Questions about use by teachers and students
2a. When am I considered to be using a video?
2b. Can I watch a film on video?
2c. Can I record or download a film that is broadcast on TV or is available on the Internet?
2d. Can I download a photo, an audio recording, or another work from the Internet and use it in an educational context?
2e. Do I always have to take the copies referred to in 2c and 2d from a legal source?
2a. When am I considered to be using a video?
You are using a video if you watch it, show it, download it, copy it, or edit it. The copyright implications are dealt with below.
2b. Can I watch a film on video?
Yes, you can watch a film that you buy as a video in a shop, that is shown on TV or in the cinema, or that is available on the Internet. The party that sells, broadcasts, or shows the video, or that provides it digitally – all of which are types of publication (see 1b) – is responsible for acquiring a licence from the right holder(s) and for paying any licence fee involved.
2c. Can I record or download a film that is broadcast on TV or is available on the Internet?
From the copyright point of view, recording and downloading are both types of reproduction (copying). This means that you basically require the copyright holder’s permission and must pay a fee. There are, however, a number of exceptions to this principle, depending on the purpose for which you want to make a copy:
1. You do not need consent to make a copy of an entire work for your “own use” in a private setting (sections 16(b) and 16(c) of the Dutch Copyright Act), for example so that you can watch it at home at a different time to when it was broadcast. You in fact already pay for this indirectly because the price of blank videotapes and CDs includes a “home copy fee”. It is important to note that a copy intended for your own study purposes or private use may not be republished, for example by showing it in an educational context. As soon as a private copy is made public, it ceases to be in a private setting and is no longer just for your “own use”.
2. If you want to record or download a film so as to show it in an educational context, you can do so on the basis of exception 2 or 3 (see section 1g). Briefly, that exception 2 allows you to copy (and show) short works but only parts of long video works. You are also required to make fair payment to the right holder. The right to quote (exception 3) means that you can copy and publish a short section of a video – or all of a short video – in the context of an educational or scientific treatise.
As pointed out at the end of section 1g, a lot of public broadcasting material can now be used in education if the institution concerned has an Academia licence.
There are also video films on the Internet for which the maker (the official term is the “author”) has explicitly given permission for reuse (whether or not commercial). The author may have done so, for example, by means of a “Creative Commons” licence (see 6i). You can copy and show such films free of charge. You are normally required to acknowledge the source. (However, you can also play the film from the Internet, so that you do not need to make a copy beforehand.)
2d. Can I download a photo, an audio recording, or another work from the Internet and use it in an educational context?
You can copy and show photos, audio recordings (or parts of them), and other works for educational purposes if you comply with the conditions for the three exceptions referred to in section 1g, and you can also download an entire work for your own use (see 2c).
2e. Do I always have to take the copies referred to in 2c and 2d from a legal source?
No, strangely enough Dutch copyright law allows you to make copies from an illegal source. An example might be a video film that is available online for anyone to access without the person who made it available having been granted a licence by the right holder. This means that although uploading the video film to the Internet was not legal, downloading it is in fact permitted on the basis of the exceptions referred to in 2c. (An educational institution could, however, introduce a policy requiring that any copies used for educational purposes should always be copied from a legal source, or only bought in a shop).