Copyright and the right to reproduce documents or images

Thus far on this blog I have downloaded and used a number of images from the National Archives of Australia and NASA. These images are subject to the copyright laws of the country of origin or various international agreements or Australian legislation. Constant Reader, being a librarian I know more than the average citizen about Australian copyright (but less than any lawyer), however, I forgot to address the copyright question for material I post on my own blog - a common problem.

Copyright law is designed to protect the rights of the creator/producer of the content from unauthorised reproduction, use or reuse. In some cases the rights conferred by copyright law can be waived, transferred, sold or given away; however, users of material can not, or should not assume that they have an automatic right to use said material. Copyright law in Australia and in other jurisdictions imposes penalties for unauthorised use of material. In using images found on the Internet or elsewhere, and other third party content one should not blithely assume a) that no one will notice your use or re-use or care or do anything about it; b) that you have automatic permission as long as you quote the source of the image, et cetera; and, c) that copyright does not apply at all.

In Australia the relevant Commonwealth act is the Copyright Act 1968, including various amendments and regulations, which allow individuals certain limited rights (e.g. "fair dealing") without having to contact the copyright holder in every case. These exemptions are narrow in that they apply to particular situations; they do not grant people broad exemptions from copyright.

The Act is administered by the Commonwealth Attorney-Generals Department; the text can be found at ComLaw (http://www.comlaw.gov.au/). Good, plain English information on copyright in the Australian jurisdiction can be found at the Australian Copyright Council website (http://www.copyright.org.au/). For Australian librarians there is also the Australian Libraries' Copyright Committee (http://www.digital.org.au/alcc/).

In general terms you must do the following if you are going beyond the provisions of the Act before you use third party content:

1. Identify the copyright holder, person or organisation;
2. Contact that person or organisation to ask permission to use the content. The holder may grant use (as did the NAA to me), deny use (subject to the provisions of the Act) or allow use subject to conditions (again subject to the Act);
3. If you have any doubts about what you are doing or posting seek reputable advice (this blog-post is information, not reputable advice!) - e.g. the Australian Copyright Council and/or legal advice.
   

The copyright holder is not obliged to grant you permission beyond what is conferred by the Act.

So for me, on my blog, what is the situation? First I looked at the NAA website to see if they say anything about copyright and archival material. They do. NASA, for the space images? Ditto. From NAA Fact sheet 8 - Copyright:

"Ownership of copyright in records held by the National Archives

The Commonwealth government owns copyright in most of the records held by the National Archives as they are official records produced by Commonwealth government agencies. The Commonwealth is not the copyright owner for records in the Archives collection that were not made by the government, for example letters written by private individuals to the government, or documents provided by other governments. Although such records are the property of the Commonwealth, the Commonwealth cannot give permission to reproduce them, as it is not the copyright owner." (http://www.naa.gov.au/about-us/publications/fact-sheets/fs08.aspx)

NASA on its website in a document titled, Using NASA Imagery and Linking to NASA Web Sites, 10.13.05 (i.e. 13 October, 2005) says, in part, the following:

"Still Images, Audio Recordings, Video, and Related Computer Files

NASA still images; audio files; video; and computer files used in the rendition of 3-dimensional models, such as texture maps and polygon data in any format, generally are not copyrighted. You may use NASA imagery, video, audio, and data files used for the rendition of 3-dimensional models for educational or informational purposes, including photo collections, textbooks, public exhibits, computer graphical simulations, and Internet Web pages. This general permission extends to personal Web pages." http://www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelines.html)

Result: email the NAA Copyright people; okay by NASA as per their October 2005 guideline. Apply the copyright symbol and attribute the images.

And finally, the emailed response from the NAA, dated 23 December:

"Dear Peter,

Thank-you for your email. The normal procedure for Copyright approval would be to submit a request to copyright@naa.gov.au with the Series Number and Item details and a brief description of the intended use prior to use, but there is no problem asking for approval now.

For the material that you have used in your blog on the Internet, I give you Copyright approval for its use.

We normally request that the records are cited ...

There is no charge for use of material held in the National Archives of Australia.

Yours sincerely
Gregory F Cope
Copyright Officer
National Archives of Australia
Brisbane Office"

Voyage of the Goya, September-October, 1949

A belated reading yesterday of the NAA's series notes for Series A11760 provided more information and clarification. The series notes on the NAA database told me that the ship my father traveled to Australia on was the S.S. Goya, departing Naples, Italy on 25/9/1949 and arriving Sydney, 23/10/1949. The note informs that the file for this voyage of the Goya, including the list of passengers is Department of Immigration file A434, 49/3/21770. Further, that file is accessible on the NAA database (see above images, to enlarge click on the image); my dad's name appears on p. 29 of the passenger list as passenger 848 (now I understand what "848" on his file means).

The NAA series note for A11760 states in part:

"The ship's nominal roll is a list of all the passengers that were on board when the ship sailed from its port of departure. (The nominal roll for this voyage of the Goya is on file A434, 1949/3/21770). Each passenger is given a nominal roll number and these numbers have been used as the item control symbols for this series.

There were 890 Displaced Persons on board the Goya when it left Naples on 25 September 1949.

