Hi Candace and all,
To the extent that this is an issue of giving proper credit where
credit is due, you might look at the Prints and Photographs room of
the Library of Congress. They have an excellent discussion of image
copyrights, permissions, and credit lines on their website. They do
not claim copyright on most of the images in their collection, but
they do request a credit line. They frame this credit line as a
professional courtesy. "Such a credit furthers scholarship by helping
researchers locate material and acknowledges the contribution made by
the Library of Congress. Example:
Wright Brothers collection, Prints & Photographs Division, Library of
Congress, LC-ppmsca-04598."
http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/195_copr.html
If you think that there is confusion on the part of your institution
and the volunteer, resulting in erroneous framing of the copyright of
or permission to use the images, then you might want to check out
Susan Bielstein's book Permissions, A Survival Guide: Blunt Talk about
Art as Intellectual Property. She is the art editor at the University
of Chicago Press, and discusses the rights of artists, photographers,
sitters, museums, and others. She also discusses the concept of fair
use. Her style is very readable, and I highly recommend it.
http://www.amazon.com/Permissions-Survival-Guide-Intellectual-Propery/dp/0226046389/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1311351894&sr=8-1
Assuming that this volunteer does good work for your institution, then
it seems to me that you have a win win situation on your hands. The
volunteer helps you out while her independent work is progressing.
That said, given that there is frustration in the air maybe this is
actually a situation where the volunteer's skills are not useful, and
she could be told that their services are no longer needed.
All the best,
Travis
On Fri, Jul 22, 2011 at 11:06 AM, Candace Perry
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> I have a difficult issue with a complicated volunteer situation. We have an
> individual who volunteers here as a cataloger and researcher. This person
> also does personal research in our collections, but there have been times
> when the personal research and the volunteer work overlapped. She also
> volunteers for another local organization.
>
> During her time here she has taken many digital photographs, which I and my
> colleague in the archives have permitted, in part believing (which now is
> apparently wrong) that this was part of her volunteering. For awhile now I
> have been seeing her use images from our collections which she then attaches
> the copyright symbol and her name to, which I understand in theory, but am a
> bit – well, frankly annoyed – because she did not discuss this with anyone
> here. And I don’t know whether this automatically gives her free rein to use
> our images. They aren’t anything all that great – some of them have actually
> been pretty bad, image wise.
>
> Furthermore, she submitted an article for the journal that is associated
> with our organization – not our journal, but with the church with which we
> are affiliated – and has put her copyright info on that also, although it is
> a church publication. The article has to be proofread and edited, and there
> are several actual typos and some other problems. Her copyright info is also
> on the images in the article, not just ours but those of the other
> organization she is working with.
>
> I becoming increasingly concerned about this, and now I need some
> professional help – in more ways than one! She is a bit of a difficult sort
> – I won’t go into that – and I am very reluctant to start conversations with
> her as I either get too many apologies or defensiveness. Neither is fun.
>
> Any suggestions? Thanks!
>
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--
--------------------------------------
Travis Nygard
[log in to unmask]
www.travisnygard.com
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