Developed in consultation with Laura Gasaway, Professor of Law, University of North Carolina. Revised July 15, 2004
As a non-profit educational institution, we enjoy certain exemptions to the Copyright Law, which allow instructors and Library Reserves to make copies of materials within "fair use" guidelines. The four "fair use" factors are used to determine if a use is fair by considering: the purpose of the use; the nature of the copyrighted work; the amount/substantiality of copied portion; and the potential market effect. The Copyright Act of 1976 offers these four factors as guidelines for analyzing a variety of situations where instructors may wish to make copies and thus allows for individual interpretation of these factors on a document-by-document basis.
At William Paterson University, "Fair Use" of copyrighted material is generally defined as the one time use of:
Repeated use, from year to year or semester to semester, requires permission from the copyright holder.
The Library will seek permission for Reserve materials when items submitted do not meet the "fair use" guidelines.
Yes. Out-of-print does not mean that the work is no longer protected by copyright.
The author is not necessarily the owner of the copyright. If the publisher, by contract, holds the particular rights for reproduction, then the Library will contact the publisher for submissions exceeding "fair use" guidelines.
The absence of a copyright notice does not mean that the work is not protected. The Library will determine copyright ownership by contacting the publisher of the work that you wish to place on Reserve.
Yes. If use of the materials exceeds the "fair use"guidelines, or is for use a second semester, permission must be obtained. "Repeated" use makes it necessary to get copyright permission after the first (spontaneous) use.
No. The Library will pay the royalty fees, up to $100 per course. We will contact instructors when the permission costs are prohibitively expensive.
Lending Services staff members will seek copyright permission. The Copyright Clearance Center is a permission-granting service, which contacts publishers and posts costs based upon date of publication, length of document and number of students enrolled in the course. For those publishers not registered with the CCC, granting permission may take a day or several weeks.
A publisher may provide permission for only a specific amount of time after which permission might have to be obtained and paid for again. Terms of permission may vary.
Yes, if the amount of use exceeds the "fair use" guidelines. No, if we link to the electronic version of the content or place the entire book or media title in the Reserve stacks.
We need to seek permission whenever copying or reproduction is involved. If the materials submitted for Reserve exceed the "fair use" guidelines or are for use a second semester, the Library will need to obtain permission.
Yes. The WPUNJ bookstore has a coursepack service called XanEdu. Some publishers also provide anthology creation from their websites. If you do not use a textbook for your class, this is the best option for you and your students, especially since a course pack is usually less expensive than a textbook.
No. We do not need to seek permission for materials published before 1923.
No. This would clearly infringe on both the copyright and the license granted to the rental store.
Many film and video libraries and distributors offer the rental or purchase of videos with "public performance rights" for a higher fee. If public performance rights are purchased, then it is permissible. The public performance right is what is needed to show a video in a non-teaching situation.
No, as long as this is the first instance that you have copied and distributed this item. An instructor may make one copy per student of a single chapter from a book, article from a periodical or newspaper, a short story, essay or poem or a graphical work - chart, cartoon, diagram for discussion or classroom use within the guidelines of "fair use," in this case interpreted as, brevity and spontaneity of use. These copies may not be used to create an anthology or be made from workbooks or exercises. Copies may not be distributed in future semesters without first seeking permission.
Yes. An instructor may make one copy per student of a single chapter from a book, article from a periodical or newspaper, a short story, essay or poem or a graphical work - chart, cartoon, diagram for discussion or classroom use within the guidelines of "fair use,"in this case, brevity and spontaneity. Library licensing fees for subscription databases allows faculty, staff and students to access information and to make a copy for educational or research purposes.
These copies, however, may not be used to create an anthology or be made from workbooks or exercises. If use of the materials exceeds the "fair use"guidelines, or is for use a second semester, you will need to obtain permission. "Repeated" use makes it necessary to get copyright permission after the first (spontaneous) use.
Yes. Using tapes licensed for "Home Use Only" is considered a fair use in a face-to-face teaching situation. A face-to-face teaching situation implies a classroom setting with only the instructor and students present. It does not extend to showing tapes for entertainment or to students or others not in the class. The "classroom" can be an auditorium or other suitable space, as long as the activity is still a part of the established curriculum.
No. The current guidelines exclude the creation of video compilations. However, FilmClipsOnline.com offers film clips for free.
Yes, you may include portions of copyrighted works when producing your own multimedia project for teaching in support of curriculum-based instructional activities as long as it follows permissible amounts. For motion media it is up to 10 percent of the total or three minutes, whichever is less. For music, you may use up to 10 percent of the work, but no more than 30 seconds of the piece. The fair use of copyrighted material in multimedia projects lasts for two years only. After two years, obtain permission before using the materials again.
