What is copyright?
Copyright is the legal protection given to the creators of certain kinds of original works. It gives them the exclusive right to copy, issue copies, rent or lend, perform, show, play, communicate the work to the public or adapt the work, and the right to stop others from doing any of these things without their consent. These are known as economic and moral rights. Anyone who infringes that right by copying a protected work without the permission of the copyright owner can be sued for damages.
Copyright comes into existence automatically as soon as a work is created without any need for registration. If the work was made in the course of employment, copyright is owned by the employer unless a contract specifies otherwise. Publicly available does not mean the work is copyright free. Free content you find on the web does not mean the work is in the "Public Domain" this term has a specific meaning in copyright.
As copyright is a type of property right it can be sold (‘assigned’) or leased (‘licensed’) in the same way as other forms of property. Copyright may therefore belong to someone other than the author of the work. Additionally a work may have different copyright holders - for example for the text and the illustrations.
Copyright law is territorial - so you need to comply with the law of the country you are working/copying in. But there are are international agreements which will protect you work under the laws of other countries. Most countries have signed the Berne Convention which provides reciprocal protection.
Who owns Copyright?
As a student of the University, you will own the copyright in your work. In the workplace, unless there is a contract to the contrary, your employer will own the rights to your work. Go to the UK Copyright Act
The creative works protected by copyright:
How long does copyright protection last?
Copyright protections lasts for a specified length of time only and this length varies depending on the type of material produced. Usually this is:
Material published on the web is covered by copyright - unless explicitly stated otherwise.
AI in student research and assignments
Read the Academic regulations, 2024 - Section 5.3 Academic Integrity for the School’s guidance on the use of Generative AI in your studies. You can find this in Canvas on your course page, or here. Any questions relating to a specific course ask the Faculty member teaching the course.
Generative AI
The data Generative AI trains on may be biased, wrong or misleading and errors in generated content can easily be recycled. You cannot rely on the citations provided as these have occasionally been found to be hallucinatory. Be critical and check the content generated and its sources.
How to Cite your use of Generative AI
You must always make it clear when, where and how you used Generative AI. The e-resource CiteThemRight Online in our A-Z list of databases offers guidance and examples of how to cite your use of Generative AI. Just enter Generative AI in the top search box.
Inputs – training materials and copyright
Generative AI tools are trained using materials: text, images, audio, video, code, many of which are protected by copyright. Using third-party works to train Gen-AI tools, without permission from copyright owners, can infringe copyright. When using Generative AI you must not:
Please note that Copilot (Microsoft’s) Intellectual Property indemnity support does not protect the customer’s input data. View it here.
Outputs - can AI output be protected by Copyright law and who owns the copyright?
Under UK law, in order for a work to get copyright protection, it must be ‘original’ meaning that the author must have created the work through their own skill, judgement and effort. Unlike many other countries, UK copyright law addresses computer generated work. Under section 9, for any “literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work, which is computer-generated, the author shall be taken to be the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the creation of the work are undertaken”.
There is still a lack of clarity in law as to how exactly this is to be interpreted and will take time until this is agreed. See this article from Freshfields.
At the moment the School recommends the use of Microsoft’s Copilot. Microsoft’s position is that it does not claim any intellectual property rights in the outputs of its Copilot services. Neither can it determine if the output delivered is copyright protected.
You should always check the terms of any other Generative AI tools you use.
Out of Copyright - Public domain
Once the copyright period has expired (and you have verified this) you can copy and use it as you want without needing the permission of anyone. However you should ALWAYS acknowledge the author and the source of the material you use and DO NOT pretend that it is your work. To do so is to commit plagiarism and it applies to both ‘out of copyright’ work and ‘in copyright’ work. Always include your source acknowledgement in BOTH the main text of your work AND any bibliography.
Copyright is waived
You may find a copyright statement on the website or attached to the work saying that the content may be used for educational purpose. Do not presume - if in doubt ask.
Creative Commons licence
The work may have a Creative Commons Licence - this is a sharing licence that encourages the sharing of materials and, depending on the licence, the adaptation of the work. Attribution may or may not be required. There are a wide range of CC licences - see this page for further details.. Open Access or OA content is free to access and use. They use CC licences to indicate how the content can be shared. See our OA page.
Copyright Exceptions
UK law uses copyright exceptions to allow you to include portions of copyright material for your assessed work without the permission of the copyright owner. The copyright exceptions: Illustration for instruction and Criticism, review, quotation and news reporting require you to apply the "Fair dealing" judgement.
The Fair Dealing concept is not defined in the legislation, is is a matter of judgment. You must ensure that:
N.B. In the USA they have "Fair use" which is not quite the same. What is permissible in the US may not be in the UK.
Images
Third-party copyright images which are integral to your academic work may be legally defensible under the exceptions mentioned above. Again you must always properly cite the source and use no more than is necessary to make you point.
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What you can and can't do You may provide more than one copy of your work for your tutors, or to share with fellow students when working jointly - but not to anyone else outside your immediate educational setting. See the guidance on this page concerning AI inputs. Using Information Services & Library resources in Experiential Learning projects |
Plagiarise: "to copy (ideas, passages of text, etc) from someone else’s work and use them as if they were one’s own." Chambers 21st Century Dictionary, © Chambers Harrap Publishers Limited 2001
It is vital that you learn to use information from other sources without committing plagiarism. Your work must show that you have read and understood the main theories and arguments surrounding your topic (or gathered the appropriate data) and are able to use this information appropriately through the correct attribution of the words and ideas of others and the use of appropriate and consistent referencing techniques. See: Research Guide: Referencing.
In order to avoid plagiarism you need to be methodical throughout your research. You need to:
Turnitin - plagiarism detection
The School uses Turnitin - plagiarism detection software, but it is not available to students to check their own work.
Turnitin have added an AI writing indicator to the Similarity Report. It shows an overall percentage of the document that AI writing tools, such as ChatGPT, may have generated.