Association of Research Libraries' Brief on Streaming Films

My blog post for Week 7 in Electronic Resource Management has to do with the brief prepared by the Association of Research Libraries regarding the TEACH act and the new rules for streaming films. This subject made me think of an experience my roommate is currently having.

My roommate is currently taking an online course through Madison College about anime and Japanese culture. Every week, he is required to watch one or two anime movies in their entirety through his college's Desire2Learn website. This instance illustrates the Fair Use claim very well. The movies are recently copyrighted materials, normally viewed at home by people, on DVDs, for the purposes of entertainment. Since they purchased the video and are not broadcasting or restreaming the content, they are using the content in a way prescribed by the law. In the case of my roommate, he is watching streaming copies of the videos on his computer through his courseware, which at first brush may seem like disregard for copyright law. The film has been copied in its entirety and offered for free by the school for the students to watch. They are not being asked to screen the films in a group in a physical meeting space or a classroom showing, nor are the films required to be watched by checking them out on reserve in the library as a hard copy. The students and teacher, however, are within their rights. Since it is for the purposes of film and animation critique and for the discussion of a specific culture through the course of the class, this case should be considered legal and be allowed via Fair Use. The fact that it is on a course website that is password protected makes it even more apparent that they are not using the items for entertainment value or to redistribute them illegally. The ARL brief confirms this stance on Fair Use.

On Friday, October 15, we had the great honor of having Tomas Lipinski from UW-Milwaukee's SOIS in our class. I really loved hearing his point of view, especially after puzzling over his article. Something that Lipinski said in class struck me: It seems ironic that teachers would cut out the "unnecessary portions" of films in order to meet copyright standards and that those would often be the credits for the copyrights of the materials. Wouldn't the original creators rather the credits not be cut and have them show the entire film, if the entire film was needed? Is not giving credit where credit is due the main point of copyright? If cutting out portions of the film makes it permissible to use, then how much does one need to cut? In the case of my roommate's anime course, it does not make sense to cut any of the film. It would be best to know who the animators of the film were, and where it was made, for the purposes of analysis. These tidbits of information can be found in the credits. As the ARL Brief suggests, "Courts likely would treat educational uses of entertainment products, such as uploading a feature film to a course website so that students could stream it for purposes of analysis, as repurposing. These cases further suggest that educators could buttress their fair use claim by recontextualizing works on course websites through selection and arrangement and the addition of background readings, study questions, commentary, criticism, annotation, and student reactions."(2-3) Therefore, the TEACH Act in cases such as these is not necessary to consult, rather it is still allowable under Fair Use. It is a shame that copyright has become so confusing and muddy that many institutions and instructors may waste a lot of time worrying about if their course's use of a work is performance-based or non-performance based, or how much to cut, due to the TEACH Act.