Legal Issues (FAQ3)

One of the first things that need to be determined is whether or not the source material can be legally digitized. One important legal consideration which affects the viability of digitization projects is intellectual property rights. In some cases legal council should be sought to determine the copyright status of the item proposed to be digitized. It may be necessary to determine both its status in the country of origin as well as in the nation in which the digitization is to be preformed.

The unfortunate current situation is that copyright laws very widely from nation to nation. In the last ten years in particular, there have been many changes both in American copyright law and international treaties concerning intellectual property. As this jumble of laws and treaties has taken effect, the net result is that determining the copyright status of materials is often much less clear than under previous regulatory systems.

The copyright status of sound recordings is often particularly murky. For a discussion of rights issues concerning sound recordings see Intellectual Property and Audiovisual Archives and Collections by Anthony Seeger.