[MCN-L] Permissions
Absolutely agree, of course. And see today's NYT article about the Rijksmuseum's contribution to the way forward: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/arts/design/museums-mull-public-use-of-online-art-images.html?nl=todaysheadlinesemc=edit_th_20130529_r=0 ?We?re a public institution, and so the art and objects we have are, in a way, everyone?s property,? said [Taco Dibbits, the director of collections at the Rijksmuseum,] in an interview. ??With the Internet, it?s so difficult to control your copyright or use of images that we decided we?d rather people use a very good high-resolution image of the ?Milkmaid? from the Rijksmuseum rather than using a very bad reproduction,? he said, referring to that Vermeer painting from around 1660. David Green redgen at mac.com @redgen 203-520-9155 On May 27, 2013, at 8:46 AM, Kenneth Hamma khamma at me.com wrote: Thanks, Peter. It is dismaying that anyone could not imagine that there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures that collections - perhaps sometimes thoughtlessly? - interpose between themselves the public for whom they are stewards. For those, here are some starting points. https://images.nga.gov/en/page/show_home_page.html http://britishart.yale.edu/collections/using-collections/image-use http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_this_site/terms_of_use/free_image_service.aspx https://www.lacma.org/about/contact-us/terms-use http://thewalters.org/rights-reproductions.aspx Knowing that it can be bothersome to visit websites and read, let me copy the simple image rights/use statement from the Walters Art Museum: All photography on our website(s) is governed by Creative Commons Licensing and can be used without cost or specific permission. Artworks in the photographs are in the public domain due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects have also been released into the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License. Cheers, ken Kenneth Hamma Yale Center for British Art kenneth.hamma at yale.edu On May 27, 2013, at 7:05 AM, Peter B. Hirtle pbh6 at cornell.edu wrote: For a different perspective from a different field, MCN-L readers might be interested in a forthcoming paper from John Overholt addressing the future of special collections in libraries. It is called Five theses on the future of special collections, and a preprint is found at http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10601790/overholt.pdf. One of his five theses speaks precisely to the issue of permissions. It begins this way: The future of special collections is openness. We are not the creators of our collections; we are their stewards. They were entrusted to us to preserve them, certainly, but preservation without use is an empty victory. It ought to be our primary purpose at all times to minimize barriers to use, so it is all the more shameful when we interpose such barriers ourselves, not out of concern for the health of the collections, but out of the misguided belief that we are entitled to control, even to monetize, their use. When we claim copyright over our digital collections, or impose permission fees or licensing terms on users, we are arguably misrepresenting the law, and certainly violating one of the central ethical tenets of the profession: to promote the free dissemination of information. It would seem to me that image permissions would be much simplified if only permission of the copyright owner had to be secured (and then only if the use was not a fair use). Peter Hirtle -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu] On Behalf Of Deborah Wythe Sent: Friday, May 24, 2013 3:59 PM To: mcn-l at mcn.edu Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions I don't think there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures, but I was struck by the frustration of the writer, who clearly had never done image acquisition before. It's a skill, just like any other. Filling in for our RR coordinator, I've learned just how many emails it can take to get all the information we need to help them. I've often wondered if there was a way to connect museum staff with art history grad programs to get this topic on their curriculum. Shouldn't every budding writer have a brief tutorial on copyright, image acquisition, image quality, etc? Then again, when I was in grad school and suggested to my advisor that we put together a guide to doing primary source research, he put me off, saying that we should all be figuring it out ourselves and that was one way they sorted the wheat from the chaff. I won't address the differing policies and prices -- that's a different (and difficult topic) -- but putting chocolate on our fee
[MCN-L] Permissions
