29 November 2011
Tim Padfield: Archive materials exist in just one document available in just one place
IFLA works closely with the International Council on Archives (ICA) on copyright limitations and exceptions for libraries and archives. Tim Padfield works as Copyright Officer at the National Archives of the UK, and represents ICA in the drafting group on the ‘Treaty Proposal on Copyright Limitations and Exceptions for Libraries and Archives’. He explains the importance of limitations and exceptions for archives.
Archives are unique materials. They exist in just one document available in just one place.
a. Documentary materials are fragile. Paper, especially paper made in the 19th and 20th centuries, is often acidic so that it yellows then crumbles to dust. Traditional photographs are also paper based but have light sensitive silver emulsions that fade on exposure to bright light or that become yellowed if imperfectly fixed. Early 20th century films were made on nitrate stock which decays and is liable to spontaneous combustion while more recent acetate-based films also decay and become brittle so that they can no longer be shown. Sound recordings are commonly on plastic tape which also decays and becomes brittle.
The short life of digital materials of all kinds is well known: it is recommended to copy computer programs or files from one disc to another every five years because the plastic carriers fail, while all software, which is essential for digital materials to be accessible, is always being updated leaving older versions unusable once they cease to be supported. The facility to make analogue and digital copies of documentary material so that the works they embody are preserved is essential to ensure the preservation of the world's memory. It will benefit not only users but also rights owners since otherwise their works will disappear.
b. Researchers may visit an archive and study documents, but few are able to predict all the questions they will wish to ask of a particular source on the first occasion they see it. Rather than return to see it again, involving costs of travel and further wear and tear on the original, they prefer to be able to obtain a copy. Many other researchers do not have the resources or the ability to travel to the archive at all. For them the only solution is to obtain a copy, sent to their country. Thus limitations and exceptions permitting copying for users, for limited purposes, and the transmission of those copies overseas by such means as are appropriate in the modern world, are of great importance to archives, researchers and society.
c. Over the last 20 years, it has become widely understood that for many people, information does not really exist unless it is available online. The demand for online access to materials in archives is very large and is growing. It has been estimated that some 40 percent of unpublished works in archives are orphan: the rights owners are unknown and untraceable even after a diligent enquiry. Without an exception enabling them to digitise these orphan works and make them available online, archives are unable to respond to the demands of society.