Learning Module:
What Chemists Need to Know about Copyright
Class and Test Questions For Copyright Teaching
Presented by the American Chemical Society Joint
Board/Council Committee on Publications
Subcommittee on Copyright
Class questions: use the idea of "What is wrong here?" Use with specific scenarios. Opportunity to discuss why. Will need to address potential student response of the legal system being too restrictive.
Here are some possible True/False questions followed by their answers:
- A work for hire cannot be copyrighted. False
- A technical paper is not copyrighted unless it is registered. False
- The reproduction of a copyrighted work is prohibited without permission of the copyright holder, unless the use is a fair use. True
- For private, scholarly research purposes, a student may make one photocopy of a journal article. True
- All college and universities have a blanket exemption to copy and distribute any copyrighted work. False
- Out-of-print books may be copied without concern about the copyright. False
- Web pages (text and graphics) are copyrighted. True
- E-mail messages are not copyrighted. False
- One archival copy of your major word processing software is permitted under copyright law. True
- Buying software gives you the right to copy and distribute it. False
- "Pirating software" means making an impermissible copy of the software. True
- Registering a copyright creates a record informing the public that the work is protected. True
- Transfer of exclusive rights can be made orally. False
- Copyright can last for the life of the author plus 70 years. True
- You can reproduce your fellow student's lab manual in its entirety under fair use. False
- If you plan to use material from another journal article, what steps would you follow? Provide a specific article as the example.
- If you want to use a graphic from another university's web page or a commercial organization, what steps would you follow? Provide specific examples.
Sample scenarios for use in classes:
- How would you copyright your personal journal or diary that you write in
regularly?
Answer: It is automatically protected under copyright laws. Although, use of a copyright notice is not required for protecting one's copyright, it is suggested. - If you want to publish your journal, how would you register the copyright?
Answer: Write for information to Register of Copyrights, Library of Congress, Washington, DC 20559, or call 202-707-3000, or 202-707-5959 (for an information specialist) or go to The United State Copyright Office. - Who owns the copyright to the papers you turn in for this class?
Answer: In most cases, you do, not the university or your instructor. - Without violating copyright, a) how much of a published work can you quote
in your student papers without giving credit? b) how much can you quote if you
do give credit?
Answer: a) almost none; b) if your paper is a review or critique, you can quote as much as you need for criticism and comment. Although, the more one quotes, the more one might exceed fair use. - I find an interesting article in a journal of the American Chemical Society
and decide I want a copy for my own personal files; may I make one?
Answer: Usually yes, if you are a student or teacher and the paper is for educational or scholarly research. However, if your "personal files" are part of your profession and you work for a corporation, your copying has been found in the Texaco case to be beyond fair use and your company should report its copying activity to the Copyright Clearance Center, unless your company has a license to make such copies. - Acme Pharmaceuticals calls you and asks you to write a booklet on how to
synthesize aspirin. You agree to do so. They pay you. They publish the booklet
and send it to thousands of customers. Who owns the copyright?
Answer: It depends: did you sign a work for hire agreement or copyright transfer agreement? If you did not sign any such agreement, then you own the copyright. - You are an employee for Acme Pharmaceuticals. They ask you to write a booklet
on how to synthesize aspirin. You agree to do so. They publish the booklet and
send it to thousands of customers. Who owns the copyright?
Answer: They do. It is an implied work for hire because you are on the payroll. - You are teaching chemistry at Northern South Dakota in Hoopla. You decide
you want your students to get a packet of reprints on NMR. You copy ten papers
from the chemical literature, write a brief preface and table of contents, and
send the packet for copying to the college bookstore. Students purchase the packet
at essentially the cost of the copying. Is this legal?
Answer: Generally no, unless you get written permission from the copyright holders of the papers. On a one-time rush case, you may, in accordance with legislative guidelines, hand out individual copies of the papers, but you may not sell them through a bookstore or copy shop.
