other copyright material in the course of producing your own work. As such you need to ensure that you have the appropriate permission to do so.
- You must get permission from the copyright-holder to use an extract from one work of ‘substantial’ length in another work.
- This also applies to images, tables and diagrams
- If work is still in print contact the publisher (rights department)
- If author has died, work is long out of print or publisher has gone out of business tracing copyright ownership can be very laborious
- Lack of response does not mean that you can use
Protecting work you make freely available in the public domain
It is possible both to publish your work and make it freely available and still protect your copyright.
- There are various options available for publishing your work in a forum where it is freely available. This is often known as Open Access publishing
- There are also simple means of ensuring you can protect the copyright of work you choose to make freely available
If you would like any further help with copyright issues related to your own work please contact AskaLibrarian@hope.ac.uk.
Copying from written works i.e. books, journals and monographs is permissible within set restrictions under our institutions licence with the Copyright Licensing Agency (CLA). The University also has licenses covering copying from newspapers, maps, recording terrestrial television programmes and for copying official information.
- The licence DOES NOT cover “recipients of instruction in short-term courses which are delivered on a cost recovery basis and in return for a fee and which are not included in the UCAS brochure.”
- Courses not included on the HESA returns are not covered by the licence.
- For these courses the permission of the copyright holder must be sought before any printed works are copied and distributed to the students.
- There are certain categories of print material (including printed music) that are not covered by the licence.
- There is information on the CLA website about what cannot be copied under the terms of the licence.
Other licensing schemes
National & Local newspapers - Newspaper Licensing Agency
TV Programmes - Off air recording of terrestrial broadcasting (excluding Open University Programmes) - Educational Recording Licence
Ordnance Survey maps - Ordnance Survey
Crown Copyright
UK government publications - PSI licence
Copyright fee paid
When the library does not hold an original copy of a work, it is still possible to obtain a copyright-fee-paid copy of an article or chapter, which can be copied for students and placed on Moodle. A fee is charged, and the amount depends on the item as the price is set by the publisher. The Library will obtain a quote before ordering an item through this service. Please contact library staff at materialdelivery@hope.ac.uk to request a quote.
The fee can either be paid from the book budget or by money wired to the library budget by the subject area. You should seek the approval of your Head of Department to access this service.
Images
Images, including photographs, are subject to copyright. All images you find on the web are copyright works. You should therefore not use images in Moodle, lecture presentations, course handbooks, or any other distributed documents unless you have explicit permission to do so. This also applies to video clips.
How can I use images and other media in my lectures and Moodle?
- The library subscribes to a number of dedicated image databases available via Online Library. They provide thousands of images which can be re-used for educational use. The images in these databases can be used in lecture notes, presentations, and student dissertations and assignments as long as the source is clearly acknowledged. You may not post images on unrestricted web pages. if you make images available electronically they must be on an access-restricted site, such as Moodle, so that only authorised people can access them.
- Some online databases, such as the photo-sharing site Flickr also provide images that can be redistributed for non-commercial purposes.
- Faculty Librarians can offer further guidance on finding and using images for educational purposes. You can contact them directly or via AskaLibrarian@hope.ac.uk.
- To share audio or video clips, you should include a link to the URL (web address) of the clip you wish to use in your Moodle, or bookmark this link to your online reading list, rather than downloading a file and uploading it to Moodle.
Copying for exams
It is not an offence to copy printed works for examination purpose in setting and communicating questions or answering the question provided sufficient acknowledgement of the original source is made.
This is a legal exception completely separate from the CLA licence and so the limits for copying under that licence do not apply for examination. Note the legislation does not cover exam questions or answers if they are then used later for another purpose. Therefore, you should not make past exam papers containing copies of copyrighted work available to students for practice purposes whether in print or via Moodle.
Music examination exception: This clause does not cover use of copied material in a musical performance examination. In this situation only a purchased copy of the work can be used.
Visual impairment
Enlargements can be provided to visually impaired staff and students of unlimited amounts provided:
- Main text copies are at least 16 point size
- Copied material is only used by visually impaired staff & students
- The item is NOT on the CLA Excluded Works List
- The Library owns a copy of the original work and it is available to other students
You can provide your students with a scanned copy of reading material completing a Scanning request form.
