Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Copyright Question for GTEP
So......for an assignment I am posing a question and would love your input. I need at least three people to respond (hint hint). Should teachers be allowed to disregard copyright laws for educational purposes? In other words...photocopy chapters of books, play movies, entire songs??? Input? I am withholding my own thoughts here, but I would encourage you to speak freely. :) In your response it would be helpful if you put your occupation or let me know if you work with copyright issues regularly or not. I am sending invites to answer this question to a variety of people. Anyway.....Thankx!!!
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4 comments:
I usually ignore them. Practically speaking, no one will ever know. Those companies would only know or come after you if you were selling their content as your own.
That being said, I can't believe that a company would make a resource book for teachers and then explicitly state that they're not allowed to make copies of it! Companies expect you to buy a copy of every supplement you buy for each and every student, which is impossible with the realities of school funding these days. It's a racket.
That's why when I created my blog and wrote my book, I specifically stated that they were under Creative Commons licenses, which allows them to be used an copied freely (as long as I get credit for my work).
I have no problem with most things a teacher would be using for educational purposes being copied.
Even original artwork as long as it is not impacting the artist negatively.
For artwork, I suspect most artists would appreciate a request for use.
If it is someone who is selling prints for collage they might not appreciate it being pirated and used for collage work in a class- but if asked I bet most would send you a nice hi-res file for your class project for free. ;)
For me, the problem comes with the ethical questions involved. What are you teaching your students about honesty and community responsibility if you are 'stealing' someone's work for them to use?
Are you going to have a class sessions on how to pirate videos, music and software? There are surely ways to hack in and download entire books for free too. Hey! from there you can go onto more advanced subjects, like shoplifting and "How to hot wire a car". LOL
I think there are provisions in the copyright law for using small amounts of copyright protected work for educational purposes.
It's not like I don't have pirated stuff of my own. ;) I don't fly that flag by the front door for nothin'. ;)
I'll be interested to hear what others have to say on this.
I'm just going to copy and paste what I said on my own blog! Hehe.
I think that as long as we are not profiting from the showing/distribution of media or other unoriginal materials, we should be allowed to use such resources in class. No one is harmed and the students benefit from being exposed to things they might not otherwise have access to. I see nothing wrong with playing more than thirty seconds of a song or showing a full video or passing out four poems by the same author.
A government teacher should be able to tape the presidential debates and show this tape to all of his classes year after year if he so chooses. A French teacher should be able to show an entire French film in class, not merely a meaningless three-minute chunk.
I truly think that the fair use guidelines for educational multimedia need to be adjusted. Teachers make very little and schools are so underfunded; the money is simply not there and I think this needs to be taken into account.
Hi Brandi,
I LOVE your page, btw! All of your posts are incredibly honest, vulnerable, and thought provoking. You've got a big fan here. About the copyright law question---I think we should try and follow the rules as closely as possible, but not so tightly that we make ourselves into policemen towards ourselves or others. I am a big believer in practicing moderation. XO Megan Clark
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