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Copyright
I should report that we had an 'interesting' experience with CANMORE.  We felt secure on copyright because of all the arguments that you have put forward and being used to working in what is effectively an academic environment.  

We were, however, pursued by an author who happened also to be a lawyer.  We had quoted from a number of books by him, and others, that were largely  gazetteer type of publications. They were fully referenced and acknowledged in the usual way in the database.  The argument was that they constituted a considerable percentage of each book and that  we had 'published' on the Internet without permission.  Even though the information was divided up between individual site records and we could prove that only a small proportion had been accessed by a handful of users we were advised by the Scottish Office solicitors to settle the matter by paying a negotiated copyright fee to the authors.  

We have eliminated quotation in the database from these and other sources, as a result, and have sought copyright permission in other cases.  
We were advised to settle rather than to pursue this in court, though I would have liked to know what  judicial opinion would have been.  I have run the problem passed a number of lawyers including the professor of copyright law at Edinburgh University and can only conclude that is is a very grey and untested area.
Good luck!


>>> [log in to unmask] 07/16/01 01:59pm >>>
Hello all
Two responses in one.....

HLF:
The Warwickshire SMR bid, which was accepted in Feb 2001 took about 1 year
to complete and then six months of correspondence with HLF in the post
application period.  However, I would reckon that the actual time would be
2.5-3 months if I had worked on it solidly.

A couple of other points I would like to make.  I managed to fit the
application to a project I had been thinking about for some time and this
made the process less painful.  The recent email discussion gives the
impression that the HLF will only accept bids for the full amount of
£100,000 and that all projects must involve web enabling an SMR and I am
sure this is not the case.  Non-internet HLF projects could broaden the
audience to an SMR in other exciting ways.

Copyright:
The Warwickshire HLF Project aims to include the descriptive text for each
record within our website but I do not think this presents a copyright
problem for the following reasons -

We do not plagiarise other works, we use the information to develop our
records and include the reference as one does within an academic essay or
other publication.

We are able to identify the original source reference for each part
descriptive text.

We are not trying to claim the original work as our own.

We intend to use images within the website and this is slightly more tricky
but we will only use those that we hold the copyright for or are able to
obtain formal agreement to use from the copyright holder.

Copyright is a difficult area and my understanding of the position may be
wrong but the HLF has not raised copyright as an issue and neither did
their expert advisors at the NMR.  I have more problems understanding what
proportion of an OS map I can supply to a member of the public for research
purposes.

Emma Jones
Warwickshire SMR Officer




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