A link to the scan (see an example here) will be provided within five working days, and this can be shared with your students on Moodle, in an online reading list or via email. Each scanning request costs £11.00, which is paid by your department. Please contact your department administrator for details of fund codes. There may be additional costs, for example, in cases where we are required to pay for further copyright clearance. The Material Delivery team will contact you if this is the case.
A maximum of 10% or one chapter, whichever is greater, can be scanned from a book. If you have any questions about the amount that you wish to scan, please contact your . Items that are available online, such as online articles or ebooks, should not normally require scanning, as you can simply provide students with a link.
Before submitting a request
If the scan is from a book, then either the Library or your department should own a copy. Please check the library catalogue, and if the library does not have a copy of the book, please contact your Faculty Librarian to discuss further options.
If you wish to scan an article, check if the Library has online access or if the article is available via Open Access. You can do this using Online Library or open access databases. If access is not available, please contact your Faculty Librarian to discuss further options.
Before submitting your request, please check that scanning is permitted by the Copyright Licensing Agency ("the CLA"). You can find this out using the CLA's Check Permissions tool and searching by title, author, ISBN, or ISSN. If scanning is not permitted, please contact your Faculty Librarian to discuss further options.
If you have followed the steps above, you are ready to fill out the Scanning request form. If you need any assistance filling out the form, please contact your Faculty Librarian or e-mail us at materialdelivery@hope.ac.uk.
What happens next?
Once you have submitted your request, the Material Delivery team will send you a link to a high-quality scan within five working days. You can then share the link with your students on Moodle, in an online reading list or via email. As well as being high-quality, scans from the Material Delivery team benefit from being searchable, offering increased accessibility through Optical Character Recognition (OCR), and being fully compliant with all copyright legislation and licences.
The above information offers a general guide to academic teaching staff submitting a scanning request. If you have any questions that are not covered above, please contact your Faculty Librarian, or refer to the list of Frequently Asked Questions below. Guidance for library staff is available here.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does scanning cost?
A typical scan will cost £11.00. This is paid by your department. In some instances there may be additional costs, for example, where we are required to pay for further copyright clearance. The Material Delivery team will contact you if this is the case.
How long does it take?
Scanning requests can take up to five working days to fulfil during busy periods. Therefore, please submit any requests at least a week in advance of when you require them. The turnaround time may be less during quieter periods.
Can I do my own scanning?
No. By requesting your scanned material through the Material Delivery team, you ensure that you are complying fully with all copyright legislation and licences. Additionally, as part of our licence, the Library is required to report data about scanning to the CLA.
Where can I get my fund codes?
In order for your department to pay for scanning, you need to include the following codes on your form: (1) Nominal / Account Code; (2) Cost Centre; (3) Project Code. You can get these codes from your department administrator.
What will the final scan look like?
You can see an example of a scanned chapter here. As well as being high-quality, scans from the Material Delivery team benefit from being searchable, offering increased accessibility through Optical Character Recognition (OCR), and being fully compliant with all copyright legislation and licences.
Where can I share the scan?
You can share the link to the scan with your students on Moodle, in an online reading list or via email.
What is Optical Character Recognition (OCR)?
OCR is the electronic conversion of images of typed, handwritten or printed text into machine-encoded text. This has many benefits, including increasing the accessibility of reading material. For example, a student with dyslexia can use text-to-speech to help them read scanned material that they might otherwise have struggled to read.
What is Open Access (OA)?
Open access research is freely available online. You can search a number of locations to discover if an article is open access. These include Google Scholar, the Directory of Open Access Journals, Core, and Paperity.
Who are the Material Delivery team?
The Material Delivery team is made up of Helen and Stephen. The team's email address is materialdelivery@hope.ac.uk.
Can I have materials scanned for use at a staff workshop or Community of Practice?
Unfortunately the answer is no. Our license only allows us to make scanned copies for use by students on a course of study so would not cover use by groups of staff.
