European Copyright User Platform (ECUP+)
and Copyright Awareness Campaign for Librarians

Contents

II.1 Objectives

II.2 Workplan

IV.1 Introduction

IV.2 ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications

IV.3 Report on meetings with rightholders

IV.3.1 Proceedings

IV.3.1.1 Meeting with representatives of authors' organisations

IV.3.1.2 Meeting with representatives of collecting societies

IV.3.1.3 Meeting with representatives of publishing houses

IV.3.1.4 Meeting 24 September 1996 - combined meeting

IV.3.2 Evaluation

IV.4 WIPO Treaty discussions

IV.5 Discussion with natural partners

IV.6 Bloomsbury Set meetings

V.1 Workshops

V1.1 Workshop structure

V1.2 Workshop dates

V1.3 Workshop reports

V1.4 Evaluation

V.2 Presentations at Conferences

V.3 Conclusion

VI.1 Introduction

VI.2 Moderated discussion list on European copyright issues

VI.3 A helpdesk for questions related to copyright and advise

VI.4 Access to documents and hyperlinks to copyright related Web-pages

VII.1 Introduction

VII.2 Legislative recommendations

VII.3 Licensing recommendations and warning list of legal pitfalls

Annex 1 - National workshop co-ordinators and other ECUP Members
Annex 2 - Final ECUP I report, December 1995
Annex 3 - Library Position on Electronic Services (matrix 10 July 1995)
Annex 4 - ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications plus 2 matrices, 25 September 1996
Annex 5 - ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications plus 2 matrices, 15 December 1998
Annex 6 - Heads of Agreement for site-licences for the use of electronic publications, 25 September 1996
Annex 7 - EBLIDA/ECUP+/STM Joint Statement on Incidental Digitisation and Storage of STM Print Journal Articles,
7 November 1998
Annex 8 - Towards a Balanced Information Society, 19 December 1997
Annex 9 - Publication on Licensing Digital Resources: How to avoid the legal pitfalls, by Emanuella Giavarra,
9 November 1998
Annex 10 - Copyright, Libraries and the Digital Environment, paper by Emanuella Giavarra, 1997

In October 1994, the European Bureau of Library, Information and Documentation Associations (EBLIDA) was granted funding for a year by the Libraries Programme (DGXIII-E3) to set up the European Copyright User Platform (ECUP I). This initiative followed a Concertation meeting organised by DGXIII-E3 on Copyright and Electronic Delivery Services on 29 November 1993 in Luxembourg. This meeting gave the first opportunity to identify the (electronic) copyright problems that the new technological developments pose on the projects under the Libraries Programme and the libraries involved. It became apparent that at least twelve projects adopted under the Libraries Programme had difficulties in performing their project due to copyright problems.

Under ECUP I, the ECUP Steering Group had the opportunity to discuss the draft 'Library Position on Electronic Services' which was schematically put in a matrix. The matrix listed a variety of library activities which should be free or paid for by the end user. This was the first attempt by the ECUP Steering Group to define "user rights" for the use of electronic information.

The ECUP Position was discussed on 10 July 1995 with representatives of Elsevier Science, Academic Press, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Blackwell Science, Chadwyck-Healey, STM, FEP and IPCC. The result can be best summarised by the statement which the publishers representatives presented at the end of the meeting.

The statement reads as follows:

The ECUP Steering Group felt that the meeting and the discussion on the matrix could be the beginning of fruitful discussions on (electronic) copyright with rightholders and other interested parties. The ECUP I project came to an end in October 1995.

In order to continue the ECUP discussions, additional funding was asked for under the first Call for Proposals of the Libraries Programme under the Forth Framework Programme. In December 1995, DGXIII/E-4 granted EBLIDA funding to continue the work started under ECUP for three years. The acronym changed to ECUP+ and was funded as a Concerted Action. As under ECUP I, the European Copyright Platform consisted of the library, information and documentation associations in Europe which were full members of EBLIDA at the beginning of the project (Annex 1).

The goals of the Platform under ECUP+ were to enhance awareness and stimulate discussion on copyright issues, to draw up model licensing clauses for the use of electronic information and to set up a Copyright Focal Point on the World Wide Web (WWW).

In this report you will find the results achieved by the European Copyright User Platform under ECUP+. It is worth noting here that the work of ECUP has follow-ups in CECUP and TECUP, both projects are funded by DGXIII/E-4. EBLIDA has set up the "Central and Eastern European Copyright User Platform" CECUP for librarians of the ten accession countries, and TECUP aims to analyse the feasibility of practical mechanisms for the distribution, archiving and use of electronic products from different types of content owners and involving different types of libraries. The focus is here on copyright and licensing.

The objective of the ECUP+ Concerted Action was to follow-up the results achieved under the previous ECUP I project and to establish new services to enhance the awareness on copyright among information professionals. It became more and more apparent that the technological developments towards digitisation and enhanced electronic services confronted libraries with increasing problems over (electronic) copyright and would frustrate further innovation of library services.

The objectives of the action were:

• to continue discussing user rights in electronic services and model clauses licenses for the use of electronic information with a larger group of rightholders, collecting societies and subscription agents.

• to continue making librarians aware of the implications of copyright on electronic services and to introduce the results of the discussions with the rightholders, collecting societies and subscription agents.

• to establish a focal point for questions on copyright and information on EU legislative developments in this area.

• to reinforce the position of libraries in discussions about copyright issues with the appropriate bodies.

The first and fourth objectives were addressed by a specifically appointed Steering Group. This body functioned as the intermediary in discussing the draft ECUP Position with rightholders, collecting societies, subscription agents and other interested parties. In order to meet the second objective, fifteen workshops were organised and conducted. The third objective was achieved by setting up the ECUP electronic discussion list (ecup-list) and a website on the World Wide Web.

The ECUP Concerted Action followed a workplan that was divided into four workpackages. The workpackages were co-ordinated by EBLIDA.

Workpackage 1: ECUP Position

Drawing up an ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Services (January - November 1996). Meetings will be organised with representatives of authors' organisations, publishing houses, collecting societies and subscription agents to discuss further the user rights in electronic services and model licensing clauses defined by the Steering Group. The results of ECUP I will be taken into account.

Workpackage 2: Awareness raising

Raising awareness on copyright (October 1996 - July 1997). Workshops will be held to continue making librarians and information professionals aware of copyright and to introduce the ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Services defined by the Steering Group and the results achieved at the meetings with the rightholders, collecting societies and subscription agents.

Workpackage 3: Copyright Focal Point

Setting up a Copyright Focal Point (January 1996 - January 1999). The 'Focal Point' will deliver: a moderated discussion list on European copyright issues; a help desk; and access via the WWW to documents on European copyright law and legislation in preparation. This Focal Point is aiming to function as a 'one-stop shop' for European copyright developments.

Workpackage 4: Legislative recommendations

Defining legislative recommendations (October 1996 - January 1999). The Steering Group will meet after the discussions with the rightholders, collecting societies and subscription agents to define legislative recommendations for the user rights in electronic services to be lobbied for with the national legislators.

The European Copyright User Platform comprised the full members of EBLIDA as of 1996 (37 in total), which are national library, information an documentation associations in Europe (Annex 1).

A special Steering Group was set up to co-ordinate and evaluate the results of the ECUP+ Concerted Action. The composition of the Steering Group was changed after a recommendation of the reviewers at the annual project review meeting on 3 October 1998. The recommendation was to include representatives of the archive and museum communities. Graham Cornish (British Library) and Dr Reinhard Ecker (former Beilstein Institute) were so kind to give up their seat and Mr Claes Granström of the Legal Committee of the International Council of Archives and David Spence of the UK Museums & Galleries Commission were appointed to the Steering Group. Kjell Nilsson of BIBSAM, Sweden joined the Steering Group as an observer due to his links with the national library community and his knowledge of copyright. Marco Marandola, copyright adviser of the Italian Library Association joined the Steering Group as an observer as well. The members of the Steering Group were:

• Frode Bakken, Tonsberg Public Library, Norway (observer)

• Isabelle Broutard, INIST, France

• Graham Cornish, The British Library, United Kingdom (until October 1998)

• Dr Reinhard Ecker, Beilstein Institute, Germany (until October 1998)

• Robbert Fisher, Coopers & Lybrand, expert to the European Commission

• Emanuella Giavarra, EBLIDA

• Claes Granström, Legal Committee of the International Council of Archives, Sweden

• Marco Marandola, AIB, Italy (observer)

• Elmar Mittler, LIBER

• Kjell Nilsson, BIBSAM, Sweden (observer)

• Sandy Norman, IFLA

• Heikki Poroila, Vantaa City Library, Finland

• Barbara Schleihagen, EBLIDA (observer)

• Elspeth Scott, Glaxo Wellcome, United Kingdom

• Josep Sort, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain

• David Spence, UK Museums & Galleries Commission, United Kingdom

The ECUP Steering Group functioned very well. After the end of the ECUP+ action, EBLIDA has set up a Copyright Expert Group to continue the useful debate. This group consists partly also of members of the ECUP Steering Group.

During ECUP I, the 'Library Position on Electronic Services' was drawn up and schematically put in a matrix. The matrix listed a variety of library activities which should be free or paid for by the end user. This was the first attempt by the ECUP Steering Group to define "user rights" for the use of electronic information.

The ECUP Position was for the first time discussed with representatives of Elsevier Science, Academic Press, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Blackwell Science, Chadwyck-Healey, STM, FEP and IPCC on 10 July 1995. The result can be best summarised by the statement which the publishers representatives presented at the end of the meeting. The statement reads as follows:

The ECUP draft 'Library Position on Electronic Services' changed name to draft ECUP 'Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications' (Annex 4) after the first round of discussions with rightholders and collecting societies on 11-12 March 1996. The final ECUP Position was adopted by the Steering Group on 15 December 1998 (Annex 5).

From 15 January 1996 onwards Steering Group meetings were organised to further discuss the draft ECUP 'Library Position on Electronic Services' (matrix, Annex 3). Separate meetings with representatives of authors' organisations, collecting societies and publishers were organised on 11-12 March 1996 in London. The draft ECUP 'Library Position on Electronic Services' which was prepared during ECUP I and the final report of ECUP I was sent to the representatives beforehand. In addition, the representatives were asked to respond to the following list of questions:

• what role do you see for libraries in the new electronic environment?

• how do you see your role in relation to libraries?

• what is your reaction to the Steering Group recommendations on the library privileges in electronic services, included in the final report of ECUP I (p. 15)?

• which topic would you like to see included in the discussions?

The outcomes of these meetings were encouraging, but very general. All representatives expressed the wish to co-operate with the library community on issues of electronic copyright and electronic services. The focus on licensing schemes instead of copyright law and its provisions for exceptions was a development that the Steering Group found most worrying. During the months after the March 1996 meetings, the Steering Group evaluated the outcomes and consulted librarians throughout Europe about these outcomes. As a result, the Steering Group felt that it was necessary to further structure and define more precise the legal and political concept underlying the ECUP Position. The draft ECUP 'Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications' (Annex 4) was drawn up as a result of this plus two accompanying matrixes. These documents addressed two different situations with respect to:

1. electronic publications available from the publisher

2. publications not available from the publisher in electronic format, but digitised by the library

Furthermore, four Heads of Agreement for the use of electronic publications (model site-licence clauses) were drawn up. The four different draft Heads of Agreement apply to the relationship between Publisher and four types of libraries, namely, a National Library, a University Library, a Public Library and a Corporate Library. Heads of Agreement were chosen, because model contract cannot be applied in every EU country due to the differences in national laws. Heads of Agreement, however, provide the core legal clauses which can be applied in every country. Additional clauses can be added according to the national laws and requirements.

