Copyright Aid

Hi everyone

Over many years I have collected football(soccer) match programmes.

I managed to complete a set today of programmes from away games from the 60's. I would like to copy/reprint these as they are exceptionally rare and I think it's something that could provide a lot of collectors with an opportunity to fill there own collection with

These would be the away legs of the matches so I'm unsure where I would stand in terms of copyright. If any one could help I would greatly appreciate it

Hi Greg,

These programmes will still be protected by copyright as literary (and possibly artistic) works. Exactly who are the owners of the copyright in the individual programmes is less clear. I assume that the team which hosts the game is responsible for producing the programme, but it may have outsourced the job. I am not aware of any central body which could issue a licence for you to copy the programmes, so you will probably need to approach each club for permission. Given that some might say 'yes' and some 'no' to your project, it seems doubtful that you would be able to reproduce the whole set. And it is likely most clubs would ask for a fee to issue a licence if they were in favour of the venture.

But more to the point, I have some reservations about your business plan. While I imagine some fans and indeed some historians of the game might be interested in getting reproductions of the programmes, true collectors will only want the real thing. You say that the programmes are rare, but if you reproduce them in any quantity, you could undermine the value of the original. As you are probably aware, some original old programmes can command quite high prices, whereas many run-of-the-mill ones can be be bought for under £5 on Ebay, or around £7.50 on a website dedicated to selling old programmes. I have no real idea of the market for reproduction programmes, although there are some on Ebay for around the £5 and under mark. I would be unsurprised to hear these reproductions were made without permission.

I'm sorry not to be able to help more.