Copyright is an important and complex area and it is essential that we, in higher education, understand the basics to ensure that we do not infringe copyright law when creating and disseminating print and electronic copies of materials.
What is copyright?
Copyright is an intellectual property right that exists to protect the intellectual standing and economic rights of creators and publishers of all literary, dramatic, artistic, musical, audiovisual and electronic works. A work qualifies for copyright providing that:
- the work is original and
- the author is a qualifying person (a British citizen, subjects or protected persons under the British Nationality Act 1981, a person domiciled in the UK or body incorporated under the laws of the UK, any citizen of any of the Member States of the EU); or
- in the case of a literary work, the work was first published in the UK
Copyright legislation gives the owners of original works the right to prevent others copying a substantial part of the original work.
Who owns copyright?
Copyright ownership usually rests with the creator of the work. However, if the work was undertaken for an employer then the copyright ownership may rest with the employer. Occasionally an author may assign copyright ownership to a publisher.
Unless a work falls within 'fair dealing' or is covered by an exception (see below) you will need the copyright owner's permission if you want to; copy another person's work, issue or loan it to the public, or broadcast it.
Exceptions to copyright
In certain circumstances (e.g. academic writing) it would be impossible or impractical to get permission from the copyright holder, therefore the law includes exceptions which allows the use of copyrighted works without the copyright holder's permission. The main exceptions in the field of higher education are:
- Research or private study: allows students and researchers to copy limited extracts of works for non-commercial research and private study. These works include; books, journals, music, artistic works, sound recordings, films and broadcasts.
- Quotation: allows anyone to produce copyrighted works for the use of quotation for criticism, review and news reporting.
- Accessible copies: allows individuals or institutions to provide equal access to copyright works for users with any type disability.
- Illustration for instruction: allows copying of all types of copyright works to illustrate a teaching point or for exam purposes, subject to fair dealing.
- Text and data mining: allows UK researchers to copy a work for analysis using text and data mining technologies for the purpose of non-commercial research.
Copyright Licenses
The university holds 'collective licenses' which allows Teesside staff and students to copy or reuse certain amounts from books, journals, recordings etc. without the need to obtain permissions.
This license allows you to:
- copy one article from an issue of a journal, a chapter or 10% of a book - whichever is greater,
- share copies with students and staff
- share copies on your intranet
- copy publications from the UK plus 38 other countries
Requests for copyrighted items under the CLA licence must be made via the Library's Scanning for Teaching service.
Off air recordings:
The University holds licenses from the Education Recording Agency (ERA) and the Open University which allows staff at the University to record programs from the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5.
Our Helpsheet on Video and Audio recordings provides more in-depth information for staff at the University.
What is Fair dealing?
Some of the exceptions outlined above only apply if the use of a work is a 'fair dealing'. Fair dealing is a legal term used to establish whether a use of copyrighted material is lawful or whether it infringes copyright. There is no statutory definition of fair dealing, however factors determining if a work is fair include:
- have you used someone else's work in a way that stops them from selling their work or causes them to lose revenue?
- have you used more of a work than you needed for your purpose?
- Is the use of the work appropriate?
- have you acknowledged the work?
Fair dealing is permitted for the following purposes:
- research or private study
- criticism or review
- reporting on current events
General advice for amounts that can be copied or used under fair dealing are:
Non-commercial research and private study:
- no more than one chapter of a book
- no more that one article in an issue of a journal or in a set of conference proceedings
- a report of a single case in a judicial review
- one short story or one poem not exceeding 10 pages in an anthology of short stories or poems or
- no more than 10% of any published edition above, whichever is the greater.
Criticism, review and quotation:
- a single extract of no more than 400 words
- several extracts of less than 300 words each and totaling no more than 800 words or
- no more than 40 lines of a poem - must be less that one-quarter of the whole poem
Illustration for instruction:
- a single extract of no more than 400 words
- several extracts of less than 300 words each and totaling no more than 800 words or
- no more than 40 lines of a poem - must be less that one-quarter of the whole poem
Copyright exceptions for students and staff with disabilities
Anyone with a disability is now covered by copyright legislation where their impairment affects their ability to study or work on an equal basis as someone without impairment.
The CLA licence allows type size enlargement/reduction/alternative fonts/colour adjustment and left/right justification (and any other techniques to make content more accessible) of any quantity of material provided that:
- the material is covered by the CLA licence
- the copies are for the exclusive use of students or staff with any recognised disability in the Disability Discrimination Act for educational purposes only
- the material is not already available in an acceptable alternative format e.g. electronic text
- the University owns a copy of the original published edition of the material and that this is available to other students.
Under the Copyright Act the whole work may be copied into another format. The full bibliographic information of the original published edition must be included and the copy be identified as being made Under the Copyright Act.
How long does copyright last?
Generally copyright lasts for 70 years after the creator's death. If there are several creators, then copyright lasts for 70 years after the death of the last surviving author.
Exceptions to the 70 year rule include:
- Photographs: taken before 1st August 1989 photographs are subject to various periods of copyright. Photographs taken on or after 1st August 1989 follow the 70 year rule.
- Dramatic and musical works - no author: 70 years from date of publication.
- Published sound recordings: 70 years from the end of the year in which it was first published or made available to the public.
- Unpublished sound recordings: 50 years from the end of the year in which it was made.
- Films: 70 years from the death of the last survivor out of the director, producer, author of the screenplay or composer of the soundtrack.
- Broadcasts: 50 years from the end of the year it was made.
- Typographical layout: 25 years from date of publication.
- Crown copyright: 125 years from publication, subject to a waver.
Requesting permission
If you want to use copyrighted material which does not fall under any of the exceptions or is not covered by 'fair dealing', then you may need to seek permission from the copyright holder. However, if the material has a Creative Commons license then it might still be OK to re-use. For example: CC BY allows users to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format, as long as attribution is given to the creator.
Using images
Images, including photographs and illustrations taken from print materials as well as online images are subject to copyright. Attribution should be given to the rights holder on any work you produce including essays, reports and presentations. You may also find that some online images require payment for their use. The university has access to Adobe Stock Free Collection as part of the Adobe Creative Cloud that Teesside Students/staff can use. The reuse of materials from here is in the licence information provided by adobe and this is where we would recommend students to source their material from.