A combined meeting with representatives of authors' organisations, collecting societies, publishing community and subscription agents was held on 24 September 1996 in London. Besides representatives of STM publishers also representatives of publishing houses of other sectors were invited. For the first time also subscription agents were represented. In total 30 representatives attended the meeting. At this meeting the draft ECUP 'Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications' (Annex 4), two assisting matrices and four different draft Heads of Agreement for site-licences for the use of electronic publications (Annex 6) were presented and discussed.

The meeting was dominated by discussions on the principles underlying the ECUP Position and not by the implementation of these principles. The matrix outlining the ECUP 'Position on user rights in publications digitised by the library' caused most problems. It was suggested not to discuss the four different Heads of Agreement at this meeting, due to the fact that no consensus was reached on the ECUP Position and the matrices. It was suggested not to send the Heads of Agreement around, because it may raise expectations that may not be fulfilled and it would make it more difficult to reach a compromise in the future.

Instead of discussing the ECUP documents further, the Steering Group suggested to test the matrices at a European level in real life environments. This idea was welcomed by all participants. In addition, national library associations were also encouraged to set up national groups to discuss the ECUP documents. The present gathering of representatives was perceived as too big to reach consensus, but it was stressed that international discussions should continue in order to reach global co-operation and guidelines.

In the following months, the ECUP 'Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications', two assisting matrices (Annex 4) and four different Heads of Agreement for site-licences (Annex 6) for the use of electronic publications were discussed with librarians and other information professionals at the ECUP+ workshops. The documents were also discussed with representatives of organisations from the museum, archiving, education, training, research, telecommunications organisations, cable distributors and consumer electronics manufacturers.

During the last months of the project, the ECUP Steering Group updated the ECUP 'Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications' and the two matrices of 25 September 1996. The final ECUP Position reflects three years of discussion with interested parties throughout the European Union. The Final Position was finalised on 15 December 1998 (Annex 5).

At the start of each meeting it was stressed by the Steering Group that the distributed documents solely expressed the outcomes of the discussions in the Steering Group and that these draft documents would form the basis of the discussions in the ECUP awareness workshops organised by the members of the European Copyright User Platform. It was also stressed that the Steering Group meetings were only organised with the sole aim of consulting and not of negotiating end results. Many representatives of the invited organisations stressed at the beginning of the meetings that they would only express their personal views, not necessarily those of their organisations.

The ECUP secretariat had trouble finding representatives for this meeting. From the 13 invited authors' organisations only five representatives could attend the meeting. The reason for this was not a lack of interest, but a lack of financial means to send a representative to London. Most of the organisations expressed their wish to be represented by the representative of the European Writers' Congress.

The representatives were asked to prepare a short contribution based on the following questions:

• what role do you see for libraries in the new electronic environment?

• how do you see your role in relation to libraries?

• what is your reaction to the Steering Group recommendations on the library privileges in electronic services, included in the final report of ECUP I (p.15)?

• which topic would you like to see included in the discussions?

The Vice-President of the European Writers' Congress (EWC) stated that authors are generally pro libraries as they have been educated by the library system and are aware of its value. Authors want maximum exposure for their works. In Europe, secondary rights are as important as primary rights (publication, production or performance). An author sells his primary rights to a publisher but not the electronic rights. There is a dispute between publishers and authors over the electronic rights.

There are exceptions in the STM journal publication field where the academic authors are also employees. Academic authors are prepared to surrender all copyrights to a publisher in support of their career. With the increase in short-term contracts in academia (mainly UK) this is changing, as authors are interested in a financial return.

In most European countries, the moral rights of paternity and integrity cannot be assigned or waived. In the UK the right of integrity can be waived. It is important for consumers that an electronic work has not been manipulated. It cannot be assumed that the publisher has all the rights in a work as many authors hold their rights. Moral rights are very important in the electronic environment.

Authors prefer to deal with a collecting society to handle their secondary rights and to maintain a degree of control. It is too early to give up the field to the entrepreneur. Publishers want the rights but authors continue to resist. Authors do not want to prevent use. They want maximum exposure and to be paid for their work. They want their works to be recognised, identified and promoted through the library system. They would prefer payment to be collectively rather than individually. Authors want to negotiate sensible terms with users. They would like a system of tagging and payments which is similar to UK Public Lending Right.

Librarians must co-operate with authors to solve the problems. Generally, if a work is out of print, the work reverts to the author. Some works (mainly books) may be out of print in six weeks from publication. Books have a very long shelf life in libraries and this could be even longer when they are in electronic form.

The Steering Group put the following question to the representatives: Which organisation will be best to support and collect authors' rights? The representatives agreed that the collecting societies would be the best choice. The problem is that publishers will not grant their electronic rights to Reproduction Rights Organisations (RROs).

The representatives expressed that they would allow the storage of articles but not the re-use without payment. An agreement could be made to cover archival storage but not re-use.

Some representatives were wondering why libraries would like to perform the activities mentioned in the matrix. In their opinion the role of libraries is to conserve, preserve and to store material. Libraries should not act as publishers. It was stressed that it is important to preserve the right to read in the electronic environment.

The Steering Group stressed that they were looking for a solution which would be global, easy and cheap. The response to that was that it might not be possible to have a Pan-European solution, but it was also stressed that discussions are useful and should continue. The solution will probably not be simple.

In the afternoon of 11th March 1996, the Steering Group met with 12 representatives of the collecting societies.

The representatives were asked to prepare a contribution on the following questions:

• what role do you see for libraries in the new electronic environment?

• how do you see your role in relation to libraries?

• what is your reaction to the Steering Group recommendations on the library privileges in electronic services, included in the final report of ECUP I (p.15)?

• which topic would you like to see included in the discussions?

The Chairman of the International Federation of Reproduction Rights Organisations (IFRRO) stated that in the analogue world library privileges were generally equated with free use in the sense that no authorisation was required and no remuneration paid. It cannot be assumed that such privileges continue to apply in the digital environment. IFRRO represents both authors and publishers and its views reflect those it represents. RROs, authors and publishers all agree that in the digital environment free uses, including library privileges, need to be carefully considered. Analogue privileges are not transferable as such to the digital environment.

At present there are no initiatives on this issue at the international level (neither WIPO, nor the EU). It is a national issue. National RROs are discussing it with national library representatives in many countries. The view that is emerging from such national discussions is a tri-partite approach:

1. at the outset it is a question of the exclusive right of the right owner

2. in the future there may be some limited free uses

3. in between 1. and 2. there are several options securing remuneration which could follow the example of existing models in the analogue environment.

In the digital environment, all right owners want to retain the exclusive right as far as possible. This involves licensing of uses by the right owners. They could do this themselves, or they could use RROs, or other entities, to license on their behalf. It is up to the rights owners. RROs are able and willing to do the licensing if the right owners so wished. The matrix appears to combine licensing options and copyright privileges. It could be used as a basis for discussion, but various questions would need to be clarified in order to do so.

Additional remarks were made by some representatives on the Steering Group recommendations on p.15 of the final report of ECUP I (Annex 2). These recommendations were perceived as rather provocative.

The following question was raised:

"Are libraries to be the primary exploiters of information under the auspices of library privileges?"

It was suggested to set up testing areas for the Steering Group recommendations. It was pointed out that other publishers, than STM publishers, might take different views on electronic licensing. The sheer number of publishers precluded reliance on individual licensing alone.

The matrix raised a lot of questions. First of all on the words "free" and "pay". It was also not clear if the matrix was referring to copying in general or just articles, STM journals only or all kind of publications. It was perceived essential to specify the type of written material in question, as different licensing solutions were likely to apply to different types of material in the future. The type of licences which RROs could offer in the digital environment was a matter for the rights owners they represented. The ability of RROs to provide a centralised rights management service was very advantageous both for libraries and for the rights owners.

The representatives of the collecting societies made the following proposals for the improvement of the matrix:

1. clarify whether a legislative or licensing solution is being proposed. The right approach is firstly to consider what library privileges would exist in the digital environment, and then to consider how electronic storage and delivery could be dealt with outside such privileges;

2. use more appropriate and accurate terminology to enable progress to be made in the next round of discussions, e.g. the word "free" is used sometimes to denote access without payment under library privileges, sometimes it means access under blanket licensing. The word "pay" is restricted to the situation where payment is to be made by the end-user under individual licensing, for which a more appropriate term might be "transactional licensing".

As to licensing by the collecting societies in the digital environment generally, it was mentioned that the trend was away from blanket collective licensing towards individualised "centralised" licensing. Collecting societies would have a role in finding solutions to license also for libraries to the extent rights owners wish to use their services.

At the start of the meeting it was announced that the Steering Group had decided to make changes in wording of the matrix after the meetings with the authors' organisations and collecting societies. The word "free" in row 1 and 4 should be replaced by "allowed". Allowed should mean "without asking for permission from the rights owners". The word "free" in row 2, 3 and 6 should be replaced by "licensed". The word "pay" in row 4 should be replaced by "pay per use". The words "viewing full text documents" in row 2 and 3, "viewing full article" in row 4 and "viewing" in row 6 should be replaced by "viewing full text".

The representatives were asked to prepare a contribution on the following questions:

• what role do you see for libraries in the new electronic environment?

• how do you see your role in relation to libraries?

• what is your reaction to the Steering Group recommendations on the library privileges in electronic services, included in the final report of ECUP I (p.15)?

• which topic would you like to see included in the discussions?

To summarise the interventions made, the role of libraries was seen as information providers as well as collectors. Librarians should continue to help end-users to search for information and to provide search profiles. The role of publishers in relation to libraries is a continuation of the present situation. There should be an effort made to police the productivity of the end-user with technological solutions. It was stressed that there is no need for library privileges in the electronic environment. The traditional role of the librarian will change in the future.

The issue of authenticity of electronic material was considered an important one where librarians can fulfil an important role. It was also hoped that librarians would take responsibility for computer assisted learning. Students may not be able to afford buying material so librarians should make it available. Currently information is packaged and sold by the page in books and journals. This will not be the same in the digital environment as one cannot talk about pages. Publishers would like to give electronic use of material to those who subscribe to the print version.

It was mentioned that the publisher's model is changing from selling individually to selling in bulk. An example of that is the recent licence initiative for higher education in the UK. This initiative allows large consortia to share the information. It does not seem to make sense to waste a lot of money on administration. The users can do what they like under the licence provided that it is within the law.

The initiative is on trial for three years. It was stressed that the role of the librarian is to make sure that the optimum rather than the maximum of material is available to the end-user in the most cost-effective way. Libraries are tending to become full-text suppliers. Librarians should be gatekeepers, educators and police. They should consider blacklisting copyright abusers. This would help the publishers and also the end-users.

Concerning the principles underlying the matrix, it was believed that a library should be more selective in order to give more benefit to the users than to try to guarantee access to a maximum amount of material. It was believed that librarians sometimes confuse the technical possibilities of disseminating information and the legitimacy of the action. Just because one can do it does not mean that one is allowed to do it. If librarians move from "just in case" policy to a "just in time" policy and only acquire information via Inter-Library Document Delivery, they will be competing with publishers. Contrary to the statement in the ECUP I report on p.15 (Annex 2) that librarians cannot be held responsible for the actions of their users, librarians should take responsibility and provide for sanctions for those who abuse copyright repeatedly. Technical safeguards should be put in place. Publishers should have the right to withdraw the service if there is abuse. Copyright must be supported with technical developments.

