Using copyrighted materials on PebblePad
The copyright compliant use of PebblePad is based on the laws of Australia. It is important that you are aware of meeting copyright compliance as a good digital citizen. Working knowledge of copyright will be helpful when working in your professional career after university.
For assessments shared to ATLAS only
You may use any type of media (images, video, articles etc) created by others if the assignment is for educational purposes and is submitted privately through ATLAS. Sharing media includes uploads, embedded codes and links.
Referencing may be required based on the assignment details. Please contact your subject coordinator or tutor for more details and the preferred referencing style for your faculty or school. Information on referencing can be found on Re:Cite.
Note regarding privacy considerations
There may be times where data and privacy is at risk when you use photo or documents (from a placement/ clinic). Please be aware of this when handling confidential data, documentation that can be used to identify vulnerable individuals, families, and communities.
For assessments shared to the Web publicly
When creating resources which is shared to the web through a public URL, you are only permitted to showcase the following type of resources:
- Materials such as reflections and journal entries that you have written
- Visual sources such as photographs and drawings you have created
- Links and embedded links to external sources (eg. Social media platforms)
- Materials that are licensed under Creative Commons
- Ensure that you understand the terms of the licence and are using the material accordingly
- The copyright has expired (i.e the materials in the public domain)
- Copyrighted materials where you have permission to upload from the copyright owner
- teaching material created by the course coordinator/ tutor is owned by the university and making them available publicly needs authorisation)
Wherever possible, link to websites or embed content as these activities do not infringe copyright. Do not link to infringing sites, or direct others to infringing sites from PebblePad, as this would be a breach of copyright.
It is best practice to reference materials that are not your own under the preferred referencing style for your faculty or school at the university.
For alumni accounts
Please refer to the information above on assessments shared on the web publicly. It is optional to reference your sources as a good academic and professional practice.
For any breaches which occur on the PebblePad alumni account, the university will not be involved in any disputes as the accounts are not through the university’s licences. Pebblepad reserves the right to remove infringing content and suspend alumni accounts in cases of copyright breaches.
Breaches of copyright on PebblePad
It is a breach of the University of Melbourne policy to use university-provided platforms such as PebblePad to share copyright materials without the permission of the copyright owner. If copyrighted materials are shared publicly, you may face disciplinary action as well as lose access to PebblePad and other relevant university systems. In addition, you may face charges from the copyright owners which may be different to Australian copyright law based on their legal jurisdiction.
More information on copyright and creative commons licenses
- University of Melbourne guide: Students' introduction to copyright
- University Copyright Office
- University of Melbourne guide: Licences and contracts
- Re:Cite
Useful resources on sourcing images for your ePortfolio on PebblePad
- Searching Flickr for Creative Commons images
- Finding Creative Commons images using Google
- Unsplash - The internet’s source of freely-usable images
- Pexels - free stock photos, royalty free images & videos shared by creators
- How to find a source of an image
For all images accessed through the PebblePad platform (such as those used for banners), these are sourced from UnSplash licensed under Creative Commons – some rights reserved. The Unsplash license allows all photos to be downloaded and used for free for both commercial and non-commercial purposes without the need to request permission needed (though attribution is appreciated). As such, any images accessed from PebblePad do not require referencing and citing.
This guide was last updated 29 Mar 2022.
Please report any errors or omissions in this guide by submitting an LMS support request.