FAIR USE

Notwithstanding the provisions of section 106, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include--

Section 107 of Copyright Act of 1976, As Amended (1994) (a.k.a. Title 17, U.S. Code)

Court cases have established the principle that none of these factors alone is enough to tip the arguement in favor or against favor of Fair Use. The arguement and the four points must be examined in total. No one point is more important than any other. Failure to satisfy one point does not doom your arguement.

Fair use . . . calls for case-by-case analysis . . . Nor may the four statutory factors be treated in isolation, one from another. All are to be explored, and the results weighed together, in light of the purposes of copyright. (Campbell v. Acuff-Rose, 510 U.S. 569 (1994).

Are the Fair Use provisions hard-and-fast rules? No. Are the guidelines vague? Yes. They are purposefully so. Congress, for its credit, decided that vague guidelines were more appropriate than hard rules.

Thus, while there are activities that appear to be clearly within Fair Use and activities that appear to be obviously outside Fair Use, there is a fuzzy set in between in which case law prevails.

Indiana University has an excellent fair use checklist that shows how each of the four factors tips for or against a fair use arguement. [Backup copy.]