Digitization of newspapers runs into copyright conflict
The digitization of the newspapers of the Regional Archive Leiden, the Netherlands, stumbled upon a copyright conflict. Dutch copyright organizations Lira and Pictoright pointed out to the archive that the digitization agreements with the newspapers were not sufficient. To make an entire newspaper available online would often require the consent of freelance journalists and photographers is to publish the work. Just in case, The Regional Archive has shut down the online archive.
The last couple of years, the archive has been placing regional newspapers online starting witht their first editions. Lira and Pictoright, Dutch copyright organizations for journalists and photographers, pointed out that the freelancers however hadn’t given their consent to publish their works. In most cases, publishers of newspapers are the copyright holders of the works from their employees. However, this isn’t the case for works written by freelancers. Lira and Pictoright have now offered the archive an arrangement to handle possible claims. The organizations stated that during the negotiations with the archive, the archive wouldn’t receive any claims.
Jan-Jaap de Haan, the Alderman (wethouder) of Culture, was disappointed with Lira and Pictoright’s announcement: “It’s a shame. I see this is a part of our city’s heritage. And it is strange: you can read newspapers for free at the archive’s reading table, but not online. Remarkable as we live in the year of 2011.”
Lira and Pictoright responded that they just gave legal advice. According to the spokesmen of both organizations, even though the newspaper articles can be seen as heritage, they are still copyright protected. Eventually, the archive will have to pay to publish the articles. De Haan estimated the archive would have to pay more than thousands of euros. Lira and Pictoright haven’t confirmed the high price rates yet, but didn’t deny them either. They did declare that the fees probably will not be very low though.
Read more about online archives on FutureofCopyright.com:
Reference: Leidsch Dagblad
By: Karen Groen
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