Copyright Laws -- Fear of Violation for High-School Project

[Coldkilla9]

Hey. I know I am still in high-school, but our teacher is on college so he is taking copyright seriously when it comes to our projects. I am taking a collection of Music/Images from the internet.. and there are a few parts of the Project that require.. lets say some ambience. I have many sound files (9,500+) from games and I was wondering.. Putting these files onto a presentation, is this legal if I give the owner (Example: EA Games, and the game title) credit. Will this be acceptible in terms of copyright? I know this seems like it is somewhere on the internet.. but the presentations begin tomarrow and we don't present until Friday. I just need to know fast before I start throwing in more and more sound effects/video/music/images, etc..

Thanks a lot!

[daamon]

Hi Coldkilla9,

I'm no expert on copyright law - but, I believe that the typical wording on copyrighted material has words to the effect of:

"This material may not be used, reproduced, copied, lent or used publicly without the written permission of XYZ".

My summation, based on the above, would be that just acknowleding the source isn't enough.

Just my opinion...

[Matt D]

I'm not an expert either, but IMO this would fall under fair use, especially since it's a school project.
If you want to know if this is ok with your teacher, ask him! If he says "no" then you do something else.

[lordsmurf]

but our teacher is on college so he is taking copyright seriously when it comes to our projects.

One of those stupid high-horse teachers. Should be in another profession.

[guns1inger]

Does your school have a drama or music department ? If so, you may find that they have a blanket license for the use of music (although this won't cover sound effects) in performance pieces for the school. I know such licenses exist in Australia as a friend of mine has one for her dancing school. We can use pretty much anything released here under the ARIA license (Australian Recording Industry Association). There are also many public domain sound effects sites and CDs, so there has to be a way around him.

[pfh]

Good point guns1inger.........

Lordsmurf- IOW's "covering your arse"

[Cobra]

This isn't anything to do with video - I'm moving this to Off Topic. You'll probably get more attention here, anyway!

[Supreme2k]

Just do the project, present it, then destroy it. If your teacher is such a hard-ass that he reports you (Oy vey!), just say "Habeus Corpus, dude?" :P

That is to say if his AR, hoity-toity "college" noggin can even recognize the pieces. You could probably throw in some Britney Spears, say it was your sister, and he would be none the wiser.

[northcat_8]

but our teacher is on college so he is taking copyright seriously when it comes to our projects.

One of those stupid high-horse teachers. Should be in another profession.

Amen.

In educational circumstances, you should be able to use the materials as long as they are referenced properly in your bibliography.

Educationally speaking, as long as you are not plagurizing the material, you should be alright. And if you are not alright, tell your teacher <from one teacher to another>, I said to get the stick out of his hypocritical ass.

[adam]

This is clearly a literal violation of copyright, the question is whether it would be exempted under the Fair Use Doctrine, which is the applicable test when determing whether something is an infringement or a personal use.

Fair Use is a 4 prong test. It looks to me like you pass 3 of the prongs right off the bat since this is not a commercial project and is for educational purposes only and will have virtually no effect on the copyright holder. The only thing you really need to do is ensure that you limit the substantiality of copying only to that amount necessary for your project. I would recommend that under no circumstances do you put an entire song or musical piece on there. That is not Fair Use.

But whether or not you think you are acting under Fair Use isn't all that important, after all there is no way you'd ever be sued for this small educational project anyway. The question is whether your professor buys your argument. Ask him/her if they care. If they say no go then print out the Fair Use doctrine and explain why you think it applies.