An addendum to this thread is the fact that many institutions, Princeton among them, are more quietly adopting an open access to public domain images policy - I'd be interested in a show of hands. Cathryn -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-boun...@mcn.edu] On Behalf Of David Green Sent: Wednesday, May 29, 2013 8:48 AM To: Museum Computer Network Listserv Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions Absolutely agree, of course. And see today's NYT article about the Rijksmuseum's contribution to the way forward: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/arts/design/museums-mull-public-use-of-online-art-images.html?nl=todaysheadlinesemc=edit_th_20130529_r=0 We're a public institution, and so the art and objects we have are, in a way, everyone's property, said [Taco Dibbits, the director of collections at the Rijksmuseum,] in an interview. 'With the Internet, it's so difficult to control your copyright or use of images that we decided we'd rather people use a very good high-resolution image of the 'Milkmaid' from the Rijksmuseum rather than using a very bad reproduction, he said, referring to that Vermeer painting from around 1660. David Green redgen at mac.com @redgen 203-520-9155 On May 27, 2013, at 8:46 AM, Kenneth Hamma khamma at me.com wrote: Thanks, Peter. It is dismaying that anyone could not imagine that there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures that collections - perhaps sometimes thoughtlessly? - interpose between themselves the public for whom they are stewards. For those, here are some starting points. https://images.nga.gov/en/page/show_home_page.html http://britishart.yale.edu/collections/using-collections/image-use http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_this_site/terms_of_use/free_image_s ervice.aspx https://www.lacma.org/about/contact-us/terms-use http://thewalters.org/rights-reproductions.aspx Knowing that it can be bothersome to visit websites and read, let me copy the simple image rights/use statement from the Walters Art Museum: All photography on our website(s) is governed by Creative Commons Licensing and can be used without cost or specific permission. Artworks in the photographs are in the public domain due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects have also been released into the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License. Cheers, ken Kenneth Hamma Yale Center for British Art kenneth.hamma at yale.edu On May 27, 2013, at 7:05 AM, Peter B. Hirtle pbh6 at cornell.edu wrote: For a different perspective from a different field, MCN-L readers might be interested in a forthcoming paper from John Overholt addressing the future of special collections in libraries. It is called Five theses on the future of special collections, and a preprint is found at http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10601790/overholt.pdf. One of his five theses speaks precisely to the issue of permissions. It begins this way: The future of special collections is openness. We are not the creators of our collections; we are their stewards. They were entrusted to us to preserve them, certainly, but preservation without use is an empty victory. It ought to be our primary purpose at all times to minimize barriers to use, so it is all the more shameful when we interpose such barriers ourselves, not out of concern for the health of the collections, but out of the misguided belief that we are entitled to control, even to monetize, their use. When we claim copyright over our digital collections, or impose permission fees or licensing terms on users, we are arguably misrepresenting the law, and certainly violating one of the central ethical tenets of the profession: to promote the free dissemination of information. It would seem to me that image permissions would be much simplified if only permission of the copyright owner had to be secured (and then only if the use was not a fair use). Peter Hirtle -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu] On Behalf Of Deborah Wythe Sent: Friday, May 24, 2013 3:59 PM To: mcn-l at mcn.edu Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions I don't think there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures, but I was struck by the frustration of the writer, who clearly had never done image acquisition before. It's a skill, just like any other. Filling in for our RR coordinator, I've learned just how many emails it can take to get all the information we need to help them. I've often wondered if there was a way to connect museum staff with art history grad programs to get this topic on their curriculum. Shouldn't every budding writer have a brief tutorial on copyright
[MCN-L] Permissions
Hello all, Since Cathryn asked for a show of hands, here's one. The Davison Art Center, Wesleyan University also is a case of so-far quiet adoption. Our open access images policy has been in effect and in use since 12/12/2012; but until we can make an initial critical mass of images available for download by users (target: September), we're staying low-key about it. The policy and accompanying information are at: http://www.wesleyan.edu/dac/openaccess cheers, Rob Rob Lancefield Manager of Museum Information Services / Registrar of Collections Davison Art Center, Wesleyan University 301 High Street, Middletown CT 06459-0487 USA rlancefield [at] wesleyan [dot] edu | tel. 860.685.2965 On 5/29/2013 8:58 AM, Cathryn Goodwin wrote: An addendum to this thread is the fact that many institutions, Princeton among them, are more quietly adopting an open access to public domain images policy - I'd be interested in a show of hands. Cathryn -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu] On Behalf Of David Green Sent: Wednesday, May 29, 2013 8:48 AM To: Museum Computer Network Listserv Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions Absolutely agree, of course. And see today's NYT article about the Rijksmuseum's contribution to the way forward: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/arts/design/museums-mull-public-use-of-online-art-images.html?nl=todaysheadlinesemc=edit_th_20130529_r=0 We're a public institution, and so the art and objects we have are, in a way, everyone's property, said [Taco Dibbits, the director of collections at the Rijksmuseum,] in an interview. 