How Lithuania gamified learning about copyright and rights statements for cultural heritage

Producing a ‘how-to’ guide for labelling cultural heritage

Our aim was to prepare an exhaustive methodology drafted specifically for librarians, museum workers and archivists, on how to label cultural heritage content when it is digitised and made available online. We wanted to create a step-by-step ‘beginners’ guide on how to first of all define if the content is ‘legally available’ for digitising/uploading online and it it’s not, how to try to make it available. Then, to help people choose the right label for online content (either a Europeana rights statement or a Creative Commons licence).

Taking our guide to the people

We hosted a series of seminars across the country travelling to different regions and presenting our methodology, and solving ‘cases’. We tasked people with making their own evaluations and choosing appropriate labels.

An evolving process

With time, we realised we needed a more simple solution - something quicker and more attractive. We also decided to involve additional audiences - not only GLAM workers, but also arts students who are potential users of digitised content (musicians, designers, etc.). 

We transformed our methodology from a written document to an online tool, with yes/no questions. The result? A tool that provides them with an answer as to whether the content can be published online, and if so, under which licence. Here it is: http://cc.lnb.lt/ (but it is only in Lithuanian, sorry).

That wasn’t our only language problem. When we were testing the tool with students, we had to try to use language that was understandable to the layperson and to not use purely legal terms, at the same time as making it understandable for GLAM professionals without using their jargon.

Making labelling content into a fun topic

When it was finished, to spread the word, we gave music and arts students a challenge - to create something new and then to upload their creation, having first used our tool to check whether it was legally appropriate and to find the right rights label. 

We chose to perform and record an African drums jam session. As it was live music, created on site, it was easy to figure out who to credit as author, co-author etc, and to decide on the rights of reuse. 

Here are some examples of things they came up with… 
 

What we’re doing next

It was all a lot of fun (and hard work, but more fun), and I hope to proceed with similar projects in the future. 

We are currently in the progress of making two explanatory videos about the benefits of rights labelling. One is specifically designed for GLAM  professionals and another is for an audience of creators.

The Lithuanian National Library has translated the Europeana rights statements into Lithuanian and they are now pending review. 

Once adopted, translations will be added to the interactive tool and published on rightsstatements.org. We believe that the availability of rights statements in our native language will foster the labelling of digitised cultural heritage objects across the country and encourage collection curators to do this important work.

Visit the interactive rights labelling tool and ‘how-to’ guide at http://cc.lnb.lt/ (Lithuanian version only) or check for the latest updates of the project at www.lnb.lt