SPECIAL NOTE, APRIL 2020:
Because a lot of people have been asking me this…
QUESTION: IS IT OK FOR TEACHERS, LIBRARIANS, AND OTHERS TO READ THE RABBIT & BEAR BOOKS (AND INDEED CHILDREN’S BOOKS GENERALLY) ALOUD TO CHILDREN OVER THE INTERNET?
SHORT ANSWER: YES! (SHORT LONG ANSWER, AND LONG LONG ANSWER, BELOW.)
SHORT LONG ANSWER
Background: I write the Rabbit & Bear books (which are so brilliantly illustrated by Jim Field). And, for the past few weeks, teachers have been asking me (through my website, on Twitter, and by email) if it’s OK to read Rabbit & Bear aloud to their students in virtual classrooms, over the internet, etc, while the coronavirus crisis continues. (Some teachers and kids were very upset, because they’d been halfway through the book when their school changed to distance learning, and they’d been told by the school to stop for legal reasons.) Rather than answer the same question again and again down different private channels, I thought it would be easier to put up a long public reply here, with all the information, and direct people to it. Please feel free to share this information, because much of it applies to children’s books generally, and it’s clear that not everybody understands how much things have changed for the better, legally, in the past few weeks.
Anyway, the short long answer: YES, no problem. It is now totally legal for you to read any of the Rabbit & Bear books to your kids, whether in the classroom or over the internet. Teachers, librarians, booksellers… you can all do it. We’ve changed the rules, so there are now no copyright issues. And yes, you can even record these readings, and even put them up on Youtube, or whatever. (Note: There are a couple of longer-term limitations, specific to recordings, detailed in the longer answer below. But it’s perfectly legal and safe to do all those things right now and for the next few months.) Personally, I am delighted that you want to read my stories, and I am incredibly happy that children want to hear them.
LONG LONG ANSWER
OK, here’s the very long answer, for people who want all the juicy details, or are simply interested: The legal situation was cloudy several weeks ago, when this first became an issue. Obviously I was – like most children’s authors – totally in favour of such readings. They are merely the continuation of something that was happening perfectly legally in classrooms anyway. And it would be utterly sociopathic for children’s book writers to try to stop online classroom readings. We just want kids to be able to hear good stories…
The problem was that such readings, once they took place over the internet, were, technically, in breach of copyright. Why? Because, as far as the law was concerned, they were electronic transmissions – whether broadcast, or narrowcast – which could be recorded. And those electronic transmission rights were held by the publishers, not the authors; so even if the authors directly gave you permission, there was a legal grey area, and nervous schools didn’t want to take the risk.
So I got in contact with the CEO of Hachette (David Shelley, a lovely bloke), and the head of Hachette Children’s Group (Hilary Murray Hill, a terrific woman), and explained the problem. (I knew them from an excellent meeting we’d had in London last year, with very classy biscuits.) They got back within the hour to say that they’d been contacted by a number of other authors about the same problem, and that as a result they had put Hachette’s lawyers to work, sorting it out, so that teachers would be legally protected. (My splendid agent, Charlie Campbell, also got involved, and worked with Hachette on this.)
These things are tricky, because there’s a really complex mesh of rights involved: you want to be fair to everybody, but most children’s authors (with about five famous exceptions), live on stale crusts of bread and the rainwater they catch in a rusty bucket; so you don’t want the publisher to look up absent-mindedly from their desk and say, “Sure, no problem, everyone can do what they want” – and then discover weeks later that they have accidentally given away all their authors’ rights to anyone who wants them, and Disney have started broadcasting everybody’s books on Disney Plus without paying, and now all your authors have starved to death.
Anyway, within 24 hours Hachette had drawn up a legal document that allowed teachers to do their thing. (That’s REALLY FAST, for lawyers, especially in a situation this complicated.) I’ll paste in the whole text below. So if you’re a teacher, and you want to read Rabbit & Bear to your kids online, and your school is nervous, point them here. This document covers all of Hachette’s children’s books, not just mine, so if you’re reading Cressida Cowell’s How to Train Your Dragon, or Dave Almond’s Skellig, or Enid Blyton’s Five Go Mad On A Space Station, it’s all good. (Hachette’s children’s imprints are: Hodder Children’s Books; Little, Brown Books For Young Readers; Orchard Books; Orion Children’s Books; Quercus Children’s Books; Pat-A-Cake; Wayland; Franklin Watts; Wren and Rook; Enid Blyton Entertainment.)
Other publishers have done similar things: Here’s a link to the statement from Penguin Random House, for instance. That covers a BUNCH of children’s imprints, and thousands of children’s authors.
So, basically, if you want to read a particular book online, but you’re not sure if that’s legally OK, check if the book’s publisher has announced a copyright permission waiver. More publishers are doing this all the time. Here is a great list of such permissions, from the website Teen Librarian.
A last, personal note: It’s been incredibly moving to hear from teachers who love the books, and whose kids love Rabbit & Bear. Writing each book, I tried to give children some of the knowledge they might need to navigate life: basically, each book contains something I wish I had known when I was five, or six, or seven, or eight… So, hearing that kids love the stories, and get something out of them, is deeply moving. Please, carry on reading!
-Julian Gough, April 2020
HERE’S THE FULL TEXT OF THE LEGAL WAIVER FOR TEACHERS, LIBRARIANS, BOOKSELLERS, ETC…
Hachette Children’s Group: Open Licences and Permissions for Online Story-Time and Classroom Read-Aloud Videos and Live Events – information
In order to encourage reading and classroom read-aloud experiences, and to support schools, bookshops and public libraries forced to close by the COVID-19 situation, Hachette Children’s Group is permitting authors, illustrators, teachers, librarians and booksellers to create and share story-time and read-aloud videos and live events on closed educational platforms or streamed temporarily on a live platform.
GUIDELINES FOR EVERYONE
Teachers, librarians, booksellers, authors and illustrators providing content for children during the period 19th March to 30th September 2020:
Should announce the title of the book and the name of the author and/or illustrator as part of each video
Should notify us via email (addressed to HCG.editorial@hachettechildrens.co.uk) when they post or stream a story-time or read-aloud video or live event, providing the following information:
I. Name and address of the library, school, or shop
II. Title, author and ISBN of the book that is read
III. Contact information for the individual responsible for the reading
IV. The educational or social media platform on which the video or live event is posted or held and a link to that video or live event
Financial gain
For clarity, permission is granted only for free use of the readings. If you are planning to charge for any use of these recordings, you should contact HCG.editorial@hachettechildrens.co.uk in the first instance, seeking formal agreement, which may not be granted.
Guidelines for educational settings
School story-time or classroom read-aloud videos in which an Hachette Children’s Group book is read aloud and the book is displayed may only be created and posted to closed educational platforms
These storytime and classroom read-aloud videos may be hosted on the educational platform until the end of September 2020, after which they must be removed from the educational platform, unless this permission is extended by formal agreement
Guidelines for public libraries and bookshops
For authors, illustrators, booksellers and librarians who wish to provide a story-time reading or other read-aloud experience to young people who would otherwise visit the library or bookshop in person:
Story time or read-aloud live events in which an Hachette Children’s Group book is read out loud and the book is displayed may be streamed live, in real time, on social media platforms such as YouTube, Facebook Live, Twitter, and Instagram
These story time or read-aloud live events may not be maintained in the archive of the social media platform and appropriate measures should be taken to ensure that videos of the live events are not retained. Because these platforms automatically archive live events by default, when your event has concluded, please locate the recorded live video in your account (YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.) and delete it.