What is fair use?©RIGHT LAW IN THAILAND

COPYRIGHT LAW IN THAILAND


Brief History of Thai Copyright Laws
Prior to the existence of a modern copyright law in Thailand, there was an announcement of the Vajiranana Library (the National Library at present) in 1894 prohibiting any person from publishing any part of, or any article published in Vajirayarnvises Books without prior permission of “Kamma-sampathikasapa.” (Surat Numnnont 1962, 17) The announcement protected the rights regarding articles published in Vajirayarnvises Book. In 1901, during the reign of King Chulalongkorn (King Rama V, 1868-1910) the Copyright Act B.E. 2445 (A.D. 1902) was promulgated. During the reign of King Vajiravudh (King Rama VI, 1910-1925) the Copyright Act B.E. 2457 (A.D. 1914) was enacted to amend the previous law. However, both Acts protected only the copyright of literary works.
In the reign of King Prajadhipok (King Rama VII, 1925-1934) the Act for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works B.E. 2474 (A.D. 1931), which repealed the former two Acts, was promulgated on 16 June 1931. This Act was the first modern copyright law, because it contained the universal principles of copyright law, especially the protection of artistic, scientific and foreign works. After having been enforced for more than forty years, the Act for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works B.E. 2474 became out of date. The penalty for copyright infringement was very minor. The Copyright Act B.E. 2521 (A.D. 1978), which became effective on 19 December 1978 provided protection for audio-visual works, sound records and video broadcasting works.
Fifteen years later, the Copyright Act growth up to date to new forms of literary and artistic works, such as computer programs, sound and visual recordings performances and the leasing of audio-visual work. In that case, the government therefore proposed a new copyright bill to the parliament which was passed as “the Copyright Act B.E. 2537” (A.D. 1994). This Act came into force on 21 March 1995.

Nature of Copyright
Section 4 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 defines the word “copyright” as “the exclusive right to do any act under this Act in relation to the work made by the author.”
The purposes of the Copyright Act are to protect the rights of a person to his/her works which uses his/her skill, effort and labor to create a work, and which may be useful for all mankind. (Phillips and Firth 1990, 115) Whenever any person makes or creates a work under the conditions of the copyright law, he/she will be exclusively entitled to do anything to or with regards to the work, for example, its reproduction, adaptation, dissemination to the public and the granting license to other persons to use the said rights, because the copyright provides a very useful and effective way of exploiting a work economically. (Bainbridge 1992, 33) The copyright law protects the work, which any author makes or creates, in the form in which it is expressed but does not protect the underlying ideas and information in the work. On this account, if any idea is not created to be a work in physical appearance, no copyright protection shall be extended to such idea. (Dworkin and Taylor 1990, 4)
Copyright gives exclusive right to the author who makes or creates a work, and acquires the right under the copyright law. However, the copyright is a property right in which the owner may assign his right wholly or in part and may assign it for a limited period of time or for the entire term of the protection of the copyright. An assignment of copyright, except by means of succession shall be made in writing signed by the assignor and the assignee, and if there is no specified period of time in any assignment, it shall be deemed that the assignment is limited for a ten-year period (Section 17).
Though the copyright is able to be assigned under the law, the author of a copyright work still has the moral rights to be identified as the author of the work (the paternity right) able to prohibit an assignee of copyright or any other person from distorting, abridging, adapting or doing any acts in relation to the work to such extent as to cause injury to the reputation or prestige of the author (the integrity right). If the author dies, his heirs have the right in litigation to enforce such rights throughout the term of the copyright protection unless otherwise agreed upon in writing (Section 18).

