Copyright in a Digital World
By Caroline McCullen, SAS inSchool Instructional Technologist
and Mary Musacchia, Legal Counsel, SAS Institute Inc.

"Look!" shouted Mark to his partner as jade green trees and rustic stones gradually speckled his computer monitor. "We found the Great Wall of China!" His finger carefully traced the image on the screen. "That's the perfect picture for our report. I'm gonna save it in our graphics folder and use it as the opening screen of our web page."

Is it legal? Maybe, maybe not. How should informed teachers of the Internet Generation handle this situation? Which items can students legally copy for use in multimedia portfolios or school web pages? These questions come up in most classrooms at some point, and we'll use this column to provide some answers. Because lawyers cannot agree on these issues, we will take the conservative approach here. But you should always check your district policy, however, and/or seek the advice of your school district's legal counsel before publishing anything outside your classroom.

Let's start with a few basic questions:

Q: How do you save images from a web page?
A: Before students can use images in their project or web page, they must be able to save the images for later use.

• On a Mac, Click on the image and hold down the mouse to display the menu and release on "Save this image as..."
• In Windows, right click on the image to display the menu and left click on "Save Picture as..." (See step-by-step illustrated instructions of this process MidLink Magazine.)
• Take note of the name of the folder in which you save your image before you click "OK."

Q: Is it necessary to cite the source of every image?
A: Well, it depends. If students never intend to show the presentation outside your classroom, it may not be necessary. On the other hand, shouldn't we be teaching students how to deal with copyright on the web? Do we really want them to leave our classroom thinking they can copy any image they choose and use it any way they like? This is a critical 21st century research skill and it should be among the first we teach. The citations will also provide a better understanding of how much original thinking has gone into the work. We want students to process information and think through the facts, rather than copying ideas and text from a web site.

If a copyright notice appears along side the image, you must include the same notice along side the image in your projects. If no notice appears with the image, cite it at the end of the work in the normal way.

In addition, we never know which student projects will end up being featured at a school Open House, a local school board meeting, or a national competition. In the latter case, improperly cited images, sounds will disqualify the project. Several teachers who entered Multimedia Mania, the International Society for Technology in Education's Multimedia Mania 1999 contest, learned that painful lesson.

Q: How can my students remember where they got their images? They collect so many pictures that they don't even use...and they visit hundreds of web sites!
A: Students should assume they will use every image they collect. They should note the address of every web site from which they collect images. When students hear this policy, you may hear some groans at first, but think about it this way: If students are held accountable for each image, they will be more likely to consider the relevancy of each before they save it. They will also consider whether it contributes significantly to the content.

Try this simple method to keep students organized and focused:

1. Open a word processing file and leave it running in the background.
2. Open your web browser (Netscape or Internet Explorer) and begin your search.
3. As you find and save each image, copy and paste its URL (web address: http://________) from the address line at the top of your browser into the word processor document. Include a one- or two-word description of the image for quick reference later
4. When you create your "Works Cited" page, you will already have all the information you need about each image.

Q: What is the correct way to cite a web page?
A: Here is the correct form for citing web pages, according to the recently updated MLA Style Guide:

Author's name (if known) last name first. Title of the page (underlined if it is a full work, or in quotations if it is an article or part of a larger work). Date of publication. Publisher. Date you last visited the site. URL in brackets < >. Alphabetize your list and indent all data after the first line of each entry. See simple example below:

CIA World Fact Book. 1999. Central Intelligence Agency. 3 Aug. 1999.
<http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html>.

Q: Should students write for permission to link to another web page from our school web?
A: There is no law (as of this writing) that requires webmasters to obtain permission to link to another site, but I think it makes sense to do so. Some sites object to links. If your link makes it appear that you created the work on another page, then you are in risky territory. When in doubt, write for permission. Although students may not get responses from busy webmasters, they should learn to ask. We should also teach them to save copies of their replies for documentation. They can simplify this process by using the "Letter of Request" templates in the "Web Clips" section below. When my students used this template to write for permission, they often received requests for permission to link to their work...quite an affirmation for anyone!

Q: What about images or text in the public domain? Aren't those free for educational use?

A: Sometimes. In general, images or text created by authors, artists, or photographers who have been deceased for more than 75 years in the US...or 50 years in Canada... are considered to be in the public domain. Some teachers encourage students to create their own illustrations and original art work, in order to make sure everything is legal. However, if you want your students want to use the wealth of current maps, images, and illustrations found on the web, however, you will need to check the copyright notice.

