Research Tools

COPYRIGHT

Copyright refers to U.S. laws and acts that protect the rights of authors of original literary, musical, or artistic works in any medium. Copyright affects everyone. A person may not use another person's works without permission, unless the use falls under the Fair Use category (see below).

Public Domain - Works with expired copyright or no copyright are considered in the Public Domain. These items can be used freely. This includes any work published in the United States before 1924 or works published before 1964 for which copyrights were not renewed.

Creative Commons licenses provide a flexible range of protections and freedoms for authors, artists, and educators.

See Copyright Basics from the U.S. Copyright Office for more details. Violating copyright laws can lead to job termination, civil lawsuits, felony charges, fines, and sentencing.

FAIR USE

(Section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Act) Fair Use is a provision in Copyright Law that allows some uses without permission. To determine if Fair Use covers your usage, consider these four factors:

1. Purpose: In most cases, Fair Use includes educational, nonprofit, or personal uses, but does not allow for-profit uses.
2. Nature of the Work: Published facts are usually allowed within Fair Use, but fiction is not.
3. Amount to be Borrowed: Consider the proportionality of your use of the work. Use as little as possible to meet your research or educational goal. 
4. Marketability of the Work: If you can buy a copy of the work, do so; don't copy the whole work. Will your use be economically detrimental to the copyright owner? 

Use Columbia University's Fair Use Check List to help determine qualified material usage.