The Bates Digital Media Studios provide cloud-based video storage in support of teaching and learning at Bates.This is a finite and costly resource, so the following policies have been developed to keep the service sustainable, fair and useful for all.

This document pertains only to the Media Portal currently provided by Ensemble.

• For guidelines on uploading, please see the Bates DMS Standard+Practices Guide
• For guidelines on where to upload Bates DMS produced content, please see the Bates DMS Digital Strategy doc.

 

Usage Policies

The Bates Media Portal is made up of four types of “libraries”.

 

Individual Faculty/Staff Libraries

All faculty may request a Library with 25GB of storage on the Bates Media Portal.

An individual Library is available for the duration of employment.

In keeping within academic fair use, there are no content restrictions but faculty are asked to consider using the Library to only store active teaching materials and not as a personal archive.

 

Student Libraries

In most cases, students are not eligible for personal libraries, but they may login and be associated (with permission of the owner) with a faculty, departmental or class library. Faculty should request student access in writing.

 

Departmental Libraries

Departmental Bates Media Portal Libraries are for “public facing” content and – with special permission – certain types of departmental “archives”. The Bates DMS maintains a special library for event videos, so in most cases departments will not need their own libraries. However, departments that regularly record events (for example Theatre or the Harward Center) may find having their own library to be advantageous.

Generally, in this context “public facing” is content that is shared with an audience outside the college and may include public lectures, events and “produced content”.

Content used explicitly in courses or content that is copyrighted (and Bates or the department do not own the copyright) should not be stored in departmental Libraries.

Departmental Libraries should be requested by a department head and need a designated “department contact/owner”.

Department Libraries are allocated based on available space and must be renewed once a year (June 1st). Failure to renew the Library will result in automatic removal of the Library and all materials stored within.

For departments wishing to use their library as an archive, their request will be reviewed by the College Archivist for eligibility. If the request is denied, the DMS will work with the department to find another option for archiving.

 

Class Libraries

Class Libraries are specifically for classes producing media content. They offer a shared location for students to upload completed projects. They are not for teaching materials (teaching materials should be stored in an individual Library).

Without exception, class Libraries are deleted 7 days from the end of term (where end of term is the last day of exams).

Faculty interested in preserving work from class Libraries (to share with future classes or for presentation in a conference, for example) may transfer student work to their personal Library or ask the DMS staff for assistance in transferring the files to portable media, but they cannot keep the course Libraries active between semesters.

 

Class Capture Libraries

Class capture Libraries have no quota and can only be used with Bates classroom capture equipment.

Class capture Libraries are deleted at the end of term. Faculty interested in preserving class capture recordings for future use may transfer the files to their personal Library or ask the DMS staff for assistance in transferring the files to portable media, but they cannot keep the Class Capture Libraries active during the semester.

> IMPORTANT: It is possible to transfer materials stored in one Library type to another. However, transfered content cannot exceed the set quota. (i.e. If my personal Library is empty, but I then transfer 10GB of content from a class capture Library to my personal Library, I now only have 15GB of storage remaining).

Increasing individual (faculty/staff) storage

 

Faculty who exceed the 25GB storage quota may make a one-time request for an additional 10GB. These requests will be granted on a space-as-available basis and are not guaranteed.

 

Usage Evaluation vs. storage quotas

In recognition of the fluidity and constantly changing landscape of cloud based media sharing, the DMS staff will reconsider individual storage quotas on an annual basis. i.e. It is not our intent that 25GB will be a permanent quota – this number simply reflects the currently availability of the resource based on current projections.

 

Additional Policies

 

Security and Safety of Content

While every possible attempt has been made at securing your content – it is best to think of all content on the Bates Media Portal as public. The BMP is designed as a publishing platform – sort of the modern equivalent of a personal TV station. As such, you’re always a click or two away from sharing your content with your colleagues, your class or even the world.

If you’re considering sharing sensitive or copyrighted materials via the Media Portal, please consult the BMP administrator first. It is possible for us to add additional restrictions beyond our usual default security – and there are times, in consulting with senior staff, that we may advise against using the BMP to post certain content.

Copyright

Copyrighted content should not be stored on the Bates Media Portal unless it fits within the concept of Academic Fair Use as defined by the Bates chief copyright officer. Do not assume you are covered by

Academic Fair Use – Bates determines the eligibility of the fair use of copyrighted content on a case-by-case basis. If you do not own the copyright, you should NEVER upload an entire copyrighted work to the Bates Media Portal.

Accounts vs. Libraries

An account is a user/password combo to login to the BMP.

A library is a storage unit for media within the BMP.

One account may have access to multiple libraries or an account may have access to NO libraries.