Our Digital Collections include some materials which are still within their term of copyright protection. These materials include original texts, images, graphics, artworks, videos, audio recordings, lyrics, and dramatic works. The user of materials from our collections is responsible to determine whether copyright or other intellectual property laws govern a particular item for their proposed use(s). Libraries do not own or administer the copyright to most materials in their collections. For helpful assistance regarding all other aspects of our collections, including any special usage permissions granted by certain donors, contact the L. Tom Perry Special Collections, BYU Library, by telephone (801) 422-3175 or email specialcollections@byu.edu.

Generally, with the exception of sound recordings, in the USA the basic copyright term has expired for materials published more than 95 years ago (or more than 120 years ago for unpublished materials or materials created anonymously or made for hire). Where the copyright term for an item has expired, such material has automatically entered into the public domain and thus may be reproduced and otherwise freely used without permission or restriction of any kind.

In cases where the copyright term for a particular item has not expired, if the proposed use is for purposes of classroom instruction, private study, scholarship, research, or if the amount used is a fair use (17 U.S.C. § 107) for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, etc., then the use of any copyrighted work is not an infringement of copyright. For all other uses including reproducing, republishing, posting, transmitting, distributing, translating, or adapting the in-copyright item for other purposes, the user of that item must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

If citing materials from our digital collections, our preferred notation is: Original held in L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 84602.