Norwegian version of this page

Copyright and DUO

Information about your copyright to your own master's thesis, and your responsibility not to abuse others' copyright when you reuse their material.

Your copyright

When writing a text, the intellectual property rights are yours, given by the Norwegian  Copyright Act. You can manage these ownership rights as you please, but not relinquish your moral rights. The summary of the thesis is also to be regarded as an intellectual work.

The Copyright Act (Åndsverksloven) can be accessed at the Lovdata pages (in Norwegian).

If your text is to be published elsewhere and you have entered into an agreement to transfer the copyright to a publisher, you must obtain permission from that publisher before your thesis can be published in DUO. Contact DUO for help.

Rights of others

Use of pictures and illustrations

Pictures may, on certain terms, be used in a master’s thesis without contacting the rights holder. This is founded on the Norwegian Copyright Act, § 37. The act is not formally translated in English, the following text is our translation and clarification.

Reproduction of works of art and photographic works in critical and scientific presentation and biographies

Published works of art and published photographic works may be reproduced in connection with the text in a critical or scientific presentation that is not of a public information nature, when it takes place in accordance with good practice and to the extent required by the purpose.

The provisions of this section do not give the right to reproduction in digital form, unless it concerns a non-commercial reproduction pursuant to the first paragraph.

For master's theses and DUO this implies:

  1. Published works of art and published photographic works may be reproduced in connection with the text in a critical or scientific presentation that is not of a public information nature, when it takes place in accordance with good practice and to the extent required by the purpose.

    The use of images must therefore be in connection with the text, and not just an illustration. And it must be in a "scientific presentation", as a master's thesis is.
     
  2. The reproduction may be in a digital form, as long as it concerns a non-commercial reproduction pursuant to the first paragraph.

    This means that the thesis can be made available in DUO.
     
  3. § 37 on photographical works and artistic works also applies to photograpic images, cf. § 23 last paragraph, where it says that this applies to photographic images to the same extent that they apply to photographic works.

Pictures/illustrations not covered by the section above

If your use of images / photographs (works of art) does not fall under the points above, you as the author must apply for the author's permission in each individual case.

It is a tempting to use images found on the internet and copy these into the master's thesis. Most likely someone has copyright to these images. Unfortunately, inserting a reference of the type "Source: http: //www.nettsted.osv." Is not enough. You need to know that you are actually allowed to reuse the photos. If the photographer has put a CC license on the image, check the contents of the license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/) and how to use the image. Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page) contains i.a. images that are all licensed and are easy to use if you need illustration photos for various topics.


Referencing

You must provide accurate information about the sources you have used in your work by referencing in your running text and in a list of works cited or a bibliography.
Suggestions and tools to help you in your writing and research

Plagiarism is prohibited

Plagiarism is to to pass off as one's own the thoughts or work of another. This is considered as cheating.
Information on cheating and repercussions of cheating on UiO's web pages.

Published Apr. 12, 2011 10:34 AM - Last modified June 28, 2021 11:13 AM