Including material of others

To use other people’s copyright content including data you must get permission from the rights holder (usually the creator), unless you can use the content under the following:

Using an insubstantial part

You won't infringe another person's copyright if you only include an insubstantial part of their material in your research. Assessing what is a substantial part can be difficult as substantiality is determined on a qualitative, rather than a quantitative basis, so each situation will need to be assessed on its own merits. Therefore, very small portions of material may represent an important, distinctive or essential component of the original.

Under licence

Look for a Creative Commons licence or symbol, a section which details other permissions (use of allowed for x,y,z purposes), or information about the copyright ownership of the data.

Under a Fair Dealing or other exception

Copyright legislation includes certain 'exceptions' to the rights of copyright owners, which allow limited uses of copyright material without having to obtain permission. These are known as the Fair Dealing exceptions.As a researcher you are most likely to use Fair Dealing for the purpose of 'research or study' in the preparation of your material though this does not apply when making available publicly, and you may rely on 'criticism or review' in specific circumstances. These exceptions allow limited uses of other people's material as long as the use is 'fair'.

Obtaining permission

Contact the copyright owner and ask for permission if you are unsure if you can use the material. How your research is used will also affect the type of permission you will need. Most publishers have a permissions contact point, and seeking permission is standard practice.Gaining permission to use content is a regular copyright activity, and for more information refer to the permission page.