MUSC Copyright Toolkit
What You Need to Know
- Copyright @ MUSC: Policies, Forms, and Resources
- Guides and Tutorials from MUSC and Others
- How to Determine Compliance
- Managing Rights to Your Work
Copyright is the law that guarantees to the author or creator of an original work, certain rights in regard to the use and dissemination of that work. In the United States, the copyright law is spelled out in Title 17 of the U.S. Constitution. The law was substantially amended in 1998 with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). It was further updated in 2002 with the Technology, Education and Copyright Harmonization Act (TEACH Act & Distance Education) to reflect the increasing use of technology for both classroom teaching and distance education. The copyright laws reflect a complex balance of the rights of the author/creator of a published or unpublished work and the public interest in the development of knowledge.
Fair Use is an important copyright concept for educators who use copyrighted works in their teaching. The Fair Use doctrine allows, under certain circumstances, the copying and distribution of copyrighted material without first getting the permission of the copyright holder. If a use falls outside the fair use guidelines, permission often must be requested and received from the copyright holder to be lawful.
Understanding and complying with the laws governing the use of copyrighted materials is daunting. The information on this site is directed at teaching faculty, students, scientific writers, researchers, and others at MUSC who use copyrighted works. It includes Copyright @ MUSC: Policies, Forms, & Resources, forms, and information about Coursepacks, Plagiarism and How to Cite Sources, releases, Images and text, and print and digital/online resources. Many of the links lead to the excellent copyright Websites of other universities.