UCL, like many universities, owns a CLA (Copyright Licensing Agency) licence, which allows readings to be digitised for taught courses, where they meet certain conditions.

The licence has just been re-negotiated with representatives from the HE community, resulting in some beneficial changes.  From August 1^st the amount that can be digitised will increase, rising to 10% or 1 chapter / 1 article (whichever is greater) of a text.  The CLA issued a press release with an update on the new licence agreement for HE institutions.

In order to take advantage of the CLA licence and digitise readings for your teaching, other conditions must be met, including a requirement to report which readings have been used. UCL submitted its annual report in June 2016 and around 3400+ thousand readings were reported, which were used on taught courses across UCL this academic year.

To remove the burden from academic departments, and ensure the CLA conditions are met, UCL library manages a course readings service. The Teaching & Learning Services (TLS) team copyright check readings, digitise and upload them in the required format and security level, and also maintain records for reporting.  See the full low-down plus how to submit readings for digitising.

Please note, if your digitised readings do not pass through this service, then they are not covered by the CLA licence.

There is already a great deal of high quality digitised material available, from e-books and e-journals to Open Access articles in UCL’s institutional respository and UCL Press, which mean that you can sidestep copying issues altogether. Linking to a resource in an online reading list using ReadingLists@UCL will give easy access for your students, whilst avoiding headaches about licensing for you.  You don’t need a licence or permission to link to legitimate or subscribed resources.

For more information please don’t hesitate to get in touch with the TLS: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/library/teaching-support

A couple living on Long Island have accused neighbours of deliberately  copying the architectural design of their new house. This is reported in full in the New York Daily News.

Having designed what they thought of as their own unique home Mr and Mrs Fortgang were angered to discover that some neighbours had built a property in the vicinity which was (at least in their eyes) suspiciously  similar in design.

The Fortgangs appear to be starting legal proceedings alleging infringement of the copyright in their architural design on the part of their neighbours. Although this is an amusing story in some respects, it is also a useful reminder that buildings, plans and drawings are all protected by copyright in the UK as well as in the USA. They are categorised as “artistic works” under Section 4 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

The article in the New York daily news includes photographs of both properties so you can make your own mind up as to whether there is an infringement of copyright.