Copyrightable Works
The prerequisite of a copyright work is that it be the product of human endeavor, be that endeavor ever so slight, and not simply somethingwhich occurs in nature. (Phillips and Firth 1990, 115) The works, which are able to be protected under the copyright Act B.E. 2537, must be creative works, irrespective of the mode or the form in which the work is expressed. By virtue of Section 6 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537, the copyrightable works are stipulated as one of the following works:
1. Literary works means every production in the literary domain, such as books, pamphlets, writings, printings, lectures, sermons, addresses and speeches, including computer programs.
Furthermore, this Act also defines computer programs as a set of instructions or anything used with a computer for making the computer work or to obtain any result, irrespective of computer program language.
2. Dramatic works mean works relating to choreography, dancing, action or performance in dramatic composition, and includes pantomime.
3. Artistic works mean any works of painting and drawing, work of sculpture, works of lithography, works of architecture, photographic works, works on illustrations, maps, structures, sketches, or three-dimensional works in relation to geography, topography or science, works of the applied arts, and includes the photographs and plans of such works.
4. Musical works mean any musical composition for playing or singing, whether with rhythm and lyrics or only rhythm, and include a musical notes or musical diagrams, the tunes in having been arranged and transcripted.
5. Audiovisual works mean works composed of a sequence of images recorded in any form of material, which are capable of being replayed by necessary apparatus for using such material, and include a sound track of that work, if any.
6. Cinematographic works mean audiovisual works composed of any sequence of visual images, which is capable of being continuously shown as moving pictures, or is capable of being recorded in another material so as to be continuously shown as moving pictures, and includes the sound track of that moving picture, if any.
7. Sound recordings mean works composed of a sequence of music, sound of a performance or any other sound recorded in any form of material, which is capable of being replayed by necessary apparatus for using such material, but not including the sound track of a cinematographic work or another audio-visual work.
8. Sound and video broadcasting works mean works communicated to the public by means of radio broadcasting, sound and video broadcasting on television or by other similar means.
9. Other works in the literary, scientific or artistic domain. When an author creates works in accordance with the conditions of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537, his works will be protected under this Act. However, Section 7 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 states that the following works do not come under the Copyright Acts:

News of the day and facts having the character of being information only.
Constitutions and legislations.
Regulations, by-laws, notifications, orders, explanations and correspondence of the Ministries, sub-Ministries, Departments or any other state or local unit.
Judgment, orders, decisions and reports of the government.
Translations and collection of those in (1) to (4) made by the Ministries, sub-Ministries, Departments, or any other state or local units.
The underlying reasons for these exceptions are that such works are general works stipulated for public interest.

Acquisition of Copyright
The acquisition of copyright for protection under the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 can be classified into four categories as follows:

1. The author shall be entitled to the copyright in the work he has created under any of the following conditions (Section 8)
1.1 In the case where the work has not been published yet, the author must be a Thai national or must have stayed in the Kingdom, or a national of or resident in a country which is a member of the convention on copyright protection of which Thailand is also a member throughout the time or most of the time of a work’s creation.
1.2 In the case where the work has been published, the first publication must have been in the Kingdom or in a country which is a member of the convention on copyright protection of which Thailand is also a member, or in the case where the first publication is made outside the Kingdom or in another country which is not a member of the convention on copyright protection of which Thailand is a member, if the work has been published in the Kingdom or in a country which is a member of the convention on copyright protection of which Thailand is also a member within thirty days as from the date of the first publication, or the author must be qualified according to that prescribed in (1.1) at the time of the first publication.
However, in the case where the author must be a Thai national, if he is a juristic person, such juristic person must be incorporated under the law of Thailand.
By virtue of Section 4 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537, the meaning of the publication is a disposition of the duplicated copies of a work, regardless of its form or character, with the consent of the author, by making duplicated copies available to a reasonable number of the public having due regards to the nature of the work, but does not include a performance or display of dramatic, musical or cinematographic works, lecturing or delivering a speech on literary work, sound and video broadcasting about any work, exhibition of artistic work and construction of architectural work.
In the case where the author has created a work in the capacity of an officer or employee, he shall be entitled to the copyright in that work, but his employer is entitled to the right to disseminate that work to the public in accordance with the purpose of the employment, unless it has been agreed otherwise in writing (Section 9 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537). Additionally, the employer shall be entitled to the copyright in the work the author was specifically commissioned to make, unless the author and the employer have agreed otherwise (Section 10)
2. In case of a work being by its nature an adaptation of the work copyrighted under this Act with the consent of the copyright owner, the person making such adaptation shall be entitled to the copyright under this Act, without prejudice to the right of the copyright owner in the work of the original author which was adapted (Section 11)
3. In case of a work being by its nature a compilation or composition of the works copyrighted under this Act with the consent of the copyright owner, or being a compilation or composition of data or anything else which can be read or transferred by a machine or other equipment, if the person, who compiles or composes, has done so by selecting or rearranging in its nature which is not an imitation of another person’s work, the person making such compilation and composition shall be entitled to the copyright to such work under this Act, without prejudice to the right of copyright owner in the work and data or anything else of the original author which was compiled or composed (Section 12)
4. The Ministries, sub-Ministries, Departments or any other state or local agency shall be entitled to the copyright in the works created under their employment or direction or control, unless it has been agreed otherwise in writing (Section 14)

