Copyright

 Is the work you want to use protected by copyright?

• Consider that copyright does not protect, and anyone may freely use, the following:
  • Works that lack originality
    • logical, comprehensive compilations (like the phone book)
    • unoriginal reprints of public domain works
  • Works in the public domain, including US Government documents
• Facts
• Ideas, processes, methods, and systems described in copyrighted works

The presence or absence of a copyright notice no longer carries the significance it once did because the law no longer requires a notice. Older works published without a notice may be in the public domain, but for works created after March 1, 1989, absence of a notice means virtually nothing.

"Freely use" means that it is not a violation of copyright to reuse the work in a new context, but it still must be cited.

If the work is protected by copyright, do you wish to exercise one of the owner’s exclusive rights?

• The owner of the copyright - usually the author/creator or the publisher - has the exclusive right to any and all of the following:
  • Make a copy (reproduce)
  • Use a work as the basis for a new work (create a derivative work)
  • Electronically distribute or publish copies (distribute a work)
  • Publicly perform music, prose, poetry, a drama, or play a video or audio tape or a CD-ROM, etc. (publicly perform a work)
  • Publicly display an image on a computer screen or otherwise (publicly display a work)

Is your use of the work exempt or excused from liability for infringement?

• The following exemptions exist within copyright law to allow for using a copyrighted work without permission or license:
  • Fair use
  • Library’s special rights (unlikely to apply here)
  • Educational performances and displays
• A copyright holder may also explicitly grant permissions (particularly, online) for use of his or her work under a Creative Commons License.  Learn more about Creative Commons.

If one of these exemptions applies to your situation, you are in the clear;  
IF NOT, YOU NEED PERMISSION!  Learn more about how to secure permissions.