Every good student and Digital Citizen should understand Copyright, Fair Use and Plagiarism.
What is copyright?
According to the Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and society at Harvard:
Copyright is a legal concept that grants authors and artists control over certain uses of their creations for defined periods of time. It limits who may copy, change, perform, or share those creations.
Source: https://cyber.harvard.edu/copyrightforlibrarians/Module_1:_Copyright_and_the_Public_Domain
What is Protected by copyright?
Copyright, a form of intellectual property law, protects original works of authorship including literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works, such as poetry, novels, movies, songs, computer software, and architecture. Copyright does not protect facts, ideas, systems, or methods of operation, although it may protect the way these things are expressed.
Source: https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-protect.html
What is Public Domain?
The public domain is the name given to the set of creative works that are not protected by copyright law.
Source: https://cyber.harvard.edu/copyrightforlibrarians/Module_1:_Copyright_and_the_Public_Domain
What is Fair Use?
There are some exceptions to copyright and that is called Fair Use. When you use materials under Fair Use it has to follow certain criteria.
This is good news for teachers and students!
Below is a short video explaining the differences and the ways in which you are able to use copyrighted works for your assignments through Fair Use.
Some other resources on Copyright:
The good news is that you can certainly use other peoples ideas and works as long as you give them credit and follow the criteria for Fair Use. Most school assignments fall under Fair Use.
QUOTING, PARAPHRASING AND SUMMARIZING RESOURCES
- Online Writing Lab at Purdue University (OWL)
- University of California Los Angeles
- Quote Workshop
- Paraphrase Workshop
Formating your Paper
So, how do you exactly cite your sources? Here are some links:
- OWL at Purdue: Modern Language Association (MLA) (this is my favorite site. Go here first)
- CUNY Write Site (MLA)
- Online! Citation Styles
- Style Guides and Resources on the Internet
- A Research Guide for Students
- A sample Paper