Copyright Law and Fair Use

Written by Christy DeShong

What Is “Copyright”? A Brief Overview

Put simply, “copyright” refers to the control an individual has over anything he or she creates, be it music, art, writing, or anything else that can be permanently recorded in any form. U.S. copyright law is incredibly extensive. The entire text of the law can be found at the U.S. Copyright Office’s Web site, here. Please bear in mind that these laws apply only within the U.S. Other countires are subject to their own copyright laws, which may be more or less strict.

In the United States, a person automatically owns the copyright on anything he or she creates upon the moment of its creation. Other individuals generally cannot use this material without the express permission of the copyright holder. However, there are some exceptions to this rule.

Public Domain
Copyright protection is not eternal. As the U.S. Copyright Office’s “Copyright Basics” article explains, copyright only extends for 70 years after the death of the author (or last surviving author, in the case of works with multiple authors). Works made for hire or anonymous works have a copyright duration of 95 years from creation (p. 5).

After copyright expires, works are considered “public domain”. Since no one owns the rights to these works, the general public is free to use them as they please. Individuals also sometimes willingly choose to give up their rights to a work because they desire it to become public domain.

Fair Use
Works that are not public domain can still be used by individuals to some extent without permission. The acceptable ways in which they may be used are lumped into a general catagory called “fair use”. Unfortunately, the legal limits of “fair use” are, for the most part, not strictly defined.

The Report of the Register of Copyrights on the General Revision of the U.S. Copyright Law in 1961 listed some of these acceptable uses:

“quotation of excerpts in a review or criticism for purposes of illustration or comment; quotation of short passages in a scholarly or technical work, for illustration or clarification of the author’s observations; use in a parody of some of the content of the work parodied; summary of an address or article, with brief quotations, in a news report; reproduction by a library of a portion of a work to replace part of a damaged copy; reproduction by a teacher or student of a small part of a work to illustrate a lesson; reproduction of a work in legislative or judicial proceedings or reports; incidental and fortuitous reproduction, in a newsreel or broadcast, of a work located in the scene of an event being reported.”

While some of these examples seem clear enough, others remain vague. For example, “parody” is not necessarily a clearly-defined concept. Also, this report dates from 1961, an age when household computers were not yet a reality. The arrival of the digital age and the Internet made copyright infringement easier than ever.

In 1996 a gathering of over 95 organizations met in an effort to create a set of more modern established fair use guidelines. Their results can be found in this report from

the United States Patent and Trade Office. Though these guidelines cover many situations and can be very useful, they are just that: guidelines. They are not legally binding and may not necessarily apply to any given situation.

What does this mean for libraries?
Obviously, any kind of librarian has access to a vast amount of information. All of that information was created by someone and may or may not be currently copyright-protected. If a public librarian wishes to hold a film screening accompanied by an educational lecture concerning the film’s contents, must the librarian seek permission to screen the film, or does fair use protect the viewing, since it is being used in an educational setting? May a library patron make photocopies of a reference book that is not in circulation in order to view some of its contents at home? Often, these questions are never addressed since the copyright holder is never even aware the instances have occured, but does that really make the question moot?

Copyright laws also apply to things like the computer software used within the library. Does the library have the right to install software to an unlimited amount of computers? Can programs be installed onto personal computers if a librarian wishes to work from home? Obviously in this case the librarian would have to refer to the software’s liscencing agreement, which varies from program to program.

Discussion
Google Books is a search function developed by Google that allows users to search for sections of text in thousands of books. Many publishers are concerned that this violates Fair Use, yet Google does not actually list the full text of any books without permission from the publishers. Do you think this qualifies as Fair Use? Why or why not?

In 2007, a YouTube video of a toddler dancing while a Prince song plays in the background was pulled from YouTube after Universal Studios, who owns the rights to the music, issued a takedown notice. After reading the CNET article here, do you agree or disagree with the judge’s decision?

