[ok-scotland] Open Licensing at the National Library of Scotland

Mon Nov 10 09:06:39 UTC 2014

Apologies! My last reply here was in response to the below email, not to
Lorna's message that i replied to above. Sincere apologies - the woes of
trying to do too much before Monday morning coffee!

-------------------------------------------------------

*From: *"Laurel L. Russwurm" <laurel.l at russwurm.org>

*Subject: Re: [OpenGLAM] Open Licensing at the National Library of Scotland*

*Date: *3 November 2014 13:17:06 GMT

*To: *open-glam at lists.okfn.org

Dear Ewan:

This sounds great, but I am just a little curious.  Does:

 "1,000 digital images have been released into the Public Domain"

mean that 1,000 images entitled to copyright protection under Scots law
have been released into the Public Domain?

Or does this mean The National Library of Scotland is just now withdrawing
its own claims of Intellectual Property ownership of Public Domain works
among its holdings?  If the latter, it is not the same thing as Nina
Paley's dedication of her own original work, "Sita Sings the Blues,"
[http://sitasingstheblues.com/ <x-msg://171/%5bhttp:/sitasingstheblues.com/>]
(and indeed all of her own original work) into the Public Domain.

I don't think you can release works into the Public Domain that are already
in the Public Domain.

And while I understand it is a good idea to praise GLAMS for doing "the
right thing,"  if the works are already in the Public Domain, using this
wording implies that NOT recognizing the legitimacy of the Public Domain is
a reasonable alternative.   It is not.

Under law, owning a work does not confer copyright ownership.  If someone
else owns the copyright, claiming copyright, even on a physical work that
you own without also owning the copyright is legally defined as copyright
infringement.    Although modern copyright law does not appear to make even
the slightest effort to actually protect the Public Domain, I think it is
important to insist that such protection should be inferred, even if not
explicitly stated.

The Intellectual Property of works in the Public Domain are owned by the
Public.  (Before the institution of copyright law, all Intellectual
property was owned by the public... that is what the Public Domain used to
be.  So If the Public owns the copyright, claiming copyright, even on a
Public Domain physical work that you own should be legally defined as
copyfraud.  If what they are doing is recognizing the legitimacy of the
public domain, if what they are doing is choosing to NOT commit copyfraud.

I think the word "copyfraud" was deliberately coined to be contentious, as
a means to raise awareness of a common practice that is eroding the Public
Domain.  And I realize it is not productive to accuse GLAMs of copyfraud if
there is a possibility that their policy can be changed, and especially if
they are in the process of changing their thinking, if for no other reason
than that both people and institutions get defensive when treated in an
adversarial manner.

So if the works in question are in fact already in the Public Domain, it
would be far better to present this as a case where The National Library is
making its Public Domain holdings available to the public.  This is, after
all, praiseworthy, because they are well within their rights to keep such
works locked away in a vault.

Of course, if the works in question are not in the Public Domain, the
original wording is fine.

Regards

Laurel

On 10 November 2014 08:42, Fredric Saunderson <fredsaunderson at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Hi Lorna,
>
> The policy described how the Library will approach licensing the digital
> photographs that we make of works. It would be copyfraud for us to claim
> intellectual property in original items where the copyright has lapsed and
> the work’s IP passed into the public domain. We do not claim intellectual
> property ownership in original items that are in the public domain. What we
> do, as is common in the UK, is claim a new copyright in digitisations. This
> is copyright in the photograph, as a new intellectual work involving a
> certain level of skill and effort, and is no claim on the IP in the
> original. As you allude, it is public domain items that we are digitising.
> Our new policy moves us towards a more open licensing approach to our new
> photographic works. The practice of claiming copyright in digitisations is
> an interesting and complex one, which is often debated. For example, it is
> not possible to claim a new copyright ownership in digitisations in United
> States law. This was laid down in the Bridgeman Art library v. Corel Corp.
> case in 1999. However, in the UK this is a common and legally established
> approach.
>
>
> Cheers,
>
>
> Fred
>
> On 3 November 2014 10:30, Lorna M Campbell <lorna.m.campbell at icloud.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Hi Euan,
>>
>> Many thanks for highlighting these initiatives. These are hugely positive
>> developments both in terms of sharing CC0 metadata and increasing access to
>> open licensed cultural heritage resources, both of which have significant
>> relevance to open education.  Congratulations to all those at the National
>> Library involved in these initiatives.
>>
>> Best Wishes
>> Lorna
>>
>>
>>
>> On 2 Nov 2014, at 14:22, Ewan Klein wrote:
>>
>> Hi everyone
>>
>> The National Library of Scotland is working on procedures and guidance to
>> support a new and developing Metadata and Digital Content Licensing policy.
>> As part of this work the Library has released collection metadata
>> associated with the First World War Official Photographs under a CC0
>> license to The European Library (TEL) for inclusion in both its portal and
>> in Europeana. The Library will continue to release further CC0 licensed
>> metadata to TEL and Europeana over the coming months.
>>
>> The policy development is also being informed by a limited release of
>> digital content to the WikiCommons project.  More than 1,000 digital images
>> have been released into the Public Domain, including photographs of the
>> construction of the Forth Bridge and The Tay Bridge Disaster enquiry;
>> images from the historic book Scotia Depicta; nineteenth century posters
>> and photographs from Edinburgh theatres; and images from Walter Blaikie’s
>> collection of Jacobite broadsides.
>>
>> See more at:
>> http://scot.okfn.org/2014/10/27/open-licensing-at-the-national-library-of-scotland
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Ewan
>>
>> -------------
>> Ewan Klein
>> Open Knowledge Ambassador for Scotland
>> Skype:  ewan.h.klein |  @ewanhklein
>> http://scot.okfn.org/  |  @okfnscot
>>
>> _______________________________________________
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>>
>>
>> -- Lorna M Campbell --
>> Assistant Director, Cetis
>> Web: www.cetis.ac.uk
>> Blog: lornamcampbell.wordpress.com
>> Mail: lorna.m.campbell at icloud.com
>> Twitter: LornaMCampbell
>> Skype: lorna120768
>>
>>
>>
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>>
>
>
> --
> Fredric Saunderson
> saunderson.me | @fredsaunderson <https://twitter.com/fredsaunderson>
>

-- 
Fredric Saunderson
saunderson.me | @fredsaunderson <https://twitter.com/fredsaunderson>
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