Public Performance Rights: What you need to know!

If you are planning to show a movie or television show publically at an event, gathering, or in any space outside of a classroom setting with more than a few people, you will need to have public performance rights for that title. While some streaming service subscriptions come with public performance rights built into the Terms of Use, others require you to buy it separately or don't allow public performances at all. If we have public performance rights to stream the title, those rights extend to using a physical copy of the title as well.

The information should help guide you through the process of finding a film in the Learning Commons databases to use for your event without worrying about violating the rights of the copyright owners.

Note: All events showing a movie or television show from the Learning Commons collections should not charge admission to view it.

"Subject to these Terms of Use, Infobase grants to Subscriber and its Authorized Users a non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable, right to access the Infobase Services and Licensed Materials for educational use in classroom teaching, research, presentations, and educational, non-commercial multimedia projects in accordance with these Terms of Use."

Infobase Services Terms of Use

"All films* purchased or subscribed to through Alexander Street, whether streaming or DVD, include limited public performance rights, which includes permission for classroom showings, as well as on-campus or in-library public screenings, as long as no admission is being charged.

*Excluding FILM PLATFORM and National Theatre titles.  National Theatre titles can be used in classroom or lecture room for teaching purposes."

Alexander Street Press Resource Center

Educational use only. No content can be used for public performances. 

License and Terms of Use Agreement for the United States

If you are looking for films already in the public domain, check out these resources:

• Library of Congress Moving Image Research Center
• Wikipedia's List of films in the public domain
• National Archives Moving Image and Sound Holdings
• Internet Archive Moving Image Archive

Educational use only. A public performance license is available for purchase from Swank.

• Cost of the license depends on the title and expected attendance. 
• Two weeks notice is recommended to obtain the license.
• Swank can ship a DVD to use or you can provide your own.
• Contact the Learning Technologies & Collections Librarian for more information and a quote.

Swank Legal Academic Streaming

Swank Movie Licensing for K-12 Schools, Parks, and Businesses

Kanopy does not grant public performance rights to all titles, but many do have them. When you search for a title or keyword, you can use the Public Performance filter on the left side of the screen to narrow down the results to only titles with public performance rights.

Kanopy Terms of Service

You can check if a title has public performance rights by locating the PPR icon on the title screen