Quick Tips

Academia.edu

See entry Publications

Adaptations

At times, it is possible to re-use some material as long as the original is considerably adapted, and the adaptation has substantial changes from its original form. You will need to reference the original and add a note “Adapted from [original source]”

Amount to copy

There is no statutory measure to define the amount of text that can be copied. The 10% quantity is a myth, and it must be done in a way that a “fair-minded and honest person” would consider just and that it is not used as an excuse to infringe copyright.

Remember to reference it correctly, using Coventry University Referencing Guidelines. Include official links to referenced resources, such as official documents, landing pages or officially uploaded material.

arXiv

See entry Publications

Broadcasts

Can I use broadcasts? Broadcasters are unlikely to allow uploading or editing of their material, which would be expensive. Additionally, some broadcasters' output has a territorial restriction that will make it impossible to licence for an international audience.

Charts

Do I need permission to re-use charts? Unless one of the exceptions to copyright applies, you usually need to seek permission to use charts and diagrams that are considered original and unique. You must keep a copy of the consent for future reference and add a note in the resource “With permission from [the copyright owner]”. If you do not obtain permission, and no copyright exceptions apply, you may adapt it considerably by building upon it in look and wording and then add the notification "Adapted from [original source's reference]”. See also data.

Copying from the Internet

Almost everything on the internet is protected by copyright; just because there is no copyright statement does not mean you are allowed to copy it.

You can usually:

Download or print an insubstantial part of such material for your own research or private study, provided it is not for commercial purposes.
Provide links to other websites, but you should always link to the homepage where copyright notices or other important information is likely to be found. If you want to deep link to pages below the homepage, you are strongly advised to seek permission from the site owner.

You must not:

Share any information copied or downloaded from the internet across a network or VLE (e.g., Aula) without the direct permission of the rights holder.
Assume that you have the right to copy information from a provided weblink without permission. You and the person providing the link need to ensure you know what permissions you have for any website you access. The individual is responsible for checking what copyright permissions they have if they wish to copy material.
Make inappropriate or derogatory references to any site, as this will infringe the moral rights of the copyright owner.

Data

Can I use other people’s data? Yes, data and facts are not copyrightable; only their expression might be subject to copyright. Nevertheless, you must provide a complete reference of the data you have not collected.

Databases

Are databases protected by copyright? Computer programs are protected as literary works. Information in databases is also covered by copyright. Before downloading information, you should read and abide by the licence for the database you are using. Databases may also receive protection for the selection and arrangement of the data. They are protected against unauthorised extraction and re-utilisation of their contents. You are not allowed to use material from a database for commercial purposes.

Diagrams

Do I need permission to re-use diagrams? Unless one of the exceptions to copyright apply, you normally need to seek permission to use charts and diagrams that are considered original and unique. You must keep a copy of the consent for future reference and add a note in the resource “With permission from [the copyright owner]”. If you do not obtain permission, and no copyright exceptions apply, you may adapt it considerably by building upon it in look and wording and then add the notification "Adapted from [original source's reference]”. See also data.

Editing

Do not remove credits and make edits from something you reuse without explicit permission from the copyright holder.

Free Art licensed material

This is an open licence which terms are availalbe here.

The acknowledgement is: [author], "[title]", [date of the work]. [where to find the originals]. Copyleft: This is a free work, you can copy, distribute, and modify it under the terms of the Free Art License http://artlibre.org/licence/lal/en/

Film

See entry Screening

Images, including photographs, diagrams and other illustrations

Images available in print or from electronic sources are subject to copyright. It is important to provide full acknowledgements or attributions of the source.

For teaching purposes, it may be permissible to use them under the criticism or review or the illustration for instruction exceptions, if they apply, but they must be given full acknowledgement or attribution, and care must be taken that they are not further distributed.

There are many sources of copyright free images available on the Internet, which provide images with permission for use in certain circumstances including teaching and private study, e.g. Creative Commons licensed images. You should always check the terms and conditions to ensure your use is legal and always fully acknowledge your source.

