UCL is running a free, one day event to examine many aspects of open science. It is open only to UCL staff and students, so apologies to any non-UCL readers of this blog. The event is happening on Monday 25th June 2018 from 09:30 to 16:00 at the Senate House, Malet Street WC1E. It promises to be a fascinating event for anyone involved in research or simply interested in open science. “How to make your data open”, “open peer review” and “citizen science” will be among the topics discussed by high profile speakers from UCL and other organisations.

UCL staff and students can find out more and book a place here.

What is the connection with copyright? Considerations of the copyright status of research outputs and data sets are essential ingredients of the open science mix. Decisions on how to licence the reuse of copyright protected material in an open access environment are also an important aspect of implementing an open science strategy.

The IPKAT website (and various newspapers) have reported the latest (and final?) stage of the legal disputes surrounding the “Monkey selfie” case. In 2014 the photographer, David Slater started an action against Wikimedia for copyright infringement following online usage without permission of the photograph of a crested macaque. The macaque had “operated” the camera set-up by Mr Slater and taken an impressive selfie. Mr Slater claimed ownership of copyright in the photograph (he had painstakingly set up his camera in a manner which made the selfie possible).  Wikimedia successfully disputed whether a photograph taken by a monkey could be protected by copyright in the first place.

Subsequently PETA, an animal rights organisation, started a separate action claiming to represent as (“next friend” in US legal terms) the interests of the monkey in question, identified as “Naruto”. PETA (on behalf of Naruto) challenged the right of the wildlife photographer to exploit the celebrated monkey selfie, given that Naruto and not Mr Slater took the photograph and was therefore the rightful owner of the copyright. The district court having dismissed the claim, PETA launched an appeal, but David Slater and PETA settled out of court in 2017. Nevertheless the appeal process went ahead and the Opinion in Naruto v. Slater has been issued by the Court of Appeals for the 9th circuit. Read also the full report from the IPKAT website.

The claim by PETA was dismissed:  “Nonetheless, we conclude that this monkey – and all animals, since they are not humans – lacks statutory standing under the Copyright Act”  Opinion of the court, page 4 (Circuit Judge Bea). The court side-stepped, perhaps wisely any practical issues about the precise identity of “Naruto” as distinct from any other crested macaque of similar appearance in the same location. Would the monkey-selfie pass the originality test under EU copyright law to qualify for copyright protection? Answers on a postcard…

One of my favourite events is the Learning on Screen AGM day.  For the past few years I have benefitted from the fantastic speakers they draw together, speaking on the themes of audiovisual material and copyright.

Last year’s session A case study on Audiovisual Essay (19 minutes) provoked me to think on the importance of timing in *when* to deliver copyright training.  Dr. Catherine Grant, the engaged, informed academic had such an excellent working knowledge of copyright, and how to use UK copyright exceptions in a research or education setting, that she was using third party material with confidence and passing this confidence and excellent academic practice on to her students.  Get it right from the start and you will be empowered to use more third party material – even with ‘difficult’ resources like moving image.

This year the theme was around Creativity, copyright and citation.  Three things really caught my attention and had me scribbling down ideas for training or support at UCL.

1. Dr. Shane O’Sullivan spoke about his students using archive footage to create their own films. Having worked in industry he automatically passed on his high standards of copyright understanding to his students, balancing a healthy respect for works with practicalities of re-using them. He encouraged students to balance third party material with their own original material (for pedagogic reasons); ‘work with broadcasters, not around them’; and said rights clearance had to be ‘achieveable’ – by using works by companies such as the BFI and Crown Copyright.  There are some copyright exceptions that could also be used in in this educational essay work, or review / critique setting.
2. The e-CHARM project, commissioned by Learning on Screen and carried out by the engaging UK Copyright Literacy team and colleague, had its results presented today. The report will be available in 2018 and identified many areas where support and information is needed. For fans, the report from their last project, Lecture recording in HE: risky business or evolving open practice is available on Open Access.
3. The first note I wrote to myself was ‘AV citation standards. Any guides’?  And by the last session I had one in my hands: the updated Audiovisual Citation guidelines by Learning on Screen, including new media such as Podcasts and vlogs.  All my questions answered at once!

Learning on Screen is the new name of the BUFVC, of which UCL is a member.  It provides services such as TRILT, Box of Broadcasts, off-air recordings (and more) which are wonderful research and teaching resources.  Our use of these are supported by UCL’s ERA licence. Get in touch if you have questions about using any of these!