The Goya arrived in Sydney on 23 October 1949.

The passengers disembarked and were transported by train to the Department of Immigration Reception and Training Centre, Bathurst."

The note partially answers a question I have, "What happened when he arrived and where did he go?" The answer appears to be the Department of Immigration Reception and Training Centre, Bathurst.

Images: © Commonwealth of Australia, 2004, 2008.

First fruits: NAA comes through

A staff member of National Archives of Australia emailed me yesterday to tell me that a digital copy of my father's immigration file is now accessible.

As mentioned in an earlier post the file title indicated that it contained migrant selection documents, well that is exactly we have, a range of administrative paperwork:

• Processing Centre index card (1 card, 2 sides) (see the images above: for an enlargement click on the image);
• I.R.O. Resettlement Registration form (4 pages);
• I.R.O. Resettlement Medical Examination form (1 sheet, folded into 4 pages); and,
• I.R.O. Emigration X-Ray card (1 card, 2 sides; chest x-ray attached).
  

The file was created and maintained by the Commonwealth Department of Immigration, Central Office as file A11760/1. All in all the file contains 12 pages and holds the assessments carried out to verify my dad's suitability (background and medical) for emigration to Australia. The file is quite dry stuff, however, a first examination did turn up some interesting crumbs of information. Once I digest its contents I will discuss it in a future post (yes, Constant Reader, its really a ploy to keep you tuned in for future installments). A couple of things I can say immediately, the alteration of his surname occurred prior to his arrival in Australia, and not here as family lore has it; the documents also allow me to construct a rough list of dates and places and occupations for my dad back to 1937. There is not much detail but there are leads to follow.

The file's series notes (i.e. series A11760) on the NAA database provide additional useful information, namely details such as the ship's name, S.S Goya. The moral here is read the series notes!

A major line of inquiry will be with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (www.unhcr.org). The UNHCR is the successor body for the UN International Refugee Organization (IRO) with the IRO being wound up on 31 December, 1950 and the UNHCR commencing operations on 1 January, 1951. Its a safe bet that the UNHCR may have inherited the IRO archives or know where they are. If the archives exist and are accessable I can track dad before he came to the attention of the Australian authorities.

The IRO was established in July 1947 as a non-permanent body of the UN and was intended to assist the millions of refugees like my dad in the post war period; due to difficulties encountered with the Soviet government the IRO worked only in the areas occupied by the western armies.

The file is viewable as a digital copy at the NAA web site (www.naa.gov.au)

Images: © Commonwealth of Australia, 2008.

Earth and Moon from space

The Voyager 1 image I posted earlier started me wondering about how many times the Earth-Moon system has been imaged or photographed from space. The Voyager image quoted was the first image from deep space, that is, out side the Earth-Moon system, however, it was not the first image of the system, that honour goes to Lunar Orbiter 1.

The image was taken 16:36 GMT on 23 August, 1966 and shows the eastern far side of the moon; the Earth is 380,000 kms away and the terminator (day-night boundary) runs through Odessa, Istanbul, and slightly west of Capetown. To see the a larger version click on the image.

The Lunar Orbiters were sent into space by the US during 1966 and 1967 to photograph the entire surface of the moon at close range. NASA before the Apollo Program could proceed needed to identify potential landing sites, and it also needed to decide how safe those sites were. Lunar Orbiter was a reconnaissance mission designed to do this. Once the program was over all five machines were crashed into the lunar surface so as not to present a hazard to the Apollo spacecraft. As a result of the program 99% of the lunar surface was photographed at a resolution of around 100 meters or less. Information on the Orbiter Program cam be found at NASA (http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/lunarorb.html)

The NASA-JPL Photojournal (http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/index.html) allows the public world wide to see many of the images taken by US (and many non-American) spacecraft, click on the image map or press the "Search Methods" tab at the bottom of the page.

Image credit: © NASA/GSFC, 1966.

Big and close moon for 2009 and a blue moon

As an amateur astronomer I take a keen interest in what is happening above our heads, but apparently not keen enough!

My mother during a recent telephone call asked if I'd seen the moon the previous day, I answered, "Yes", and asked her why was she asking, because although she does look through my 'scope on the odd occasion, she is no-way as keen as her son. The answer, it turns out, was that there had been a piece in the evening TV news.

What was being discussed was the occurrence of the instant of full moon with the moon being at the closest point in its orbit to the Earth (the perigee of its orbit); this occurred on 12 and 13 December and although not common is not rare. The conjunction of these two phenomena has two results: higher than usual tides (king tides), and the moon appears larger than usual in the sky. Nick Lomb at Sydney Observatory explains all the mechanics in his post for 15 December (www.sydneyobservatory.com.au/blog/?p=1535).

So I don't miss the next, Constant Reader, I give the circumstances of the event, which is the only one for 2009: 10 January (perigee, distance 357,497 km, 10 pm AEST); 11 January (full moon, 2:37 pm AEST).

While checking my facts and figures for the above I noticed that December 2009 will have two full moons. This means the second December full moon (31 December) can be called a blue moon.

