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| Public domain image. |
It’s a perennial problem.
In the course of putting
together almost every issue of Horizons,
we come across at least one or two photos that violate copyright laws submitted by staff members.
We try to give the students
who submit these pictures a chance to replace them with something else. Once in
a while they do. Usually we end up just ditching the infringing photos.
Copyright violations have
legal ramifications for Horizons. We
could face civil penalties if we were to use someone else’s protected work
without permission.
Why do these violations keep
happening? The fact is that most students – heck, most people – know almost
nothing about intellectual property law or theory.
The Internet has exacerbated copyright ignorance. It takes only a
few clicks to download a picture, a song, or a video. Most websites don’t help
- often there is no copyright information anywhere near the piece of work. The
user has to go digging to track it down.
But in order to do that
digging, you first have to know that there’s something to dig for.
I can understand the
confusion. If I right-click, I have an option to save an image on my hard
drive. Nothing stops me from doing it or tells me about my rights under Fair Use statutes.
It’s important for students
to understand, though, what they can and cannot do in all aspects of their
personal and educational lives. Nearly everyone with an Internet connection now
deals with copyright on a day-to-day basis, whether one realizes it or not.
Regardless of what you think of lawsuits
against 12-year-olds by the Recording Industry Association of America, you
need to be aware of the laws, as well as your rights and responsibilities under
them.
I decided, along with
Professor Karyn Smith, that it was time to give the Publications class a primer
on the basics of copyright. I prepared a short slide presentation and a handout
that they could reference in the future.
Of course, there was no way I
could cover everything. Copyright is complicated. I’ve been interested in
intellectual property law for years, and there are still many facets I know
little about.
I boiled my talk down to
three major points. The first was to explain to the students that their own
work is protected, and to let them know they could assert their rights.
Next I gave an overview of
the broad categories of copyright: public domain, creative commons, “all rights
reserved,” and “unspecified” (cases in which it is not possible to determine the
copyright holder). I explained the conditions under which they could use works
from each of these categories.
The third point I touched
upon was the idea of derivative works - a photograph of a painting, for
instance. This is one of the areas in which the lines of impropriety get fuzzy,
but it’s imperative to have a notion of when that threshold has been crossed.
I tried to make derivation
relatable to the students by analogizing with a journalistic example. I scribbled
on the board:
Great Article
By Dave W.
Blah, blah, blah -------------
---------------------------------
---------------------------------
---------------------------------
“Imagine Dave wrote this fabulous
article,” I said, “and it says everything I would want to say. I want to use
it, so I do this....” I made some adjustments, until I had this on the board:
Great Article
By Brandon T. Bisceglia
“Blah, blah, blah -------------
---------------------------------
---------------------------------
---------------------------------,” said Dave W.
Several students immediately
sensed this was not kosher, and voiced their dissent. I told them this was the
idea (though admittedly taken to an extreme) behind restrictions on derivative works of any
kind.
When I was finished, Karyn
asked if there were a few strategies students could use to find appropriate
pictures for their articles. I briefly walked through using Google Image’s “Advanced Search” license
filters. I also said they could check the copyright policy on most professional
websites if there was no obvious indication of a picture’s copyright status.
Karyn added that students could stage their own shots if necessary. I agreed –
I’ve done it many times before, including for the picture in my
previous blog entry.
Will any of this staunch the
flow of useless photos? Probably not. Not every student understands the first
time you explain something. Not every student pays attention – or cares.
Now, however, those who do
care can refer to the handout if they have doubts about an article.
They also have a powerful
tool in their knowledge that copyright laws apply to them. It’s essential for
survival in the digital age.
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