The worry was expressed that libraries might compete with publishers rather than complement them, especially if they share licensed material with other libraries.

The discussion started with row 1: internal library activities. This row signifies the situation where material which is not available and will not be available from publishers, should be allowed to be scanned and stored by libraries for internal library use, without asking for permission from the rights owners. After a lively discussion, no agreement was reached on this issue. It was decided to discuss this issue at a next meeting.

The discussion moved to row 2 and 3. The word "limited amount" caused confusion. It was generally agreed that "limited" should read: a single copy of a reasonable proportion of a document in electronic or paper format may be copied for personal use.

In row 4 the word "abstract" raised discussion. The publishers agreed to the viewing of a contents page, but they had problems allowing the free viewing of abstracts or a single page. They were of the opinion that an abstract provides essential information, especially in STM sectors, so that it in many cases substitute the whole article. No consensus was reached. It was agreed to leave this subject for the next meeting. Row 5 and 6 hardly raised discussion and were agreed.

A summary was given on the results of the meetings the day before with the representatives of authors' organisations and collecting societies. The issue about ownership of electronic rights was raised. This question was puzzling the Steering Group as the authors had claimed to own these rights. According to the publishers they own the rights going back 20-30 years for books and 5 years for journals. It was stressed that if a publisher does not get the rights assigned, he will not publish the material. Librarians should approach the publishers in the first instance, not the collecting societies.

The Steering Group asked the publishers if they are planning to involve the RROs in the management of rights. According to the publishers the role of the collecting societies is likely to diminish in the electronic environment, because they are unlikely to be mandated for the electronic rights. There was consensus that a body to collect for authors and publishers is needed for the publications of smaller publishers. It was suggested that maybe librarians could take up this role. Librarians could then offer document delivery and would not be in competition with commercial providers. The representatives were quite keen for subscription agents to take on the intermediary role. It was presumed that they would work on a commercial competitive basis. For future meetings it was suggested by the publishers to involve also other types of publishers.

At this meeting the ECUP 'Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications', two assisting matrices (Annex 4) and four different Heads of Agreement for site-licences (Annex 6) for the use of electronic publications were presented and discussed.

The Vice-President of the European Writers' Congress (EWC) took the floor as first speaker and expressed her frustration about the fact that the authors' concerns expressed at the meeting in March 1996 were not reflected in the ECUP Position. It was stressed that Article 9 (1) and 9 (2) of the Berne Convention were specifically written for authors. The ECUP Position as it stands was not acceptable. Authors are library friendly, but in an digital environment new ways have to be found to meet the concerns of the authors by coherent licensing systems or an equivalent in the form of a lending right. The need was expressed to detail in the matrices when and where payments should be made.

The reactions from the representatives of the publishing houses and collecting societies can be best summarised by the introductions given by the representatives of STM, FEP and IFRRO.

The Secretary General of the International Association of Scientific, Technical & Medical Publishers (STM) felt that the documents were twofold by setting first a number of guidelines to which no agreement has been reached yet and secondly, by going into very detailed considerations to which he felt difficult to make any comments before a number of principles have been set out. The following comments to the Position Paper and the matrices were made.

On the first page, third paragraph - © A balance should be preserved - it is one of the main causes of uncertainties but also the problem of authenticating information which causes STM publishers to be cautious about the flow of content in the electronic environment.

The so-called nightmare scenario for libraries concerning the availability of information in the future was considered a separate issue and cannot be extended to journal prices and is therefore seen as a non-sequitur. It should be both an opportunity and a challenge for the library operating in the electronic environment to find in the supply of information the right balance between the publisher and the end-user and in doing so shift from being a warehouse where information is available, to a professional intermediary in the electronic information chain.

STM had great difficulties with the guiding principle of the ECUP Position which implies that the user has an automatic right to access copyrighted material. According to STM this so-called right has no foundation in any existing law in the world.

On page three of the ECUP Position, second bullet point states that:
"the licensor will put a library system in place which will enable the library to manage its collection of licences efficiently."

STM felt that it is up to the libraries themselves to install an efficient management system for licences and that that is not up to the licensor or content providers.

The item about what rights owners can expect was regarded as being too vague. The second point about liability for end users leaves open the contractual issue. The liability of networks in general is currently debated in the US and Europe and the outcome is not yet known and will take some time.

With regard to the detailed consideration of the guiding principles, STM wanted to give more specific comments after general principles have been established. By way of example, the notion that end-users may electronically copy the information or have a right to digitise the material themselves is according to STM not based on any legal foundation.

STM agreed in general with the definitions given in paragraph III lawful library activities concerning copyrighted materials and the identified categorising of user groups. STM suggested that the ECUP documents should be regarded as a discussion paper only, because the recipients of these documents are very limited.

The first matrix outlining the ECUP Position on user rights in publications digitised by the library, could not be accepted by STM. In their view it assumes a statutory license for libraries on behalf of user groups. The second matrix outlining the ECUP Position on user rights in electronic publications provided by the publisher, was addressed as being discussed on previous occasions and it was stressed that these user rights must have a contractual basis which are set by separate publishers only.

In this context, STM repeated the publishers statement which was produced after the first ECUP meeting with the representatives of the larger publishing houses on 10 July 1995 in Amsterdam:

STM responded to the four Heads of Agreement for site-licenses for the use of electronic publications, that they were willing to listen to what the ECUP Steering Group were asking, but that one should realise that any agreement should be a bilateral one and that this has to be worked out between individual publishers.

STM conclusions:

• STM recognises the important role of libraries

• STM is grateful for the engagement of ECUP in the discussion with the publishing industry as representing the interest of the rights holders

• STM are more than willing to inform the STM membership on the progress of the ECUP Steering Group and to engage in further discussions

• STM is very concerned about the guiding principles in ECUP's Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications and believes that these principles should be interpreted as desires expressed by the library community

• STM regards these guiding principles of such basic understanding for which first an extensive discussion in a broader perspective is necessary

• STM therefore is open to further discussions and appreciates a joint collaboration on these issues and these should include the participation of the other parties present

• Last but not least, it was emphasised that ECUP should not ignore international implications or work in European isolation, but keep an open eye for the global context of the electronic information society.

The Secretary General of the Federation of European Publishers (FEP) stressed that FEP cannot accept either the matrix outlining the ECUP position on user rights in publications digitised by the library nor the matrix outlining the ECUP position on user rights in electronic publications provided by the publisher for obvious reasons. Nevertheless, as FEP is setting up a task-force to deal with the issue of relations with librarians, FEP reiterate their willingness to collaborate and try to reach acceptable solutions.

Charles Clark, legal adviser, responded on behalf of STM and FEP on section IV: Legal arguments. He expressed his concerns to the opening sentence of Section IV: The legal justification for the ECUP Position can be found in Article 9 (2) of the Berne Convention as follows:

The Secretary General of the International Federation of Reproduction Rights Organisations (IFRRO) stated that neither IFRRO nor the European Group had had an opportunity to arrive at a position on the ECUP Position and the matrices. IFRRO's general position remained as stated in the previous meeting on 11 March 1996 - copyright legislation should fairly protect the rights of both authors and publishers. IFRRO represents the views of both groups of rightholders. In the analogue environment national legislation provided for various free uses including library privileges. In some cases such free uses involved no authorisation or payments to rightholders, in others remuneration was at least payable to rightholders.

Such free uses were not necessarily applicable in the digital environment. In the digital environment rightholders wanted to go back to the exclusive right of reproduction as far as possible, i.e. they wanted to license uses. They could license digital uses themselves, or via RROs or through other entities. This was a matter for them. RROs were ready, willing and able to do the licensing if the rightholders so wished. It was doubted whether direct individual licensing was a practical option except in a limited number of cases, but this was for the rightholders to decide.

At the last meeting IFRRO had welcomed the previous paper and matrix as a useful starting point for discussion. It had however made a number of criticisms of the matrix notably:

1. as to the terminology used - e.g. use of "free" in a wide sense

2. failure to distinguish between different types of work

3. most important, the widespread provision for the continuation of library privileges in the digital environment.

The new matrices appeared to go some way to meet the first criticism, but not the second and third. The distinction made between works already available in electronic form and works not so available did not appear helpful. This distinction was said to be based on a strange interpretation of Article 9(2) of the Berne Convention. It was considered better to confine the discussion to the matters of principle raised in the ECUP Position. Only if consensus could be reached on the principles involved in the operations of libraries in the digital environment, it would be meaningful to try to agree detailed matrices which reflect and implement those principles.

The representatives of EBSCO and SWETS stated that they acknowledge the need of libraries to have a central point which deals with the licences for electronic products and are willing to assist libraries to achieve this. The idea for a project was raised to test business models for an initial small number of journals.

An introduction to the four Heads of Agreement was given. It was suggested not to discuss the Heads of Agreement at this meeting, due to the fact that no consensus was reached on the ECUP Position and the matrices. It was announced that STM will propose in the foreseeable future a model contract. It was suggested not to send the Heads of Agreement around, because it may raise expectations that may not be fulfilled and it would make it more difficult to reach a compromise.

Instead of discussing the ECUP documents further the Steering Group suggested to test the matrices at a European level in real life environments. This idea was welcomed by all participants. In addition, national library associations were also encouraged to set up national groups to discuss the ECUP documents. The present gathering of representatives was perceived as too big to reach consensus, but it was stressed that international discussions should continue in order to reach global co-operation and guidelines.

The first session of separate meetings in March 1996 and the combined meeting in September 1996 resulted in a different kind of atmosphere at the meetings. The difference between the March and the September meetings was more or less the willingness of constructive discussions on the subject of user rights in electronic publications, especially from the side of the publishing houses. The September meeting was dominated by the discussions on the principles underlying the ECUP Position and not by the implementation of these principles. The matrix outlining the ECUP Position on user rights in publications digitised by the library caused most problems. Nevertheless, the Steering Group is convinced that the ECUP meetings resulted in a better understanding of the positions taken by authors, publishers, collecting societies, subscription agents and libraries towards electronic copying. The representatives of the rights owners organisations, collecting societies and subscription agents have expressed their willingness to continue the discussions with the ECUP Steering Group and to co-operate in European and national projects concerning the implementation of business models derived from the ECUP Position and matrices.

After September 1996, the library and the rightholders community focused their attention on the proposals for a WIPO Copyright Treaty by the World Intellectual Property Organisation in Geneva. Via the ECUP-list, the Steering Group raised awareness on the issues at stake. Thanks to the effective lobbying of EBLIDA, IFLA and FID during the WIPO Diplomatic Conference a balanced WIPO Copyright Treaty was adopted on 20 December 1996 in Geneva.

During February 1997-September 1997, the ECUP 'Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications', the two matrices (Annex 4), the outcome of the Steering Group meetings with representatives of rightholders and the impact of the new WIPO Copyright Treaty on library services were discussed at the ECUP workshops. At several workshops, representatives of the archiving and museums communities expressed the wish to be involved in the ECUP activities. The ECUP received also requests from commercial organisations to share concerns about the status of exceptions in electronic copyright.

