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creation. Copyright registration is not required to obtain a copyright, though registration may be
required to enforce a copyright in federal courts. Works published after 1989 also do not need to
have a copyright notice (i.e., © Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences 2012)
to enjoy copyright protection. So if in doubt, assume copyright applies.
The penalties for copyright infringement can be harsh. Under the Copyright laws, a court may
award up to $150,000 in civil statutory damages for each separate willful infringement; copyright
infringement can also be a crime under federal law. Under College policies, violation of
copyright law may result in administrative action, such as loss of networking privileges or
disciplinary action up to and including termination of employment or student status.
Not all works enjoy copyright protection, and all works eventually fall into the public domain.
Once a work is in the public domain it may be freely used without restriction (unless accepting
access to a work was done under a license, in which case the terms of the license will control).
The College encourages the use of Public Domain materials, which are widely available on the
Internet. See, e.g., Project Gutenberg, http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page, Google
Books, http://books.google.com.
FAIR USE.
According to Title 17 U.S. Code ch. 1 §107 of the Copyright Laws of the United States, four
factors are considered when determining whether or not a particular use is fair:
the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of commercial nature
or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
the nature of the copyrighted work;
the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a
whole; and
the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
Each of these factors must be considered when analyzing whether a proposed use may be
accomplished without seeking permission from the copyright owner before making an overall
determination. There is no one standard, so the analysis is necessarily subjective and it can be
difficult to produce a definitive determination. All of the following should be taken into
consideration:
1. Educational, non-profit and personal use is favored over commercial applications.
The character of the use is shown by whether it merely reproduces the original work or whether
it is employed to criticize, comment or parody or otherwise add something new to the original
work.
2. The nature of the work depends on whether it is factual, which tends to favor fair
use, or more original or imaginative, which is more likely to require permission.
3. With regard to the third point, the “amount and substantiality of the portion used
in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole”: There is no specific number of words, lines, or
notes that may safely be taken without permission. License agreements with database producers