A Few Interesting Links
Key Court Case Summaries on Fair Use from the Copyright Center at Indiana University
Project Gutenberg, a website that lists full text of thousands of copyright-free books

Works Cited

United States Copyright Office. (2008). Copyright Basics. Retrieved from http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.pdf

United States Copyright Office. (1998). Reproduction of Copyrighted Works by Educators and Librarians. Retrieved from http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ21.pdf

Lehman, Bruce A. (1996). The Conference on Fair Use: An Interim Report to the Commissioner. Retrieved from http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/dcom/olia/confu/report.htm

 

Filtering the Internet in Libraries and Intellectual Freedom

Written by Ariell Burch

Filtering the Internet in Libraries

One of the hot-topics in libraries today is whether or not they should filter the internet on their computer terminals. Some of the reasons this is such a hot-topic is that some people are concerned that filtering the internet infringes on their intellectual freedom while others say that that computers need to be ‘safe’ for children to use . The Supreme Court ruling on the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) has an impact on the filtering of computers at libraries that choose to receive funding under that act. Libraries that do not or choose not to accept funding under the CIPA have to decide individual whether or not to filter their computers and to what degree.

Children’s Internet Protection Act

The Supreme Court has ruled in the June 2003 decision in the case UNITED STATES, et al., APPELLANTS v. AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION, INC., et al. that requiring filtering on computers in libraries that accept money from the E-rate program and Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) does not violate the constitution. Although it was decided that it was unconstitutional not to disable the internet filter for adults who ask “to enable access for bona fide research or other lawful purposes.” (“UNITED STATES V. AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSN., INC.,” 2003)

The Supreme Court declared that CIPA was constitutional because “when the Government appropriates public funds to establish a program it is entitled to define the limits of that program.” (“UNITED STATES V. AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSN., INC.,” 2003), libraries do not have to accept the funding, libraries are not forums for public speech, and it is not an unreasonable burden for an adult patron to ask to have the internet filters disabled. (“UNITED STATES V. AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSN., INC.,” 2003)

What does this mean for libraries?

If the library accepts funding from CIPA they have to filter their internet on their computers and when an adult asks to have the filter disabled the library has to disable the filter. The Supreme Court concluded that having an adult patron ask to have the internet filters disabled was not and unreasonable burden.

Libraries have a choice in accepting the funding so the government is not infringing on their constitutional rights by deciding that libraries under this program have to filter their internet. Neither is the government suppressing free speech because “Internet access in public libraries is neither a “traditional” nor a “designated” public forum”. (“UNITED STATES V. AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSN., INC.,” 2003) In short, if a library does not want to filter their internet do not accept this funding. This decision does require all libraries that filter their internet to disable the filters when an adult patron asks because not disabling the filter in that case is not constitutional.

What about libraries that do not accept funding from CIPA but are unsure if they want to filter their internet?

The major pro for filtering the internet at libraries is it keeps materials harmful to minors away from minors. The major con for filtering the internet is that the library is censoring information from minors.

Proponents of filtering the internet say that “Courts have balanced freedom of speech and society’s interest in keeping children from harmful material by upholding as constitutional restrictions that do not outlaw harmful material, but limit the time, place, or manner of distribution.” (Johnson, 2006). Another pro for filtering the internet is people who wish not see pornography on a computer screen in their library do not.

People against this say it violates the Library Bill of Rights by it is not providing equal access to patrons regardless to age. (“ALA Interpretations,”) Also, adults could be too embarrassed to ask to have the filter removed so they would never ask to have the filter removed. Additionally, the library can install privacy filters on the monitor so the image on the screen is only visible to people that are directly facing the screen

For the reader

Which should a library choose, accept funding from the E-rate or LSTA program or not accept the funding? Why or why not?

For libraries that do not have to follow the CIPA, should they filter all their internet terminals, filter only the internet terminals that are used by minors, or not filter at all? and Why or why not?

References

ALA Interpretations. Retrieved 10/10/2008, 2008, from http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/oif/statementspols/statementsif/interpretations/default.cfm

Johnson, R. W. (2006). Trademark for Creating a Kid-Friendly Cyberplayground on the Internet (Publication. Retrieved 10/10/2008, from LexisNexis Academic

UNITED STATES V. AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSN., INC. (Supreme Court 2003).