The Cheng Library has licenses for accessing databases, which allow instructors to create links to articles within the databases. You need not "copy" these articles, but can simply link to them.
Fair Use Guidelines allow you to copy/reproduce limited amounts of a lawfully acquired copyrighted video for educational purposes. The general rule of thumb for this is no more than 3 minutes or 10% of the whole work, whichever is less.
A web site's URL is not copyrighted; it is simply an address to that site; therefore one may include a link to that site. It is always good practice to seek permission from the creator of the site before you link to it. It is easy to send an email to a webmaster, and you may be surprised how quickly you receive a response.
The Teach Act extends the existing "classroom exemption" in using copyright works to digital distance education. It also expands the categories of works that can be used besides non-dramatic literary and musical works. It allows them to be digitized for distribution when no digital version is available; however, only limited portions of works may be transmitted unless permission from the copyright holder is given.
Yes, this is fair use. If the site is protected and does not allow for guests in this area, then it is considered permissible.
Yes. An instructor may make one copy per student of a single chapter from a book, article from a periodical or newspaper, a short story, essay or poem or a graphical work - chart, cartoon, diagram for discussion or classroom use within the guidelines of "fair use", in this case, brevity and spontaneity. These copies may not be used to create an anthology or be made from workbooks or exercises.
No. If use of the materials exceeds the "fair use"guidelines, or is for use a second semester, you will need to obtain permission. "Repeated" use makes it necessary to get copyright permission after the first (spontaneous) use.
The graphics, text, and content as well as the overall design of a web page are protected by copyright from the moment they are created. If you cannot easily identify the owner of the information, you may want to think twice about using it as a resource. In this case, credit the source of information and make every effort (and document your efforts) to contact the author/designer of the pages for permission. You may wish to ask a Reference Librarian for assistance in contacting the web page owner.
No. Permission is required any time you paste a portion of someone's page onto your page. A better option is to link to the entire page.
You should seek permission to scan (copy) photographs and other images/graphics if your use exceeds the "fair use" guidelines.
No. Legitimately acquired material may be used in classrooms. However, under the current law, no professor may redistribute such material over the Internet or any other medium. You may use it, but you may not redistribute it.
WPUNJ is responsible for student behavior on campus. By working together, we can help to inform students that file-to-file sharing is indeed piracy and illegal. Consider showing these two short educational videos (interview with a student who was convicted of a felony for his downloading activities) to your students: http://www.cwu.edu/~its/property.html
Yes, this would be considered fair use. MP3.com pays for its archives, so the material there is legitimately acquired. Be wary of some of the other peer-to-peer sites and determine whether they are legitimate or pirated.
Contacting the Copyright Clearance Center is a good first step. If the CCC is not able to grant permission, it may provide you with contact information for the copyright holder. Or you can email or write to the publisher directly.
Copyright protection and intellectual property rights are flip sides of the same issue. As authors/creators, individuals may wish to exercise their exclusive intellectual property rights by prohibiting the reproduction of their materials by others, except as permitted by the various US copyright laws.
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Draft May 10, 2004, revised July 15, 2004
As a non-profit educational institution, we enjoy certain exemptions to the Copyright Law, which allow students, instructors and Library Reserves to make copies of materials within "fair use" guidelines. The four "fair use" factors are used to determine if a use is fair by considering: the purpose of the use; the nature of the copyrighted work; the amount/substantiality of copied portion; and the potential market effect. The Copyright Act of 1976 offers these four factors as guidelines for analyzing a variety of situations where students may wish to make copies and thus allows for individual interpretation of these factors on a document-by-document basis.
At William Paterson University, "Fair Use" of copyrighted material is generally defined as the one time use of the following:
Repeated use will require permission from the copyright holder.
Copyright is a protection extended to authors and others under federal law (Title 17, US Code) for various types of creative works, for example, literary, musical, dramatic works, digital media, artistic and intellectual works. The owner of a copyright has the exclusive right to copy, display, perform, distribute the work or create a derivative version of the work.
A copyright exists as soon as a work is saved in a tangible form. It is not necessary to register a copyright with the US government and a copyright notice is not necessary for protection. You should assume that works are copyrighted unless labeled otherwise.
There are, however, certain materials that are not protected by copyright law, such as materials in the "public domain." Some materials published by the US, state and local governments and those with expired copyright protection (generally occurring 70 years after the death of the copyright holder) are examples of documents in the public domain.