This note from the CIA World Fact Book clearly explains one agency's policy: "The Fact Book is in the public domain. Accordingly, it may be copied freely without permission of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The official seal of the CIA, however, may NOT be copied without permission as required by the CIA Act of 1949 (50 U.S.C. section 403m). Misuse of the official seal of the CIA could result in civil and criminal penalties."

Q: What about sound files? Can we use those as background music for presentations?
A: Students can enhance their multimedia presentations with the abundant sounds found on the web, but songwriters and audio producers are very protective of their creations. Again, sounds in the public domain are free and clear as long as students cite the source. Any melody or sound clip of recent compositions, particularly popular music, is off limits unless you obtain permission from the publisher.

Multimedia Mania contestant, Nancy Lott, a teacher at Donwood Park Junior Public School, Ontario, Canada, uses a software called Band in a Box, which enables her students to compose their own melodies. She shares the following advice from her conversations with music publishers, "Students may choose to record their own sounds, but remember that the melody belongs to the creator. In other words, they cannot record the love song from the movie Titanic and use it in their presentation, because that melody belongs to the composer." One way to solve this problem is to use the variety of free sound clips now included in many popular multimedia authoring programs, such as HyperStudio or KidPix.

Q: But can't we use a very short portion of a sound?
A: Yes, if you are creating a presentation under "Fair Use Guidelines," you may use a clip that lasts no longer than 10% of the sound but in no event more than 30 seconds. This turns out to be longer than you might think and is usually adequate for background music accompanying a presentation. The courts have not ruled on the legality of looping of a sound-repeating the same sound over again.

Q: Doesn't any educational presentation qualify as "Fair Use" as long as we aren't charging a fee for it?
A: No. The concept of "Fair Use" was created in order to allow writers to use small portions of a published work as they comment on it, criticize it, or quote it in research. Key factors to remember are:

1. Quantity: You may not use large portions of a copyrighted work.
2. Intent: You are in violation if you intentionally plagiarize and try to pass off the work as your own.
3. Damage to commercial value: You may not damage the author's ability to make a profit. You may not, regardless of quantity, use a portion of the author's work that makes it so unique as to constitute a truly original idea.

Under Fair Use Guidelines, students may use:

• 10% or 3 minutes, whichever is less, of a motion media clip
• 10% or 30 seconds, whichever is less, of a music clip

Q: How should my students protect their work?
A: Any original becomes copyrighted from the moment of creation, but you may want to include a copyright notice. It gives notice to the general public that this work has value to someone and is not free to copy for their purposes. Such notification is even more important in the international community.

Q: Do I need parental permission to publish student writing, art, or photographs on the web?
A: Most districts have an Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) requiring a parent signature before student work is published on the web. Laws governing minors' privacy and safety are currently under consideration in most states and at the federal level. Many schools send home this policy at the beginning of the year with other forms. Protect yourself and your district by making sure your students have permission to use the Internet.

Stay away from publishing photographs of individual students. Save autobiographies and journals for more appropriate mediums. Publish pictures of student groups, but don't identify individual students. Certainly students need to get credit for their writing and art, but accompanying pictures are unnecessary. Some districts have rules against publishing students' last names in order to protect the anonymity of foster children, children of divorced parents, and learning disabled students. Never publish student addresses, home phone numbers, or contact information.

Web Clips:
How to Cite Your Sources: http://www.ncsu.edu/midlink/citing.html#Web%20Page
Purdue's OnLine Writing Lab (OWL) - Guide to Citing Your Sources: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/research/r_docelectric.html
MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers: http://www.mla.org/store/CID24/PID159
"Letter of Request" templates, MidLink's Teacher Resource Room: http://www.ncsu.edu/midlink/posting.html
Canadian Intellectual Property Office: Information for Canadian educators: http://cipo.gc.ca/

Works Cited:
Becker, Gary H. A Guide to Information and Resources. Gary H. Becker. 1997.
"Copyright and Intellectual Property." 26 Jul. 99. Association of Research Libraries. 29 Jul. 99. <http://www.arl.org/info/frn/copy/copytoc.html>
"Crash Course in Copyright." 15 Jul. 99. University of Texas System.
4 Aug. 1999. <http://www.utsystem.edu/ogc/IntellectualProperty/cprtindx.htm#top>
Templeton, Brad. "10 Big Myths about Copyright Explained." 1 Aug. 99. <http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html>

Reprinted from the October 1999 edition of Middle Ground, a quarterly magazine published by the National Middle School Association. Reprinted online with permission.