Thing 19: The Legal Side of Things

Copyright restrictions have given me more grey hairs than I care to think about and I really appreciated this Thing which was well written and very informative.  In fact, I'd love a 23 Things course on copyright issues alone!!!  We've often had to grapple with this problem at work and let me tell you there is no thornier or more dangerous ground than copyright law.  It is also an area on which it is very difficult to find clarity as copyright regulations vary not only from country to country but between different forms or works.  For example, depending on the country, copyright length can extend from 0 to 100 years from the death of the creator.  Copyright can also be extended and there is even such a thing as perpetual copyright although thankfully this is extremely rare.

Fair use is another term which is as clear as mud.  There is no clear definition as to what exactly is meant by it and again regulations vary wildly from country to country.  Some copyright owners will haul you into court even in circumstances where the fair use defense would probably succeed with the aim of frightening you badly enough to stop you from using their works for free.  Nice.

Then there is the nightmare of images posted on the Internet.  Let us assume that you find a photograph of a nineteenth-century watercolour uploaded by an art gallery which you want to use on your blog.  The watercolour is well out of copyright and you think you are good to go.  You are not, because the art gallery holds copyright of the photograph they have taken of the out-of-copyright watercolour.  It's enough to give you a splitting headache.

In trying to source "safe" images from the Internet, Creative Commons is a great option.  Some large organisations such as the Imperial War Museum and the National Portrait Gallery in the UK also provide creative licences as long as users adhere to certain basic rules.  However  some websites with allegedly free content should be approached with caution.  One of them is Wikimedia Commons, which does contain images that clearly are covered by copyright but are touted as being freely available.  To be fair, they do flag up questionable content uploaded by contributors, one just has to be vigilant enough to spot it before using the source.

When I first began this course I didn't even think of using images to illustrate my blogs because frankly copyright issues frighten me witless.  After a few dull and colourless blogs I changed my mind and began to search for images guaranteed to be in the public domain or covered by a Creative Commons licence.  Thankfully Google allows you to search for images by their usage rights which saves a lot of grief and trouble.  My rule of thumb is that if your'e not sure about the copyright status of something, stay well away from it and if you are sure, always, always cite your source.  This in fact is a rule I have sadly broken myself as I have provided no source details for any of the images that I've used on my blogs.

To practice what I preach, here are the citations for the two images I've used:

Image 1: "Creative Commons Headache" by openDemocracy licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
Image 2: This open Clipart image is from Pixabay and is in the public domain with no attribution required.  However, for those who want to source the image you can find it by following this link: https://pixabay.com/p-156107/?no_redirect

Thing 18: Communicating through Photographs

I was really interested in this Thing as I have always been keen to learn more about Flickr and to find out what exactly Instagram is and does.  I have to confess though that I decided against opening a personal Flickr account as I've opened enough accounts during this course to last me a lifetime and, like many others, I am reluctant to part with all the information the registration requires.  Luckily it is possible to browse and use Flickr to a certain degree without signing up!  In fact, many of the images I have used to illustrate my blogs have been taken from Flickr.

Our library has a Flickr account and we used it extensively in 2013 when the University of Limerick celebrated its 40th anniversary.  We had to organize a photographic exhibition and grappled with literally thousands of images taken during those 40 years, many of which depicted events and people we couldn't identify.  One of our team had the bright idea of uploading some of the images onto Flickr to see if this might yield some information and it did!  We are currently experimenting with the idea of using Flickr for a small exhibition of 70 turn-of-the-century glass plate negatives we purchased at an auction a couple of years ago.  We have photographed the negatives and converted them into positives and are hoping that somebody out there might be able to tell us something about the people featured in the images.  I mean, they were only taken a 120 years ago so somebody out there is bound to recognize a face or two, right?!?

Instagram is a new concept for me.  I can't sign up for it as I don't own a smartphone but I was glad to read up about it as I have heard it mentioned many times but hadn't a clue what it was.  Now I know!  It seems to me to be a pictorial version of Twitter and I'm not quite sure how exactly the two differ from one another as Twitter also allows you to share photographs.  I must confess I see limited application for this in a library because, like Twitter, you have to be at it morning, noon and night for it to have any impact and who has time for that, or that many photos or events to promote?

I find photographs a great way to communicate and to spread information because people are instinctively drawn to images.  As people's attention spans are shortening, long reams of text appeal to few whereas a photograph literally only needs a blink of an eye to take in and can really captivate its audience.  As they say, a picture tells more than a thousand words!

