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Complying with copyright

University students and staff must comply with copyright law and licences whenever they copy works in copyright. These regulations include photocopying  and scanning extracts from books and journals, use of articles from online databases and journals as well as guidance on uploading documents to Study Direct.

Staying Legal

When you use resources in the library or online, you need to remember a number of points to keep within the law.

• You may copy under Fair Dealing for the purposes of private study or research for a non-commercial purpose without asking permission from the copyright holder. 
• The amount that you can copy is not defined by the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act but the extent of copying must not harm the economic interests of the copyright owner. Commonly accepted practice is that copying should not exceed: one article from an issue of a journal or one chapter or 5% from a published work.
• You may only make multiple copies of extracts under licence  - see below, Flowchart for scanning under the CLA Licence.
• Using a scanner, mobile phone or camera to digitise pages from a work is treated in the same way as photocopying under copyright law.
• Online databases and journals are subject to the same limitations but also have their own licences. Please refer to the individual licence terms displayed on their website.
• Articles from online databases and journals must not be sent to others or placed on a shared network. This also applies to articles you have scanned in yourself.

The following pages provide an overview of what can, and cannot, be done within the law. 

• Copyright guidance 
  An overview of copyright law from the Office of  Governance and Secretariat.  These notes are intended to give general guidance on copyright issues.
• Copyright Licensing Agency (CLA) HE Photocopying and Scanning Licence (01 August 2011 - 31 July 2013) 
  The CLA Licence covers photocopying and scanning by staff and students from printed books and journals. 
• CLA HE Support Material 
  Provides general guidance on photocopying and scanning under the CLA Licence.
• Flow Chart for Scanning under the CLA Licence 
  Provides a step-by-step guide to scanning from printed material.
• How to compile a paper Course Pack
  A copyright guide to making multiple paper copies for course provision under the CLA Licence.
• Copyright Checklist for adding material to Study Direct 
  A summary of the copyright issues to consider before uploading different types of material to Study Direct.
• Copyright guidance for doctoral students [PDF 278.18KB]  
  Issues arising from the electronic submission of doctoral theses.
• World Images
  The World Images database provides access to the California State University IMAGE Project, containing around 80,000 images licenced for use under the Creative Commons licence 'Attribution - Non-commercial'. Images contained in the database can be used for non-profit educational purposes.

 

For help with general queries about copying paper, audiovisual or electronic publications, please email library.copyright@sussex.ac.uk