Preservation, access and intellectual property rights challenges for libraries in the digital environment

Increasingly libraries are acquiring, creating and managing information in digital form, as the electronic publishing industry continues to develop and librarians digitise their non-digital collections. There are various reasons for digitisation in libraries and archives, including improving access to collections generally, and particularly to unique, rare and fragile material. Another reason for digitising is to facilitate preservation through the creation of a surrogate and therefore reduce handling of originals. A particular example of improving access is the ability to digitise material from a variety of geographically dispersed collections and bring it together in a coherent digital resource. A recent worldwide survey (Bültmann et al 2005) of digitised resources indicated that manuscripts and images are the most frequently digitised type of material in libraries, although other types of material, including artefacts, have also been digitised. Librarians are digitising collections in individual institutions, but are also working with other libraries and knowledge institutions, such as museums. A more recent development is the partnership arrangements Google has with a number of major libraries to scan their collections, include them in “Google Book Search and, like a card catalog, show users information about the book plus a few snippets – a few sentences of their search term in context” (Google 2006)

Legal deposit of digital publications

Legal deposit is an obligation to deposit publications with specified depositories. The purpose of legal deposit is to preserve and provide long-term access to the national intellectual heritage. Extending legal deposit to digital publications presents many challenges for the framing of legislation, selection and acquisition of material, preservation and provision of access. The aim of this research was to: explore the potential issues related to the extension of UK legal deposit to digital publications and identify the implications for existing legal deposit arrangements. The research was based on Soft Systems Methodology. Data was gathered through two rounds of interviews with stakeholder groups, including legal deposit libraries, publishers, government and technical experts. Preservation is accepted as the main purpose of legal deposit, but there is some tension and lack of trust between publishers and legal deposit libraries on access to legal deposit collections. The new UK legal deposit law is enabling only; implementation will require further regulations that will be subject to detailed consultation and negotiation. While there has been a voluntary scheme in place for some time in the UK, the research found a lack of readiness amongst the UK legal deposit libraries. They still had to develop cooperative arrangements between themselves and publishers; policies, procedures, especially for online publications; and did not have all the necessary technical infrastructure in place. The deposit of digital publications is an extra role for legal deposit libraries and it is not clear that they will receive extra funding, as is the case in some other countries. There is currently no full-scale fully functional digital legal deposit system in the world. However, there are lessons to be learned from other legal deposit libraries and research and development work is providing partial solutions. The key issues are the need for communication and collaboration between UK legal deposit libraries and cooperation and trust between legal deposit libraries and publishers. Developments since the research was carried out demonstrate some progress in this. Without these, digital legal deposit cannot be successfully implemented in the UK. There is also a need to look at what the users require in terms to material collected and how it is preserved

Online copyright enforcement by Internet Service Providers

The culture of online sharing of information on the Internet extends to unauthorised sharing of copyright content, and is perceived as a major threat to copyright owners and content industries. Enforcement of existing copyright laws is difficult due to the widespread nature of unauthorised sharing. Rights holders have pursued individuals and organisations involved through existing legal channels, with limited success. They have also engaged in voluntary arrangements with Internet Service Providers to educate and, potentially punish infringers. Governments have more recently become involved in developing new legislation with similar aims. The approaches to addressing the issue have been controversial, mainly because of lack of transparency in their development and concerns about their potential impact on the rights of individuals. The approaches to addressing online copyright infringement are described. The nature of the policy making process and its impact on how legal measures are perceived are analysed. The potential impact of measures on the rights of subscribers is discussed. A key conclusion is that new measures to combat unauthorised file sharing need not, in principle, adversely affect the balance between rights, but the design and implementation of legal measures do raise concerns in terms of necessity and proportionality

Right to preserve? Copyright and licensing for digital preservation project: final report

The Copyright and Licensing for Digital Preservation Project ran from September 2002 to March 2004 and was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Board. The aim of the research was to investigate whether and how copyright legislation and licensed access to digital content affect the ability of libraries to provide long-term access to that content, and to suggest ways in which any problems can be overcome. The project included a review of the library, legal and related literatures. Questionnaire surveys were then used to explore the views of libraries, publishers and authors. These were supplemented by twenty in-depth, face-to-face interviews with librarians, publishers, legal experts, digital preservation experts and representatives of rights holder organisations. An invitation-only seminar was held, at which delegates discussed possible solutions to the issues identified