The Steering Group organised a special meeting on 18-19 September 1997, to which 27 representatives of organisations from the museum, archiving, education, training, research, student and consumer sector were invited to discuss the draft ECUP 'Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications' and other copyright and licensing issues. The following organisations were represented:

• European Council of Information Associations

• International Association of Music Librarians

• EUCLID

• European Information Association

• NORDINFO

• EUSIDIC

• European Association of Teachers

• EU concerted action HARMONICA

• nternational Visual Arts Information Network

• Museums & Galleries Commission UK

• European Federation of Journalists

The discussion continued the following day with representatives of telecommunications organisations, cable distributors and consumer electronics manufactures. The following organisations were represented:

• European Cable Communications Association

• European Telework/Telematics Forum

• European Association of Consumer Electronics Manufacturers

• Telia Sweden

The ECUP Steering Group felt that the level of awareness of the implications of electronic copyright was very low in the museum, education, teaching and research sector. Each of these sectors is in fact in need of an initiative like the ECUP+ Concerted Action. The meeting with these 'natural partners' established good contacts and made way for closer co-operation. The meeting with the 'industry partners' was received with mixed feelings. Some parts of the multimedia industry could be good allies, other sectors were less likely to be on the library side concerning the exceptions. It is more likely that libraries can work together with them on the liability issue. Nevertheless, it was agreed with all invited organisations to keep in contact and to exchange information on future developments.

In November 1997, the ECUP+ secretariat was approached by Elsevier Science with the request to continue the discussion with the publishing community as it was left after the Steering Group meeting of 24 September 1996 in London. On 10 December 1997, four representatives of each, the publishing world and libraries met in London. The members of the Bloomsbury Set are Lex Lefebvre (STM), Mark Seeley (Elsevier Science), Maurice Long (British Medical Association), Pieter Gispen (Brill Academic Publishers), Barbara Schleihagen (EBLIDA), Elspeth Scott (ECUP/GlaxoWellcome), Prof. Dr. Elmar Mittler (ECUP/LIBER), Emanuella Giavarra (ECUP), and Mechthild von Alemann (FEP) as observer.

The point of departure was to discuss the issues on which publishers and librarians can co-operate rather than the ones that divide them. It was felt that discussing specific issues in a small group would be more beneficial than in a big one. It was agreed that the group 'the Bloomsbury Set' would have no official status and that the discussions would be on an informal basis. There was consensus to first start with STM material and to discuss the access to and the management of this kind of information before opening up to other materials. The meeting identified the following topics for discussion at the next meetings:

• digitisation/retro-digitisation

• archival function of the library

• intermediation (role of intermediaries, like libraries, vendors and RRO's)

• available licensing options

• communication to the public right

It was agreed to discuss these issues from an international perspective and in the spirit of co-operation not confrontation. It was suggested that experts might be invited to some of the meetings. Digitisation/retro-digitisation was selected as the first issue for discussion. During 1998, the Bloomsbury Set met on 2 February in Brussels, 11 March in Amsterdam, 1 May in London, 8 July in London, 19 August in Amsterdam and 7 November in Rome to reach agreement on a Joint Statement on Digital Archiving of Non-Current Printed STM Journals.

On 11 March initial agreement was reached on the text of the draft Joint Statement. The member of the Bloomsbury Set hoped for an announcement of the Joint Statement at the STM seminar on 16-17 April 1998 in Heidelberg. At this Seminar the library members of the Bloomsbury Set learnt that a majority of the European and US members of STM rejected the text op the Joint Statement and that we were sent back to the drawing board.

A revised draft text of the Joint Statement was sent around the STM members at the beginning of July. Only a few large US publishers made objections. These publishers were invited to put there objections in writing and to sent them to the STM secretariat before 12 August 1998. On 19 August 1998, the Bloomsbury Set met during the IFLA Conference to discuss the reactions from the US publishers. After hours of discussion it was agreed that more alterations to the texts were necessary. Finally, on 7 November 1998 in Rome the EBLIDA/ECUP/STM Joint Statement on Incidental Digitisation and Storage of STM Print Journal Articles was accepted by the parties involved (Annex 7). Both the EBLIDA Executive Committee and the STM Executive Council discussed and approved the text of the Joint Statement in October 1998. Formal ratification of the Joint Statement took place after adoption by the EBLIDA Council on 9 May 1999. The Joint Statement was announced on the ecup-list, liblicense-list, cni copyright-list, eblida-list and is available from the EBLIDA and ECUP web sites.

At their next meeting on 10 March 1999, the Bloomsbury Set participants reviewed the acceptance of the Joint Statement by both parties, the publisher and the library community. At that point, only Elsevier Science had explicitly informed the STM secretariat in writing that Elsevier adheres to the Joint Statement. Other publishers, like British Medical Journal, Springer, and Wiley have indicated their support but so far did not explicitly confirm it. It was observed that it might take some time and that among publishers there exists some scepticism about the Statement, but that they would give their support in the end.

From the side of the library community, the reactions were very positive. Several announcements and articles appeared in various library journals (e.g. Bibliotheksdienst 32 (1998), H. 12, p. 2151-2152; Inform December 1998, p.8-9; The Library Association Record 101 (3) March 1999, p. 146; Informatie Professional 1999 [3] 2).

In order to promote the acceptance of the statement among publishers it was agreed to have Elsevier's letter put on the STM website. The Statement was further promoted at the STM Spring meeting in Washington.

To continue cooperation in the informal Bloomsbury group, it was agreed to focus in 1999 on four items which could also lead to separate Statements or other appropriate activities:

• archiving and preservation of electronic material

• project digitisation

• interlibrary resource sharing and transfer of on-line information

• licensing issues

Regarding the first item, it was suggested that two representatives would work on a proposal for further cooperation. It was foreseen to hold the first Round Table in November 1999. It was also agreed to invite the secretary to the national library group CENL, to one of the next meetings to report on activities of CENL in this area and on their cooperation with FEP.

At its next meeting on 8 June 1999 in London, the Bloomsbury group discussed these suggestions. It was agreed that consideration should be given to instituting a dialogue between publishers and librarians on the subject of archiving of STM literature which has been produced and distributed in digital format. The idea was not to arrive at a solution to this extremely complex challenge, since the new media are far too immature for all of the problems to be even fully defined, let alone resolved. But both STM and EBLIDA recognised that opening a dialogue might well be a key step forward. This dialogue will need to be of sufficient technical detail so that meaningful results can be achieved and held at high enough levels of responsibility for any solutions to be implemented.

Recognising that this dialogue will be held in a European arena, it will need to be aware of similar debates being conducted elsewhere, particularly in North America (e.g. ICSTI). For this reason it is foreseen to both share its deliberations with any corresponding groups and to invite participation from other parties where appropriate. The Bloomsbury Set identified a number of issues to be considered in such an Archive Forum as e.g.: standards, role of national libraries, multimedia formats, transatlantic cooperation, ownership of archives, funding, technical aspects, access.

A date was preliminary fixed for 19 November in Brussels, which was at its next meeting on 20 September changed to Luxembourg to coincide with the Telematics for Libraries conference. It was agreed to contact the European Commission regarding possible cooperation and co-funding. The suggestions of the Bloomsbury group were well received by the European Commission, and it is now envisaged to elaborate on a proposal for a series of Round-tables to be handed in for the coming call for Proposals under the IST programme.

Regarding project digitisation, it was agreed at the March meeting that two representatives should co-operate and come forward with suggestions and an inventory on project digitisation of STM information. During the June meeting, these suggestions were further debated. The greatest concern of publishers regarding project digitisation are questions of rights and rights management. It is not clear at all whether publishers would have the right to authorise digitisation on a project basis. The Bloomsbury group therefore decided to put the issue of project digitisation on ice for the time being.

Regarding interlibrary resource sharing, one representative agreed at the March meeting to work on a proposal for the next meeting. During the June meeting, differences between document delivery and interlibrary loan were presented with the help of concrete examples. The German project SUBITO was clearly regarded as document delivery system where users should pay for individual articles. The German system of special collections, whereby university libraries have an agreement to share costs by collecting special literature only in designated libraries with the intention to share it with other libraries was given as example for the continuos need for interlibrary loan, also in electronic form. It was suggested that electronic interlibrary loan should only be possible for special collections with very low use. It was argued that heavily used material would anyway be also collected in other libraries. As no agreement on further activities could be reached, it was suggested to provide the Bloomsbury set with more information at a later time.

In the March meeting, one representative had agreed to work on a paper regarding licensing issues. At the June meeting, it was proposed drafting a list of model clauses that could be endorsed by both, libraries and publishers. The Bloomsbury group, however, foresees problems with competition law if publishers were to agree to model clauses. It was suggested to leave this issue for the time being, and to concentrate in future meetings on the issue of "digital archiving".

EBLIDA and STM have agreed that the Bloomsbury Set meetings will continue beyond the ECUP+ Concerted Action.

Under the first ECUP contract, 14 copyright awareness workshops were held during 1995 throughout the European Union and Norway. At the EBLIDA Council meeting in Dublin in May 1996, the national ECUP co-ordinators indicated that they were more than happy to organise follow-up copyright awareness workshops under the ECUP+ Concerted Action. The time schedule for organising the workshops was set from January 1997 until July 1997. The organisers considered the timing opportune. In most of the cases, the workshop proved to be the first opportunity to inform the participants on the outcome of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference of December 1996. The organisers were asked to arrange a two-day workshop consisting of a general meeting open to everybody on the first day and a closed expert meeting on the second day.

During 1997, the ECUP+ co-ordinators organised in total fifteen workshops and twelve copyright expert meetings. At the workshops and expert meetings valuable comments were made towards the ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications, the two matrices and the model licensing clauses in the four different Heads of Agreements for site-licences. This report contains brief reports of the outcomes of the workshops and expert meetings and provides useful links to national and international project related to copyright.

In order to guarantee that the same issues were covered at each workshop, the ECUP secretariat prepared a programme for the two days which was sent to the national ECUP co-ordinators. The proposed programme consisted of the following items:

Day 1: Public meeting

1. Introduction to the ECUP+ Concerted Action

2. National and European Copyright developments

3. Introduction to the draft ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications

4. Partners in projects under the European Libraries Programme report on their experiences with copyright owners

5. Electronic Copyright Management Systems

Under this item, a brief introduction was given on the different concepts of copyright law and their common themes. The protection provided for under the law was explained, as was the relation between the Berne Convention, national laws and EU legislation. The EU Directives which are relevant for the subject were briefly introduced. An explanation followed as to why copyright in a digital environment is different from in the paper environment and where there are similarities. In this respect the outcome of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference of December 1996 was introduced. Also the Green Paper on Copyright and its Follow-up were briefly touched upon. Finally the objectives, structure and the work plan of the ECUP+ Concerted Action were outlined. This presentation was given by Emanuella Giavarra, Project Director of ECUP+, except at the ECUP+ workshop in France where this presentation was given by Isabelle Broutard, a member of the ECUP Steering Group and legal adviser of INIST. A copy of the paper given by Emanuella Giavarra can be found in Annex 10.

The speakers introduced the current national copyright legislation and touched upon the outcomes of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference and the effects on national copyright legislation. Besides this, the new initiatives of the European Commission in the area of copyright were explained.

Under this item, the proposed rights for users and libraries in a digital environment were explained. These rights were outlined in the two matrices which were prepared by the ECUP Steering Group in conjunction with the ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications. Furthermore the outcomes of the meetings between the ECUP Steering Group and representatives of rights owners organisations, collecting societies and subscription agents during 1996 were discussed. A copy of the paper given by Emanuella Giavarra can be found in Annex 3.

