Global solutions from the creative industries

There was good news last month when the Government promised to contribute £150,000 in funds to the Copyright Hub, matching industry support.  It was equally pleasing to see another step forward in creative industry collaboration announced by the Linked Content Coalition (LCC) this week.

The LCC is creating the first ever international rights management framework for Copyright.  The Framework should contribute to enabling the management and access of online rights information seamlessly across all types of media and content, whether text, image, sound or audio-visual. The LCC work is fundamental to the development of the Copyright Hub in the UK.

This project has huge potential to simplify both rights management for collecting societies, and make life easier for businesses and individuals who need to access copyright across borders.  It will also help to create a simple mechanism to enable creators to claim intellectual property rights in their works – whether for commercial or non-commercial use.  This is particularly important in the digital age, as without such a framework it is very difficult to identify the owners of many works placed online.
As with the Copyright Hub, the NLA is involved with the LCC as a member and funding contributor.  LCC Chairman, Christoph Keese from Axel Springer explains more about the opportunity the Framework presents here.  

David Pugh
Managing Director, NLA

Follow the NLA on Twitter - @NLA_ltd

Paywalls and Media Monitoring

Following yesterday’s announcements that The Telegraph and the Sun are adopting paid models NLA is watching the UK newspaper movement towards paywall models with great interest. As providers of paid access to news content to professional monitoring agencies, we have a natural bias to support these changes. Anything that makes the value of content clearer tends to get our vote.

The NLA is also feeling good about the decision we made three years ago to develop eClips web. This takes data directly from newspapers’ production systems, allowing faster and more accurate coverage of what was printed. It also allows subscribing media monitoring companies and their professional users seamless access to pay-walled material.  The service is also used by many publishers to feed content to licensed third parties like Factiva and Lexis-Nexis. The return on the investment comes from ensuring the professional information users who expect a premium service get the data they need, and that publishers get properly paid. 

In the USA ‘soft’ or metered pay-walls have become common place, with over 400 dailies now operating this model . NLA is ready to make the connections needed between publishers, monitoring agencies and users if and when – as seems increasingly likely – the UK follows that lead.

Andrew Hughes

Commercial Director, NLA

Follow the NLA on Twitter - @NLA_ltd

Copyright Hub gets government support

Good news: Lord Younger, the Intellectual Property Minister has just announced government funding for the Copyright Hub project led by Richard Hooper.

The £150,000 promised by the government matches funding already provided by publishers and licensing agencies - including the NLA - that has supported the development of the project in its first year. It is hoped that the first stage of the project will be operational in 2014; simplifying copyright licensing for business users.

David Pugh
Managing Director, NLA

Follow the NLA on Twitter - @NLA_ltd

Judge rules for AP in copyright dispute with Meltwater

Over in the United States global news network Associated Press is celebrating a win in its court case against Meltwater News. 

The case began after AP sued Meltwater last year, alleging that AP content was copied and sold by Meltwater for profit to its customers without any fees being paid to AP.  The judge agreed, and on Wednesday ruled in their favour.  A full decision is to be released soon.

Regular readers of this blog will be aware of the NLA’s own dispute with Meltwater in the UK courts and at the Copyright Tribunal.  Other than a narrow technical point around temporary copying, the dispute was resolved in the NLA’s favour.  The appeal on temporary copying had a two day hearing in February 2013 and we are awaiting a final decision.

The NLA has always believed that paid for services using newspaper copyright material need a licence. The UK experience is that users accept licence fees should be paid.  Now it seems the US has reaffirmed the need fairly to remunerate its newspaper industry for use of its intellectual property too.

Andrew Hughes

Commercial Director, NLA

Follow the NLA on Twitter - @NLA_ltd

First Journalism Diversity Fund Intern Begins Placement at Newsquest

Last month we announced our support for the Journalism Diversity Fund's internship schemes which provide recipients with 1-3 month work experience placements at a regional newspaper. The grant covers both travel and living costs.

We are pleased to announce that the first recipient, 23 year old Khaleda Rahman will begin her three month placement at Newsquest today, providing her with real hands-on experience to help launch her promising career in journalism.

We wish her luck for the months to come!

Click here for the full press release.

David Pugh
Managing Director, NLA

Follow the NLA on Twitter - @NLA_ltd