What is a Copyright?
Copyright is a protection that covers published and unpublished literary, scientific and artistic works, whatever the form of expression, provided such works are fixed in a tangible or material form. This means that if you can see it, hear it and/or touch it - it may be protected. If it is an essay, if it is a play, if it is a song, if it is a funky original dance move, if it is a photograph, HTML coding or a computer graphic that can be set on paper,
recorded on tape or saved to a hard drive, it may be protected. Copyright laws grant the
creator the exclusive right to reproduce, prepare derivative works, distribute, perform and play the work publicly. Exclusive means only the creator of such work, not anybody who has access to it and decides to grab it.
Fair Use.
Fair use or fair practice is utilization of a portion of a copyrighted work "as is" for purposes of parody, news reporting, research and education about such copyrighted work
With out the permission of the author. Use of copyrighted works, or portions thereof, for any other purpose is not deemed fair use, so be careful! That includes copying text or scanning pictures from postcards, magazines, books or any other work. Scanning a photo of the Amazon Forest printed in National Geographic and using it without permission on your personal web site about your family trip to South America will most likely not be considered as fair use. However, if such photo is of the Amazon Forest and you use the photo in a web site dedicated to describing the crusade to save the Amazon Forest, this would most likely be considered as fair use. You still have to credit your source by
naming the author of the work on the same page. In any event, it is always safer to take the time and effort to contact the owner and request permission to use the owner's work, and more likely than not the owner will be very appreciative and give you a favorable response.
Many think that one may take someone else's work, whether it be writings, graphic images, midis and the like and use it in an "educational" work without obtaining the author's permission or giving credit because it is "fair use". When you wrote a term paper in school, didn't you credit your sources? Even if you paraphrased the author's original words, or if you feel that you don't need the author's permission because it falls in this vague concept of fair use you must credit your source's hard work by naming your source as a reference. This is a requirement under copyright legislation. If not, you'd be committing plagiarism.
Copyrights and the Internet.
Public domain - not! When visiting a web site, it is so easy to click and save with a
mouse button when one sees a graphic image that one likes, or to view the source code
and copy part of or all of the HTML coding because one "likes the way this or that was done" or one "wants a similar layout", or to copy original writings because "that person expresses this or that so well". The general (and incorrect) notion is that anything that is
on the Internet is public domain and may be taken without permission from the creator/owner. Some people actually think (incorrectly) that just because bits of web pages may be stored in one's cache, or because certain browsers allow one to do "file save as" moves or anything similar one may use such material as you wish. These are false statements. Just because your backyard is not inside of your house, is it in the public domain? Does that give anybody off the street the right to step foot into your backyard without your permission, even if they can see it from the street, or easily access it? Well, the same applies to material published on the Internet. Such material may be copied if - and only if - the information is created by the (i) federal government, (ii) if the copyright has expired or (iii) the copyright has been abandoned by the holder. Therefore, "internet" and "public domain" are not synonymous...any work published on the internet is not automatically placed it in the public domain, unless the material in question complies with one or more of the characteristics mentioned.
I have read and understand this handout about the copyright laws concerning use of the Internet.
Signed________________________________________ Date____________________