Family Historian User Group

I am new to FHUG so this is a first inquiry. I have been a specialist in copyright law for over 30 years, 18 of which I spent as advisor to the British Library. A number of people have suggested there is ;a need for a user-friendly guide to copyright law in our field. I would be very interested to know the reaction of other FHUG members as to whether this is something they would find helpful. My book on copyright for librarians is now in its 6th. edition having started life in 1990.
I would appreciate comments.
Graham Cornish

Graham

I would certainly be interested as long as it covers both sides of the copyright issue.

1: Copyright of my research
2: Copyright of the research data and images that I have used from FindMyPast, Ancestry, TNA etc

Would this cover countries other than the UK?

Welcome to the FHUG Graham.

To get an insight into how much or little we understand, see Mark Sources or Media as Private (14360) that discusses various copyright issues. Also a Search for the word copyright will dredge up a few more discussions.

If you are able to untangle our thinking that would be very useful.

I think the answer to that Graham, is "crikey, yes...."

I have tried over the years to give my own personal opinion where I felt people were going up the garden path (such as, "No, if it's visible in public, that isn't the same as being in the public domain!") but I've always tried to remember that IANAL (I Am Not A Lawyer) .

One of my go-to sites for this sort of thing is Judy Russell's blog "The Legal Genealogist" http://www.legalgenealogist.com/ - the issue there is that she writes from an American viewpoint. For instance, I have this vague idea (vague because IANAL!) that "database copyright" (for want of a better term) is different over here. Another aspect, picked up from Judy R's blog, is the difference between copyright and Terms & Conditions that might apply to a web-site, and how people claim they have copyright when they really mean that they have Ts & Cs for their site. So, for instance, if a library puts 130y old photos on its web-site and claims copyright on them - can they? Or can they simply say our Ts &Cs are such that you can't use them elsewhere?

I'm not asking for guidance now, I'm throwing up some points that occur to me, partly to illustrate it's not just books that we're interested in.

I'm with Adrian -- "Crikey, yes"! (And he's made all the other points I would have made as well.)

My goodness - a resounding YES from me.
Copywrite for genealogists is such a minefield and it is so difficult to know what you can and cannot do in terms of using data and images, particularly those acquired from a subscription site, where their own T&C also need to be taken into consideration.
I belong to a few genealogical facebook groups and the number of arguments on this topic are huge.
I'll be first in the queue to buy it - unless some of my fellow members of this forum elbow me out of the way.

A "yes" here too...please.

I just regard everything done by other people as in copyright, unless its REALLY clear it's not, or it's clear it has passed out of copyright (which is often difficult to establish), but err on the "if in doubt, leave it out" principle. I transcribe essential bits into notes, which don't get printed in printouts that go out of my hands. Maybe incorrectly but on same principle, I put a copyright symbol (and "do not reproduce without permission" note) on my printouts too,

Yes from me too.

See Copyright (14773) posting in the General Forum.