JISC

Naomi Korn

1. IPR and Licensing Challenges

Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) and licensing issues are central to the creation, sharing and delivery of e-content, public-sector organisations. In typical circumstances where public-sector bodies are likely to generate their own IPR, as well as be responsible for providing access to IPR owned by third-party rights holders, it is important that these issues are addressed in order to maximise opportunities and also remove potential barriers for optimising e-content within and across the public sector.

Specific challenges associated with IPR and licensing include:

1. The complexity of rights and permissions associated with the broad range of e-content held by public-sector bodies.
2. The necessity for succinct processes, documentation and staff awareness to manage such issues, means that access and use of e-content may not always be optimised.
3. The growing and unresolved issue of culturally, historically and academically valuable works, usually of low commercial value, for which the rights holders are unknown or cannot be traced, (so called ‘orphan works').
4. The resource and administrative implications of rights management across the public sector.

2. Common Issues Require a Common Approach

These common issues require a common collaborative approach to ensure basic IPR and licensing literacy. In particular effective rights management needs to be supported by:

1. forms and other tools, policy statements and documentation systems.

2. Staff training and high levels of staff awareness about copyright and risk management.

3. The view of rights management and licensing as ongoing processes within a broader IP ecosystem of events, workflows and standards, rather than occasional, one-off events.

As part of the Strategic Content Alliance programme of work to create an econtent framework, the optimal legal, technical and organisational structures have been identified that can lower barriers and allow public sector bodies to take advantage of opportunities for effectively using internet technologies to provide access to e-content. This work has included the creation of an interoperable IPR framework of best practice for professionals and policy makers working across the public sector.

3. SCA IPR and Licensing Toolkit

The creation of the SCA IPR and Licensing Toolkit heralds the first time that different sectors have collaborated with a common cause. Following audience needs analysis, the comprehensive Toolkit takes into account the eclectic nature of content that is generated, the heterogeneity of public sector bodies and specific needs and wants – to provide practical tools which can be customised to suit particular circumstances. This presentation will introduce the audience to the Toolkit.

4. Dissemination

IPR and Licensing Workshops which will be run across the country for practioners and policy makers involved in the digital content lifecycle from creation to curation. Dates will be announced at the session

 

Tom Morgan

The National Portrait Gallery is a sector leader in the field of rights management, based on the consistent application of key methodologies.

Tom Morgan will set out the handful of decisions which have transformed a technical and administrative problem into a piece of constructive organisational development.