The project partners were briefed beforehand on the items to highlight during their interventions. Presentations were given on BIBDEL, DECOMATE, CHILIAS, JUKEBOX and FASTDOC.

The speakers responsible for this session were asked to discuss the different systems of identifying works and usage in an electronic environment, the state of the art of these systems, experiences with these systems and the restriction for legitimate use of the electronic material. EC projects in this area, like IMPRIMATUR and COPEARMS were briefly introduced.

1. Discussion on the draft ECUP Position in detail

2. Discussion on the four different draft ECUP Head of Agreement on site-licences for the use of electronic publications

3. National implementation of the Directive on the legal protection of databases

4. National action plan

3. National implementation of the Directive on the legal protection of databases

This directive was adopted by the Council of Ministers on 11 March 1996. National governments are required to implement this directive in their national copyright legislation before 1 January 1998. The Directive was explained at the expert meetings and the draft proposals for national implementation were analysed.

Each ECUP co-ordinator received copies of the following documents for distribution among the workshop participants:

• ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications

• ECUP Heads of Agreement for National Libraries

• ECUP Heads of Agreement for University Libraries

• ECUP Heads of Agreement for Public Libraries

• ECUP Heads of Agreement for Company Libraries

• D1.1 - Report on Steering Group meetings with rightsholders

• IPA Statement on The Use of Digitised Copyright Works in Libraries

• Article on Who Owns Digital Works? - by Ann Okerson, Yale University

• WIPO final outcome - by Emanuella Giavarra

• Follow-up to the EU Green Paper on Copyright

• 100 brochures on the ECUP+ Concerted Action

Many workshop organisers sent the material to the participants beforehand. Others provided copies of the documents at the workshop session.

V.1.2 Workshops dates

Workshops and expert meetings were held on the following dates:

• Helsinki, Finland, 13-14 January 1997 (open/expert)

• London, United Kingdom, 26-27 February 1997 (open/expert)

• Milan, Italy, 7-8 April 1997 (open/expert)

• Oslo, Norway, 17-18 April 1997 (open/expert)

• Barcelona, Spain, 21-22 April 1997 (open/expert)

• The Hague, The Netherlands, 14 May 1997 (open)

• Stockholm, Sweden, 20-21 May 1997 (open/expert)

• Bordeaux, France, 31 May 1997 (open)

• Vienna, Austria, 9-10 June 1997 (open/expert)

• Hamburg, Germany, 22 May 1997/12 June 1997 (open/expert)

• Copenhagen, Denmark, 16-17 June 1997 (open/expert)

• Brussels, Belgium, 18-19 June 1997 (open/expert)

• Lisbon, Portugal, 23-24 June 1997 (open/expert)

• Dublin, Ireland, 14-15 July 1997 (open/expert)

• Athens, Greece, 26 September 1997 (open)

A copyright awareness session in Germany was organised at the Bibliotheca in Dortmund on 22 May 1997. A list of the National ECUP co-ordinators are enclosed in Annex 1.

V.1.3 Workshop reports

Finland


Organiser: Suomen Kirjastoseura (The Finnish Library Association)
Attendance: 46 (open), 17 (expert)


The Finnish workshop was not only the first workshop under the ECUP + Concerted Action, it also had the premiere on reporting on the outcome of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference which ended on 20 December 1997. Mr Jukka Liedes of the Ministry of Education in Finland, who was the draftsman of the Treaties discussed at the WIPO Diplomatic Conference in Geneva, reported on the outcome of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference. The WIPO Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty were adopted and the WIPO Database Treaty was left for a later date. The audience was well informed on copyright and the latest international developments. The organisers had arranged for some journalists and radio reporters in the audience who interviewed Mr Jukka Liedes and Emanuella Giavarra during the lunch break about their reactions to the outcome of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference.

A comprehensive paper on ECMS was given by Heikki Poroila, an ECUP Steering Group member and music librarian at Vantaa City Library. In the afternoon Pekka Gronow of Yleisradio reported on the JUKEBOX project, a project under the EC Libraries Programme. He stressed the importance of knowledge about copyright and licensing to run a project, like JUKEBOX, successfully. He made the remark that although JUKEBOX was not intended as a copyright project, it very soon became one. A second presentation was held on the ELEKTRA project by Inkeri Salonharju of the Helsinki University Library. It is a very interesting project where libraries, publishers, authors and collecting societies work together on a national level to make digital information available to the public.

At the expert meeting on the second day, the two matrices were discussed in detail. The need to keep in mind that copyright is not only about discussing the user rights in an electronic environment, but more so the future role of libraries was mentioned. The participants agreed that libraries should be able to perform their archival function, to provide free access to public domain material and to provide users the possibility to view and to browse electronic copyrighted material on-site for free. It was stressed that a user should be allowed to copy more than a limited number of pages as put down in the matrices. The ECUP provisions were considered as too restrictive. It should also be possible for on-site and off-site users to browse for relevance and view copyrighted documents. An interesting discussion started on the digitisation of the library and making it available to off-site users. The majority was of the opinion that off-site distribution should be possible, but the participants differed in opinion on the conditions. The WIPO Copyright Treaty and the national implications were also discussed at this meeting. Also the national strategy got a lot of attention. In Finland there has been for a long time an active library copyright committee. The need was stressed that besides copyright, this group should also concentrate on licensing issues. A report of the workshop was published in KIRJASTOLEHTI 2/1997.

United Kingdom

Organiser: The Library Association
Attendance: 80 (open), 13 (expert)


Due to the Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib) and the UK copyright regime, the UK librarians and other information professionals are more aware of copyright and licensing issues than those in most of the other countries of the EU. At the open workshop meeting Prof. Charles Oppenheim of the Institute for Electronic Library Research, reported on the experiences of partners in eLib projects with licensing. He also briefed the audience on the recently started discussions with publishers and other rights owners on formulating fair dealing principles for the use of electronic information. He indicated that in an electronic environment it is unsure who owns the electronic rights in electronic publication, the author or the publisher. He stressed that publishers should assume liability for the material that they provide in electronic form and should protect themselves by indemnity insurance. The liability for claims from authors should under no circumstances be transferred to the library. He advocated an efficient system of rights clearance for on-demand use of electronic material. At the moment, the clearing of rights takes a lot of time, and so perhaps, collecting societies could play a major role in that, when they have convinced the publishers to mandate them to do this. A copy of Charles Oppenheim's paper is available on the Internet and can be retrieved from http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue7/copyright-corner/.

Elizabeth Lyons of the University of Surrey introduced project PATRON, a project under the eLib programme. It is an 18 month project for development of a multi-media system to deliver on-demand digital audio, video, scores and text in the areas of music and dance across high speed broadband networks to the desktop. She shared the experiences gained by the project partners in getting permission to digitise data. In the UK there is no "fair dealing" for sound recordings and films. This frustrated the project's progress initially. At the start of the project they contacted 37 rights owners and 7 associations and they discovered that once you stressed the benefit of co-operation to test the water and promised to provide usage information, the permission was more easily obtained.

The experiences of a site licence user under project ACORN (Access to Course Readings via Networks) was explained by Hazel Woodward of Loughborough University. The project is developing and testing a model to effectively manage the process of making short loan journal articles available electronically. The project will be finished in January 1998. More information can be found at http://info.lboro.ac.uk/library/acorn.html. In the afternoon Bill Tuck gave an introduction to Electronic Copyright Management Systems. Publishers want to have complete control over user terminal equipment. He suggested that 'trust' may be cheaper and more practical. A question was raised about the relationship between copyright and contract law and the over-ridability of copyright by contract law. UK copyright law differs here from copyright laws that are based on the concept of droit d'auteur, which are the majority of EU laws. It was stressed that librarians need copyright law to safeguard the fundamental principles of society. It would be very difficult, in many cases impossible, to negotiate licences that take into account fair dealing principles if these principles are not provided by statute.

The participants at the expert meeting were the members of the LA/JCC Working Party on Copyright. At this meeting concerns were expressed that the ECUP Position does not take into account the interests of the visually impaired. Concerns were also expressed about the ECUP Concerted Action not covering artistic works. The US JSTOR project was mentioned where librarians digitise works and the copyright is shared with the publishers. This led to a discussion regarding possible conflict between the publisher and the library if the library digitises and adds value to publishers' or authors' material. When discussing the Heads of Agreements the suggestion was made to include an arbitration clause and providing for the inspection of records.

Italy

Organiser: Associazione Italiana Biblioteche (Italian Library Association) and Regione Lombardia, Direzione Generale Cultura Servizion Biblioteche e Sistemi culturali integrati
Attendance: 76 (open), 25 (expert)

The structure of this workshop was different in that a speaker of the Italian Publishers Association was invited to give the point of view of the publishing community to copyright and the user exceptions. Marco Marandola, copyright lawyer, gave an overview of the present Italian copyright law. It appeared that the interpretation of the Italian law presented by Marco Marandola was not shared by Ivan Cecchini of the Italian Publishers Association. In his presentation he said that in general copyright does not allow for exceptions for libraries and users, especially not the Italian copyright law, not for the use of material in paper form and certainly not for material in electronic form. According to the library community, Article 68 of the Italian Copyright Act allows for private copying of material in paper form. Mr Cecchini also stressed that libraries and publishers operate on the same market, thus they are each others competitors. An animated discussion started. The appeal from the audience toward the representative of the Italian Publishers Association was: Let us make the effort to sit around the table and talk about the issues of (electronic) copyright.

The expert meeting started with four introductions by representatives of the four types of library categories as listed in the ECUP matrices. Each speaker gave a response for their sector to the ECUP Position. This was a very useful exercise. It was suggested that the distinction in the matrices should not be according to the type of library but according to the type of services. It was mentioned that both libraries and publishers are intermediaries and that licences were an important aspect of the electronic environment. The consensus was that the way forward lay in setting up consortia and drafting licensing principles as library consortia have done in the US.

Norway

Organiser: Norsk bibliotekforening (Norwegian Library Association)
Attendance: 89 (open), 18 (expert)

European copyright developments were introduced by Kjell Nilsson of BIBSAM Sweden. His evaluation of the new communication to the public right, which was adopted at the WIPO Diplomatic Conference in December 1996, was that this right could mean that even viewing and browsing in the library would need the permission of the rightsholders. He advocated a concept in which digital library services should be free when used in the library. The Scandinavian and Norwegian developments were introduced by Helge Sønneland of the Ministry of Culture. He also explained the impact of EU Directives on Norwegian law. Frode Bakken of the Norwegian Library Association analysed the challenges of the Electronic Copyright Management Systems. He stressed that the introduction of these systems could mean the end of the copyright exceptions even if they were safeguarded in our copyright laws.

The main topic at the expert meeting was the redefinition of the library and user exceptions under Norwegian copyright law. It was stressed that libraries should not do this in isolation but try to start a public debate on this issue. A lot of emphasis was placed on building alliances with other cultural groups. The suggestion was made to lodge a complaint of abuse of a dominant position with the Ministry of Trade and Industry when a rights owner uses his right unreasonably, for example when access to information is prohibited and the information cannot be obtained otherwise or when a licence does not allow the viewing or the browsing of digital information.