Brown Thomas at UL

Thing 17: Reflective Practice

I don't feel like re-writing any of my blog posts because I am quite reflective by nature and tend to take my time writing the blog.  I never post anything on the first day of writing; instead, I revisit it over a couple of days and fine-tune it.  Not only does it enable me to write better posts (I hope!) but it also allows me time to think about each Thing and perhaps revise my initial view or opinion.

I tend to think about life a lot and my place in it.  I am not competitive by nature but I have a strong drive to improve myself and to be the best that I can be.  Any time I finish a large project I sit back and reflect on what I've done.  These are the sort of questions I tend to ask: Am I happy with what I've produced?  If yes, why, and are there ways in which I could improve further?  If I am not happy, why not?  What would I do differently?  Can I change my work practices to produce a better result next time?  What should those changes be and how can I implement them?

I find myself doing the same thing with people.  We all know individuals that we don't quite get on with and whenever that happens to me I tend to reflect on the situation  and try to identify behavioral or attitudinal barriers on my part that might be contributing to the problem.  I also try to find ways in which I could change or bypass these shortcomings although I confess this is not always easy!  As we get older we tend to become more entrenched in our views and approaches and these habits can be hard to break.  Luckily I also find that as one gets older one doesn't get bothered about issues quite as easily - it's more and more a question of living and letting live, and accommodating all comers.

Perhaps because reflective practice is something I do instinctively, I tend to balk at models and theories.  I'm not sure that there is a right or wrong way of reflecting although I can see that if one is new to the concept reflective models can help to kick-start the process.  I also have a feeling that reflective practice can be taken too far, to the point when it becomes self-obsessive and a hindrance rather than an asset.  Life is not all about me and my feelings and there is a fine line between self-knowledge and self-centeredness.

On this journey through 23 Things, I have thought much about my own attitudes to Social Media and modern technology.  I am aware that I am resistant to a degree to both but whether this is a generational or a personal thing I'm still not sure.  Perhaps it's a bit of both.  However, I have learnt an immense amount and am glad to have been brought out of my comfort zone into this new playing field.  Some of the Things have blown me away with excitement, others have filled me with apprehension or cynicism but none have left me unmoved!

Thing 16: Collaboration Tools

I thought I knew nothing about collaboration tools but it turns out I do!  I am familiar with Doodle which we occasionally use to arrange inter-departmental meetings, or meetings with a large number of participants with diverse schedules.  We also use Outlook but I kind of like Doodle, it's simple and straightforward and looks quite cheery.

I haven't used Google Drive but from what I've read it seems to be similar to Dropbox which I occasionally use, or SharePoint which is a software tool we use a lot at work.  It is a life-saver for large collaborative projects where lots of people need to view and have access to a large number of images or documents and make comment of same.

I am rarely involved in collaborative projects so these tools are not something I would use that frequently.  However, what little experience I have of them has been extremely positive. Collaborative tools are practical and easy to use and make large projects so much easier to manage.

Thing 15: Advocacy for Libraries

Libraries, like museums, have seen a big change in their attitudes in recent years as regards their users.  They have not stuck with the traditional way of doing things but instead have taken a good look at the type of services and experiences people want and set out to providing these.  By widening their services they have also broadened their customer base which has revolutionized libraries.

Archives I fear are somewhat lagging behind and here I must blush and admit that it its partly because of the sticks-in-the mud like me!  Rather than going out of our way to meet user demands we try to educate users by telling them not to expect too much too fast because gosh we are dealing with such rare and fragile items and it takes so long to process them appropriately and really, you should be grateful that we are even considering doing something about it.

Yes, I exaggerate but there is a grain of truth in what I say.  However, the archival world is moving on.  Archives and Records Association and the National Archive (UK) run a joint annual advocacy campaign called Explore Your Archive, which encourages archives across the UK and Ireland to raise awareness of archives by showcasing their collections and interacting with people and local communities.  It takes place for a week in mid-November and has proved extremely popular.  I am embarrassed to say that so far we have only participated once and then the best we managed to do was to stick an Explore Your Archive poster on our front door!  How sad is that.

