This guide provides copyright information and links, but not legal opinion, which is relevant to teaching staff in the University community. For copyright matters not covered in this Guide, including copyright surveys, licenses and breaches of copyright, contact the University Copyright Officer. Help is also available from the organisations listed in the External Copyright Contacts box on the left.
Thankyou to the University of Canberra Library for allowing use of their copyright information for learning and teaching material.
Copyright is the right to make, keep, adapt and distribute/communicate copies of someone's work.
Copyright covers original literary, artistic, dramatic and musical works, and recordings:
It covers the "physical" (or electronic) manifestation of ideas, not ideas and information itself.
| Copyrightable | Not copyrightable |
|---|---|
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Manifestations of ideas such as:
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(NB: These may be covered by other forms of IP protection, such as trademarks or patents)
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In order to use third-party material that is covered by copyright, you need permission from the copyright holder (a licence).
Licences can be provided in advance (e.g., Creative Commons, Unsplash). You must follow the conditions of these licences to be covered by them, otherwise you will need to contact the copyright holder to ask for permission to use their work in a way that is not covered by that licence.
In Australian law, "Fair Dealing" and other exceptions allow some use of certain amounts of third party material without asking for permission - but your use must be covered by the exceptions.
Examples of works covered by copyright include:
| Literary works | Artistic works | Dramatic works | Musical works |
|---|---|---|---|
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Including, but not limited to:
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Including, but not limited to:
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Including, but not limited to:
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Including, but not limited to:
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Examples of "subject matter other than works" that are covered by copyright:
For more information, see this resource by the Australian Libraries and Archives Copyright Coalition:
What is the education statutory licence, and what does it mean for my teaching?
The education statutory licence is a copyright licence* that covers educational institutions such as schools, TAFEs and universities.
It allows a university to copy and communicate, for educational purposes,
The material can only be used in connection with a course of instruction and must only be available to students undertaking instruction.
It can be made physically available to students through photocopies or coursepacks, or uploaded into a content management system (CMS) or learning management system (LMS) that is only accessible to students enrolled in a course. The material should be accompanied by a copyright notice that notes the material has been copied in accordance with the licence. Using the Readings platform at JCU helps to ensure compliance.
Content can be emailed to students from staff members, but must be done so in a way that is minimises misuse. Use JCU email addresses for both staff and students, and include a copyright warning so that the students know it is not to be shared with others.
The licence allows the copying of any format from any source, as long as it does not exceed a "reasonable amount".
You may copy and make available to students:
This is per student per course. For example, you cannot make two chapters of the same book available to the same student during the same course. Making too much content available to the same student is known as a copyright clash. The Readings platform is designed to ensure copyright clashes do not occur.
If the work is out of print and cannot be purchased in a "reasonable" timeframe for an "ordinary commercial cost", it is possible to copy more than 10% or one chapter and may copy as much as you need. However, you must undertake "reasonable investigation" to attempt to find a commercially available copy, and you must be able to show that you have only copied what you need for a specific, present, actual use (i.e., you cannot supply copies of things that "might be useful" in the future).
As with material that is available commercially, you must use JCU systems like Readings to ensure this material is only supplied to students undertaking a course of study.
*Permission to use copyrighted material
The Copyright Act provides exceptions which enable some use of copyright material without the permission of the copyright owner in certain circumstances. The most important exceptions permit "fair dealings" with copyright material for certain purposes:
Educational institutions also have special agreements with copyright owners to allow them to digitise and electronically communicate copyright material, as long as the use is "fair" and falls within the scope of the agreements.
See the Australian Copyright Council's fact sheet on Fair Dealing linked below
Some works may be copied under Creative Commons licence.
Is there anything I know I can freely use without going to the copyright owner to ask for permission?
Some works and some uses of works do not require permission from a copyright holder. Proceed with caution, as there may be strict conditions on what you can and can't do without asking for permission.
You do not need to seek permission if you are not using a “substantial part” (important, distinctive, essential or large amount) of the work.
If the work has a pre-approved licence applied to it (such as a Creative Commons licence or the licences available through "royalty free" sites), then you can use the material without seeking permission provided your use does not contravene conditions of use. Attribution is usually a requirement. If you wish to use the material for something not covered by the licence, then you will need to request permission.
Works that have fallen out of copyright (copyright has expired) or works that have been given to the public domain can be used in any way, without seeking permission.
Copyright exceptions may allow you to use copyright materials without permission. Find out about exception categories, including fair dealing.
The education statutory licence allows for some copying to be done under the licence, for the purposes of providing learning material to a class. The amount of the copied material and the way in which it is made available to students must be controlled in order to come under the licence agreements.
We acknowledge the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the first inhabitants of the nation and acknowledge Traditional Owners of the lands where our staff and students, live, learn and work.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) 4.0 International License, unless otherwise noted. Content from this Guide should be attributed to James Cook University Library. This does not apply to images, third party material (seek permission from the original owner) or any logos or insignia belonging to JCU or other bodies, which remain All Rights Reserved.