Spain

Organiser: Federación Española de Sociedades de Archivística, Biblioteconomia, Documentacíon y Museística , Universitat Pompeu Fabra
Attendance: 61 (open), 7 (expert)

Josep Sort of the Universitat Pompeu Fabra informed the participants on the activities of the FESABID working group on copyright issue. This group was set up in October 1996 in Barcelona. The working group consists of librarians and copyright specialists. The working group was set up to provide active input into the work of the ECUP Steering Group and to enhance the discussion of copyright issues in Spain. A special web-site has been set up which contains among others a Spanish version of the ECUP Position. Besides this a national ECUP copyright discussion list, called ES-ECUP has been initiated to discuss the issues of copyright in Spanish. The URL of the web-site is http://www.upf.es/bib/ecup.htm.

Two law professors were asked to give an introduction to Spanish copyright law and highlight the position of libraries under Spanish copyright. The two presentations were more author focused than library focused and their presentations raised a lot of questions which at the same time created awareness of the position of libraries for the two professors involved. In the afternoon, Nuria Gallart introduced the DECOMATE project (and Assumpta Bailac the CHILIAS project. Both projects are funded under the Libraries Programme of the European Commission DGXIII/E-4. The experiences with copyright issues and licensing during the DECOMATE project can be found in the workshop report for The Netherlands. Ms Bailac informed the audience that due to the copyright uncertainties, the project partners decided to limit the first phase of the project to material which was free of copyright. The day was finalised with the presentations of two professors who explained the impact of Electronic Copyright Management Systems.

The expert meeting was focused on the ECUP Position and the Heads of Agreements for site-licences. The Spanish expert group had prepared beforehand the questions which they were going to raise. There was a very good interaction between the participants. It was mentioned that the word 'licensed' in the matrices causes confusion. In many cases the licences on the market at the moment contain also the 'allowed' provision. To make clear that certain rights do not require negotiation, but are or should be provided by law, it would be more helpful to use the term 'statutory right' instead of 'allowed'. The negotiable activities should be called 'negotiable' instead of 'licensed'.

The view was expressed that the distinction between closed user group on-site and off-site is irrelevant. Furthermore, it was proposed that the definition of inter-library loan for a digital environment should be redefined. The question was raised if we should not speak of 'inter-library document delivery'?

The Netherlands

Organiser: Federatie van Organisaties in het Bibliotheek-, Informatie- en Documentatiewezen (Dutch Federation of Library, Information and Documentation Organisations)
Attendance: 163 (open)

The title of the Dutch workshop was 'Copyright and Freedom of Information: a conflict of interest on the Internet?'. The morning session of the workshop was only open to librarians and other information professionals and the afternoon session was open for everybody. The organisers of this workshop had prepared a Position Paper on Copyright for the Digital Library which was launched at the workshop.

At the morning session Trudy Noordermeer of the Dutch Royal Library gave an overview of the project of the EC Libraries programme and raise questions about ownership, copyright and exploitation of the results. Prof Bernt Hugenholtz of Stibbe Simont Monahan Duhot introduced the Dutch copyright law and explained the digital bottlenecks. He explained why library and user privileges are being threatened in a digital environment. On the one hand, it was because of the broadening of the "reproduction right" and the "communication to the public right", but, on the other hand, it was also because of the digital services provided by libraries themselves. The libraries are increasingly becoming competitors of the publishing community. He stressed that if libraries want to opt for a special status under electronic copyright, they have to define and legitimate their role in a digital environment. Having a sign saying "library" on the front will not be enough.

Hans Geleijnse introduced the DECOMATE project and highlighted its results. The goal of this project was to provide end-user access, through the library, to copyright materials in electronic form. He mentioned that the co-operation with the publishers was good throughout the project. During the projects many changes took place. For instance, they started with a licence that was designed for use within the campus and this changed to a licence designed for a much wider group according to defined user groups. Moreover viewing and printing were gradually not valued as two different acts but as one act for which one should pay. This means that viewing a document on a screen became a restricted activity. The terminology used changed from pay-per-use in pay-per-view.

Other licensing conditions were for instance that electronic documents could only be purchased when the library had a subscription for the paper copy, a guarantee of non-cancellation had to be given, usage information should be provided, sufficient protection by user name or password should be installed and document delivery to third parties was not allowed.

In the afternoon, the organisers invited a variety of speakers to talk about their perceived role in a digital environment. The representatives of PTT Nederland explained why they have chosen the side of the library in the discussion about the availability of information and the liability issue. Like the library, a Telco is only an intermediary. The representative of Stichting Reprorecht focused on the role that collecting societies could play once they get a mandate from the rights owners to do this. The representative of Kluwer Law stressed that there is a need for more dialogue between publishers and libraries. She explained why she is in favour of a structure of self-regulation. Publishers look at libraries as equal partners and customers. The perspective of the consumer was highlighted by a representative of the European Union of Consumers. She stressed the importance of unrestricted access to information. The representative of the Ministry of Justice explained that the role of his Ministry is to construct a balance between the different interests in digital information services in the Dutch Copyright Act.

Sweden

Organiser: BIBSAM, DIK-förbundet, Sveriges Allmänna Biblioteksförening, Svenska Bibliotekariesamfundet (Union of Librarians and Swedish Library and Librarians Associations)
Attendance: 11 (experts), 66 (open)

In Sweden, the expert meeting preceded the open workshop meeting. During the expert meeting the Directive on legal protection of databases and the ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications were discussed in detail. Art. 15 of the Directive on the legal protection of databases was welcomed. A clause like this could avoid that the exceptions under copyright and the sui generis right can be overridden by contracts. Swedish copyright developments and recommendations for the Swedish Copyright Act were discussed. To enhance the awareness raising on copyright issues in Sweden, DIK-förbundet recently published a booklet called "Digital is Different?" (DIK on copyright law in a digital environment). This publication is available in Swedish and in English from dik@akademikerhuset.se.

At the workshop, Prof Jan Rosen of the Handelshögskolan in Stockholm introduced the concept of Swedish copyright law. Mr Henry Olsson of the Ministry of Justice explained why the USA perceives that the Swedish copyright law is violating the TRIPS agreements and has to be changed accordingly. He mentioned that the harmonisation of the exceptions are high on the agenda of the European Commission, but that Sweden is not in favour of harmonising all of them. It will be very likely that the Nordic countries want to maintain a say in establishing exceptions at a national level. The afternoon was dedicated to discussions on user rights in the digital environment. It was stressed that the balance between authors and users is ultimately a matter of democracy.

France

Organiser: Association des Bibliothécaires Français (French Association of Librarians)
Attendance: 137 (open)

The ABF organised a session on copyright at their annual conference which was this year held in Bordeaux. The title of the day was 'Libraries and the economy of information: public access to digital information'. The legal framework in France, the outcome of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference and the European Directives were introduced by Mahfoud Galloul of the University of Lyon III. It was explained that the French Copyright Act's only exception for private copying relates to where the person who makes the copy is the owner of the copying machine.

The point of view of the publishing community was expressed by Alain Gründ, President of the International Union of Publishers. He stressed that publishers will not ask for more protection, but certainly also not for less in a digital environment. The position of the library community was given by Françoise Danset on behalf of the ABF and Isabelle Broutard on behalf of ECUP. Françoise Danset presented the IFLA Manifesto of 27 August 1996 and Isabelle Broutard gave an update on the activities of ECUP and presented the ECUP Position on User rights in Electronic Publications. Varda Lerin of the Association for Audio-visual Developments informed the audience about the problems that non-commercial lending videotheques encounter with rights owners. She explained that rights owners perceive their activities as competitive and they have imposed surcharges and have even forbidden the sale of videos in certain cases. The last speaker was Mrs Burgatova of the Czech Librarians Association, who talk about public access to information in the Czech Republic. The day finished with a debate on the issues raised by the speakers.

Austria

Organiser: Vereinigung Österreichischer Bibliothekarinnen und Bibliothekare (Association of Austrian Librarians)
Attendance: 78 (open), 10 (expert)

Prof Dr Gunter Nitsche of the University in Graz introduced the Austrian copyright law and the adopted and expected EU Directives in the area of copyright. In the afternoon Dr Werner Deutsch and Dr Dietrich Schüller of the Österreichischer Akademie der Wissenschaften, Schallforschung und Phonogramm-archive discussed the copyright issues that they encountered when working on the JUKEBOX project. Dr Reinhard Ecker of ABC Datenservice explained the purpose of an Electronic Copyright Management System and informed the gathering on the IMPRIMATUR project and gave practical examples of ECMS systems.

The expert meeting focused on discussing national recommendations for the Austrian Copyright Act concerning digital copyright issues. It was decided to draft a Position Paper on these issues on behalf of the Austrian library community before the end of 1997. Furthermore the implementation of the Directive on the legal protection of databases was discussed. It was expected that the implementation would be finalised in the autumn together with the German implementation.

Germany

Organiser: Bundesvereinigung Deutscher Bibliotheksverbände, Deutsches Bibliotheksinstitut
Attendance: over 300 (open), 11 (expert)

The BDB organised an open session on Copyright and New Media - Developments in Europe during the Bibliotheca in Dortmund on 22 May 1997. Besides a presentation on the ECUP Concerted Action and its activities, other presentations were given on related copyright issues. Harald Müller, Max-Planck Institut Heidelberg, advocated the need for a citizen's right to safeguard unrestricted access to digital information. Dr Reinhard Ecker of ABC Dataservice informed the participants on the impact of Electronic Copyright Management Systems on society at large. He was asked to answer the question if these systems could or would lead to total control of information and the monitoring of usage of this information. Karin Junker, Member of the European Parliament, gave an overview of the initiatives and activities of the European Parliament in the area of copyright. She was also asked to respond to the presentations of the previous speakers. Being a journalist by profession, she stressed that authors' rights should not be forgotten when we talk about the issues of copyright. Without the creators, copyright would not be an issue. She advocated that libraries and authors should work closely together to make the information society a reality.

The ECUP expert meeting for Germany was held on 12 June 1997. The meeting started with an introduction to the state of affair of copyright in Europe and Germany. The discussion focused instantly to the implementation of the Directive on the legal protection of databases. The DBI-Rechtskommission had prepared beforehand a document assessing possible national recommendations for the implementation of digital copyright provisions in the German copyright law. The outcomes of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference of December 1996 were presented and its effects on German law were discussed.

Denmark

Organiser: Bibliothekarforbundet (Union of Danish Librarians)
Attendance: 15 (open), 13 (expert)

The European copyright developments and the concept of Danish copyright law was introduced by Margrethe Tøttrup of the Danish National Library Authority. She explained that according to Danish law it is not possible to make an electronic copy of an electronic document, but you can make a print copy. She also gave a very comprehensive overview of the national implementation of all EU Directives related to copyright law in Danish Copyright Act. Morten Hein of Hein Information Tools informed the gathering about the experiences with copyright gained during the project JUKEBOX. He explained the difficulties they encountered with individual licences. He advocated the use of consortia licences which would enable libraries to put money and knowledge together to acquire better licences.

During the expert meeting the ECUP Position was discussed in detail. It was perceived that a licensing check list and a document containing the principles for licensing was necessary for Denmark. The term 'limited number of pages' in the ECUP matrices was perceived as too restrictive. It should be possible to make one copy of a work for private purposes on-site. The group agreed that off-site copying should be restricted in order not to undermine the investments made by the rights owners.