Protection of Copyright
The copyright owner shall have the exclusive rights regarding the following acts (Section 15)
1. Reproduction or adaptation. By virtue of the meaning under Section 4 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537, “reproduction” is any mode of copying, emulation, duplication, block-making, sound recording, video recording or sound and video recording, from the original, a duplicate or a publication in its material part, whether wholly or in part. In relation to computer program, reproduction is any mode of copying or duplication of the computer program from any recording medium in its material part, and not being in the nature of making a new work, whether wholly or in part. And “adaptation” is a reproduction by conversion, improvement, amendment or copying of the original in its material part, and not being in the nature of making a new work, whether wholly or in part.
2. Dissemination to the public. Under Section 4 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537, dissemination to the public means making the work available to the public by means of performing, lecturing, praying, playing, converting into different formats such as sound and image, reconstructing, disposing or by any other means.
3. Letting the originals or the duplicates of computer program works, audio-visual works, cinematographic works and sound recording works.
4. Granting benefits accruing from the copyright to other persons.
5. Granting license to other persons to use the right under (1) (2) or (3), with or without imposing any condition, but such condition shall not be stipulated in the nature that being the restriction or unfair competition. However, in the case where a copyright owner by virtue of this Copyright Act, grants license to a person to use any said right, this license shall be regarded as a non-exclusive license, and the copyright owner can grant the same license to anyone else, unless the license imposes the prohibition (Section 16).

Term of Copyright Protection
Generally, the copyright in a work shall subsist for the life of the author and shall continue to subsist until the end of the period of fifty years from the death of the author. Nevertheless, in the case of a work of joint authorship, the copyright in such work shall subsist for the life of the joint authors and shall continue to subsist until the end of the period of fifty years from the death of the last surviving joint author. Additionally, if the author or every joint author was dead before the publication of the work, the copyright shall subsist for a period of fifty years from the date of its first publication(Section 19).
In case of the author being a juristic person, or using a pseudonymous or anonymous name and being unknown in terms of identity, the copyright in such work shall subsist for a period of fifty years from the date of its creation, but if the work is published during the said period, the copyright shall subsist for a period of fifty years from the date of its first publication (Paragraph 4 of Section 19 and Section 20).
The copyright in the photographic, audio-visual, cinematographic, sound recording or sound and video broadcasting work, or the copyright in the work created in accordance with the employment or direction or control of the Ministries, sub-Ministries, Departments or any other state or local agency shall subsist for a period of fifty years from the date of its creation. But if the work is published during the said period, the copyright shall subsist for a period of fifty years from the date of its first publication (Section 21 and Section 23).
However, the copyright in the work of applied art shall only subsist for a period of twenty-five years from the date of its creation, but if the work is published during the said period, the copyright shall subsist for a period of twenty-five years from the date of its first publication (Section 22).
The publication of any copyrighted work after the termination of the term of copyright protection shall not give rise to the copyright in that work anew, for instance the publication of a musical work after fifty years from the death of the composer does not give rise a new to the copyright in that work (Section 26).

