Proposal
for a Directive on Copyright and Related Rights in the Information Society
COM(97)628
http://europa.eu.int/comm/dg15/en/intprop/intprop/1100.htm
Response from The Library Association
IV ECONOMIC IMPACT
The absence of adequate exceptions covering the printed and
the digital environment in the proposed Directive would severely restrict the Government's
aim (and that of the European Union) of promoting lifelong learning for all as a basis of
the information society. It would also hamper the Government's plans to connect libraries,
educational institutions including schools and other public institutions to the
information superhighways to guarantee access for all.
The intention by the European Commission in this proposed
Directive is to leave the future of access to information to licensing mechanisms. In an
environment where information can be monopolised, citizens, libraries and archival
institutions could be left in a nearly impossible negotiation position, mostly being
subject to rights holders' standard contracts. It is therefore essential that there are
statutory provisions made for exceptions applicable in all countries of the European Union
to allow access to information and copying for private, educational and research purposes.
If these exceptions are not provided for,
then, in the absence of a licence, libraries, universities, documentation centres and
archives could not (even for a non-commercial purpose):
- display electronic copyrighted material on a screen
on-site
The library, having purchased a copy of a digital work, or having paid a subscription to
use online material, or having accessed the work (implicitly freely available) on the
Internet, would also have to be authorised or pay extra to
display it on the screen inside the library to library users.
- Enable on-site users to view, listen and browse
electronic copyrighted material for private or educational purposes
Similarly, the library would have to ask permission, or pay extra,
to enable its users to look at the material on the screen, listen to digital works, or
search for what they want to look at or listen to for the purposes of research, education
or private study.
- enable on-site users to make a digital copy for
private or educational purposes:
All such copying would have to be cleared and paid for. Copying
for research or private study purposes is presently allowed in print environment for
copying under fair dealing or library regulations.
- provide access to digital material to remote users
for private or educational purposes:
Every access by a remote user will have to be cleared and paid for.
Government initiatives for the Information Society such as the National Grid for Learning,
the People's Network, etc which involve remote access will be severely hampered if not
curtailed.
- make a digital copy of a work for preservation or
archival purposes:
This will have to be licensed and paid for. Librarians and
archivists, concerned about the long term integrity of information in all its formats,
will not be allowed to collect and preserve information for education and cultural
purposes without payment. The Government would have to pay
rights holders to extend legal deposit to non-print media. To leave preservation and
archiving to economic forces would be to the detriment of society.
- send copyrighted material via FTP or by email to
another library:
The library would have to be authorised and pay to copy library
to library even if the purpose of copying was legitimate i.e. allowed under an existing
exception. For example, a library would not be able to digitise and send a reasonable
amount of a work or one article as part of copying for users under the library
regulations. The costs would be so phenomenal, traffic will cease.
- send copyrighted material via FTP or by email to
students or staff within an institution:
The library would have to be authorised and pay even though
copying and use will be controlled within a closed user group and so should not be a
threat to rights holders.
The need for fair practice exceptions has been made clear
in the LA Briefing Paper The Case for Fair Practice. The library and information
profession strongly believe that the activities described above equate with the principles
of fair practice, and are legitimate uses which would fall under Article 9(2) of the Berne
Convention and the agreed statement to Article 10 of the WIPO Copyright Treaty which
states that Contracting Parties are permitted to carry forward into the digital
environment those limitations and exceptions which were seen to be acceptable under the
Berne Convention.
Estimated costs of not having exceptions for research or
private study
To give some idea of the extra costs involved in not having
public interest exceptions we have looked the present costs of licensing in the print
environment and drawn on these figures. At present single copies are allowed under fair
dealing and under the library regulations for research or private study. If these had to
be paid for in the print environment these are the possible additional costs.
| Academic libraries: |
£16.5m pa |
| It is estimated that
up to 250 million fair dealing copies are made each year. If a similar charge to the
present cost of licensing (between 5-10p per page) were made the additional costs to
Higher Education are likely to be in excess of £16.5 million. There would be a similar
increase for school and college libraries. |
| Public Libraries: |
£5.8m pa |
| During the financial
year 1996/97 photocopies made in public libraries in the UK totalled 57,785,2741. These included those supplied for users.
Under the library regulations, public libraries are allowed to make a charge for copying
done for their users which encompasses the cost of production plus a contribution towards
expenses. The average cost of a staffed copying service ranges from 10p to 25p per A4
page. Self-service copying is cheaper at around 10p per page. Total income from
photocopying in 1996/97 was £5,134,759,000. If this copying attracted royalty payments,
the estimated extra costs to UK libraries would be in the region of another £5.8m per
annum. Costs would have to be passed on to the consumer as libraries would not be in a
position to absorb them. This would probably increase the cost of making photocopies in
libraries with the result that users would choose to go elsewhere to obtain copies. No-one
would win: Libraries would lose many of their users; the general public and students will
not afford to be able to make full use of the library facilities; the rights holders would
find it difficult if not impossible to license an uncontrolled environment and would be
unlikely to benefit. |
| Libraries in the
health sector: |
£4m pa |
| The CLA claimed in
1990 that the NHS was costing them £4 million in lost photocopying fees. This is an
indication of how much extra it would cost if there was no exception for research or
private study. |
| Libraries in the
charitable and voluntary sector: |
|
| There are no figures
to estimate how much this sector would have to pay. It is likely that the ability of this
sector to pay photocopying royalties would be out of the question and yet they too would
be subject to pay-per-use. |
| Industrial and
Commercial libraries: |
|
| Although these
libraries are not prescribed to copy for their users, they are permitted to make fair
dealing copies for research or private study. Many business sectors are already paying
very high licensing fees for multiple copying (the standard business licence ranges from £7-21
per professional employee per annum depending upon type of business sector). Extra charges
imposed by not having fair dealing, or if there was no fair dealing at all for commercial
purposes would increase these costs considerably. An indication of extra cost can be seen
by looking at the CLA Rapid Clearance Service fees for photocopying which are £0.13
per page from a book to £2.50 per article. Whereas large organisations
may be able to pass costs on in the course of business (but with a knock-on effect), small
or medium sized enterprises would be hit hard. There are no comparable statistics to reach
an overall annual figure for this sector. |
Costs in the digital environment
To give an estimate at how much extra it would cost to
clear permission and pay to view, browse and copy in the digital environment for all
sectors is extremely difficult. One indicator is Project ACORN2,
one of the eLib projects in the HE sector, where it was reported that time taken to clear
some works took anything up to six months and sometimes requests were
ignored or permission was denied. The price to clear copyright for digitisation ranged
from 2.5p per page to 25$ per page although because this was a pilot
project, many rights holders waived their charge. The administrative cost of obtaining a
limited number of copyright permissions between November 1996 - March 1997 was £1830.
This could add up to an enormous figure under the proposed legislation.
1 CIPFA statistics
2 http://acorn.lboro.ac.uk
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