Belgium

Organiser: Vlaamse Overlegorgaan inzake Wetenschappelijkk Bibliotheekwerk, Belgische Vereniging voor Documentatie/Association Belge de Documentation (Flamish Forum on Scientific Library Activities, Belgian Association for Documentation)
Attendance: 68 (open), 11 (expert)

The concept of droit d'auteur and its global evolution were introduced by Mr Jerome Debrulle of the Ministry of Justice. He explained the increasing influence of the UK concept of copyright (common law) on the concept of droit d'auteur, which we find in civil law countries. He also touched upon the outcomes of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference of December 1996. The audience favoured the Norwegian proposal on the reproduction right, which was introduced during the WIPO Diplomatic Conference, to replace Article 7 which was drafted by Mr Jukka Liedes. Prof. Dr. Van Slype of the Bureau van Dijk introduced the activities of the COPEARMS project. This is a project funded by DGIII and which focuses on testing the ECMS system which was designed during the CITED project.

In the afternoon Mr Martin Hackemann of the Fachinformationszentrum Kalsruhe gave a presentation on the copyright problems of full text document delivery services experienced during the AUTODOC (Automatic Document Delivery) project. Prof. Dr. Dirk Voorhoof of the University of Gent updated the audience on the developments in Belgian law. His presentation was focused on the draft statute on reprography and the implementation of the Directive on the legal protection of databases.

During the expert meeting the implementation of the draft Directive on the legal protection of databases was heavily discussed. As with most amendments to the Belgian copyright law, close consultation and co-ordination took place between the Belgian and the Dutch Ministry of Justice. This was also expected for the implementation of this Directive. The Dutch implementation proposal was analysed and the position of the Belgian library community towards the implementation of this Directive was discussed.

Portugal

Organiser: Associação Portuguesa de Bibliotecários, Arquivistas e Documentalistas (Association of Portuguese librarians, archivists and documentalists)
Attendance: 103 (open), 7 (expert)

The awareness of international copyright developments was very high among the participants of the workshop. During the last year, the BAD has put a lot of effort in raising awareness on the activities of ECUP. A special web-page was linked to the BAD website on copyright issues and a Portuguese discussion list on copyright issues was set-up. At the workshop the implementation of the EU Directives, especially the Directive on the legal protection of databases, in Portuguese copyright law were discussed by Dr. Almeida Paiva of the Ministry of Culture. He stressed that a balance of interests should always be safeguarded to guarantee access to information. Dr. Alexandre Libório of the Faculty of Law of Coimbra introduced the copyright issues in relation to electronic information services. He was of the opinion that contractual relations will become equally important to copyright in the delivery of electronic services.

The outcome of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference and the implications for the Portuguese copyright law were explained by Dr. Pedro Cordeiro of the Faculty of Law of Lisbon. He warned of the increasing introduction of common law concepts in EU Directives. He explained why Art. 8 of the WIPO Copyright Treaty on the communication to the public right will become of paramount importance to library services. In Art. 10 of the WIPO Copyright Treaty a fair balance was achieved and it is up to the library community in Europe to convince their governments to implement exception on behalf of the public interest. Dr Manuel Lopes Rocha, an advocate from Lisbon, was asked to comment on the presentations given during the morning session. He explained the high amount of interest in copyright at the moment. Copyright is business. It is about money and in an unclear digital environment the positions taken towards the exceptions will be polarised. The audience responded by stressing that copyright is also about access to information.

The afternoon session was dedicated to the ECUP Position and the two matrices. The outcome of the discussion was that off-site activities were not seen as a primary activity of the library. The on-site activities should be safeguarded by statutory exemptions. Portuguese library activities will be focused on giving references and not full text services.

The expert meeting was dedicated to the implementation of the Directive on the legal protection of databases. The relation between the changes to copyright and the new sui generis right was explained and discussed.

Ireland

Organiser: The Library Association of Ireland
Attendance: 54 (open), 7 (expert)

The workshop started with a general introduction into copyright and the outcomes of the WIPO Diplomatic Conference of December 1996. The copyright owners' perspective was introduced by Anthony Quinn, a barrister in Dublin. He stressed that the authors' rights should not be neglected in an electronic environment. Publishers say that they own the electronic right in an work that they published previously on paper, but authors claim these rights as well. This is an uncertain situation for users of electronic copyrighted material. Where should they ask for permission for reproduction or usage? An update on Irish copyright law was presented by Sean Phillips, librarian at University College Dublin. A practical example of electronic copyright issues which can arise was explained by Alan MacDougal, Director of Library and Information Services of Dublin City University. He informed the gathering on the experiences gained during the BIBDEL project. He explained that due to copyright restraints the BIBDEL project was limited to the delivery of information by fax and had to leave the electronic delivery aside. The afternoon session was dedicated to the ECUP Position and the matrices.

At the expert meeting the Directive on the legal protection of databases was discussed. The exceptions given in Art. 6 and Art. 9 of this Directive raised a lot of confusion. Art. 6 (2) (d) was interpreted by the Irish library community as allowing traditional library exemptions as long as they pass the three step test of Art. 9 (2) of the Berne Convention. The implementations in other EU countries did not seem to take this approach into account. It was concluded that the Irish library community will arrange for a meeting with the responsible Department to make the concerns of the library community heard.

Greece

Organiser: Enosis Ellenon Bibliothekarion (Association of Greek Librarians)
Attendance: 92 (open)

The first part of the workshop had as title 'ECUP: Role and action at the EU'. Theodora Stathoulia was asked to advocate the need for library and user privileges in a digital environment. The politics on copyright at national and international level were explained by Michael Marinos of Dionesia Kallinikou. He informed the audience that private copying or copying for private study, in contrast to most other EU laws, does not qualify as an exception under Greek copyright law. He advocated that this has to be changed. During the latest update of the Greek Copyright law in 1993, the library requests were not heard. He called upon the representative of the Ministry of Culture, who was present at the meeting, to include appropriate copyright exceptions when the copyright law will be amended, which he expected to happen with the implementation of the Directive on the legal protection of databases.

Catherine Sinelly of the University of Patras and Catherine Toraky informed the participants about the experiences that they have gained on copyright issues while working on EU projects like FASTDOC and CHILIAS. Due to copyright restraints, the FASTDOC project partners could mainly experiment with material owned by the Beilstein Institute and in the CHILIAS project experiments are made mostly with material in the public domain. A comprehensive overview of management systems of rights in electronic publications was given by Philip Tsiboglou of the National Documentation Centre in Athens.

The workshop was finalised with a round table with representative of the library community, the publishing community and the Ministry of Culture. The representative of the Ministry of Culture was asked about the possibility of implementing the exception for private copying in Greek copyright law. The representative responded that she would like to ask the Association of Greek librarians to visit her and to inform her about the wishes of the library community for the paper and the digital environment. The publishing representative was asked to inform the gathering on licensing negotiations. Initially the representative responded that there is no room for negotiations in licensing, but after some pressure from the audience, he admitted that there is always scope for negotiations. The President of the Association of Greek Librarians promised the participants that action will be taken towards the Ministry of Culture and that principles for licensing would be drafted in order to guide librarians in the negotiations with publishers and other rights owners.

V.1.4 Evaluation

The timing of the workshops could not have been better. During the autumn of 1996, the discussions at a national level about the proposals for new WIPO Treaties made librarians increasingly aware how important knowledge of copyright is for the activities of information professionals. The workshops provided in the necessity to find out the impact of the two new WIPO Treaties for the national copyright laws. The participants were also interested to know more about the initiatives of the European Commission in the area of copyright related to new technologies. It came as a shock for many participants to discover that parts of the European Commission have the intention to eliminate the exceptions under copyright for the use of digital material. Much of the discussions centred around how to make the general public and the national parliament aware of this agenda.

The ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications was well received. There was also a lot of appreciation for the ecup-list. The ECUP Position was perceived as a useful document for structuring the discussion on these issues. Some people thought that the provisions did not go far enough whilst others thought that some of the provisions went too far, especially the provision which provides that libraries are allowed to provide off-site access to material they digitised themselves without paying royalties (matrix 2).

It was explained that in a digital environment, it seems, that libraries buy access to information instead of buying a physical copy which they can archive for eternity. A requirement in a lot of CD-Rom licences is that the Licensee has to send back the CD-Roms after the licence expires. Increasingly, instead of providing disks, publishing allow only access to their journals via their own server. This means that licensing provisions for perpetual access to digital material is a crucial issue and should be negotiated by the library.

The awareness about the increasing use of licences by publishers for acquiring digital products was not very large. It was somewhat surprising to find out that many participants thought that they never had been involved in licensing. It appeared that most participants at the workshop had not read the conditions when they acquired a CD-Rom. It was explained that it is necessary to read them, because in some cases these conditions unnecessarily restrict the use of the product.

It was also stressed that a licence is an invitation to negotiate the terms and conditions. The developments in the US were taken as example. A group of library associations engaged themselves in drafting licensing principles to assist their members in their licensing negotiations. The participants were also informed about the increasing tendency of setting up State-wide library licensing consortia to bundle money and knowledge in order to increase negotiation power.

The four different Heads of Agreements for site licences for the use of electronic material were briefly introduced at each workshop. Emphasis was put on the responsibilities of the Licensor (in many cases the publisher) and the choice of law. It was stressed that it is of the utmost importance that libraries negotiate that the publishers warrant the library that they have full rights and authority to grant the licence and that the publishers indemnify the library against any claim from somebody claiming to own the electronic rights in the material that is licensed. At the moment it is unclear who owns the rights in electronic publications, the author or the publisher. This is particularly the case with older material which was published in paper form and is now also available in digitised form. The choice of law is of relevance when something goes wrong. The library was advised to negotiate the introduction into the licence of the national law that they feel most comfortable with and to choose a court to resolve any disputes near the library. Copies of the four different Heads of Agreement can be found in Annex 6.

With the active support of the ECUP Steering Group members, in most EU countries national ECUP advisory committees have been set up or existing groups were asked to organise an ECUP expert meeting. The discussion at the expert meetings were very instructive. It was good to discuss in detail the Directive on the legal protection of databases and the ECUP Position. The expert groups expressed the wish to be kept closely informed by the ECUP Steering Group on the developments at the EU level and were willing to contribute actively to the discussions on national activities and legislative recommendations.