Infringement of Copyright
As mentioned above, the Copyright Act provides the exclusive rights to the copyright owner, so infringement of copyright means the act which any person commits to the copyrighted work without permission of the copyright owner. The infringement of copyright is divided into two kinds as follows:
1. Direct Infringement. Any of the following acts in relation to every type of copyrighted works, except for a sound and video broadcasting, shall constitute an infringement of copyright: (1) reproduction or adaptation; (2) dissemination to the public. (Section 27, Section 28 and Section 30)
However, in relation to an audiovisual work, cinematographic work, sound recording work or computer program, the infringement of copyright also includes the letting of an original or duplicate of such works (Section 28 and Section 30).
Moreover, any one of the following acts in relation to a copyrighted sound and video broadcasting work shall constitute an infringement of copyright: (1) a production of audio-visual work, cinematographic work, sound recording or sound and video broadcasting work, whether wholly or in part; (2) a rebroadcasting of sound and visual images, whether wholly or in part; (3) an arrangement of the sound and video broadcasting work to be heard and/or seen by the public, by asking for a fee or other commercial benefits in return. (Section 29)
2. Indirect Infringement. Any person, who knows should have reason to know that a work was made by an infringement of the copyright of another person, does any of the following acts in relation to such work for profits, shall be deemed to commit an indirect infringement of copyright:

selling, possessing to sell, offering to sell, letting for hire, offering to hire, selling by hire-purchase or offering to sell by hire-purchase;
dissemination to the public;
distributing in such manner as to be prejudicial to the copyright owner;
importing or making an order for importation into the Kingdom. (Section 31)
Exceptions from Infringement of Copyright
Section 30 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 provides the exceptions from infringement of copyright, that is an act done in relation to the copyrighted work of another person by virtue of this Act shall not constitute an infringement of copyright, if done as follows:

research or study of the work, which is not done for making profit;
use for one’s own benefit and/or use for the benefits of his family member, or close relatives;
criticisms, comments or reviews of the work accompanied by an acknowledgement of the copyright ownership in such work;
report of current events through the mass media, accompanied by an acknowledgement of the copyright ownership in such work;
reproduction, adaptation, exhibition or making available for judicial or administrative proceedings under the law, or for a report of the said proceedings;
reproduction, adaptation, exhibition or making available by a teacher for teaching, which is not done for making profit;
reproduction or adaptation of a part of such work, or abridging or making a summary by a teacher or educational institution for distributing or selling to students in the class or in an educational institution, provided that is not done for making profit;
utilization of the work as a part of the examination questions and answers.
Regarding the exception of the infringement of copyright of computer programs, Section 35 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 stipulated that an act done in relation to a copyrighted computer program shall not be deemed an infringement of copyright, if there is no intention for making profit, in the following cases:

research or study of that computer program;
use for the benefit of the owner of the copy of the computer program;
criticisms, comments or reviews of the work accompanied by an acknowledgement of the copyright ownership in such computer program;
report of current events through the mass media, accompanied by an acknowledgement of the copyright ownership in such computer program;
duplicating computer program in an appropriate number by the person who legitimately purchased or obtained the computer program from another person for the purpose of maintenance or loss replacement.
reproduction, adaptation, exhibition or making available for judicial or administrative proceedings under the law, or for a report of the said proceedings;
utilization of the computer program as a part of the examination questions and answers;
adapting the computer program in case of being necessary for using;
making duplicates of the computer program to keep for reference or research of public interest.
Additionally, a reasonable recitation of, copying from, emulation of, or reference to any part of the copyrighted work, which is accompanied by acknowledgement of the copyright ownership in such work, shall not be deemed an infringement of copyright (Section 33).
Moreover, the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 states that any one of the following acts shall not be deemed an infringement of copyright:
1. reproduction for use in a library or for supplying to other libraries, or reasonable reproduction of certain parts of the work for supplying to other persons for the purpose of research or study, by librarians, if not being made for profit-making proposes (Section 34).
2. performing a dramatic work or musical work for suitable dissemination to the public, if not being made or conducted for making profit as a result of such dissemination, and not charging for admission fee, whether directly or indirectly, and the performers not receiving remuneration for such performance, in case of that being conducted by an association, foundation or other organizations with a charitable, educational, religious or social-welfare purpose (Section 36).
3. a reproduction, for the benefit of the government service by an authorized official or under the direction of the official, of a copyrighted work, which is in the possession of the government (Section 43).
However, such mentioned acts done in relation to the copyrighted work by virtue of this copyright Act, which shall not constitute the infringement of copyright, must not conflict with the normal exploitation in the copyrighted work of copyright ownership and not unreasonably affect the legitimate right of the copyright owner (Paragraph 1 of Section 32).
Furthermore, with regard to any act done to the artistic work, the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 states that any drawing, painting, building, engraving, moulding, carving, lithographing, photographing, cinematographic taking, video broadcasting or any similar in relation to any artistic work which is normally displayed in a public place and is not the work of architecture; or the drawing, painting, engraving, moulding, carving, lithographing, photographing, cinematographic taking, or video broadcasting in relation to the work of architecture; or the photographing or cinematographic taking or video broadcasting of any work in which any artistic work is included as a component part, shall not constitute an infringement of copyright in such artistic work (Section 37, Section 38 and Section 39).

