copyright question

[Janice Pilch]

Dear Sergey,

To answer this question, more details are needed, as to the materials being used, the authors whose works are being used (death dates) and exactly how they are planned to be used: compiled as handouts for classroom use, printed as a textbook by a publisher or compiled as a coursepack by an instructor, posted to a website, publicly distributed as a textbook, adapted for use through annotations or translation, or some or all of the above. 

Works of contemporary Russian authors, who are alive or who are died within the last 70 years are in most cases still protected by copyright in the U.S., but this does not preclude your use of them in in the U.S. in certain educational situations. It depends on what you plan to do. U.S. law governs such use, and much depends on the application of Section 107 of the law (fair use). The less of the works you use, and the less widely you distribute the materials, the greater chance of your use falling into what would be considered "fair." Adapting the works, then publishing and publicly distributing them as a textbook would probably not qualify as a fair use; handing out print copies of 2-page excerpts of works by 10 different authors to a limited number of students in a classroom, even if adapted in some way with annotations or translations, would no doubt be considered fair. Adapting the works, then posting them to a public website to serve as a textbook for students anywhere!
  w!
ould be questionable. 

If you would like to send me more information on the works and exactly what you would like to do with them, I can provide some helpful advice. In the meantime, if you take a look at section 107 of the U.S. copyright law, and to the website on fair use created by Prof. Kenneth Crews at IUPUI, you will get an idea of the exceptions that U.S. law allows for these kinds of uses of educational material, and how to apply the fair use concept. 

http://www.copyright.gov/title17/chapter01.pdf
http://www.copyright.iupui.edu/index.htm

We can communicate off line on this concerning the details. I'll be away at meetings in Chicago until Friday evening, but will reply again after that.

Sincerely,

Janice Pilch, Chair
AAASS Bibliography and Documentation Subcommittee 
on Copyright Issues

---- Original message ----
>Date: Wed, 3 Jan 2007 19:27:08 -0500
>From: Sergey Glebov <sglebov at SMITH.EDU>  
>Subject: [SEELANGS] copyright question  
>To: SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU
>
>Dear colleagues,
> 
>I am posting a copyright question (again!) on behalf of someone not
>subscribed to SEELANGS. A private Russian-language school in the United
>States wants to compile a collection of texts ("khrestomatiia") for the
>students' use. The texts include excerpts of up to 2 pages from
>contemporary Russian authors, adapted for heritage speakers. Are such
>excerpts protected by US copyright law and are the publishers vulnerable
>to legal action? 
> 
>I will be very grateful for off the list responses.
> 
>With best regards,
> 
>Sergey Glebov
>
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----------------------------------------
Janice T. Pilch
Associate Professor of Library Administration
Head, Slavic and East European Acquisitions
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 
1408 W. Gregory Drive, Urbana, IL 61801  
Tel (217) 244-9399
Fax (217) 333-2214

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