'With the Internet, it's so difficult to control your copyright or use of images that we decided we'd rather people use a very good high-resolution image of the 'Milkmaid' from the Rijksmuseum rather than using a very bad reproduction, he said, referring to that Vermeer painting from around 1660. David Green redgen at mac.com @redgen 203-520-9155 On May 27, 2013, at 8:46 AM, Kenneth Hammakhamma at me.com wrote: Thanks, Peter. It is dismaying that anyone could not imagine that there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures that collections - perhaps sometimes thoughtlessly? - interpose between themselves the public for whom they are stewards. For those, here are some starting points. https://images.nga.gov/en/page/show_home_page.html http://britishart.yale.edu/collections/using-collections/image-use http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_this_site/terms_of_use/free_image_s ervice.aspx https://www.lacma.org/about/contact-us/terms-use http://thewalters.org/rights-reproductions.aspx Knowing that it can be bothersome to visit websites and read, let me copy the simple image rights/use statement from the Walters Art Museum: All photography on our website(s) is governed by Creative Commons Licensing and can be used without cost or specific permission. Artworks in the photographs are in the public domain due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects have also been released into the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License. Cheers, ken Kenneth Hamma Yale Center for British Art kenneth.hamma at yale.edu On May 27, 2013, at 7:05 AM, Peter B. Hirtlepbh6 at cornell.edu wrote: For a different perspective from a different field, MCN-L readers might be interested in a forthcoming paper from John Overholt addressing the future of special collections in libraries. It is called Five theses on the future of special collections, and a preprint is found at http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10601790/overholt.pdf. One of his five theses speaks precisely to the issue of permissions. It begins this way: The future of special collections is openness. We are not the creators of our collections; we are their stewards. They were entrusted to us to preserve them, certainly, but preservation without use is an empty victory. It ought to be our primary purpose at all times to minimize barriers to use, so it is all the more shameful when we interpose such barriers ourselves, not out of concern for the health of the collections, but out of the misguided belief that we are entitled to control, even to monetize, their use. When we claim copyright over our digital collections, or impose permission fees or licensing terms on users, we are arguably misrepresenting the law, and certainly violating one of the central ethical tenets of the profession: to promote the free dissemination of information. It would seem to me that image permissions would be much simplified if only permission of the copyright owner had to be secured (and then only if the use was not a fair use). Peter Hirtle -Original Message- From: mcn
[MCN-L] Permissions
The Cornell University Library adopted an open access to public domain images policy in 2009. You can read our rationale in this article at http://publications.arl.org/rli266/2. To date, the museum at Cornell has not elected to follow the Library's lead. Peter Hirtle -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-boun...@mcn.edu] On Behalf Of Cathryn Goodwin Sent: Wednesday, May 29, 2013 8:59 AM To: Museum Computer Network Listserv Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions An addendum to this thread is the fact that many institutions, Princeton among them, are more quietly adopting an open access to public domain images policy - I'd be interested in a show of hands. Cathryn -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-boun...@mcn.edu] On Behalf Of David Green Sent: Wednesday, May 29, 2013 8:48 AM To: Museum Computer Network Listserv Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions Absolutely agree, of course. And see today's NYT article about the Rijksmuseum's contribution to the way forward: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/arts/design/museums-mull-public-use-of-online-art-images.html?nl=todaysheadlinesemc=edit_th_20130529_r=0 We're a public institution, and so the art and objects we have are, in a way, everyone's property, said [Taco Dibbits, the director of collections at the Rijksmuseum,] in an interview. 