Common Academic Uses of Copyrighted Information
Fair use
The exclusive right to copy, distribute, make derivative works, display or perform copyright-protected work is held by the copyright owner. However, copyright law provides several important exceptions to this rule. The best known is fair use, which was created to allow the public to make limited use of copyrighted material without seeking permission from the copyright holder.
For purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, copyrighted work may be used without permission and not be considered an infringement of copyright. All educational use of protected works is not necessarily allowable, however. The purpose of the intended use is only one of four factors to be considered. Users are advised to conduct an analysis of the four fair use factors for each item they wish to claim a fair use exemption.
Know Your Copy Rights: Using Copyrighted Works in Academic Settings: a brochure and website developed by the Association of Research Libraries to help educators make informed copyright decisions, located at
http://www.knowyourcopyrights.org/
A Fair Use Analysis Checklist is available at http://www.copyright.iupui.edu/checklist.pdf.
For the complete text of the fair use statute, see http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#107.
Summaries of Fair Use Cases
http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter9/9-c.htmlFair Use Network: Information & Resources for Free Expression
Copyright Scenarios
http://blog.lib.umn.edu/copyinfo/scenarios/cat_teaching.htmlClassroom handouts
Instructors may hand out copyrighted material to students in a class under certain circumstances. For more information, see: http://www.copyright.iupui.edu/classroom.htm.
Course Management Systems (BlackBoard, WebCT, etc)
Instructors must consider copyright issues when placing protected materials in a university course management system, applying fair use or seeking permission. See the Copyright section (IX) of the SU Computing and Electronic Communications Policy at http://cms.syr.edu/policy/computepolicy.cfm.
Course readers
Agencies such as the SU Bookstore that prepare and sell course readers (coursepacks) secure copyright permissions for the items they include and build those costs into the selling price of the compilation.
Distance Education (ISDP)
The 2002 "TEACH Act," completely revised Section 110(2) of the U.S. Copyright Act governing the lawful uses of existing copyrighted materials in distance education. For more information, see the American Library Association's Distance Education and the TEACH Act resource guide.
Library Course Reserve
The Library applies fair use principles when making materials available on reserve, whether print or online. All reserve materials are either library-owned or provided by the faculty member. For SU Library policy, see: http://library.syr.edu/information/reserves/index.html.
Library online content
Licenses governing the use of library full text databases, electronic journals, and other digital resources may follow fair use or may have more or less liberal use restrictions. Please note that the terms of a license will generally prevail over copyright law. By making use of licensed material, you have inherently agreed to its license terms, even if those terms limit your fair use rights. Librarians can assist in determining what uses are permissible under each license.
Permissions
In cases where the fair use analysis weighs against using any particular item, the user should seek permission from the copyright holder. For more information on this process, see http://www.copyright.iupui.edu/permhome.htm or http://www.cetus.org/fair7.html.Reproduction: Photocopying or Scanning
Reproduction of small portions of copyrighted material is permissible under current copyright law. See Section 108 of the law for library exemptions: http://straylight.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000108----000-.html.
Video/DVD
Generally, videos and DVDs may be shown in a face-to-face classroom setting during the regular course of instruction. Most other showing of videos or DVDs would constitute a public performance and permission must be obtained in writing from the copyright holder or via various 'umbrella' licensing companies. There is usually a per-showing fee for public performances. http://www.copyright.iupui.edu/pubperf.htm.
Web page content
University policy does not permit the posting of copyrighted material on University Web servers without permission of the copyright holder. Section IX of the SU Computing and Electronic Communications Policy states:
Accordingly, you may not copy and/or distribute any materials of a third party (including software, database files, documentation, articles, graphics files, audio or video files) unless you have the written permission of the copyright holder to do so.
Full policy is available at http://cms.syr.edu/policy/computepolicy.cfm
 
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