Copyright and Fair Use What are you really allowed to do with that file you got from the internet?

What is copyright? copyright the exclusive legal right, given to an originator to print, publish, perform, film, or record literary, artistic, or musical material, and to authorize others to do the same. In other words, if someone created something, they get to decide how it’s used, and you’re not allowed to use it unless they authorize it.

Do I always have to get authorization? There’s something called fair use that says, “Well… not really…” fair use a legal doctrine that portions of copyrighted materials may be used without permission of the copyright owner provided the use is fair and reasonable, does not substantially impair the value of the materials, and does not curtail the profits reasonably expected by the owner. In other words, it’s sort of OK to use copyrighted things in certain situations.

OK, so when can I ‘fair use’ them? As a student, you have more liberty than professionals, but since this class gives you real- world situations, you need to be familiar with both. Either way, depending on what it is, you have different options.

Illustrations and Photographs You may use a single photograph, illustration, chart, graph, diagram, or cartoon. You may not use more than 5 images by a single artist or photographer. You may use up to 10% but no more than 15 images from a single publication. You may NOT publish to the internet, however, without the owner’s permission.

Google Image Search

Video (for use in multimedia projects) As long as you own it (you didn’t just download the clip from YouTube or something), you can use up to 10% or 3 minutes, whichever is less.

Music As long as you own it (you didn’t just download the song from YouTube or something), you can use up to 10% or 30 seconds, whichever is less.

But for professionals… For nonprofit/educational purposes (like practicing your skills). As long as you’re not preventing them from making money (this is a bigger deal than it sounds).

Examples If I’m designing a t-shirt to make for myself, can I use the Nike logo? On one hand, by making a shirt for yourself, Nike is losing the money that you would have spent on their shirt. On the other hand, what if you can’t purchase this design? If I made a movie and I want to use my favorite song by Led Zeppelin, what do I do? First, you have to own the song, either by buying the CD or buying the digital file from iTunes or Amazon. Second, you can only use 10% of the song, up to 30 seconds. So if the song is 2 minutes long, that’s 120 seconds, so you can use 12 seconds of it. I need a picture of a watermelon for my class blog. Can I just Google it? Nope. In other circumstances, you’re allowed to use single images as long as you cite the source. But if you’re going to post it online, you need permission. Instead, make sure you adjust the usage rights in Google, or use a service like Pixabay that is full of images you’re allowed to use however you want.