Penalty and Prescription
The penalty stipulated in the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 is much higher than the one stipulated in the Copyright Act B.E. 2521. Any person directly infringing the copyright under Section 27, Section 28, Section 29 or Section 30 shall be liable to a fine from twenty thousand baht to two hundred thousand baht. If the said offence is committed for a commercial purpose, the offender shall be liable to imprisonment for a term from six months to four years or to a fine from one hundred thousand baht to eight hundred thousand baht or to both (Section 69).
Any person indirectly infringing the copyright under Section 31 shall be liable to a fine from ten thousand baht to one hundred thousand baht. If the said offence is committed for a commercial purpose, the offender shall be liable to imprisonment for a term of three months to two years or to a fine from fifty thousand baht to four hundred thousand baht, or to both (Section 70).
Furthermore, any person, who having been convicted of an offence under this Act, commits an offence hereunder again within five years from the date he is released from his punishment, shall be liable to double penalty prescribed for that penalty (Section 73).
In the case where a juristic person commits an offence under this Act, every director or manager of such juristic person shall be regarded as joint offenders with juristic person, unless he can prove that such act of the juristic person has been done without his knowledge or consent (Section 74).
In case of all articles made or imported into the Kingdom, which constitute an infringement of copyright under this Act, and still owned by the offender, they shall become the property of the copyright owner, whereas all articles used for committing an offence shall be forfeited (Section 75).
However, the offences under this Copyright Act shall be compoundable offences (Section 66). Additionally, the prescription of an action for infringement of copyright under this Act is a special prescription that differs from the prescription of wrongful acts in accordance with the Civil and Commercial Code. That is three years from the day when the copyright owner becomes aware of the infringement and the identity of the offender, but it must not be entered later than ten years from the date of infringement of copyright (Section 63).

The Use of Copyright in Special Circumstances
The new dimension of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 is the stipulation of the provision relating to the use of copyright work in special circumstances. Section 54 of this Act provides that a Thai national who wants to apply for a license to use a copyright work which has been disseminated to the public in the form of printed matter or other similar forms, for the benefit of study, instruction or research, and not for making profit, may submit an application to the Director-General of the Department of Intellectual Property. Evidence is required to show that the applicant has applied for a license to use the copyright in the Thai translation of work into or in the reproduction of the duplicated work, which used to be published in the Thai translated version, from the copyright owner, but the application was rejected, or after a reasonable period of time, no agreement could be concluded, if it appears that at the time of submitting such application to the Director-General :
1. the copyright owner has not arranged for or permitted any person to make the Thai translation of such work for publication within three years after the first publication of the work; or
2. the copyright owner has published the Thai translation of his work for publication, but after three years from the most recent publication of the translation, there has been no further publication of that translation and there has been no duplication of that translation in the market.

