17.3 Copyright & Open Licensing
An open license is a vital component of an open educational resource. Because of this, it is important that you understand how open licenses work within copyright law. This chapter will provide an overview of U.S. copyright law, fair use, and licensing to help you navigate this topic.
Watch this video to learn more about how Creative Commons Licenses work, the most common form of open licensing in OER.
Copyright Law
U.S. copyright law protects an author’s rights over their original creative works (e.g., research articles, books and manuscripts, artwork, video and audio recordings, musical compositions, architectural designs, video games, and unpublished creative works). As soon as something is “fixed in a tangible medium of expression,” it is automatically protected by copyright. A resource is considered fixed when:
“its embodiment …by or under the authority of the author, is sufficiently permanent or stable to permit it to be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated for a period of more than transitory duration.”
In other words, an idea for a book you want to write is not protected by copyright, but the first draft of your manuscript is. Copyright protection ensures that the creator of a work has complete control over how their work is reproduced, distributed, performed, displayed, and adapted. You do not need to register your resource with the U.S. Copyright Office for this to come into effect; it is automatic.
Open Licenses
Open licenses are an integral part of what makes an educational resource an OER. The adaptability and reusability of OER make it so that they are not just free to access, but also free for instructors who want to alter the materials for use in their course. For example, in the figure below an openly licensed image has been traced to make it more readable for users.
“Adaptation in action” by Abbey Elder, licensed CC 0 1.0 Links to an external site., was adapted from “Copyrighted source to tracing Links to an external site.” by Kelvinsong, also licensed CC 0 1.0 Links to an external site.. This image was originally used to represent an improper recreation of a copyrighted work via tracing. In this example, it shows how an already open work can be legally recreated via tracing for readability.
One of the tenets of OER laid out early on in the open education movement was the idea of the 5 Rs (originally the 4 Rs) introduced by David Wiley. These five attributes lay out what it means for something to be truly “open,” as the term is used in open education. The 5 Rs include:
- Retain = the right to make, own, and control copies of the content.
- Reuse = the right to use the content in a wide range of ways
- Revise = the right to adapt, adjust, modify, or alter the content itself
- Remix = the right to combine the original or revised content with other open content to create something new
- Redistribute = the right to share copies of the original content, your revisions, or your remixes with others
While the “redistribute” and “revise” rights are the most commonly exercised rights in open education, each of the five plays an important role in the utility of an open educational resource. For example, without the right to “remix” materials, an instructor who teaches an interdisciplinary course would not be able to combine two disparate OER into a new resource that more closely fits their needs.
In the next chapter, we’ll look at Creative Commons licenses and how they facilitate the expression of the 5 Rs in unique ways.
Works Cited
- Copyright Law of the United States, 17 USC §102. https://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#102 ↵ Links to an external site.
- Copyright Law of the United States, 17 USC §101. https://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#101 ↵ Links to an external site.
- Copyright Law of the United States, 17 USC §106. https://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#106 ↵ Links to an external site.
- Of course, standard citation procedures still apply for creative works in the public domain. You cannot claim another's work as your own. ↵ Links to an external site.
- Peters, Diane. "Improving Access to the Public Domain: The Public Domain Mark." Creative Commons Blog, October 11, 2010. https://creativecommons.org/2010/10/11/improving-access-to-the-public-domain-the-public-domain-mark ↵ Links to an external site.
- Attribution: "Licensing" and "Public Domain" were adapted in part from UH OER Training Links to an external site. by Billy Meinke, licensed CC BY 4.0 Links to an external site.. ↵ Links to an external site.
- By assigning an open license to your work, you allow any user to exercise the rights allowed under the license, and cannot restrict reuse by certain individuals or parties without changing the license itself. ↵ Links to an external site.
- Free Sotware Foundation. "GNU Free Documentation License." 2008. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/fdl.html ↵ Links to an external site.
- Copyleft Attitude. "Free Art License 1.3." 2007. http://artlibre.org/licence/lal/en ↵ Links to an external site.
- Free Software Foundation. "What is Copyleft?." Accessed June 29, 2019. https://www.gnu.org/copyleft/copyleft.html ↵ Links to an external site.
- Wiley, David. "Defining the 'Open' in Open Content and Open Educational Resources." Open Content blog, 2014. http://opencontent.org/definition ↵ Links to an external site.