Photocopiers & Copyright Law
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Any published document or image may well be protected by copyright law prohibiting or restricting its reproduction. Copyright law is a complicated area and its enforcement is taken very seriously. In fact, infringing copyright could land you a hefty fine or in serious cases, even jail time. As such, it’s prudent to make sure you know where you stand before you photocopy or distribute any material.
The Basics
Copyright legislation in the UK, under the 1988 Copyright, Designs and Patents Act; enshrines in law the right of creators and publishers of original works, to earn a living from that material, to control how it is used and to protect their identity as its author. This is legal protection lies within the UK’s greater tradition of protecting intellectual property rights and by doing so, encourages both innovation and entrepreneurialism in society. Without this protection, it would be very hard to make a living in any creative industry; as who would consider financing an album, book or film without knowing that they are entitled to any profits the final products’ sale may generate.
The upshot of this, with specific relation to photocopiers, is that it may be illegal to reproduce, distribute or adapt any copyrighted work, without prior consent from the copyright holder. Failure to obtain consent before reproducing the work could constitute copyright infringement and depending on the extent of the infringement, is either a civil or criminal offence.
However, not all copying is illegal and there are three occasions when something can be photocopied legally, without any copyright infringement. They are:
If The Material Is Out of Copyright
The legal protection from reproduction afforded to a documents’ creator does not last forever and eventually all works will be “out of copyright”. Generally, published works go out of copyright 70 years after the death of the author. As such, given that George Orwell died in 1950, the literary content of his works will be out of copyright in 2020, at which point it may be reproduced, published and distributed without the permission of his estate. However, although the literary content will be out of copyright in 2020, editions of his work may still be covered by typographic copyright; which pertains to the composition of the published material and lasts for 25 years after its publication. So an edition published in 2020 would have its layout protected until 2045.
Chapter III of The Copyright Act (available through the Office of Public Sector Information) dictates the terms under which material can be legally reproduced without permission. Fundamentally, what is allowed is the reproduction of part of original material in accordance with “fair” practice. This covers areas such as; reproduction for research, study, reviews and news reporting. In general though, one can assume that if you are reproducing a document in its entirety or expressly for financial gain, you will be breaching copyright. For any other reason you should consult the legislation prior to reproducing the material.
If Reproduced In Accordance With a License
It is possible, through the Copyright Licensing Agency, to purchase a licence entitling you to reproduce and distribute original material. The licence constitutes the creators permission within certain terms and if you would like to investigate copyright licences further you should see the CLA’s website.