Images that are freely available on the internet may still be protected by copyright, and you need to obtain permission from the rights holder before copying them. Not all material marked as free to use on the Internet is meant to be distributed freely: material might be incorrectly annotated like, for example, some posted on Flickr and Wikimedia – the latter complies with US law and marks some content as Public Domain, but it is not considered to be so in our jurisdiction.

Images in sources covered by the CLA Licence may be scanned and distributed to students. They may also be included in presentations. Any teaching material that includes scanned images should be reported to the Digitisation Service through the Academic Liaison Librarian.

Linking

How do I link to e-published content? Exercise care to ensure that the link resource is available legally. It is unlawful to purposely link to illegally hosted resources on the Internet.

We recommend that you include a full reference using the APA Style reference, which mandates the inclusion of a hyperlinked Digital Object Identifier (DOI) (usually starting with https://doi.org/10...). Such a link is a permalink that will bring users to articles’ landing pages on the publishers’ websites. Students will be able to access the full text according to these conditions:

The article was published in open access
The publisher has made the document accessible (though it could be subject to territorial and temporal restrictions)
The Lanchester Library must have a subscription to the resource (off-campus users may have to login via OpenAthens or Shibboleth), without which the user will either receive an error message or be prompted for payment.

It is possible to provide a permalink to resources through Locate following the correct reference details.

Music

Do I need permission to re-use music? Normally, commercially available music cannot be copied without the rights holder's written permission. Short extracts of commercial music may be used in teaching materials only to illustrate, instruct, or critique and review in the classroom. Still, you would need permission from the rights holder to include them on online platforms. You may use free music, but check the terms and conditions.

Online live lectures

Can we record online live lectures? Many aspects must be considered when recording lectures and writing CU group guidance. In the meantime. The JISC guide Recording lectures: legal considerations offers clear guidance, including copyright issues that may arise when recording lectures.

Regulations allow individuals to control how information about them is to be used. The University processes personal data while recording identifiable living individuals - lecturers, students, and other people.

Any processing must be done fairly and in line with the data protection principles. This includes identifying a lawful basis for using and re-using recordings of teaching sessions that include personal data.

Privacy notice. Clear information about the nature and purpose of the recording must be provided in advance to those being recorded. This includes who is making the recording, how it will be re-used, the lawful basis, how long the recording will be kept for and to whom it will be disclosed or shared. This is usually done as a Privacy Notice (IGU can assist with drafting this).

In practice, all participants should be referred to the privacy notice, informed that a recorded lecture is taking place and, where possible, provided with an opt-out, e.g. a specified area in the lecture room where recording will not occur. Likewise, where a teaching session is taking place online and being recorded (for re-use of the teaching session), participants need to be referred to the privacy notice, informed that a recording is taking place and provided with information about the further re-use of the recording.

In some circumstances, when a recording is to take place, a simple announcement by the lecturer (referring to the privacy notice) will be sufficient. Where there is likely to be a significant contribution or presentation by a participant or another party, a signed consent form before the recording is needed. Recordings cannot subsequently be used without consent for purposes incompatible with those for which they were made.

Please contact IGU directly for further advice and guidance. You may look at the University’s guidance for Film and Photos

Open Government licensed material

It is licensed under an open licence. You must acknowledge the source of the information, including or linking to any attribution statement specified by the Information Provider(s) and, where possible, provide a link to the licence.

If the Information Provider does not provide a specific attribution statement, you must use the following: "Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0"

If you are using Information from several Information Providers and listing multiple attributions is not practical in your product or application, you may include a URL or hyperlink to a resource that contains the required attribution statements.

Permissions

How we I go about asking permission to use third-party material? An organisation's website is likely to display terms of use or at least a contact address for seeking permission. When copyright restrictions for reuse apply, your course's Project Manager may seek permission directly to the original copyright owner in writing, specifying your intended re-use of the material. We must keep a copy of the permission for future reference and add a note in the resource “With permission from [the copyright owner]”

PowerPoint presentation

You should only place information and images in a PowerPoint presentation where it will be available to others if any of the following conditions are met:

You own the copyright.
You have the permission of the copyright holder, or you have a licence.
The copyright has lapsed.