'With the Internet, it's so difficult to control your copyright or use of images that we decided we'd rather people use a very good high-resolution image of the 'Milkmaid' from the Rijksmuseum rather than using a very bad reproduction, he said, referring to that Vermeer painting from around 1660. David Green redgen at mac.com @redgen 203-520-9155 On May 27, 2013, at 8:46 AM, Kenneth Hamma khamma at me.com wrote: Thanks, Peter. It is dismaying that anyone could not imagine that there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures that collections - perhaps sometimes thoughtlessly? - interpose between themselves the public for whom they are stewards. For those, here are some starting points. https://images.nga.gov/en/page/show_home_page.html http://britishart.yale.edu/collections/using-collections/image-use http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_this_site/terms_of_use/free_image_s ervice.aspx https://www.lacma.org/about/contact-us/terms-use http://thewalters.org/rights-reproductions.aspx Knowing that it can be bothersome to visit websites and read, let me copy the simple image rights/use statement from the Walters Art Museum: All photography on our website(s) is governed by Creative Commons Licensing and can be used without cost or specific permission. Artworks in the photographs are in the public domain due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects have also been released into the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License. Cheers, ken Kenneth Hamma Yale Center for British Art kenneth.hamma at yale.edu On May 27, 2013, at 7:05 AM, Peter B. Hirtle pbh6 at cornell.edu wrote: For a different perspective from a different field, MCN-L readers might be interested in a forthcoming paper from John Overholt addressing the future of special collections in libraries. It is called Five theses on the future of special collections, and a preprint is found at http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10601790/overholt.pdf. One of his five theses speaks precisely to the issue of permissions. It begins this way: The future of special collections is openness. We are not the creators of our collections; we are their stewards. They were entrusted to us to preserve them, certainly, but preservation without use is an empty victory. It ought to be our primary purpose at all times to minimize barriers to use, so it is all the more shameful when we interpose such barriers ourselves, not out of concern for the health of the collections, but out of the misguided belief that we are entitled to control, even to monetize, their use. When we claim copyright over our digital collections, or impose permission fees or licensing terms on users, we are arguably misrepresenting the law, and certainly violating one of the central ethical tenets of the profession: to promote the free dissemination of information. It would seem to me that image permissions would be much simplified if only permission of the copyright owner had to be secured (and then only if the use was not a fair use). Peter Hirtle -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu] On Behalf Of Deborah Wythe Sent: Friday, May 24, 2013 3:59 PM To: mcn-l at mcn.edu Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions I don't think there's any way around the wide variety of charges
[MCN-L] Permissions
Not to take this down a completely different line (perhaps a subset of this terrific string) but, not mentioned in the Times article is the fact that the Rijksmuseum also has 140,000+ images, in very high resolution, available through the Europeana portal http://www.europeana.eu/portal/search.html?query=rijksmuseum. Are we getting close with the Digital Public *Library* of America http://dp.la? David Green redgen at mac.com @redgen 203-520-9155 On May 29, 2013, at 11:16 AM, Peter B. Hirtle pbh6 at cornell.edu wrote: The Cornell University Library adopted an open access to public domain images policy in 2009. You can read our rationale in this article at http://publications.arl.org/rli266/2. To date, the museum at Cornell has not elected to follow the Library's lead. Peter Hirtle -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu] On Behalf Of Cathryn Goodwin Sent: Wednesday, May 29, 2013 8:59 AM To: Museum Computer Network Listserv Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions An addendum to this thread is the fact that many institutions, Princeton among them, are more quietly adopting an open access to public domain images policy - I'd be interested in a show of hands. Cathryn -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu] On Behalf Of David Green Sent: Wednesday, May 29, 2013 8:48 AM To: Museum Computer Network Listserv Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions Absolutely agree, of course. And see today's NYT article about the Rijksmuseum's contribution to the way forward: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/arts/design/museums-mull-public-use-of-online-art-images.html?nl=todaysheadlinesemc=edit_th_20130529_r=0 We're a public institution, and so the art and objects we have are, in a way, everyone's property, said [Taco Dibbits, the director of collections at the Rijksmuseum,] in an interview. 'With the Internet, it's so difficult to control your copyright or use of images that we decided we'd rather people use a very good high-resolution image of the 'Milkmaid' from the Rijksmuseum rather than using a very bad reproduction, he said, referring to that Vermeer painting from around 1660. David Green redgen at mac.com @redgen 203-520-9155 On May 27, 2013, at 8:46 AM, Kenneth Hamma khamma at me.com wrote: Thanks, Peter. It is dismaying that anyone could not imagine that there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures that collections - perhaps sometimes thoughtlessly? - interpose between themselves the public for whom they are stewards. For those, here are some starting points. https://images.nga.gov/en/page/show_home_page.html http://britishart.yale.edu/collections/using-collections/image-use http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_this_site/terms_of_use/free_image_s ervice.aspx