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Many of you will be creating web sites for your course sections. Please keep in mind that the same copyright guidelines that you follow for writing your research papers apply for your web sites as well.
1) You should not assume that a posting on the Web, even on a UCI site, is open for copying or cut and paste. Web sites, like any other creation in tangible, fixed form, such as books, art work, photographs, etc., are automatically copyrighted. Under present copyright law, the copyright symbol © is not necessary to indicate that an original work, including a web site, is copyrighted. Therefore, unless explicitly stated otherwise on the site, you should get permission from the web site author for any material you are using for your own site.
2) Ask for permission in writing, either by e-mail or letter. Indicate the purpose of your site, by stating, for example, that it is an educational or course web site. Most web site creators, especially if they are educators, curators, or researchers, tend to give permission more readily to an educational site than to a commercial one.
3) Do not assume that a lack of response to your request is a sign of permission. It is not.
4) Once you get permission to use the whole or portion of a web site, you should always give credit to the web site creator with appropriate citation, just as you would any other citation from a journal, book, article, etc.
5) Be certain that you are asking permission from the actual creator or owner of the material. Complete source citation for text and images is one probable indication of a reliable site.
6) Linking to another site is a good option for text and image references. You ordinarily don’t need permission for linking, especially to other educational sites. It is good practice with commercial sites to link to the home page with further instructions to get to your specific reference, as some commercial sites are sensitive to bypassing their home page (and thus their advertising). In general, look for a policy page on the site regarding linking.
7) Keep the above points in mind when you’re posting your own site so that other web site creators can easily apply these same guidelines for potential use of your material. Give proper labels and citations of text, images, and other media that are included in your site. It is also helpful to indicate those materials on your site that are open for sharing and those for which you require permission. Also include your own contact information.
8) Become informed about public domain, copyright, and fair use. This knowledge will be useful to you throughout your career, for both web site creation and for your papers, books, and articles.
For UC policy and guidelines: University of California Policy on the Reproduction of Copyrighted Materials for Teaching and Research
http://www.ucop.edu/ucophome/coordrev/policy/4-29-86.html#policy
For specific guidelines in the Humanities, refer to HumaniTech® Copyright Guidelines http://www.humanities.uci.edu/humanitech/copyright/copyright.html.
You may also enroll in one of EEE’s quarterly workshop on “Copyright and Fair Use Basics” at http://eee.uci.edu.
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