Publications

Would any source do for a publication? At times, material that is usually available through subscription may appear available from other websites. Sometimes, this is legitimate (for example, through institutional repositories and permitted subject repositories, such as PubMed and arXiv). However, at other times, it is in breach of copyright law: for example, some articles in ResearchGate and Academia.edu are sometimes available without the copyright owners’ permission. We recommend not linking to ResearchGate, Academia.edu and personal web pages.

PubMed

See entry Publications

Quotation

How much can I use for quotation? There is no statutory measure on how much can be taken for quotation purposes. A quotation from a work can be used where it’s considered ‘fair dealing’. It should only be the amount necessary to justify the specific point for which it is being used. Sufficient acknowledgement must be given to the author of the work.

References

It is always good practice to include full references to any third-party-owned material so that students can find the original source. Proactively ensuring that correct acknowledgement is given to other people’s work sets a good example to students that they can replicate in their own approach.

ResearchGate

See entry Publications

Recording of online live lectures

See entry Online live lectures

Screening

Can we screen clips and movies? It is permitted for the sole purposes of illustration for instruction, as long as its use is fair, with clear evidence of its educational and non-commercial purposes and appropriately acknowledged. Additionally, there are some further conditions for screening:

Access must be restricted to those students enrolled on the module
Technological measures ought to block downloading
Availability restricted to a specific time only

Material made available through Box of Broadcasts (BoB) has territorial restrictions and students connecting from abroad will be unable to gain access.

TED Talks

Can we link to TED Talks? TED Talks impose a fee to upload their videos on a Subscription-Based Educational Service (Online Education Company). If unsure, the best practice is to suggest students search for a specific video on the TED website. Linking to TED Talks distributed on TED YouTube channels is lawful because the provider platform's Terms and Conditions override TED restrictions.

Transcript

Can I make a transcript? Creating a transcript from a third-party-owned resource constitutes an adaptation and it can only be done with permission of the copyright holder. If the owner withholds consent, it is possible to summarise, cite and comment the material.

Uploading

Can I upload a chapter or an article? The inclusion of downloaded and scanned materials on any platform or further publication, are most likely to be subject to copyright restrictions. The university has the CLA Licence that covers most UK publications and some US and other international publishers. The CLA Licence allows for copying and distributing limited amounts of material without requesting permission every time. Contact your Academics Liaison Librarian for more information on whether your re-use of material is covered under the licence.

Videos

We can broadly assume that material hosted on an organisation’s official channels is legally available, and consequently, we can link to and embed it. However, more care is necessary when linking to private posts that may infringe on copyright. You need to be especially cautious with footage from blockbusters and stock collections.

Videos that are freely available on the internet may still be protected by copyright, and you need to obtain permission from the rights holder before copying them. Not all material marked as free to use on the internet is meant to be distributed freely; some may be incorrectly annotated, such as content posted on YouTube and Vimeo.

Wikimedia and Wikipedia

Wikimedia and Wikipedia’s material are distributed under the US copyright law. Use care in selecting items licensed in the public domain are not necessarily so in the UK or other countries. You may click on the world icon marked 'use this file' to discover the page URL, file URL, preferred attribution and scripts to embed for both attribution and file.

YouTube

Can we link to YouTube? Videos hosted on official organisations’ YouTube channels are generally acceptable to use. However, more care must be taken when seeking YouTube videos on private channels (it is unlawful to link to material illegally posted online). Furthermore, some countries block access to YouTube, and linking to resources on the platform may disadvantage some foreign students. Sometimes, the same organisation on YouTube makes videos available through other platforms, such as Vimeo. It is possible to seek permission directly with the organisation (you will need to retain the permission correspondence for future reference). If using YouTube is unavoidable, you need to provide alternatives for the activity.