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V.2 Conferences

Although the awareness raising part of the ECUP+ contract was fulfilled in July 1997, the ECUP secretariat and EBLIDA have taken every opportunity to spread the information on the activities of ECUP+ in the area of electronic copyright and licensing. These awareness raising activities were done at conferences, workshop etc. throughout 1997, 1998 and 1999. At the following occasions, the ECUP Project Director gave papers about ECUP+, international and European copyright developments and licensing issues:


• International Conference in Bielefeld, 7 February 1996

• FASTDOC Workshop in Patras, 6 March 1996

• International Conference on Library Automation in Budapest, 7 April 1996

• ELITE workshop in Paris, 9 June 1996

• Concertation meeting on Exploitation of RTD results in Luxembourg on 18 June 1996

• STM Annual meeting in Frankfurt, 1 October 1996

• Seminar at the Götenborg Book Fair, 24 October 1996

• EBLIDA workshop on European Copyright Developments in Norway, 4 Nov. 1996

• Meeting with Mr Reinbothe and his staff at DGXV in Brussels, 3 December 1996

• ARL Conference on Licensing Electronic Resources in San Francisco, 9 Dec. 1996

• DECOMATE Conference in Warwick, 28 February 1997

• Symposium at the London International Book Fair, 15 March 1997

• Concerted Meeting of the Education and Training sector in Brussels, 21 March 1997

• Nordic-Baltic Library Meeting in Lithuania, 17 May 1997

• Biblioteca conference in Dortmund, 22 May 1997

• LIBER pre-conference in Bern, 1 July 1997

• ICHIM'97 in Paris, 1 September 1997

• IAML'97 in Geneva, 5 September 1997

• NORDINFO conference, 9-10 October 1997

• IFRRO annual conference in Athens, 22 October 1997

• Meeting with DGXV on liability of intermediaries in Brussels, 12 November 1997

• EBLIDA copyright conference in Copenhagen, 12-13 February 1998

• DIK conference in Uppsala, 10 March 1998

• ELAG seminar in The Hague, 26 March 1998

• BAD annual national congress in Aveiro, 8 May 1998

• NVB Serials Group in The Hague, 14 May 1998

• EBLIDA Council meeting in Helsinki, 16 May 1998

• STM Seminar in Heidelberg, 16 April 1998 (Elspeth Scott)

• IFLA pre-conference at European Parliament in Brussels, 13 August 1998

• IFLA pre-conference in Amsterdam, 14 August 1998

• IFLA conference in Amsterdam, 18 August 1998

• British Council information day in Paris, 25 November 1998

• EBLIDA Council meeting in London, 8 May 1999

The EBLIDA Director Barbara Schleihagen gave in addition papers at:

• IFLA Copenhagen, 5 September 1998

• Frankfurt Bookfair, 16 October 1997

• Telematics Application Conference in Barcelona, 5 February 1998

• New Book Economy Conference in Bad Honnef, 16 February 1998

• Concertation meeting in Luxembourg, 8 March 1999

• Music and copyright workshop in Vienna, 21-22 January 1999

• Summer school Copenhagen, 5 July 1999

On 5-6 November 1998, the Italian Library Association (AIB), EBLIDA and ECUP+ organised in Rome an international conference and workshop entitled 'Electronic Copyright and Digital Licensing: where are the pitfalls?'. This conference and workshop aimed at informing and debating the latest European copyright legislation, promoting the activities performed under the ECUP+ Concerted Action and to raise awareness on the legal pitfalls in licences for the use of electronic resources.

Furthermore, EBLIDA organised in cooperation with HARMONICA a two-days music and copyright workshop on 21-22 January 1999 in Vienna.

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VI. Copyright Focal Point

VI.1 Introduction

One of the objectives of ECUP+ was to establish a focal point for questions on copyright, licensing and information on EU legislative developments in this area. This focal point had as aim to support project partners in the Libraries Programme with advise by a professional copyright lawyer and to provide an one-stop shop for material concerning developments of copyright and licensing issues in Europe and the USA. Several services were set up to assist the dissemination of information.




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VI.2 Moderated discussion list on European copyright issues

This service was launched on 22nd May 1996 and is open to everybody. It facilitates librarians and information professionals throughout Europe to discuss:


• European legislative developments and policies

• interpretation and scope of national copyright laws

• how the existing "user rights" under copyright apply to the use of electronic material

• the library position on Inter-Library Loan (ILL) of electronic material

• licensing issues and European Copyright Management Systems (ECMS)

• the implementation of the Directive on lending rights

• copyright duration issues, etc.

The list also updated subscribers on the copyright discussions in the USA and Australia. The list is also open for announcements on events, publications, new sites, proposals for legislation, etc.

The Web-site contains a page with information on the ECUP-list, how to subscribe and the archive with the messages posted to the ECUP-list. The ECUP-list has at the moment over 635 subscribers from all over the world. The issues being discussed were among others the Statement of the International Publishers Copyright Council on Libraries, Copyright and the Electronic Environment, free access to the databases of the British Library, the role of subscription agents in the electronic environment, WIPO Copyright Treaty and the draft EU Copyright Directive.

The ecup-list is being continued by EBLIDA and still attracts new subscribers from all different players in the information chain. It is seen as a useful tool for discussion beyond the actual ECUP+ project. The ECUP+ website will be kept up and running also after the financial support from the European Commission has come to an end.




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VI.3 A help desk for questions related to copyright and advise

A special e-mail address was set up for the helpdesk (ecup.secr@dial.pipex.com). This service was open to participants in projects under the Libraries Programme and members of EBLIDA only. The help desk was run by a professional copyright lawyer. The service could be contacted for information on general copyright issues, but it was also possible for project partners to send in their project proposal to be checked on possible copyright problems. Another example was to ask the professional lawyer to read through the licensing agreements which they were about to be signed with the rightholders.




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VI.4 Access to documents and hyperlinks to copyright related Webpages

This service was launched on 8th July 1996 and significantly enlarged on 17 April 1998. It includes resources on international and national copyright legislation, licensing issues, technical issues, other issues related to electronic copyright, a section with relevant publications, events and projects in these areas.

The ECUP Website is at present the only website in Europe that covers besides international copyright legislation, a special section on copyright exceptions and licensing materials. During the last 1/2 year, with some additional funding from the European Commission, the website was completely revised and all links were updated. In addition, a lot of new materials was added. This is partly due to the close connection with CECUP, which allows for the first time to give direct access to the copyright legislation and library exemptions in all ten accession countries. In addition, new developments are closely followed by the former ECUP project director and the website is constantly being updated. To allow easier retrieval of new items, the section "what's new" was included.




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VI.5 Evaluation

The services proved to be very successful. The help desk for copyright questions received many requests for information and assistance during the months when the workshops were held. The requests were about the interpretation of the Directive on the legal protection of databases, but also on the interpretation of licensing clauses, guidance on how to approach copyright owners, legal advise in setting up consortia and the interpretation of the draft EU Copyright Directive. More and more questions were received about the relationship between copyright and licensing and the value of the exceptions under copyright.

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VII. Legislative and Licensing recommendations

VII.1 Introduction

The national implementation of the Directive on the legal protection of databases, which had to be finalised before 1st January 1998, made discussing the national legislative recommendations by the ECUP Steering Group necessary at an earlier stage than expected. Some governments were aiming to implement this Directive with severe restrictions on the applicability of traditionally allowed limitations and exceptions, which were originally put in place to make some free use of copyrighted work possible.

During 1998 Steering Group meetings were organised to discuss the situation in the Member States concerning revisions to the national copyright laws and the tend to regulate access to electronic material by contract law rather than by copyright law.




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VII.2 Legislative recommendations

The ECUP Steering Group published on 19 December 1997 its first legislative recommendations with the title 'Towards a balanced information society' (Annex 8). This document was published in a format that could be readily used by library associations. This deliverable was translated in several languages by the Steering Group members.

On 11 February 1998 in Copenhagen, EBLIDA organised a two-day Conference on Copyright, to discuss the implications of the draft EU Copyright Directive of 10 December 1997. After the EBLIDA Conference, the ECUP Steering Group drafted the document "Be Aware! Possible consequences of draft Copyright Directive", which was made public on 18 March 1998. This document sums up the consequences for libraries, universities, documentation centres and archives if the proposed Copyright Directive would be adopted without changes. Under the new draft EU Copyright Directive of 10.12.97 libraries, universities, documentation centres and archives cannot (unless they have a licence):


• display electronic copyrighted material on a screen on-site

• enable on-site users to view, browse and listen to electronic copyrighted material for private or educational purposes

• enable on-site users to make a digital copy for private or educational purposes

• provide access to digital material to remote registered users for private or educational purposes

• make a digital copy of a work for preservation or archival purposes

• send copyrighted material via FTP or by email to another library

• send copyrighted material via FTP or by email to students or staff within an institution

During the last months of the project, the ECUP Steering Group updated the ECUP matrices and ECUP Position on User Rights in Electronic Publications of 25 September 1996 to reflect the state of affairs after three years of ECUP+ and discussions with a variety of publishers and library representatives. The updated version was available from the ECUP website from 15 December 1998 (Annex 5).




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VII.3 Licensing recommendations and warning list of legal pitfalls

It appeared at the ECUP workshops that the awareness about the increasing use of licences by publishers for acquiring digital products was not very high. It was somewhat surprising to find out that many participants thought that they never had been involved in licensing, even though they had acquired several CD-Roms with licences on the back. Most participants at the workshop had not read the conditions when they acquired these CD-Roms.

It was explained that a licence is an invitation to negotiate the terms and conditions. Contract law is dominated by the concept of freedom of contract which means that parties to a contract are free to negotiate the terms of use of copyrighted material or indeed waive the rights that the copyright law grants them.

During the last six months of the ECUP+ Concerted Action, the Steering Group tried to make librarians aware of the complementary value of mandatory copyright exceptions in licensing for the library community and its users.

Although several international and national library institutions and organisations had drafted principles for licensing, more and more requests were received by the ECUP secretariat for a practical warning list on the legal pitfalls in licensing.

The ECUP publication "Licensing Digital Resources: How to avoid the legal pitfalls?" (Annex 9) was finalised on 9 November 1998. The publication was launched at the EBLIDA/ECUP+/AIB workshop on this issue on 6 November 1998 in Rome.

The publication was enthusiastically received by the European library community. This publication is now available in English, German, French and Italian via the ECUP website. A Swedish translation is in progress. The German library association published a German-English printed brochure in March 1999 (translation was done in cooperation with the Austrian library association). It will proof to be a very useful tool in the negotiations between librarians and publishers in the years to come.

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VIII. Conclusions

ECUP I and ECUP+ were foremost initiated to raise awareness amongst librarians and other information professionals about (electronic) copyright. Nobody could have foreseen how necessary and timely an initiative as ECUP was. Through funding of the European Commission librarians were able to engage themselves in (electronic) discussions about copyright and licensing with their European and US counterparts, which would not have been possible on the same scale without an initiative such as ECUP+.

Besides discussions amongst colleagues, ECUP+ facilitated in discussing (electronic) copyright issues with rightholders and other interested parties. It is fair to say that these discussions resulted in a better understanding of the positions taken by authors, publishers, collecting societies, subscription agents and libraries towards the use of electronic material.

In order to keep up awareness and activities in copyright and licensing issues, the following actions were agreed by the EBLIDA Executive Committee at its last meeting on 10 October 1998 in Athens and were all successfully implemented during the reporting period:


• To continue to organise once a year in cooperation with national library associations a copyright/licenses conference to inform members in detail about latest developments and to offer a forum for discussion and exchange of views.

• To maintain the ecup discussion list. Although it functions mainly as a list for information on new developments which can easily be taken over by the internal eblida-list, subscribers to the ecup-list come from all different areas of the information chain, and the list could be used for wider dissemination of EBLIDA activities, interim results of the TECUP (licensing) and CECUP (C&EE copyright platform) projects and further discussion of the EBLIDA/ECUP/STM Joint activities.

• To set up an EBLIDA copyright expert group consisting ideally of one expert each from each member state that continues to meet regularly (2-3 times a year). The establishment of such a group will facilitate the exchange of information, will enhance coordination of activities on national and European level and will establish and/or strengthen the link with national administrations in charge of libraries, museums and archives. EBLIDA has set up a closed discussion list for the copyright expert group to provide regular up-to-date information.

• The director of EBLIDA will continue to give papers on copyright and latest developments on the draft EU Copyright Directive in different countries. The ECUP project director will continue to give papers on licensing issues. The CECUP project manager will give papers at ten workshops in C&EE countries during the course of 1999.

• Meetings within the framework of the informal "Bloomsbury Set" will continue during the course of 1999. EBLIDA will provide funding for its legal adviser to attend these meetings.

EBLIDA would like to thank the European Commission and especially DGXIII/E-4 for their trust in the ECUP+ Concerted Action and their support.




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EBLIDA, 22 October 1999

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