A new open letter from EARE (the European Alliance for Research Excellence) to the MEPs sitting on the EU Parliament’s Legal Affairs Committee (JURI Committee) puts the case for a really effective and workable copyright exception for Text and Data Mining (TDM) in Europe. UCL is one of some 20 organisations which have signed the letter, representing universities, research organisations, libraries and businesses in Europe.  The letter makes a strong case for an exception which permits anyone with lawful access to a body of copyright protected material to use the innovative techniques of TDM to carry out computer-based analyisis of that material without the risk of infringing copyright. The JURI Committeee will be considering amendments to the draft Copyright Directive in the near future, so this initiative is very timely.

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The blog of solicitors Collyer Bristow includes an interesting post about a copyright claim brought by a photographer against the well known model, Gigi Hadid. It is alleged that Ms Hadid circulated the photograph of herself to her millions of Instagram followers without seeking permission from the copyright owner (the photographer, Peter Cepeda). One interesting detail is that it is alleged a watermark carrying information on the ownership of the copyright was also removed from the photograph. In some cases people who recirculated the photograph were apparently misled into attributing the copyright to Ms Hadid and even to Instagram. The case is still to be decided but the scenario is an interesting illustration of how readily photographs can become separated from evidence of copyright ownership and the perils of reusing photographs on social media without permission.

Are the formats of television shows like “The Voice” protected by some kind of intellectual property right? The answer seems to be that in some countries they are protected and in others not. The UK seems to be  one of the latter. UK copyright law has a finite list of the categories which are protected by copyright, listed in Section 1 of the Copyright , Designs and Patents Act 1988. Reality TV and quiz show formats don’t fit into any of them.

TV formats involve big money and often give rise to tussles over ownership, such as the disagreements about “The Voice” which are described by Hollywood Reporter The contrasting treatment of TV formats in Italian law and a recent case before the Italian Supreme Court are discussed by Eleonora Rosati in an interesting post on the IPCAT website.

Celuloid secrets by Kit

Calling film and media students, and teaching staff!  Copyright issues around re-using audiovisual material are complex, particularly in student assessment such as film essays: this free, October workshop could help you in your studies or teaching.

Run by the BFI, Learning on Screen and Kingston School of Art, this half-day workshop will explore the creative use of archive material, for Higher Education studies.

Participants will raise their awareness of copyright considerations in re-using archival moving-image works, and consider creative and pedagogic approaches to using this kind of material.

The workshop also marks the launch of an initiative to open up the BFI archive to student film makers, and a recent pilot scheme using BFI archive material will be presented.

Attendance is free but registration required. 18 October 2017, 11.00 – 14.00 at the BFI Southbank. Full details  are on the Learning on Screen website.

The draft EU Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market is currently being scrutinised by a series of European Parliamentary committees and is open to proposed amendments which could either maximise the usefulness to the HE and research sector of the proposed copyright exceptions or alternatively render them quite unhelpful. This is the subject of a great deal of advocacy by groups supporting a more user-friendly copyright framework and those who are opposed to more generous exceptions.

In this context UCL Library Services has recently lent its support to the European Alliance for Research Excellence (EARE) which provides a platform for those advocating a more generous EU wide exception for Text and Data Mining (TDM).

The original wording of the draft Directive (Article 3) provided an exception only for the benefit of a narrowly defined class of “research organisations” run on a non-profit basis. That would create uncertainty about the position of collaborative projects of all kinds between universities and commercial organisations, including technology based start-ups.

The position of EARE is that since one has to have “legal access” to the information in order to carry out TDM under the exception then the exception should be available to anyone who has legal access not just a narrow class of research organisations.  This is an significant issue for the future of research in Europe given the importance of TDM in all areas of research.

The National Archives (TNA)  provide a user-friendly online database of  UK legislation but it sometimes takes a long time for it to be updated with changes. The good news, spotted by an eagle-eyed colleague at the University of Kent, is that the legislation.gov version of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 has recently been updated with all the positve changes to copyright exceptions which were introduced in 2014. This is a link to the newly refreshed version of the Act. Better late than never…

Public performances of other people’s music must be licensed in order to avoid copyright infringement and also infringement of performance rights (when playing recorded music). Currently there are two separate licensing bodies in the UK who are able to assist:  PRS for Music represents the interests of composers, song writers music publishers, whereas PPL deals specifically with recorded music and represents the interests of producers and performers.

It follows that if you are organising a public performance of musical works then you are likely to require both a PRS and a PPL licence (particularly if recorded music is involved).  The good news is that it should become simpler to obtain licences for public performance of music. PRS and PPL are working together on a joint venture the aim of which is to offer a single licence. Apparently this is will be ready at some point during 2017.