Thursday, July 16, 2009

Fair Use Evaluator

I just learned about a new tool from the American Library Association's Office for Information Technology Policy, the Fair Use Evaluator. This tool walks a person through the evaluation process of deciding whether their use of copyrighted material falls within the provisions of Fair Use. As you go through the process you can click on statements for and against Fair Use for all four of the issues that help determine fair use. The tool then calculates the pluses and minuses and creates a time stamped .pdf document that documents the process of deciding whether or not to use copyrighted material. It should be very helpful in documenting someone's good faith effort to exercise their fair use rights as they make use of protected material.