Cover lesson · History · Year 10 · Intermediate

Historical photos and copyright

DCF: Citizenship → Digital rights, licensing and ownership

Name: Class: Date:

Cover teacher — you need no subject knowledge

Print: this sheet, one per pupil, and the stimulus sheet “Wales at Work: six photo records and the rules”, one per pair. No computers are needed. Everything pupils need to decide is in the rules box on the stimulus sheet.

Run: 5 min — read “The project” and “The rules” aloud · 7 min — Step 1, true or false · 10 min — Step 2, work out the copyright dates · 15 min — Step 3, the decision grid · 8 min — Step 4, write two credits · 10 min — Step 5, write a permission request · 5 min — swap with a partner and check the grid against the rules.

Collect: this sheet. This is not legal advice and pupils do not need to be lawyers: a pupil who reads the rights statement, applies the rules and says “ask first” when unsure has done the task.

What you are doing

Historians use other people’s photographs all the time, and old photos feel as though they belong to everyone. Some do. Many do not — and the same photo can be fine on a classroom wall but not on a website, or fine on a website but not in something you sell. You are going to decide, photo by photo and use by use, what your class may do with six pictures for an exhibition called Wales at Work, 1900–1990.

Step 1 — true or false?

Use the rules box. Write T or F, then correct any false statement in a few words.

Statement T / F If false, what is true?
1. If a photo comes up on a search engine, it is free to use.
2. If nobody knows who took a photo, nobody owns the copyright.
3. Copyright in a photo usually lasts until the end of the 70th year after the photographer died.
4. If I put the photographer’s name under the photo, I do not need permission.
5. A CC BY-NC-SA photo must not be used in something that is sold.
6. A plain scan of an out-of-copyright photo is unlikely to be a new copyright work, but the website that supplied it can still set terms of use.

Step 2 — when does copyright run out?

Use rule 2 for a known photographer and rule 3 for an unknown one. Show the adding up.

Photo Year the photographer died (or, if unknown, the year published) + 70 = Public domain from 1 January… Still in copyright this year?
A
B
C
D
F

Photo E is missing from the table. Why can nobody work out its date yet?

Step 3 — the decision grid

For every photo and every use, write ✓ (yes), C (yes, on conditions — say which) or ✗ (no — ask permission first). Add a short reason. Use the rights statement first, then the rules.

Photo 1. Classroom display 2. School website 3. Fair booklet sold for £3
A
B
C
D
E
F

(a) How many of the six photos can go in the booklet without asking anyone? Which ones?

(b) Photo B is out of copyright, yet the archive says “all rights reserved”. Explain the problem and what you would do about it.

Step 4 — write the credits

Write a full TASL credit (title, author, source, licence) for Photo C and for Photo E, exactly as it would appear under the picture.

Photo C:

Photo E:

Step 5 — ask permission

Your class really wants Photo D on the school website. Write the email to the Gwasg y Gogledd picture desk, 80–120 words. Say who you are, which photo (use the reference number), exactly how and where it would be used and for how long, that nobody will make money from it, and how you would credit it.

Step by step

  1. 5 min — Read “The project” and “The rules” on the stimulus sheet.
  2. 7 min — Step 1: true or false.
  3. 10 min — Step 2: the copyright dates, with the working.
  4. 15 min — Step 3: fill all 18 boxes of the grid, then answer (a) and (b).
  5. 8 min — Step 4: two TASL credits.
  6. 10 min — Step 5: the permission email.
  7. 5 min — Swap with a partner. Check any box where you disagree against the rules.

Success criteria

If you finish early