Digital copyright protection: Issues in the digital library environment

Abstract

Copyright and intellectual property rights (IPR) have been established and extended over hundreds of years. Although initially developed to give a publisher control over the right to publish (copy) a work, they were extended to give rights to authors, painters, photographers, film producers, software writers, and many others. 'Access to information' is the buzzword of the recent past and today is essential in business, education, and research and has a direct impact on literacy levels, economic growth, and quality of life. Information hubs/ houses like archives, libraries and museums, etc. have had a fundamental role to play in the development of a democratic society by enabling access for all members of the community to a wide range of knowledge, ideas, opinion as well as cultural, and scientific and educational information. Libraries provide access to digital material through a variety of legal constructs; license agreements, exceptions under national copyright law, legal deposit, and the public domain. Digital rights management (DRM) poses a threat. At worst, it can block access, at best it can inhibit by making access time-consuming and costly to arrange. Today, these institutions are crippled by a parallel harmonisation of limitations and exceptions thrust upon them by technology (digital) that serve the public interest, glorifying the 'rights' and de-meaning 'fair-use'. An attempt has been made in this article to introduce the issues concerning the copyright protection in the digital library environment. © 2012, DESIDOC.