What does ERA Licence

What does ERA License?

ERA grants licences in accordance with the Licensing Scheme, which has been certified by the Secretary of State under Section 35 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 ('the Act'). The Licences issued by ERA under Section 35 authorise the following activities:

Recording from broadcasts made in the UK of the works and performance owned or represented by ERA members. Recordings may be made by or on behalf of an educational establishment;
Electronic communication of licensed recordings within an educational establishment.

You require an ERA Licence if you wish to use recordings of broadcasts as teaching resources. Open Univeristy programmes are covered by a separate licensing scheme. Certain rights may not be covered by ERA Members; recordings may be made of this material outside the ERA scheme under a separate licence.

In general, what can be recorded?

The ERA scheme permits recordings of broadcasts to be made for non-commercial educational use. A 'broadcast' is defined as a transmission for simultaneous and lawful reception by members of the public i.e. it is not encrypted or encoded and is for general reception, unlike pay per view services. The ERA Licence therefore covers scheduled free to air broadcasts on:

BBC television and radio
ITV Network services (including ITV2 and ITV3)
Channel Four, E4, More 4 and Film 4
Five Television
S4C

What about on-demand and interactive services?

On demand and interactive services, i.e. where the viewer or listener actively chooses the viewing or listening time or content of individual programmes, are not considered to be broadcasts under the Act and are therefore not covered by the Licence nor by any part of Section 35.

Broadcast programme services delivered via the internet, where the provider or broadcaster offers a range of fixed viewing times for the viewer to select from, are not on-demand services and may be recorded. Non-scheduled internet transmissions are not broadcasts and are not covered by the Licence.

Further terms and conditions of the Licence.