Research Guides: Find: Audio: Copyright

Copyright

Due to US Copyright law, audio materials receive legal protection as creative intellectual works. This requires that you responsibly investigate your options for audio reuse and attribution.

Copyright protects most fixed and tangible expressions of an idea:

texts : books, articles, emails, and web-based information
photographs, art, graphics
music
software

Copyright does not protect:

works that lack originality (like the phone book)
works in the public domain
US government works

Copyright applies as soon as a work is put in material form. A copyright lasts for the lifetime of the author plus 70 years before it automatically becomes a part of the public domain.

US Copyright Law

If you are unable to determine permitted uses, it is best to check with the copyright owner before using a sound recording. For educators, researchers and students, copyright law does provide some flexibility when it comes to using media for scholarly purposes. When searching for audio try terms such as: public domain, free, copyright-free, or royalty-free.

To “use” a copyrighted work, you must either have the copyright holder’s permission, or you must qualify for a legal exception such as “fair use.” Fair Use is the legal, unauthorized use of copyrighted material, allowable under certain circumstances. Many educational and classroom use falls under fair use, but there are many images use cases that can be fair.

Fair use (Section 107 of the U.S. Copyright code) provides parameters for the legal use of copyrighted material without the permission of the copyright holder.

Four factors for determining fair use eligibility:

Purpose and character of use, including whether the use is of a 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 work as a whole.
The effect of the use on the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

Fair Use Evaluator
Thinking Through Fair Use This online form helps you structure your own reflections about the fair use factors, and provides a record that you did consider relevant issues.
VRA Statement on the fair use of images for teaching, research, and study
CAA Best Practices for Fair Use This Code of Best Practices provides visual-arts professionals with a set of principles addressing best practices in the fair use of copyrighted materials. It describes how fair use can be invoked and implemented when using copyrighted materials in scholarship, teaching, museums, archives, and in the creation of art.
U.S. Copyright Office Fair Use Index

Public Domain

Images in the Public Domain are no longer under copyright protection and can be used freely. In general images published before 1923 are in the public domain in the United States Learn more about copyright terms

There are four common ways that works arrive in the public domain:

the copyright has expired
the copyright owner failed to follow copyright renewal rules
the copyright owner deliberately places it in the public domain, known as “dedication,” or
copyright law does not protect this type of work. Learn more

Creative Commons

Images and Photos made available under a creative commons license are free to use, with varying restrictions. Creative Commons licenses are not an alternative to copyright. They work alongside copyright and enable owners to modify copyright terms to best suit their needs.

You can search most image databases for creative commons licensed images.

Creative Commons Licenses and Tools
Use Creative Commons tools to help share your work.
Creative Commons Search
Search music options with CC Licenses.
Creative Commons License Generator
Select the appropriate license for your work.

Images by Creative Commons - Creative Commons, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=20727292