Copyright and Fair Use

Ensuring Proper Citations and Use in an Academic Setting

What does it mean to be copyrighted?

Copyright is a law that protects works from being used without the permission
of the creator.

Copyright is put forth to secur[e] for limited Times to Authors and Inventors
the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries. (United
States Constitution, Article I, Section 8)

How do I know if something could be

Copyrighted?

Anything that is original, tangible, and creative falls under the rights of law in
terms of copyright.

So when does Fair Use come into play?

Fair Use is when the use of copyrighted materials falls under certain
guidelines in educational circumstances.

Some of the specifications for using copyrighted work in these circumstances

includes:

Ensuring the amount used is not excessive compared to the work as a whole

Not using the material for profit

Seeing what affect this use of material would have on the originals market

What to watch out for!

Just because you give credit/cite an author, that does not automatically mean
you are able to use material.

Just like stealing a car is not okay even if you tell everyone it is not your car, taking
original work and acknowledging the author is not acceptable.

What is acceptable under Fair Use?

It is more likely to fall under Fair Use if you are:

Using a small portion of any given work

Not distributing that portion of the material

Using it for educational purposes

While there are gray areas, there are a multitude of sites that can help to
determine the legality of using copyrighted work: Four-Step Test

Examples of Fair Use in everyday class

work

Book Reports: Quoting a portion of the book

Presentations: Using a clip of music

Research papers: Quoting a section of the findings (though not the heart of
the analysis)

These are Fair Use because they are using much less than ten percent of the total work, is
for educational purposes, credits the author, and is temporary

When do I NOT have to cite something?

If information is common knowledge, you do not have to cite the author from
whom you found the information.

This means if something can be found from several different sources, such as the
date of the start of the civil war, it is common knowledge versus a statistic from
one specific university researching percentage of students who use textbooks
regularly.

Creative Commons

This is a collection of creative works that allow for use of materials without
copyright restrictions (such as clip art), though you still need to acknowledge
where you got it from.

What is the difference between General

legal use and Fair Use?

The reason there is a distinction between these two is because in an

educational setting, the copyrighted material is often analyzed, discussed, or
reviewed with others.

General Legal use more often consists of personal usage of material, such as a
recorded television show for only the household.

So what is Plagerism?

Plagerism is any case in which a person claims to have created a work that
belongs to another individual.

Therefore, it is important to continue to give all credit to the original

author/writer/composer, even if it is only a small portion (thus quotations).

(Hollingworth, Sheila.
"Spiderweb Copyright."Pet
Hates or Pet Peeves
Cartoons. N.p., Aug. 2014.
Web. 06 June 2015.
<https://cartoonsbysheila.
wordpress.com/category/an
imals/>.)

Is there any way to use more than a

small portion?

You can send a copyright request letter to the original creator for using any
amount of a copyrighted material; in some cases, this is the best way to avoid
any possible issues especially in gray areas.

Overall, it is better safe than sorry for

copyrighted material and Fair Use

Double-checking how and why you are using material in the classroom will
help avoid legal issues.

If you want to look up other cases on Fair Use in the legal system to get a better
idea of what will be accepted as Fair Use in the United States, this index will be
useful: Copyright Cases

-Images not otherwise cited were

obtained under the Creative Commons
License