Citation and Copyright

Here in the United States we value intellectual innovations and want to honor the individuals for their creative achievements. We want them to receive credit for their work and to make important decisions about how their work will be displayed, copied and used. That’s why we have something called copyright and as artists, writers, programmers, entrepreneurs and researchers this entity makes it possible to uphold the value we have in ideas.

As soon as an intellectual work (on-screen an idea in fixed tangible form) is created it is protected by copyright. No need to request or register which makes it very easy.

When a work is created, there is a defined amount of time for the work to be protected by copyright. The current guidelines have been in existence since 1978 and there are a few variations on works published before that year. Check out the table for a brief outline of copyright guidelines. Take note that works created before 1923 are in the “public domain” which means they are free for anyone to use without copyright restrictions.

Copyright Duration Guidelines (US)

Related Links

Fair use is a copyright principle that allows users of information to be able to use intellectual property while still enabling the creator to be able to own and profit from their work.  If you are using an intellectual work for any of these reasons then you are more than likely falling under the fair use principle of copyright.

These reasons include criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship and research.

What counts as “fair use” of something depends on these four main factors:

1) The Purpose and Character of Use: How have you used the work? Have you transformed the original work by adding new expression or meaning?

2) The Nature of the Copyrighted Work: Is the work factual in nature or creative? Is it unpublished or published? Different factors about the original work will have an effect on fair use.

3) The Amount and Substantiality of the Portion Used: How much of the original work are you quoting, summarizing or using? (Quoting three lines of a six line poem is different than quoting three line from a five-minute song). And, of the portion that you are using - how much of the “substantial” idea of the work are you using?

4) The Effect of the Use on the Original Work in the Market: Does the way you use the work deprive the copyright owner of income? Or does it undermine a new or potential market for the original work?

For more information on fair use check out Stanford University's guide to Fair Use.

The Code addresses the following five questions:

• Analytic Writing: When may scholars and other writers about art invoke fair use to quote, excerpt, or reproduce copyrighted works?
• Teaching about Art: When may teachers invoke fair use in using copyrighted works to support formal instruction in a range of settings, including online and distance teaching?
• Making Art: Under what circumstances may artists invoke fair use to incorporate copyrighted material into new artworks in any medium?
• Museum Uses: When may museums and their staffs invoke fair use in using copyrighted works—including images and text as well as time-based and born-digital material—when organizing exhibitions, developing educational materials (within the museum and online), publishing catalogues, and other related activities?
• Online Access to Archival and Special Collections: When may such institutions and their staffs invoke fair use to create digital preservation copies and/or enable digital access to copyrighted materials in their collections?

Frequently Asked Questions

Have questions about how the Code of Best Practices can be used to evaluate your use of copyrighted materials? Not sure if your use of copyrighted materials falls under the fair use doctrine? Check here for frequently asked questions.