copyright and fair use

Winnie21

Hi All,

Anyone know how the copyright / fair use rule works in Ireland?

I am interested in making children's books - these will use classic stories or nursery rhymes e.g. the three bears / hey diddle diddle. I would also like to use recent stories by recent writers e.g. the gruffalo. These will all be seperate books and not compiled into one volume.

I want to donate these to schools / libraries that would use them. This will be voluntary and not for commercial use / gain.

Anyone know if I am allowed to use these original stories freely? 7

Thanks

aidan_walsh

Might be worth having a read of the relevant education level page here.

not even wrong

"Fair use" does not exist in Irish copyright law, it is an American concept. Instead we have something called "fair dealing", which is considerably more limited.

Writing your own retelling of old fairy tales like the three little pigs is fine -- most of these tales date back centuries so the characters and plots are long since out of copyright. Simply reprinting other people's modern versions verbatim or rewriting modern original stories like the Gruffalo is likely to get you sued, even if you're not selling the books.