https://www.lacma.org/about/contact-us/terms-use http://thewalters.org/rights-reproductions.aspx Knowing that it can be bothersome to visit websites and read, let me copy the simple image rights/use statement from the Walters Art Museum: All photography on our website(s) is governed by Creative Commons Licensing and can be used without cost or specific permission. Artworks in the photographs are in the public domain due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects have also been released into the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License. Cheers, ken Kenneth Hamma Yale Center for British Art kenneth.hamma at yale.edu On May 27, 2013, at 7:05 AM, Peter B. Hirtle pbh6 at cornell.edu wrote: For a different perspective from a different field, MCN-L readers might be interested in a forthcoming paper from John Overholt addressing the future of special collections in libraries. It is called Five theses on the future of special collections, and a preprint is found at http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10601790/overholt.pdf. One of his five theses speaks precisely to the issue of permissions. It begins this way: The future of special collections is openness. We are not the creators of our collections; we are their stewards. They were entrusted to us to preserve them, certainly, but preservation without use is an empty victory. It ought to be our primary purpose at all times to minimize barriers to use, so it is all the more shameful when we interpose such barriers ourselves, not out of concern for the health of the collections, but out of the misguided belief that we are entitled to control, even to monetize, their use. When we claim copyright over our digital collections, or impose permission fees or licensing terms on users, we are arguably misrepresenting the law, and certainly violating one
[MCN-L] Permissions
We've tried out the Rijksmuseum site and found that the free image for personal use comes through as a compressed JPG of about 1 Mb or less, though it could be that some works have larger master images -- hard to tell. Any scholarly or commercial use just bounces you to their normal image services request page. All of our images are available for download at a modest side (1536 pixels on the long side) if they're in the public domain, licensed, or 3D (CC-BY license for the latter). Also done quietly, as others have noted. Deb Wythe Brooklyn Museum deborahwythe at hotmail.com deborahwythe at hotmail.com From: cathryng at Princeton.EDU To: mcn-l at mcn.edu Date: Wed, 29 May 2013 12:58:44 + Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions An addendum to this thread is the fact that many institutions, Princeton among them, are more quietly adopting an open access to public domain images policy - I'd be interested in a show of hands. Cathryn -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu] On Behalf Of David Green Sent: Wednesday, May 29, 2013 8:48 AM To: Museum Computer Network Listserv Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions Absolutely agree, of course. And see today's NYT article about the Rijksmuseum's contribution to the way forward: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/arts/design/museums-mull-public-use-of-online-art-images.html?nl=todaysheadlinesemc=edit_th_20130529_r=0 We're a public institution, and so the art and objects we have are, in a way, everyone's property, said [Taco Dibbits, the director of collections at the Rijksmuseum,] in an interview. 'With the Internet, it's so difficult to control your copyright or use of images that we decided we'd rather people use a very good high-resolution image of the 'Milkmaid' from the Rijksmuseum rather than using a very bad reproduction, he said, referring to that Vermeer painting from around 1660. David Green redgen at mac.com @redgen 203-520-9155 On May 27, 2013, at 8:46 AM, Kenneth Hamma khamma at me.com wrote: Thanks, Peter. It is dismaying that anyone could not imagine that there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures that collections - perhaps sometimes thoughtlessly? - interpose between themselves the public for whom they are stewards. For those, here are some starting points. https://images.nga.gov/en/page/show_home_page.html http://britishart.yale.edu/collections/using-collections/image-use http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_this_site/terms_of_use/free_image_s ervice.aspx https://www.lacma.org/about/contact-us/terms-use http://thewalters.org/rights-reproductions.aspx Knowing that it can be bothersome to visit websites and read, let me copy the simple image rights/use statement from the Walters Art Museum: All photography on our website(s) is governed by Creative Commons Licensing and can be used without cost or specific permission. Artworks in the photographs are in the public domain due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects have also been released into the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License. Cheers, ken Kenneth Hamma Yale Center for British Art kenneth.hamma at yale.edu On May 27, 2013, at 7:05 AM, Peter B. Hirtle pbh6 at cornell.edu wrote: For a different perspective from a different field, MCN-L readers might be interested in a forthcoming paper from John Overholt addressing the future of special collections in libraries. It is called Five theses on the future of special collections, and a preprint is found at