CLEAR design: developing an electronic copyright management system for Project ACORN

Outlines the copyright clearance difficulties faced by librarians in the development of the Electronic Library and states the need for an electronic copyright management system (ECMS) to log the clearance process and to protect electronic documents. Reports the absence of a suitably priced commercially available ECMS for the academic sector and describes the design process for the eLib project ACORN's Rights Management system entitled CLEAR (Copyright Licensed Electronic Access to Readings) based on Microsoft Access. Describes the functionality of the CLEAR database and concludes that it might provide a template for other institutions in the design of subsequent ECMSs

Stakeholders in the selection of digital material for preservation: relationships, responsibilities, and influence

Selecting digital material for preservation in libraries, archives, and museums is a necessary task but has not been widely examined, although the nature of digital material challenges traditional methods of selecting. This article examines the social context of selection in institutions, in which the responsibilities of stakeholders and relationships between them can affect the material chosen for preservation by practitioners. A range of stakeholders is identified; relationships between practitioners, information technology staff, and sources of material are found to be crucial. The influence of senior managers is important in providing a mandate and encouraging shared working and networks of expertise

Where have all the games gone? Explorations on the cultural significance of digital games and preservation

It is now 50 years since the development of the first computer game but despite the proliferation of digital games in our society - with an industry which is flourishing and an average of 9 games sold every second of every day in 2007, it seems that these products are not as valued as the products of other cultural industries, such as film and television, and they are being excluded from the preservation of our digital heritage. This paper will focus on research interviews undertaken with people in the academic community. It will highlight that the growing academic interest in digital games is being hindered by a lack of research collections to support historical study. Researchers acknowledge that the study of digital games is a relatively new discipline and that outside academia, there is still little understanding of their cultural significance. However, they recognise the importance of protecting games as part of our digital heritage to ensure that future generations are able to understand the development of a valuable aspect of our social history. In other words, this research has underlined that games are considered a culture worth studying and something in need of preserving

The barriers to the preservation of digital games: questions on cultural significance

Digital games have become an increasingly visible and popular leisure activity in the 21st century. Despite this proliferation in our society, it seems that they are not valued as part of our culture in the same way as products such as film and music. Furthermore, digital games are a largely ignored part of our cultural heritage. Dismissed as “at best recreational, and at worst desensitizing and degenerate” (Neiburger, 2007, p. 28), they have not specifically been addressed in most of the academic literature on digital preservation and represent a serious omission in past research. This essay discusses this gap in the research in relation to evidence of the cultural significance of digital games, the potential barriers to their acceptance as part of our cultural heritage, and how this relates to the preservation of digital games as cultural artifacts. First, the current status of digital games in our society and the size and strength of the digital games industry is considered. Second, the current interest from academia in digital games is explored. Third, the current preservation activities and the limitations of these initiatives are reviewed. Finally, the barriers to the preservation of digital games in relation to their status as a new cultural phenomenon, their relationship to traditional institutions, and perceptions of their value in terms of selection policies for preservation are examined

Playing games with cultural heritage: a comparative case study analysis of the current status of digital game preservation

Digital games are major part of popular culture. They are also an important part of the history of play and as such they deserve to take their rightful place in our cultural legacy. However, they have received little attention in the academic literature on preservation. Despite this lack of interest, some institutions have recognized the significance of preventing the loss of these valuable materials but to what extent is their longevity ensured? What is the current status of game preservation? What are the challenges facing institutions as they ‘‘play games with cultural heritage?’’ This article provides an overview of the current state of play and, using a comparative case study analysis, provides an insight into the issues, which lie ahead

Digitised content in the UK research library and archives sector

A study of the current provision of digitised collections for researchers in the UK higher education sector was carried out through desk research, a Webbased questionnaire of research libraries and interviews. The study identified a great deal of digitised material in the sector and there has been considerable expenditure of UK public funds in the creation of digital material in the last ten years. However, funding of digitisation been piecemeal and uncoordinated. It is clear that there is a need for coordination, but no agreement on how it should be implemented. Any future national approach would have to be a co-ordinated and distributed, rather than centralised, one