An overview of copyright and fair use

1. The Ethical Use of
Electronic Media.
Guilford County SciVis
V103.03

2. Computer Ethics
 Resources such as images and text
on the Internet are copyrighted.
 Plagiarism (using something that
you did not create) is a serious
offense covered in the Copyright Law
of 1976. Plagiarism items can include
literary, dramatic, and musical
works.
 Copying of software without
purchasing it is illegal and is a
punishable offense.

3. Copyright LAWS and Terms
 Copyright is a form of
protection provided by the
laws of the United States
(title 17, U.S. Code) to the
authors of “original
works of authorship,”
including literary,
dramatic, musical, artistic,
and certain other
intellectual works.

4. Copyright LAWS and Terms
 This protection is available to both published
and unpublished works. Section 106 of the
1976 Copyright Act generally gives the owner
of copyright the exclusive right to do and to
authorize others to do the following:
 To reproduce the work in copies or
phonorecords.
 To prepare derivative works based upon
the work.
 To distribute copies or phonorecords of the
work to the public by sale or other transfer
of ownership, or by rental, lease, or
lending.

5. Copyright LAWS and Terms
 To perform the work publicly, in the case of
literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic
works, pantomimes, and motion pictures, and
other audiovisual works.
 To display the copyrighted work publicly, in
the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and
choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial,
graphic, or sculptural works, including the
individual images of a motion picture or other
audiovisual work.
 In the case of sound recordings, to perform
the work publicly by means of a digital audio
transmission.

6. Plagiarism
 Plagiarism includes a
range of actions from
failure to properly cite
works to wholesale
cheating. A student who
plagiarizes may do so
unintentionally or with
purposeful deliberation.
Listed below are some
common forms of
plagiarism.

7. Plagiarism (continued)
 Buying a paper from a research service and
turning it in as yours.
 Turning in another student’s work without that
student’s knowledge and claiming it as yours.
 Turning in a paper a peer has written for you.
 Copying a paper from a source text like a book or
the Internet without proper acknowledgment.
 Copying materials from a source text, supplying
proper documentation, but leaving out quotation
marks.
 Paraphrasing materials from a source text
without giving appropriate documentation.

8. Plagiarism (continued)
 Infringement- copyright
infringement can occur
when someone, without
owner’s permission, copies
copyrighted work.
 Copying does not need to be
word-for-word copying, but
changing of a few
selected words. The owner
is allowed to obtain
damages to compensate for
the copying.

9. Plagiarism (continued)
 Trademarks are familiar names
and symbols that have become
associated with quality, reliability,
and/or fame. That’s why people
and companies spend millions of
dollars protecting these images.
 A way of protecting is through a
registered trademark. Registration
of a trademark is a legal title to a
symbol or idea in the same way as
a deed is title to a piece of
property.

10. Fair Use Limit
 Fair use - the acceptable boundaries to which a
person may use copyrighted material without
obtaining the owner’s permission.
 Music - 10% or 30 seconds of a song
whichever is less.
 Video - 10% or 3 minutes of a video whichever
is less.
 Be aware of the condition “whichever is less.” In
order to use 30 seconds of a song, your song
must be 5 minutes in length and most popular
songs are only 3 to 3 ½ minutes.
 Give credit for clips and videos in the bibliography
of your project.

11. Acceptable Use of School Computers
 The person named in the account should be the
only one to access that account.
 Tampering is not permitted on school
computers.
 The use of school computers is only for
academic work and cannot be used to play non-
academic games or for any fraudulent activity.
 Personal e-mail and instant messenger are
unacceptable.

12. The End