http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10601790/overholt.pdf. One of his five theses speaks precisely to the issue of permissions. It begins this way: The future of special collections is openness. We are not the creators of our collections; we are their stewards. They were entrusted to us to preserve them, certainly, but preservation without use is an empty victory. It ought to be our primary purpose at all times to minimize barriers to use, so it is all the more shameful when we interpose such barriers ourselves, not out of concern for the health of the collections, but out of the misguided belief that we are entitled to control, even to monetize, their use. When we claim copyright over our digital collections, or impose permission fees or licensing terms on users, we are arguably misrepresenting the law, and certainly violating one of the central ethical tenets of the profession: to promote the free dissemination of information. It would seem to me that image permissions would be much simplified if only permission of the copyright owner had
[MCN-L] Permissions
This has been a really interested thread for me to read (as an OpenGLAM volunteer and open culture advocate). Always strange to be an outsider to these things :) (i.e. I don't work in a GLAM right now as paid staff) Deb - I do have one comment about the BM website. It has been quite sometime since I looked at it, so this was a great chance for me to revisit your website and browse the collections. I see that BM allows people to use images, but only for non-commercial use which counters the public domain or openly licensed reference you stated below: http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/image_services.php However, it counters statements seen on object pages, for objects like: http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/610/The_Peaceable_Kingdom# Which is a public domain artwork. The image service page says I can only use the images for non-commercial purpose. However, I can download /The Peaceable Kingdom/ and do what I want with it (and rightfully so, since it's PD) according to the object's no known copyright page. It'd be wonderful to see the image services page agree with what is happening on object pages on the website. Just a suggestion :) Thanks for all you do, -Sarah On 5/29/13 10:50 AM, Deborah Wythe wrote: We've tried out the Rijksmuseum site and found that the free image for personal use comes through as a compressed JPG of about 1 Mb or less, though it could be that some works have larger master images -- hard to tell. Any scholarly or commercial use just bounces you to their normal image services request page. All of our images are available for download at a modest side (1536 pixels on the long side) if they're in the public domain, licensed, or 3D (CC-BY license for the latter). Also done quietly, as others have noted. Deb Wythe Brooklyn Museum deborahwythe at hotmail.com -- *Sarah Stierch* */Museumist and open culture advocate/* Visit sarahstierch.com http://sarahstierch.com
[MCN-L] Permissions
FWIW, I think the Met is in the same position as the BM; website terms-of-use being more restrictive than copyright law, for images of 2d pd works. Sent from my iPad On May 29, 2013, at 2:01 PM, Sarah Stierch sarah at sarahstierch.com wrote: This has been a really interested thread for me to read (as an OpenGLAM volunteer and open culture advocate). Always strange to be an outsider to these things :) (i.e. I don't work in a GLAM right now as paid staff) Deb - I do have one comment about the BM website. It has been quite sometime since I looked at it, so this was a great chance for me to revisit your website and browse the collections. I see that BM allows people to use images, but only for non-commercial use which counters the public domain or openly licensed reference you stated below: http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/image_services.php However, it counters statements seen on object pages, for objects like: http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/610/The_Peaceable_Kingdom# Which is a public domain artwork. The image service page says I can only use the images for non-commercial purpose. However, I can download /The Peaceable Kingdom/ and do what I want with it (and rightfully so, since it's PD) according to the object's no known copyright page. It'd be wonderful to see the image services page agree with what is happening on object pages on the website. Just a suggestion :) Thanks for all you do, -Sarah On 5/29/13 10:50 AM, Deborah Wythe wrote: We've tried out the Rijksmuseum site and found that the free image for personal use comes through as a compressed JPG of about 1 Mb or less, though it could be that some works have larger master images -- hard to tell. Any scholarly or commercial use just bounces you to their normal image services request page. All of our images are available for download at a modest side (1536 pixels on the long side) if they're in the public domain, licensed, or 3D (CC-BY license for the latter). Also done quietly, as others have noted. Deb Wythe Brooklyn Museum deborahwythe at hotmail.com -- *Sarah Stierch* */Museumist and open culture advocate/* Visit sarahstierch.com http://sarahstierch.com ___ You are currently subscribed to mcn-l, the listserv of the Museum Computer Network (http://www.mcn.edu) To post to this list, send messages to: mcn-l at mcn.edu To unsubscribe or change mcn-l delivery options visit: http://mcn.edu/mailman/listinfo/mcn-l The MCN-L archives can be found at: http://toronto.mediatrope.com/pipermail/mcn-l/
