Copyright Basics for Faculty
Disclaimer: Do not construe anything on these pages as legal advice from Information Services at the University of Richmond.
Course Reserves
Placing a journal article on reserve for student's academic work is permitted under the "fair use" provisions of copyright law. However, if an article is placed on reserve perpetually or recurrently, in most cases the University must pay a fee to the copyright holder. To protect yourself and the University, work with Boatwright Library's Access & Delivery Services staff to place items on reserve. This includes scanned images of articles. Faculty members may also place direct links (not the article) on their syllabus or in Blackboard for articles available through our electronic databases (see Linking to Blackboard for more information). The library will assume responsibility for payment of copyright fees. Call 8876 for additional information.
Copying of Books
It is a violation of copyright law to reproduce a copyrighted book in full unless its is done for narrowly defined preservation purposes. Rarely will any member of the University community other than a member of the library's preservation staff have justification to reproduce an entire book. If the portion of a book to be copied (either by photocopying or by digitization) for reserve reading exceeds 25%, it cannot be copied. Instead the physical book itself must be placed on reserve at the library.
Photocopies of Articles for Class Distribution
Planned replication of full articles rarely falls under the "fair use" provisions. Unless the decision to make copies for each student in a class is "spontaneous" (i.e., very last minute), faculty should make readings available through the library's reserve system.
Multimedia Presentations
Students and faculty may incorporate copyrighted material into multimedia presentations for face-to-face presentation or in distance education classes. Limits on copying are:
Motion Media--10% of whole or 3 minutes, whichever is less
Text materials--10% of whole or 1000 words, whichever is less
Music lyrics or video--10%, but never more than 30 seconds
Images Downloaded from Web Sites
Copyrighted images downloaded from Web sites may be reproduced on other Web sites or in other media with the express permission of the copyright holder. Web surfers are advised to check carefully for copyright statements on Web sites. All should assume that images of cartoon characters, corporate logos, are protected by copyright and should not be reproduced without permission. Copyright holders normally charge a fee for use of these images; payment for such fees is the user's responsibility.
Tips for Faculty to Protect Their Intellectual Property
When Publishing a Book
When publishers, including many university presses, offer an author a contract for a book, a very common practice is to include a clause that assigns copyright to the publisher. This is your work, so you should retain your rights to it. Negotiate with the publisher to register your book's copyright in your name and make sure that the contract unambiguously specifies this.
When Publishing an Article
Authors of journal articles, especially scholarly articles, have less leverage than authors of books. Generally the publisher reserves all rights to the article. Some journals, however, will allow the author(s) to retain rights to publish their article or parts of it again in anthologies, collected works, etc. Discuss this with the journal editor and try to retain as many rights to your work as you can.