LIBER has submitted its response to the German consultation to adapt copyright law to the requirements of the Digital Single Market. In its proposal focussing on the mass digitisation and making available out-of-commerce works (Art 8-11), LIBER directs its concerns towards two specific items. The first is the lack of clarity in the draft as…
Covid-19 has left research libraries scrambling to support a swift and unprecedented switch to digital teaching. The transition to fully online learning has exacerbated existing problems, namely a lack of appropriate copyright legislation (as LIBER flagged in April), and sky-high prices for digital textbooks. To highlight the problems faced by librarians, LIBER’s Copyright & Legal…
The Association of European Association of Research Libraries (LIBER) applauds the cOAlition S announcement of a Rights Retention Strategy: a move which will allow authors to retain copyright to their work and, at the same time, will accelerate progress towards LIBER’s goal of Open Access as the predominant form of scholarly publishing by 2022. Under…
Europe’s incoming Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market contains two new exceptions allowing text and data mining (TDM). The Directive is currently being implemented by all member states and must come into force no later than June 2021. Article 3 grants universities, educational establishments and libraries the right to mine in-copyright works to…
During this unprecedented global emergency, LIBER calls on European Commissioners, Member State governments, publishers and authors to urgently help libraries, universities and other educational establishments, so that they can continue supplying researchers, teachers and students with access to books, archives and other instructional materials. In our statement, issued 9 April 2020, we ask for: Member…
Articles 8-11 of the Digital Single Market Directive introduce a ‘hybrid exception’ to copyright. The exception allows libraries and other cultural heritage institutions to digitise and place their published and unpublished out-of-commerce (OOC) works online — once these works have been ‘advertised’ for at least six months on the EU Intellectual Property Office’s website, in…
The webinars of this series on the Digital Single Market Directive have passed. We would like to thank to all who joined the webinars and hope that they will help you to get involved in national implementation of the new Directive. Slides and recordings from the webinars are available on Zenodo. Are you a librarian…
Tell us and the Libraries Archives Copyright Alliance (LACA) if you have been blocked from access to electronic content in the context of data mining. Our Copyright & Legal Matters Working Group is working with LACA to gather evidence about what happens when Technical Protection Measures (TPMs) block researchers from accessing content because they have…
Are you a research librarian working in Europe? If so, you have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to help shape your national copyright legislation. Speak up for libraries and research so that your library benefits from new activities and services. If you don’t, your library’s ability to serve users could be unnecessarily restricted. This unique situation stems…
As we reported, the new Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market was passed by Council and Parliament in April. This means it will come into force across the European Union by 7 June 2021. Whether it is implemented well or poorly from a library and research perspective in a particular country is now,…
By LIBER, the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA), the European Bureau of Library Information and Documentation Associations (EBLIDA), the European University Association (EUA) and SPARC Europe. Following the European Parliament’s adoption of the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market on 26 March 2019, the Council of Ministers of the European Union…
On Tuesday this week, the European Parliament voted to adopt the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market by a majority of 348 to 274. The European Council is expected to ratify the Directive next month and —soon after that — it will enter into European Law. Member States will have two years to…
