Copyright for Faculty

The Fair Use Guidelines for Educational Multimedia apply to the use, without permission, of portions of lawfully acquired copyrighted works in educational multimedia projects which were created by educators or students as part of a systematic learning activity by nonprofit educational institutions.

Students may incorporate portions of lawfully acquired copyrighted works when producing their own educational multimedia projects for a specific course. They may perform and display their multimedia projects in the course for which they were created and may use them in their own portfolios as examples of their academic work for later personal uses such as job and graduate school interviews.

Faculty members may incorporate portions of lawfully acquired copyrighted works when producing their own educational multimedia projects as teaching tools in support of curriculum-based instructional activities. Educators may perform and display their multimedia projects in the following situations:

1. Face-to-face instruction
2. Assigned to students for directed self-study
3. For remote instruction to students enrolled in curriculum-based courses and located at remote sites provided over the educational institution's secure electronic network. There must be technological limitations on access to the network such as a password or PIN and technological means which prevent the making of copies of copyrighted material.

Educators may perform or display their own educational multimedia projects in presentations to their peers, for example, at workshops and conferences. Educators may also retain their multimedia projects in their personal portfolios for later personal uses such as tenure review or job interviews.

Time Limitations

Educators may use their educational multimedia projects, created for teaching courses, for a period of up to two years after the first instructional use with a class. Use beyond that time, even for educational purposes, requires permission from each copyrighted portion incorporated in the production.

Portion Limitations

Portion limitations mean the amount of a copyrighted work that can reasonably be used in educational multimedia projects under these guidelines without permission.

Motion Media

Up to 10% or 3 minutes, whichever is less

Text Material

Up to 10% or 1000 words, whichever is less. An entire poem of less than 250 words may be used, but no more than three poems by one poet, or five poems by different poets from any anthology may be used. For poems of greater length, 250 words may be used but no more than three excerpts by a poet, or five excerpts by different poets from a single anthology may be used.

Music, Lyrics, and Music Video

Up to 10%, but in no event more than 30 seconds of the music and lyrics from an individual musical work. Any alterations to a musical work shall not change the basic melody or the fundamental character of the work.

Illustrations and Photographs

Fair use usually precludes the use of an entire work, however, under these guidelines a photograph or illustration may be used in its entirety but no more than 5 images by an artist or photographer may be reproduced or incorporated in a multimedia project. When using photographs and illustrations from a published collective work, not more than 10% or 15 images, whichever is less, may be incorporated into an educational multimedia project.

Numerical Data Sets

Up to 10% or 2500 fields or cell entries, whichever is less, from a copyrighted database or data table.

Copying and Distribution Limitations

Only a limited number of copies, including the original, may be made of an educator's multimedia project. There may be no more than two "Use" copies, one of which may be placed on reserve. An additional copy made be made for preservation purposes but may only be used or copied to replace a "Use" copy that has been lost, stolen, or damaged. In the case of a jointly created educational multimedia project, each principal creator may retain one copy.

Downloading Material from the Internet

Educators and students are advised to exercise caution in using digital material downloaded from the Internet in producing their own educational multimedia projects, because there is a mix of works protected by copyright and works in the public domain on the network. Access to works on the Internet does not automatically mean that these can be reproduced and reused without permission or royalty payments. In addition, some copyrighted works may have been posted to the Internet without authorization of the copyright holder.

Attribution and Acknowledgement

Educators and students are reminded to credit the sources and display the copyright notice and ownership information, if this is shown in the original source, for all works incorporated as part of an educational multimedia project. Crediting the source should include full bibliographic description including author, title, publisher, and place and date of publication. The copyright ownership information includes the C, year for first publication, and name of the copyright holder.

Notice of Use Restrictions

Educators and students are advised that they must include on the opening screen of their multimedia project and any accompanying print material a notice stating that certain copyrighted materials are included, as allowed under the educational multimedia fair use guidelines, and are restricted from further use.

H.R. 104-879, 104d Cong. (1995)