A basic understanding of copyright, fair use, the TEACH Act, and intellectual property is necessary before using and developing OER in order to minimize the risk of violating the law. You are encouraged to visit one or more of the many online tutorials exist which address these topics.
The fair use doctrine, as codified in §17 U.S.C. 107, sets forth four general factors to be considered when evaluating whether a proposed use of a copyrighted work is a fair use and thus, does not require permission from the copyright holder.
The four factors are:
- What is the purpose of the proposed use?
- What is the nature of the copyright work to be used?
- How much of the copyrighted work will be used?
- What is the effect on the market or potential market for the copyrighted work?
The TEACH Act is updates copyright law for digital online education as a compromise effort to address the copyright restriction disparities between digital classroom and the traditional classroom in terms of performances and displays. TEACH Toolkit provides checklists and a “best practices” as well as basic information. Under the Teach Act, faculty can use copyrighted material in their online courses without seeking the author's permission under the following circumstances:
- The college must be accredited and nonprofit.
- The college must have an internal policy on use of copyrighted material and on copyright law.
- The college must provide printed or online resources for faculty members that describe their rights and responsibilities under copyright law.
- The material must not have been originally intended for educational use.
- The material must have been lawfully acquired
- The material must be an integral part of the class session.
- Reasonable precautions must be made to restrict access to the copyrighted content to students enrolled in the course.
- Other reasonable controls must be used to prevent students from disseminating the material after viewing it.
- If a digital version of the material is readily available for use at the institution, then the instructor cannot convert an analog version to digital form for use in an online course.
- The college must inform students that the material may be protected by copyright law.
Watch the video introduction to Creative Commons (CC). CC is a nonprofit organization that provides authors with(free tools to manage their intellectual property. A CC license allows others to reproduce a licensed work when they give credit to the license holder. The CC website has a tool that generates licenses (in HTML format) based on chosen criteria. Educause provides good summary of 7 Things Series You Should Know About Creative Commons
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