“Fair Use as a Complement to Open Licensing,” the seventeenth installment of the Impact of Open Source Software Series, was posted on November 14th, 2007, by Steve Foerster who currently serves as the Director of E-Learning at Marymount University in Arlington, Virginia, where he oversees distance learning, instructional technology, and technical training. He is also on the Advisory Board of WikiEducator, a Commonwealth of Learning funded project to develop a complete set of open educational resources for all disciplines at the primary, secondary, and tertiary level by 2015. Thanks Steve for a great posting!
In his posting Steve provides an overview description of the US doctrine of Fair Use, which points to the issue of appropriate use of copyrighted materials for educational purposes. In his post Steve:
- Provides some background,
- Identifies the factors that the court will use when considering the application of Fair Use,
- Identifies some of the challenges and limitations of Fair Use, and
- Points to a method to help reduce the ambiguity associated with using Fair Use as a defense against copyright infringement.
The thrust of Steve's post is that Fair Use, by its nature, carries significant ambiguity causing some confusion and anxiety for actors who would like to rely on it as a means to enhance education through the use of copyrighted materials. He then points to a potential solution that reduced ambiguity around Fair Use, which was used by several documentary film organizations. The documentary filmmakers drafted a Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use for their industry, which provided context for others interested in applying Fair Use and to serve as guidance for court interpretations. Steve suggested that we might consider the same approach for teachers and professors.
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