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I think it's worth noting for the record that Deb Wythe and the Brooklyn Museum began making public domain images available way before other US museums, and with fewer restrictions. Brooklyn (and to some extent the Met) have been early in moving toward open, free access to all p.d. images. To do so, Brooklyn has had to mount a huge project to research the copyright status of every work. As Peter Hirtle's chart tells us, determining whether a work is p.d. or not is not always a cut-and-dried thing. That said, the next stage of this process is looming: to make all p.d. images available for all uses--including highly commercial ones--without trying to monetize the process. Deb, the one bone I would pick with you is on the question of how difficult or onerous the paperwork and research are for end-users. The process is out-of-control burdensome, with as many as 3 or 4 different stakeholders all claiming authority to grant or withhold access. In NYC, if one wants to get a permit to do work on one's building, the process is so entangled, and so many people need to be bribed, that it has given rise to a career known as an expediter. Likewise, museums, publishers, and individual authors are having to hire rights-clearance professionals just to get access to pictures that are freely found everywhere on the Internet. And lastly, the Internet is full of those pictures, but by and large the quality is terrible. The museums who are the stewards of art and who profess to care most about the artworks have taken great care to keep their high-res, large-size, color-corrected scans as unavailable as possible. Instead, the bad ones--the cheap scans from books, the old outdated faded copies--are what the public (and the arts community) has access to. I cannot fathom how this can be said to meet museum mission, or serve art well. In a nutshell: the advent of the Internet changed the game, and museums are now, step by step, coming to terms with that. Regards, Eve Sinaiko NYC
[MCN-L] Permissions
For a different perspective from a different field, MCN-L readers might be interested in a forthcoming paper from John Overholt addressing the future of special collections in libraries. It is called Five theses on the future of special collections, and a preprint is found at http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10601790/overholt.pdf. One of his five theses speaks precisely to the issue of permissions. It begins this way: The future of special collections is openness. We are not the creators of our collections; we are their stewards. They were entrusted to us to preserve them, certainly, but preservation without use is an empty victory. It ought to be our primary purpose at all times to minimize barriers to use, so it is all the more shameful when we interpose such barriers ourselves, not out of concern for the health of the collections, but out of the misguided belief that we are entitled to control, even to monetize, their use. When we claim copyright over our digital collections, or impose permission fees or licensing terms on users, we are arguably misrepresenting the law, and certainly violating one of the central ethical tenets of the profession: to promote the free dissemination of information. It would seem to me that image permissions would be much simplified if only permission of the copyright owner had to be secured (and then only if the use was not a fair use). Peter Hirtle -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu] On Behalf Of Deborah Wythe Sent: Friday, May 24, 2013 3:59 PM To: mcn-l at mcn.edu Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions I don't think there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures, but I was struck by the frustration of the writer, who clearly had never done image acquisition before. It's a skill, just like any other. Filling in for our RR coordinator, I've learned just how many emails it can take to get all the information we need to help them. I've often wondered if there was a way to connect museum staff with art history grad programs to get this topic on their curriculum. Shouldn't every budding writer have a brief tutorial on copyright, image acquisition, image quality, etc? Then again, when I was in grad school and suggested to my advisor that we put together a guide to doing primary source research, he put me off, saying that we should all be figuring it out ourselves and that was one way they sorted the wheat from the chaff. I won't address the differing policies and prices -- that's a different (and difficult topic) -- but putting chocolate on our fee schedules is an interesting concept. Deborah Wythe Brooklyn Museumdeborahwythe at hotmail.com From: lesleyeharris at comcast.net Date: Fri, 24 May 2013 12:06:38 -0400 To: mcn-l at mcn.edu Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions Whoops--article is at http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/comment/opinion/opinion-snap- decisions/2003969.article. On May 24, 2013, at 12:05 PM, Lesley Ellen Harris lesleyeharris at comcast.net wrote: This article on obtaining permissions from museums will be of interest to MCN members. Lesley lesley at copyrightlaws.com www.copyrightlaws.com ___ You are currently subscribed to mcn-l, the listserv of the Museum Computer Network (http://www.mcn.edu) To post to this list, send messages to: mcn-l at mcn.edu To unsubscribe or change mcn-l delivery options visit: http://mcn.edu/mailman/listinfo/mcn-l The MCN-L archives can be found at: http://toronto.mediatrope.com/pipermail/mcn-l/
