ALA Press books on copyright and the Creative Commons

The catalogue of ALA textbooka and course resources has arrived and there are books worth noting:

Benson, Sarah. (2021) Compact Copyright: Quick Answers to Common Questions.

Description: Faculty, students, and colleagues come to you with copyright questions, both simple and complex. And they all want reliable answers—as fast as you can get them. With this guide, designed for ready access, you’ll be prepared to deliver. Lawyer, copyright librarian, and iSchool instructor Benson presents succinct explanations ideal for both on-the-fly reference and staff training. Copyright specialists will appreciate excerpts from the law itself alongside tools and resources for digging deeper. Practical discussions of key legal concepts, illustrated using 52 scenarios, will lead you to fast, accurate answers on a range of topics, such as

• barriers to using the TEACH Act provisions in content for online teaching;
• showing a full-length movie in a university class;
• public domain and the 1998 Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act;
• your legal options when receiving a DMCA take-down notice;
• court interpretations of fair use in three key recent cases;
• Creative Commons licenses, complete with a quick reference chart;
• library rights to license photographs in a digital collection;
• using letters under copyright in a special collections display case;
• a grad student’s right to use in a thesis writing published in their professor’s journal article;
• applying the implied license option to post historical student dissertations in institutional repositories;
• the Marrakesh Treaty provision supporting transfer of accessible works internationally; and
• limiting factors for interlibrary loan.

Creative Commons (2019) Creative Commons for Educators and Librarians.

Description: The figures are eye-opening: more than 1.6 billion works on 9 million websites are licensed under Creative Commons (CC). These materials constitute an extraordinarily rich repository for teaching, learning, sharing, and creative reuse. Knowing your way around CC will help you make the most of the Open Access (OA) and open educational resources (OER) movements. This book represents the first-ever print complement to the CC Certificate program, providing in-depth coverage of CC licenses, open practices, and the ethos of the Commons. Inside readers will find guidance on

• the layers and elements of CC licenses, with clear explanations on how they interact;
• reusing, revising, and remixing;
• how to acknowledge the underlying work in a remix;
• techniques for locating works in the public domain and communicating their value;
• supporting learners’ access to a wide array of open knowledge resources in primary, secondary, and higher education;
• assessing institutional policies for open education, plus advice on revising these policies;
• ways to adapt existing openly licensed materials in order to keep your institution’s knowledge base relevant and up to date;
• how to meet the open licensing requirements increasingly present in government and foundation grants and contracts; and
• hundreds of authoritative resources for additional learning.

This book is published under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license; digital versions are available for download at Creative Commons web page Certificate Resources (CC BY).

Crews, Kenneth. (2020) Copyright Law for Librarians and Educators: Creative Strategies and Practical Solutions, Fourth Edition.

Description: Copyright law never sleeps, making it imperative to keep abreast of the latest developments. Declared “an exemplary text that seals the standards for such books” (Managing Information), this newly revised and updated edition by respected copyright authority Crews offers timely insights and succinct guidance for LIS students, librarians, and educators alike. Readers will

• learn basic copyright definitions and key exceptions for education and library services;
• find information quickly with “key points” sidebars, legislative citations, and cross-references;
• get up to speed on fresh developments, such as how the recently signed Marrakesh Treaty expands access for people with disabilities and why the latest ruling in the Georgia State University case makes developing a fair use policy so important;
• understand the concept of fair use, with fresh interpretations of its many gray areas that will aid decision making;
• learn the current state of affairs regarding mass digitization, Creative Commons, classroom use and distance education, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, and other important topics;
• receive guidance on setting up on a copyright service at a library, college, or university; and
• find many helpful checklists for navigating copyright in various situations.

This straightforward, easy-to-use guide provides the tools librarians and educators need to take control of their rights and responsibilities as copyright owners and users.