People looking for work after completing our proofreading course find that blogs are a good way of getting their businesses noticed. But some of our proofreading course graduates find that it is hard to come up with original content.

How far can you go in using copy from other websites without consent? Further than you might expect.

Legally, under the Copyright Act 1988, there is no copyright on news, facts or information. Copyright applies to the way these things are selected, arranged and presented.

So you should be safe to use them on your online proofreading course blog, provided you invest skill, labour and time to create an original product with the facts / information.

However, a court once ruled that persistent lifting of facts from a newspaper was a breach of copyright, even though the stories were rewritten each time.

The breach occurred because the court decided that the original research involved skill, labour and time.

This case involved a newspaper. But the same principle could apply if you persistently lifting facts from other sites.

So – feel free to lift facts from other websites, but check they’re correct, and make sure you rewrite them.

See our online proofreading course