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Academic Libraries Remediating “Born PDFs”

We currently offer a service that collects older static PDFs of library/research content and provide faculty with a URL (or permalink) to that resource in our library’s digital collections. This service provides the following enhancements:

  • Increases accessibility as links will always test as accessible in Brightspace (DLE/LMS)
  • Enhance student discovery of library resources.
  • Provide more accurate usage metrics that influence library subscription decisions.

Occasionally, we come across an old scanned PDF of a book chapter or scholarly article that we do not subscribe to.

Our question is: If we publicly offer to remediate (as best we can) published content that we do not subscribe to or own so that faculty can place an accessible version of them in their course shells, are we violating copyright? Keep in mind these materials would only be shared with students of specific courses and would be available only through the learning management system that requires a login.