By The Editors

The editors, EAO news service, 20-07-24 -- Let us begin by thanking and congratulating the very many contributors, Salesians and members of the Salesian Family in EAO, to our austraLasia (email service) and bosco.link (web) news service. This service is now more than a quarter of a century old, and perhaps one of the most valuable repositories of the anecdotal history of a region in existence in the Congregation.

We need to share a problem with you, one that has arisen in a fast-changing world where conflict and more restrictive legal requirements are more likely to rear their ugly head! We are all 'citizen journalists' these days, and we need to be both good Christians and upright citizen journalists. The issue we often have to face is that a contributor sends in photos or images to accompany a news item that are not ‘original’, and indeed have been downloaded from some non-Salesian site. Even (and perhaps especially!) if that site is the Vatican, or a diocesan or other Catholic website, materials on those sites are usually still covered by copyright. Any use of their materials requires permission in writing.

The problem goes beyond just the single use of such items. If we publish a copyrighted image, there is every possibility that someone else will download that same image from bosco.link and they too, then, unwittingly become implicated in the copyright violation. This is not an imaginary situation - it has already happened.

The consequence for you, the contributor, then, following this appeal of ours, is to request that you verify your choice of photos/images that you wish to accompany a news item, and under no circumstances include items that may come under some copyright provision. We have to say that in 99% of cases, all these accompanying photos and images are 'Salesian', original and authentic, so it is not an everyday problem and you should not feel unduly alarmed by our request. It is the 1% that is of concern, and we cannot afford (morally yes, but not even financially afford!) errors in this matter. If such a problem does occur, our only resource is to pass the problem back directly to the contributor and leave them to resolve the issue with the legal bodies who follow up such copyright violations.

Thank you for your attention to this issue.

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