[MCN-L] Permissions
Thanks, Peter. It is dismaying that anyone could not imagine that there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures that collections - perhaps sometimes thoughtlessly? - interpose between themselves the public for whom they are stewards. For those, here are some starting points. https://images.nga.gov/en/page/show_home_page.html http://britishart.yale.edu/collections/using-collections/image-use http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_this_site/terms_of_use/free_image_service.aspx https://www.lacma.org/about/contact-us/terms-use http://thewalters.org/rights-reproductions.aspx Knowing that it can be bothersome to visit websites and read, let me copy the simple image rights/use statement from the Walters Art Museum: All photography on our website(s) is governed by Creative Commons Licensing and can be used without cost or specific permission. Artworks in the photographs are in the public domain due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects have also been released into the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License. Cheers, ken Kenneth Hamma Yale Center for British Art kenneth.hamma at yale.edu On May 27, 2013, at 7:05 AM, Peter B. Hirtle pbh6 at cornell.edu wrote: For a different perspective from a different field, MCN-L readers might be interested in a forthcoming paper from John Overholt addressing the future of special collections in libraries. It is called Five theses on the future of special collections, and a preprint is found at http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10601790/overholt.pdf. One of his five theses speaks precisely to the issue of permissions. It begins this way: The future of special collections is openness. We are not the creators of our collections; we are their stewards. They were entrusted to us to preserve them, certainly, but preservation without use is an empty victory. It ought to be our primary purpose at all times to minimize barriers to use, so it is all the more shameful when we interpose such barriers ourselves, not out of concern for the health of the collections, but out of the misguided belief that we are entitled to control, even to monetize, their use. When we claim copyright over our digital collections, or impose permission fees or licensing terms on users, we are arguably misrepresenting the law, and certainly violating one of the central ethical tenets of the profession: to promote the free dissemination of information. It would seem to me that image permissions would be much simplified if only permission of the copyright owner had to be secured (and then only if the use was not a fair use). Peter Hirtle -Original Message- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu] On Behalf Of Deborah Wythe Sent: Friday, May 24, 2013 3:59 PM To: mcn-l at mcn.edu Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions I don't think there's any way around the wide variety of charges and procedures, but I was struck by the frustration of the writer, who clearly had never done image acquisition before. It's a skill, just like any other. Filling in for our RR coordinator, I've learned just how many emails it can take to get all the information we need to help them. I've often wondered if there was a way to connect museum staff with art history grad programs to get this topic on their curriculum. Shouldn't every budding writer have a brief tutorial on copyright, image acquisition, image quality, etc? Then again, when I was in grad school and suggested to my advisor that we put together a guide to doing primary source research, he put me off, saying that we should all be figuring it out ourselves and that was one way they sorted the wheat from the chaff. I won't address the differing policies and prices -- that's a different (and difficult topic) -- but putting chocolate on our fee schedules is an interesting concept. Deborah Wythe Brooklyn Museumdeborahwythe at hotmail.com From: lesleyeharris at comcast.net Date: Fri, 24 May 2013 12:06:38 -0400 To: mcn-l at mcn.edu Subject: Re: [MCN-L] Permissions Whoops--article is at http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/comment/opinion/opinion-snap- decisions/2003969.article. On May 24, 2013, at 12:05 PM, Lesley Ellen Harris lesleyeharris at comcast.net wrote: This article on obtaining permissions from museums will be of interest to MCN members. Lesley lesley at copyrightlaws.com www.copyrightlaws.com ___ You are currently subscribed to mcn-l, the listserv of the Museum Computer Network (http://www.mcn.edu) To post to this list, send messages to: mcn-l at mcn.edu To unsubscribe or change mcn-l delivery options visit: http://mcn.edu/mailman/listinfo/mcn-l
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Whoops--article is at http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/comment/opinion/opinion-snap-decisions/2003969.article. On May 24, 2013, at 12:05 PM, Lesley Ellen Harris lesleyeharris at comcast.net wrote: This article on obtaining permissions from museums will be of interest to MCN members. Lesley lesley at copyrightlaws.com www.copyrightlaws.com