Image: The Earth & Moon as seen by the Voyager 1 spacecraft, 18/9/1977. Distance: 7.25 million km. Moon is at 11 o'clock position.

Image credit: © NASA/JPL, 1977.

Being processed

The $16.50 has been sent (by credit card) and my request for a digital copy of my Dad's file is being processed, according to my online NAA order account. Imagine my surprise tonight when I checked my mail box and found a white envelope from the National Archives, "they've sent photocopies!", I said and opened the thing right there in my drive way. As I was ripping it open a stray thought occurred, "the envelope's not very big or fat, what if the file only had one page in it?"

Nothing of the sort, just an efficient federal public servant sending me a form letter (explaining the NAA's services), a payment advice form and some advice as to the costs involved with the various access options. I did glean from that I may have to wait 20 working days for my digital copies to appear and that the NAA will email when they are available. Disappointment.

Multiculturalism - Australian style

In early November I purchased All of Us by Michel Lawrence, a Melbourne based photographer who specialises in portraiture. This is my second encounter, my first was in June when I purchased it for work. Then it made an impact on me. All of Us is a collection of large format colour photographs of immigrants and refugees who have made Australia their home. Michel, in the two years he worked on this project, had a number of goals, but chiefly to "... understand more about Australia today and the people who live here." And the catalyst for this journey - seeing the Cornulla Beach riots of December 2005 on the TV news.

The book connected with me for multiple reasons. At the first viewing (for work) it sold itself with its short and snappy biographies of the people who make up Australia, there was a genuine attempt to find people from all corners of the globe; this might speak to, and connect with some of the students enrolled in ESOL, TPC, welfare/social work courses at my VET college. And finally, for the fine arts students, the portraiture offered good examples of photography that says someting.

Last month at my second look my reasons for liking it were far more complex and personal. While filling in time browsing in a bookshop the cover again caught my eye. The stories of the people, and in particular of the author's father, Maxie, had paralells with my own father. Maxie survivied the Pacific War, and came to Australia in 1946 "because it seemed new and safe"; my father arrived in October 1949 as a refugee from the European War, Australia was a place to start a new life and a haven from the chaos and suffering and uncertainty he had gone through between 1941 and 1948. Many of the biographies in the book are laced with the theme of Australia as a place of safety.

I am also deeply interested in photography and to me many of the photographs tell their own stories. Many show the quiet dignity of the subjects; other portraits show an edginess and wariness in the subject; several people show an obvious pride in their backgrounds and culture and in living in Australia. In short, the shots have an impact as documentary photography.

This book I could relate to, through my understanding of my father's (and mother's) experiences. All of Us shows to me that many others shared similar experiences, heartaches and joys, and found a home in Australia. It helps me better understand my country and her people, in that realising that I concluded that Michel Lawrence succeeded in the task he set himself. I have one criticism of the book: the majority of the subjects came from Melbourne and its environs and not all over the country.

Bibilographic/Availability & Price details:
All of Us / Michel Lawrence. Melbourne, Vic. : Scribe, 2008 (ISBN: 9781921215193 - in hardback; price $AUD 59.95).

There is a companion website at http://www.allofus.com.au/

First success at the NAA

This evening I decided to re-visit the National Archives of Australia web (www.naa.gov.au) to see if any decision was reached about access to the immigration file on my father held there. A few weeks after his death I took an educated guess that Customs or Immigration may have created a file on him and I was right.

Using the Name search at the NAA website I found a listing for a file created by the Department of Immigration, Central Office in September 1949. At the time of my first enquiry the file was marked "Not yet examined", meaning it had not been assessed for release. So I emailed asking for access and checked tonight to find the file is now marked "Open" and that a decision on the file's status was made on "27 Nov 2008". Bureaucracy does not always move slowly.

And the name of the file: "Migrant Selection Documents for Displaced Persons who travelled to Australia per Goya departing Naples 25 September 1949". The listing (and name on the file) for Dad gives the Serbian spelling of his name and the anglicised version. Now I just need to order a copy of the file; apparently I can do this online and view a digital copy of the file (for $16.50) or a photocopy can be sent for $25.00. I think I'll go digital as the wait for the post would kill me.

Finding the 3rd Man

To you out there in the Blog-world, greetings,

I am about to look for my dad (above, Dad, aged 24 or 25, ca. 1948 from his UN IRO control book).

If you know me (and its very likely you don't) you will say that's strange or stupid as he died on 28 October and he lived in Australia for 59 of his 85 years. Yes, you're right, but it is the years before 1962 that are a big black hole; the years before he met and married my mum. There are some fragments, some scraps he passed on; things he told mum and a few things to me, much, however, he never talked about - ever. That's quite a contrast to my mum's family: I know lots, where they came from, who they are, there are photos going back four (or five) generations, et cetera.

So I am going to look for my dad and doing what I do for a living provides some clues as to where to start the search. I have some names and the name of place he was born in. He's gone and there is no one who I know who knew him before 1962; no one before he arrived here in 1949; but maybe I can follow the record trail and that may lead to other information (and maybe, if I am very lucky, people).

Hello World!

Hello all, welcome to the Complete Peter! This is a blog about my world and the stuff that interests me (and hopefully you will find interesting and fun).