Before you can request permission to use copyrighted material you must know one very important item: who owns the right to grant permission. That right does not always belong to the author of the work. With books, it is often the publisher who holds permission rights. The info is generally found on the reverse side of the title page where all other copyright information is listed.
In today’s Internet world, many publishers now include how to ask for permissions along with what they consider fair use (word count varies widely). Some sites include tabs directly labeled “rights” or “permissions” or both. In other cases you may have to do a bit of searching on their site to find the information, and in other cases you will have to contact the company to gain more information. When what I’m looking for isn’t obvious, and a search yields no results, I often have success by referring to the “Contact Us” page.
Here is a list of information permissions grantors will need (please realize this is not an exhaustive list of the information you may be required to supply, and varies from publisher to publisher):
- Who you are
- Title of work you want to quote
- Author of work
- Copyright year of book
- Page quote appears on
- Word count of the quote
- Your intended use, i.e. online, book, greeting card, etc.
If your intended use is in a book, they’ll want to know:
- Title
- Author
- Publisher
- Date of publication
- List price
- Estimated print run.
If your intended use is on the Internet, at a minimum they’ll want the web address.
All these things determine the permissions fee. (Yes, there is a cost to using someone else’s material.) If you do not expect monetary gain from your use, tell them. It may lower the permission fee.
So you can get a better idea of how all this looks, here is a link to Baker Publishing Group’s online permission request form.
If this seems too overwhelming to you, and you have the money to spare, you can find assistance from the Copyright Clearance Center or from freelance permissions consultants.
Does online research intimidate you? Leave a comment below.
Debar L. Butterfield © 2013