How do you cite content you’re using from the web? Can you even use it in your work or on your website? If you need to modify it, can you? In today’s muddled online world, Creative Commons (CC) wants to be the answer to all your digital copyright questions.
So what is Creative Commons? In their own words, “Creative Commons is a nonprofit organization that enables the sharing and use of creativity and knowledge through free legal tools.” Their copyright licenses are easy to use and complement existing copyright to “provide a simple, standardized way to give the public permission to share and use your creative work.”
Sites like flickr, Wikipedia, and many others are using Creative Commons to let users know what they can and cannot use and how they can use it.
Here are some more excellent places to learn more about Creative Commons:
The Harvard Law School Library’s short libguide about Creative Commons.
Nancy Sims, the Copyright Program Librarian at the University of Minnesota Libraries, talking about CC.
You will notice that CMLE uses Creative Common’s attribution standards with most images we use in our posts. If you need to know more about the individual licenses you can go to Creative Commons’ About The Licenses page.
CMLE’s copyright/fair use information just keeps getting better! We have added a new Resources tab to our Copyright LibGuide on CMLE’s Learning Landing! The new tab features links to: images, video, music, books, software, open education resources, and open access scholarly resources. You can rest easy in knowing that these resources can be freely used with no worries around copyright or fair use. How do we know? Because these resources were assessed and shared by Nancy Sims, U of M Copyright Librarian at our November event, Us, Use, and Users. A big thank you to Nancy for creating her materials under Creative Commons licensing, which allows us to share freely!
“Thank you for providing this wonderful resource!!”
CMLE is happy to report the wonderfully positive response to our copyright event! It seems that many people were able to get good information at the presentation, get some resources to take home, and even have a little fun!
When looking at the evaluations, with 1 being a “Weak Understanding” and 5 being a “Strong Understanding,” it was nice to see such increases in knowledge:
We also asked about Fair Use, a subject that can be tricky to understand. It seems that again we saw a better understanding after the event from attendees:
It’s hard to pick just one quote from the evaluations but a few of the great responses to our question “What is the one thing you plan to do within the next few weeks as a result of having attended this event?” were:
“I really liked the “Stuff You Can Use!” handout.”
“Rethink how I use materials & how I instruct users to use materials.”
“…this helps answer the many questions I had in regard to the materials I use to develop my programs – I know what resources I can use and how to use them.”
We look forward to sharing more about copyright over the upcoming months with our “Copyright Continues” themed posts. So stay tuned for even more copyright information!
If you missed our November 18, 2014 copyright event with Nancy Sims, we are truly sorry for your loss. Nancy referred to a number of resources during her presentation, which we promised to share broadly with everyone. She did a great job of explaining fair use and shared relevant examples to allow us all a bit of time to wrestle through the fair use process too. Much to the consternation and sometimes delight of participants, copyright is not black and white, and often, we have more ability to make a case for fair use than we may have thought! Today we share a treasure trove of Best Practices to help guide your fair use decisions in specific areas!
Visit Best Practices in Fair Use to receive additional guidance on specific areas of fair use as listed below. Tip: zero in on a relevant area and consider downloading or bookmarking the PDF to keep handy for all of your staff members to use as a reference tool when making internal decisions about fair use. The list of best practices includes…..
You asked for it, CMLE has responded! We are proud to present this event on copyright, and are very excited to welcome the very capable, well-versed, Nancy Sims to our region. Nancy is well-known for her practical way of making copyright understandable, entertaining, and fun too!
Nancy will lead this customized workshop, which will focus on fair use and public domain as they relate to the use of existing materials. The information will be relevant to our own internal library uses, and relevant to assisting library users/teachers/faculty/and administration as well.
First, Nancy will focus on fair use,then she will lead us through strategies and exercises in sharpening our fair use analysis skills.
Pre-submitting some of your questions to Nancy’s Google form should help her target information to areas of particular interest, and help make the best use of time together. See your email for the link to the form.
Q & A: There will be plenty of time throughout the event for asking questions.
We will also spend time learning about free materials that are definitely, 100% legally usable by us and by our users – including public domain materials, open scholarship, and materials available via Creative Commons and other open licenses. Return to the workplace armed with bullet proof sources you can use immediately with no worries!
Why Come? Public, K-12, academic, and special librarians are often called upon to make decisions about copyright for themselves, their end users, and for their institutions. And, it is surprising how much all library types have in common around copyright. A 3rd-grade teacher seeking iPad activities for a science lesson faces many of the same issues as a college instructor who wants to share course readings with students online. A university archivist and a public library patron with an interest in genealogy may both benefit from knowing more about the public domain. And almost every facility that provides public copiers or scanners has at least one staff member with concerns about responsibility for others’ use of those facilities.
Feel free to also invite teachers, curriculum directors, tech integrationists, and others who may also be part of your copyright team. CMLE scholarships are readily available within the registration process for librarians and school media specialists from the central Minnesota region.
This session will provide information about general legal principles, professional ethics, and various practical approaches to copyright issues. However, no legal advice will be provided.
Learning outcomes for participants:
Strengthen understandings of copyright law concepts such as fair use, the public domain, and open licensing.
Explore personal and institutional orientations to risk and liability through a professional ethics lens.
Develop confidence applying legal concepts to example situations drawn from real-world library and teaching experiences.
Know how to locate and appropriately make use of “100% legal” materials for your own purposes, and those of people you support
Nancy Sims is a lawyer/librarian who is fascinated by the pervasiveness of copyright and licensing issues in modern life. She enjoys helping individuals, groups, and organizations understand how technology choices, copyright, and related legal and policy issues may affect their work, research, art, and everyday communications. She is currently the Copyright Program Librarian at the University of Minnesota Libraries, and also does consulting and speaking with library, education, and technology organizations and institutions around the country.
How do you cite content you’re using from the web? Can you even use it in your work or on your website? If you need to modify it, can you? In today’s muddled online world, Creative Commons (CC) wants to be the answer to all your digital copyright questions.
Central Minnesota Libraries Exchange 