Both concepts relate to the use of another person's ideas expressed in writing or creative expression---in other words, another person's "intellectual property." The University's Undergraduate Catalog defines plagiarism as:
"the copying from a book, article, notebook, video, or other source material, whether published or unpublished, without proper credit through the use of quotation marks, footnotes, and other customary means of identifying sources, or passing off as one's own the ideas, words, writings, programs, and experiments of another, whether or not such actions are intentional or unintentional." (William Paterson University. Undergraduate Catalog, 2001-2003, p. 42)
Copyright, on the other hand, is a protection afforded under federal law. Owners of copyrights have the exclusive right to copy, display, perform, distribute and create derivative versions of their works. This means that unless your use of a journal article, a book chapter, a play, poem, musical composition, video etc. falls within the exceptions to copyright protection known as Fair Use, you may not copy, display, perform, distribute or create derivative works without expressed permission from the copyright holder.
Both kinds of actions are illegal. Theft usually means taking something owned by someone else (stealing) and is a violation of criminal law. Copyright infringement means copying, distributing, performing, displaying or modifying a copyrighted work beyond the parameters permitted by Fair Use without the expressed consent of the copyright holder. Copyright infringement is a violation of civil law.
Every member of the University community is responsible for complying with the copyright law. Educators in non-profit, educational institutions such as ours, are permitted to copy, distribute, etc within the guidelines established by the Fair Use exception. This means that your professors may distribute copies of limited portions of materials in class for use in their teaching as long as they do so within the framework established by Fair Use. It also means that you, as a student, may generally copy small amounts of a work for your own personal study and research without obtaining permission from the copyright holder. However, if your need or purpose exceeds the guidelines of Fair Use, permission must be obtained (How to Obtain Copyright Permission). Copyright law also protects your work from unauthorized use by others. Be sure to include your contact information in all print, digital and multimedia works you create so that others may request your permission if their use exceeds the Fair Use guidelines.
Yes. By including your name and contact information on every web page, presentation or paper you create, it is easy for others to contact you for permission. When may I use a copyrighted work? Students follow the same permissions and fair use guidelines as all other members of the university. Students using copyrighted materials need to abide by US copyright law. You may legally use copyrighted materials in some circumstances. You must ask the copyright holder for permission to use a copyrighted work unless your use is covered by one of law's exemptions, such as Fair Use.
You may legally copy, display, perform, etc. copyrighted materials in some circumstances. You must ask the copyright holder for permission to use a copyrighted work unless your use is covered by one of the law's exemptions, such as Fair Use. You should assume that everything you find on the Internet is copyrighted unless labeled otherwise. Web pages are copyrighted as a compilation work combining text, images and design. Logos, photographs and other images, although easily cut and pasted, are also protected by copyright laws.
Try search terms such as "copyright-free images" and " public domain images" in your favorite search engine or use especially created, copyright and royalty-free "clip-art" anthologies. Always check the introductory material to be sure there are no copyright, licensing or other restrictions involved.
Technology, such as Peer-to-Peer software, has made creative works widely available through the Internet. Sharing digital music, movies and software is illegal without permission. Copying and sharing images, music, movies, or other copyrighted material, or purchasing a CD or DVD and then making copies for others is illegal. File sharing copyrighted material using software such as KaZaa is illegal. To learn more about this, we recommend these two short videos about illegal downloading: http://www.cwu.edu/~its/property.html where you can hear from a student who was convicted of a felony for his downloading activities.
There are "pay for play" subscription sites such as E-Music and Peoplesound where you may legally obtain MP3s and other digital files. Licensing is required for installing software. This essentially pays the permissions for you to use the information. Loading software without the appropriate licensing or copying software without permission is illegal. Depending upon the type of media, small portions of music, motion pictures, and text may be used for educational purposes, such as in-class presentations. Please see the Educational Multimedia Fair Use Guidelines: http://ccumc.org/copyright/ccguides.html
Yes, students may incorporate portions of lawfully acquired copyrighted works when producing their own educational multimedia projects for a specific course. They may perform and display their own projects in the course for which they were created and they may retain these projects indefinitely in their own portfolios as examples of their academic work for later personal uses such as job and school interviews.
Yes, up to 10 percent or 30 seconds, whichever is less, of a lawfully acquired copyright musical work may be reproduced, performed and displayed as part of a multimedia program produced by a student for a specific course.
Yes, as long as it is used as part of the class instruction. Hard news and certain news event programs broadcast by commercial stations may be recorded. Where there is no commercial advantage as provided under Section 108, these programs may be kept for archival purposes.
Last Updated: 10/19/2006 A. Joachim
William Paterson University
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