Comply With Copyright and Fair Use Guidelines in Course Materials
Duke Scholarly Communications Blog - The Duke Community’s source for advice and information about copyright and other scholarly communications issues.
Creative Commons is a nonprofit organization that provides authors and educators with tools and information on ways to protect and share their work.
The Fair Use Network helps users analyze intellectual property issues.
Know Your Copy Rights - includes a useful PDF on fair use and copyright issues from the Association of Research Libraries
This page provides only rules of thumb for adhering to copyright law and fair use standards. The information provided here is neither legal advice nor a complete guide. For more detailed information, see the U.S. Copyright Office's Copyright Basics and Fair Use; also see the Technology, Education, and Copyright Harmonization (TEACH) Act of 2002, which defines educational exemptions from copyright law.
Strategies
Use Blackboard
Materials that are to be placed online must meet the criteria for fair use. Posting on a Web site on that password protected and only accessible by students enrolled in the class improves the argument that a particular excerpt or clip is fair use. Blackboard provides such an environment for Duke faculty. Please be sure that you also consider the other fair use factors, include the amount you are using from an entire work and the nature of the original work.
Don't allow public access
Make sure copyrighted materials on your Blackboard course site are not available for guest (public) access. By default, Blackboard sites do not allow guest access. If you want to open parts of your site to the public, see the Allow Guest Access instructions for how to secure sections within your site that contain copyrighted material.
Link to existing materials where possible
For example, instead of quoting extensively from a Duke Dialogue article about the CIT Showcase (making sure to cite the author, date, publisher and title), simply link to the CIT Showcase Exhibits How Technology Is Remaking the Classroom article.
Don't re-digitize material
Before digitizing material, first check if it is already available electronically at Duke. For example, if you want to scan a chapter of a book, first see the Libraries' Placing Material on Reserve guide and contact the e-reserve group to check if the book is already available in digital form.
Reproduce only the minimum amount of materials
Once you decide which sections of complete works you will need for class purposes, distribute only those sections -- not the complete works. For example, if an assignment involves only a single scene in a movie, provide access only to that clip -- not the entire movie.
Present materials in the format that is least easily copied
For example, if you want to make a song available online, post it as a streaming media file, instead of making it available as a downloadable file.
Consult Duke resources
Duke Scholarly Communications Blog is the Duke Community’s source for advice and information about scholarly communications issues. If you need permission to use copyrighted material for more public media, such as a public Web site or a CD, Duke Libraries' Reference Services can assist in locating copyright holders. The Office of Information Technology handles Copyright Concerns about Duke Web sites. CIT can also consult on copyright and fair use issues, usually in collaboration with Duke's Scholarly Communications office.
Check the copyright status of a work
If you are using materials in a manner that would require permission from a copyright holder, you can check the copyright status of a work through the U.S. Copyright Office's Search Copyright Records: Registrations and Documents site. (Please note the site's disclaimer that its online databases contain records only from 1978 forward, and may not include records for the most recent copyright registrations.)
Further Reading
Duke Scholarly Communications Blog - Scholarly Communications Toolkit
Includes sample release forms, licenses and more.
Copyright Crash Course
A Web site from University of Texas that provides a thorough introduction to copyright and fair use.
Current Legislation and Issues
A Web site from Stanford University that provides news on copyright and fair use issues.
TEACH Toolkit
A Web site from North Carolina State University that provides best practices around the TEACH Act.
