Multimedia minus copyright questions

A recent post on Sean Aune's Sitepoint blog , titled 30+ Places to Find Creative Commons Media, is worth reading. For students who are doing multimedia projects, the Sitepoint list is a potential gold mine. And at the very least, it presents some interesting tools to complement our e-resource collections of audio, visual, and primary text materials.

I so wish Yahoo Image Search (which was recently touted as a superior product to Google Images) had a filter for CC materials, but I was glad to be reminded that Flickr does provide that option in its advanced search. Something I didn't know: Google Images allows a similar kind of restriction (also in advanced search mode).

Requests for Reproductions

If someone wants a reproduction of something which the Harvard College Library owns, and it's not feasible for her to travel here to photocopy or scan the material (or if she wants a publication-quality image), she should fill out an Order Inquiry Form for HCL Imaging Services. After receiving the form, Imaging Services will determine what permission is needed from Harvard for reproducing the item; the patron is expected to obtain copyright permission from the copyright holder, if the material is still under copyright.

Government Documents in Google Book Search

In our lightning session on the Google Book Project, we discussed the anomaly of government publications being treated as copyrighted works. There's an interesting discussion of the issue in the Prelinger Library Blog.

More on copyright

A KSG student approached the desk this week with a question about the permissibility of using a news photo (found on the web). She had reproduced it on the title page of her thesis and wondered if citing her source was enough or if she'd need to determine if copyright restrictions applied.

In the process of getting her a "reasonable" answer, I ended up on the OGC (Office of General Counsel) website.

There's quite a lot of helpful information there, including a set of links to copyright resources from other agencies (including Stanford).

Also worth noting is the wonderfully clear, 24 page document
produced by the OGC specifically for the Harvard community.

The ARL "Know Your Copyrights" (which I posted
about on February 13th) is really aimed at course-related questions. The OGC manual is broader in scope and probably good to have in your arsenal when copyright questions come your way at the desk. And if a patron needs something "definitive" rather than simply "reasonable," you should probably direct him or her to the OGC's "Contact Us" form on the site.

ARL's "Know Your Copy Rights" website and campaign

From the ARL press release:

"The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) has published Know Your Copy Rights™ – What You Can Do a brochure that gives faculty and teaching assistants in higher education an easy-to-scan explanation of when and how they can legally use intellectual property in their teaching, often without requesting permission or paying fees.

"Among the topics covered in the brochure are: fair use, the advantages of linking to instead of copying works, and special provisions for displaying or performing works in classes. It also includes a handy one-page chart that highlights 24 situations when various categories of works can be used.

"A broader Know Your Copy Rights™ campaign, aimed at helping librarians implement strategic copyright education programs on campus, will be rolled out by ARL in the coming months. It will include a Web site that helps librarians address copyright issues relevant to different groups across their institutions, including faculty, students, legal counsel, academic leadership, and library staff."

In addition to the brochure, the site also supplies a one page poster that distills some of the copyright provisions.