I Searched…

I Found It Online…       

Now, Can I Use It?

Copyright: What Is It?
The law of the United States that protects the works of authors, artists, composers, and others from being used without permission. The copyright law tries to balance the rights of artists and others with the rights of the public. Fair use protects the rights of the public to limited use of copyrighted materials.
 
Is It Copyrighted?
  • Assume that EVERYTHING is. Even handwritten letters are covered by copyright law and belong to the writer of that letter.
  • Just because a page doesn’t have the word or the symbol ©, doesn’t mean it isn’t copyrighted. In fact, almost everything on the Web is copyrighted.
Does It Qualify As Fair Use?
  • Does it have a nonprofit educational use?
    What kind of material do you want to use?
  • Are you using only a small portion?
  • Will your use deprive the author from making money?
     
ePlagiarism Prevention: Some Guidelines
Do...
  • Identify and evaluate sources of information as you gather them; always give credit where credit is due.
  • All ideas, judgments, and inferences of others that are not your own must be attributed (credited).
  •  Ask permission to use someone else’s work; a polite request is often granted.
  • Carelessness in failing to use quotation marks is no excuse; ask your teacher and your school librarian for help with paraphrasing and summarizing.
  • Learn the laws of copyright, fair use, and intellectual property.
  • Manage your time wisely: writing is thinking—be creative and original.
  • Patchwork cut & paste is ePlagiarism, thus cheating.
  • Plagiarism in any form is dishonest. You dishonor yourself as well as the author and may jeopardize your reputation.
 
Do Not..
  • Exceed the limits on amounts of copyrighted works that can be used in multimedia projects without asking for permission from the copyright holder.
  • Copy a friend's (or anyone's) software or copyrighted music or DVD files onto your laptop's hard drive or burn to a CD. If you like it so much, please buy it (enable the author/publisher to make enough money to develop new versions and sequels)! Beware of web sites, such as Kazaa, which may make it easy to copy music files from other hard drives. These files are probably copyrighted. If in doubt, don't copy!
  • Allow a friend (or anyone) to copy your software or copyrighted music files onto his/her laptop's hard drive.
  • Use a web site's HTML code without permission.
  • Post a web page without proper rights for graphics, designs, logos, and photos which you use from other sources.
  • Assume that no one will catch you, so it won't matter if you copy software, copy someone's code or music. Remember - you are dealing with intellectual property--it is no different than taking someone's real property without his or her permission.
  • Plagiarize.
Multimedia Examples..

When creating multimedia projects for classroom purposes, students may use small portions
of copyrighted works with proper attribution

  • 10% or three (3) minutes of motion media

  • 10% or 1,000 words of text materials; An entire poem of less than 250 words; but, no more than three poems by one poet, or five poems from any anthology

  • Five images by an artist or photographer or 10% or 15 images from a collective work

  • 10% or 2,500 fields or cell entries from a copyrighted database or data table;

  • 10% or 30 seconds of music and lyrics from one work or from several extracts from one work.
     

Always Cite Your Sources!
  • First, evaluate your source for Accuracy, Authority, Objectivity, Currency, and Coverage
  • Always give credit or attribution to the person who created the work such as a photograph, sound recording, motion picture or document
  • Check with your instructor for format of the citation (MLA, APA, etc.)

Copyright Guidelines