Our website, social media and email channels are a space where we can help people learn about, discuss and engage with the National Library and Trove’s collections, services and activities. We use our channels to share our collections, to connect with the public and to allow collaboration between the Library and the public to create a valuable and useful resource.
The following guidelines establish the Library’s expectations and rules of engagement with users. We encourage and value discussion and contribution on our online channels provided it is respectful and complies with these guidelines.
Guidelines
Be mindful of others
Our online channels are used and monitored by real people that your comments directly affect. Communicate politely and respectfully as we will not tolerate personal attacks on contributors, staff members or anyone else.
Protect your privacy
Do not post any personal information on our social media channels. Any posts that include an email address, phone number, address or other personal information will be removed. We are subject to the Privacy Act 1988 which requires that we comply with the Australian Privacy Principles set out in that Act. See Privacy for more information on the Library’s privacy policy.
Stay on topic
We welcome discussion and questions, but please keep comments relevant to the original post, and don’t repeat the same message across multiple unrelated posts. Off topic posts or comments will be removed.
Respect copyright
Do not post anything that is not your original creative content or that you do not have a lawful right to post. If you are the owner of intellectual property rights and you believe your rights may be infringed by any material that is published on our social media channels, please report it to us via our Feedback page.
Social media monitoring
We monitor our social media channels Monday to Friday during business hours (9am to 5pm). We aim to respond to enquiries during these hours, but please note that some enquiries can take longer to resolve.
Where possible, we will respond to enquiries and direct messages on our social media channels. These responses may be relatively informal. If you are seeking a formal response, please send your request to us via the Contact Us page on our website.
Policy of the National Library of Australia
If any of the above guidelines or following points are breached, we may remove or edit any (or all) of your contributions, block your access or terminate your account to any or all of our online channels without notice or discussion.
You must not use our online channels to:
- Post content that is insulting, threatening or hateful towards anyone (including other contributors and Library staff).
- Abuse, harass, stalk, threaten, insult or intimidate anyone (including other contributors and Library staff).
- Post any misleading, deceptive or false information.
- Attribute any information as being sourced from the Library or the Library’s staff or any other person or source associated with the Library unless that information has been publicly published by the Library or has been specifically cleared by the Library for publication by you.
- Impersonate any person or entity, or falsely state or otherwise misrepresent your affiliation with a person or organisation.
- Spam your contribution to the site by sending multiple copies or versions of it.
- Infringe another person's intellectual property rights, including copyright.
- Post personal website addresses, email addresses, telephone numbers or any other personally identifiable information.
- Scrape, collect or store personal information of any other person or information pertaining to any group.
- Post content that incites hatred on the base of race, religion, gender, nationality, sexuality, age, political affiliation, socio-economic status, or any other personal characteristics.
- Post or upload content of a political nature.
- Post off-topic or irrelevant contributions not in keeping with the prescribed topics or themes, including links to websites and internet content.
- Advertise or offer to sell or promote any goods or services in a manner that could be considered to be for any commercial purpose unless you have written consent from the Library to do so
Please see our Privacy Policy for more on what information we collect about visitors to our websites and how that information is used; our Copyright conditions for how you may use our content; and the Trove Terms of Use.
If you are an employee of the Australian Public Service, please follow the guidance from the Australian Public Service Commission available at Social media: Guidance for Australian Public Service Employees and Agencies.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander content advice
The Library’s online channels may include content that refers to Indigenous cultural material and/or perspectives. This may include the use of names, images and voices of deceased Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. This content is developed through a rigorous consultation process that ensures the material is shared with cultural integrity, authenticity and authority.
Legal disclaimer
While every effort is made to ensure that the content posted by us on our online and social media channels is current and accurate, we accept no liability for the accuracy, completeness or currency of that information. Content of linked external sites are beyond our control. Any reliance placed upon the content on our online and social media channels as well as the content of linked external sites is strictly at the user’s own risk.
Comments and posts made by members of our online communities are the views of those individuals only and do not reflect the views or opinions of the National Library of Australia.
