Digital Legal deposit

Learn more about digital legal deposit, what to hand in, how to hand it in, and where to do it.

Employee at shelves with CDs

Photo: Thomas Søndergaard

The Danish Legal Deposit Act forms the basis for complete collection and preservation of the part of the cultural heritage that includes published material.

Since 1697 Denmark has collected printed cultural heritage due to the Legal Deposit Act. With the current law and its immediate predecessor, legal deposit has been extended to include publications other than print - most recently internet material as well as radio and TV.

Digital legal deposit

Today, many materials are published in digital form only. As a cultural heritage institution under the Danish Ministry of Culture, Royal Danish Library collects and preserves both physical and digital cultural heritage. Some digital materials we collect automatically, but there is a lot of content we do not receive.

We therefore encourage record companies, publishers, authors, musicians and others associated with digital music publications and e-books to hand over the publications to us, so you help us preserve Denmark's cultural heritage. You do this by uploading your publications right here on our site.

If you have material for legal deposit that cannot be uploaded here because it is neither digital music publications nor e-books, you are welcome to contact us.

Before you upload, please ensure that you have the music files available in the correct format, as well as information about the publication (contributors, titles, release year, etc.). You must log in with MitID in order to upload.

What file types do we need?

The music files must be in one of the following formats: wav, aiff, flac, m4a, aac, mp3, wma or ogg.

We automatically receive all Danish music that is distributed to Danish music streaming services.

If you have arranged for publication for these in Denmark, e.g. YouSee Musik, you do not need to upload your publication to us.

Before you upload, please ensure you have the e-book file available in the correct format, as well as information about the publication. In order to upload you must log in with MitID.

What file types do we need?

The e-book file must be in one of the following formats: pdf, opf, epub, ibooks, azw, azw3, kf8, kfx or mobi.

We automatically receive all e-books and audiobooks distributed through Publizon. Therefore, you do not need to upload your publication to us, if you already distribute your books through Publizon.

If you represent a publisher or a digital distributor, please feel free to contact us so we can give you access to upload the publications collectively.

Programmes broadcasted on local radio stations is considered cultural heritage, and the local radio stations is an important element in the Danish media image. The Danish Legal Act gives Royal Danish Library the task of collecting and preserving Danish media,including material from local radio stations as part of our cultural heritage.

Please help us by sending us a copy of the programmes broadcast on your radio station during week 46 every year. We also need a copy of the list of programmes. We automatically collect material from the national radio stations as well as the stations which are streaming their programmes online, but we are unable to collect material from local radio stations automatically.

Before you upload, please ensure you have all the programmes/audiofiles available in the correct format, as well as a digital copy of the list of programmes. In order to upload you must log in with MitID.

What file types do we need?

The audio files must be in one of the following formats: wav, aiff, flac, m4a, aac, mp3, wma or ogg.

Please contact us, if you have any questions.

Royal Danish Library is the national archive for staged professional drama (plays, TV and radio drama, musicals). The submission is a practice that has been developed in consultation with the Danish Writers Guild. As an employee of a producing theatre, a theatre company, a drama-producing media institution (for example DR Drama) or as a translator or playwright, you can regularly upload works.

Remember to enter all rights holders (playwrights, translators, editors, writers), the premiere date and the place where the work premiered. In the case of co-productions, state the premiere date the manuscript version relates to. That is, if it is Aarhus Theatre that uploads, it is the date that is linked to the production at Aarhus Theatre.

Regarding children's theatre drama: Some children's theatre productions play over a number of years. If there are significant changes in the script, one can choose to upload the version from the original premiere and the version played today. Then enter as the release date the original release date in one version and the time the later text originates from.

You can only upload one work at a time.

As we have found that a number of theatre programmes are no longer printed, we have a trial scheme where you can also link the programme text to the performance and other relevant performance material.

If the theatre or theatre group that performed the play does not appear on the list of captions, write to kb@kb.dk att. the theatre collection - then we make sure to add the theatre or theatre group.

We have no file format requirements.

You identify yourself by either the theatre's MitID (as an employee) or with your own MitID (as a rights holder).

If you have any questions, feel free to contact us.

What happens to the material

  • Once we have received your upload, we will preserve the content for posterity in accordance with the rules and guidelines in force at any time. Royal Danish Library provides access to the content to the extent possible in accordance with applicable legislation, including the Copyright Act.
  • You can find the Legal Deposit Act at retsinformation.dk