Contributing organizations will remain legally responsible for their items/materials, including consideration of copyright, privacy, ethics, and/or contractual limitations on use. Items/materials should not contain anything defamatory, libelous, or otherwise violating the rights of third parties.
Contributing organizations will most often not own the copyrights for items in their collections, but will be able to legally make items available if they believe their use of the items to be permitted by law. Contributing organizations are wholly responsible for deciding when they are legally able to make materials available, and documenting those decisions. MDL will work to provide training and systems to support applicants and contributors in making and documenting these decisions.
Contributing organizations may sometimes own the copyright in items in their collections and in these cases, participation in the Minnesota Digital Library will be considered to grant a non-exclusive license to the MDL to make those materials available to the public, and to exercise any rights needed for the MDL's mission.
Contributors may always provide suggested attribution/citation language for item records, but must describe copyright ownership as accurately as possible.