Most text and images are covered by copyright. So if you are using someone else’s text or images, you usually need permission (a licence).
The Copyright Agency manages five types of licences:
Statutory EDUCATION licences
Educational licences are set out within the Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) and cover educational institutions including schools and universities. The Copyright Agency’s role is to administer the licences, collect and distribute royalties, and negotiate some of the terms on behalf of copyright owners.
Private Education Providers and Registered Training Organisations (RTOs)
In addition to arrangements with peak bodies for schools and universities, the Copyright Agency also has individual agreements with more than 1,000 other educational institutions, including Private Education Providers and TAFEs.
Statutory Government licences
The Copyright Act enables Commonwealth, State and Territory governments (the Crown) and persons authorised in writing by the Crown to make an unlimited number of uses of copyright material for the services of government.
Copyright Agency provides these government agencies or department with an indemnity to ensure your department or agency is protected against legal proceedings by having pre-determined terms for the use of copyright material. Additionally, since Copyright Agency has been declared by the Copyright Tribunal as the collecting society for government copies of works and published editions of works, government departments and agencies are no longer required to notify copyright owners of use when they have entered into an agreement with Copyright Agency.
Commercial licences
Many organisations choose to take out a Commercial licence to free their business activities from the risk of copyright infringement. The Copyright Agency sets the terms and administers these licences.
The Copyright Agency offers pay-per-use licences for:
And annual licences for:
- Commercial Businesses across sectors like Banking & Finance, Energy, Property and Health.
- Local Governments
- Religious Associations
MEDIA MONITORING licences
Copyright Agency provides licensing for Media Monitoring Organisations to use our members content in their businesses.
As part of those licence arrangements, Copyright Agency Licensed Media Monitoring Organisations act as Copyright Agency’s agent to provide limited internal sharing rights to their clients for the use of newspaper and magazine content, via the ‘Downstream Licence’.
Visual arts licences
If you are looking to use an image of an artwork in your next book, advertisement, film or merchandise, then you’ll need to request a image licence to allow the use of the artwork and you may need to pay a fee.
At Copyright Agency we can help manage the end-to-end Visual Art licensing process for you.
EXCLUDED WORKS: Some works aren’t covered by some of the licences we offer as agent for our members. These exclusions do not apply to educational institutions and government departments and agencies covered by statutory licences. See excluded works.