I did a quick search on the internet to see what archives across the world do for advocacy and was quite saddened to see that the answer is precious little.  However, in America, October is known among the archival community as Archives Month, during which repositories organize special events to raise public awareness of their collections.  Apart from that, it seems that advocacy is pretty much left for individual archives to deal with as they see fit.

Even though at my place of work we have done very little to promote what we do, I am actually a great supporter of advocacy.  I think it is really the one thing that can and does make a difference.  However, I think it's more than just a question of participating in a joint event once a year.  Ideally, advocacy should be a permanent state of affairs, a constant goal and something built into the archive's daily or weekly activities.  The more you shout the more people hear what you're saying!  Hmm, I think this course is beginning to have an effect on me!!

Weird images to be found on the internet

Thing 14: Augmented Reality

About a year ago I met a woman who was touring with Riverdance and while performing in Limerick asked to come and see the National Dance Archive of Ireland.  When we had shown her the premises and told her everything she wanted to know about the archive, we sat down with her for a cup of coffee and asked her how the performances were coming along.  Her greatest source of regret was that audiences seem to have lost their ability to live in the moment and to interact with a performance, being too preoccupied with recording it on their tablet or smartphone or whatever mobile application they use for the purpose.  This left her as a performer feeling ignored and undervalued, almost irrelevant.

This struck a chord with me.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not a complete technophobe and I understand the importance of teaching digital literacy to children, I just feel that we run the risk of overdoing it. Going to an art gallery and pointing your phone at a painting to find out all about it is well and good but where exactly does that leave us?  Will we get to a stage where we just point our phones at a book and it will give us the plot, character analysis, reviews and an  interview with the author thus conveniently eliminating the need to engage in a real life reading experience?  Instead of reading a book we just read about it.  And another thing: who ultimately is responsible for the information channeled to us in this manner?  Will we accept everything that is fed to us through our phones and lose our ability for critical judgement?  This is already a problem with the internet and I can't see augmented reality helping at all.  The problem lies in the very word - who augments, what, how, and to what end?

I have never understood the obsessive attachment people have to their mobile phones, and augmented reality leaves me ice cold.  I find reality is complicated enough without any augmentation and frankly how boring can your life be if you feel a compelling need to enhance it through technology or to escape from it into a virtual one?  Instead of encouraging children to watch bees buzzing in an augmented reality poster, wouldn't they be better off going for a walk in a meadow and watching real bees doing real buzzing?  Are we going to turn our backs on current issues such as climate change, energy crisis and pollution and escape into a perfect virtual world in which such issues do not exist?

There is an old saying that fire is a good servant but a bad master.  I believe the same applies to technology.  It is important to remember that technology is not an end in itself, it is a tool, and as such it is only as good as its user.  Properly harnessed it can streamline and enrich life but if given total control it will take over, enslave and ultimately destroy us.

Thing 13: Professional Organisations

I have been a member of the Archives and Records Association (ARA) since I started my Archive Administration degree course at Aberystwyth University back in 2006.  It was one of the first things on the agenda on the first day of our study school - application forms were circulated around and we were strongly advised to join.  I don't know how many of us did but I thought it made perfect sense, particularly since they had a special subscription rate for students - I think it was something like sixteen euro per year which was incredibly good value!  For professionally qualified archivists the subscription fee is tied up with your salary range - the lower your salary the lower the fee.  They also have very low special rates for the unemployed and the retired.

ARA operates nine sections of special interest that members can join - I subscribe to Specialist Repositories, Preservation & Conservation, and Film, Sound & Photography sections.  There used to be a charge of a few euro per section but these days belonging to them is free.

I have nothing but good things to say about ARA.  They publish a magazine once a month full of news and information.  Members can contribute articles about events, projects, new acquisitions and any number of other topics.  I have contributed to it a couple of times and find it a great way to spread the news within the archival community.  The Irish branch also publishes an e-zine three times a year and we have contributed to this also once or twice.  ARA also publishes a peer-reviewed academic journal twice a year to which needless to say I have not contributed...

In addition to the magazines and newsletters, ARA publishes recruitment notices twice monthly and organizes a range of workshops both in the UK and ROI throughout the year.  They also run an Registration Scheme which enables full members to pursue accreditation by ARA.  I started on this path a couple of years ago but I have to say it entails an enormous amount of work and effort and is definitely not for the faint-hearted!

I would highly recommend membership of a professional organization, it is a great support network, keeps you up to date with news and developments, provides professional advice and is useful in myriad other ways.