International Copyright
Regarding the protection of international copyright, on July 17, 1931 (B.E. 2474), Thailand became a contracting state of the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works A.D. 1886 (B.E. 2429) or “the Berne Convention” (Tawach Rattanaphichat 1986 : 52) which was established in Berne, Switzerland on 9 September 1886 (B.E. 2429) by the International Union for the Protection of Copyright. Being a contracting state of the Berne Convention, Thailand is obliged to comply with this Convention. If Thailand desires the Convention to be legally applicable, it has to provide an internal law containing the provisions in the Convention, thus making the Convention become an internal law. (Ukrit Mongkolnavin 1976, 182)
Therefore, the Act for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works B.E. 2474 began to stipulate the provision relating to the International Copyright in Chapter 2, but there was only a provision recognizing the translation work in that Act. Although Section 42 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2521 embraced the protection of international copyright more than that of the former Act, such Section 42 ambiguously provided the protection of international copyright, because of providing that international copyrights shall be protected according to the conditions stipulated by a Royal Decree. Besides this, the Royal Decree B.E. 2526 (A.D. 1983) and the Royal Decree B.E. 2536 (A.D. 1993) promulgated in accordance with such Section 42, stipulated too much complicated and restricted principles for the protection of international copyright in Thailand, for example the definition of the country of the origin of work, and the conditions regarding the term of the protection of international copyright work and the translation of literary or dramatic work.
Consequently, the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 protects international copyright more obviously than the provisions under the former copyright laws, because the conditions relating to the acquisition of a copyright of any work which a foreign author created in another country, which used to be stipulated in the said Royal decree, are included in Section 8 regarding the acquisition of copyright under Chapter 2 of this Act, as mentioned above. Moreover, in Chapter 5, the International of Copyright by virtue of this Act, Section 61 also provides distinctly the protection of copyrighted works belonging to foreign authors.
Section 61 of the Copyright Act B.E.2537 provides for the protection of international copyright as follows:
1. Any copyrighted work of the author of a contracting state to the convention relating to the protection of copyright to which Thailand is also a contracting state shall be protected by this Act. Therefore, any copyrighted work of an author of any contracting state to the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, such as United State of America, United Kingdom and Japan, shall be protected under the Copyright Act B.E. 2537. (A.D. 1994)
2. Any copyrighted work of an international organization of which Thailand is a member shall be protected by this Act. By this principle, any copyrighted work of an international organization of which Thailand is a member, such as United Nations (UN), World Health Organization(WHO), shall also be protected under the Copyright Act B.E. 2537.
However, Paragraph 2 of Section 61 of the Copyright Act B.E. 2537 stipulates the Minister of Commerce to have an authority to announce the names of the countries which are the contracting states of the Berne Convention in the Government Gazette.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bainbridge, David I. Intellectual Property. London : Pitman, 1992.
Dworkin, Gerald and Taylor, Richard D. Blackstone’s Guide to Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. London : Blackstone Press, 1990.
Mana Pittayaporn. The Explanation of the Act for the protection of the Literary andArtistic Works. Bangkok : Ramkhamhaeng University Press, 1965. (in Thai)
Phillips, Jeremy, and Alison Firth. Introduction to Intellectual Property Law. London : Butterworths, 1990.
Surat Numnont. “Copyright.” Humanity Journal Chapter 1 (1962) : 17. (in Thai)
Tawach Rattanapichat. The Protection of Literary and Artistic Works. Bangkok : Department of Fine Arts, 1968. (in Thai)
Ukrit Mongkolnavin. The Explanation of International Law. Bangkok : Faculty of
Law, Chulalongkorn University, 1966. (in Thai)


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Fair user


What is fair use?
We would all appreciate a clear, crisp answer to that one, but far from clear and crisp, fair use is better described as a shadowy territory whose boundaries are disputed, more so now that it includes cyberspace than ever before. In a way, it's like a no-man's land. Enter at your own risk.

Why is it like this and does it have to be this way? Is there no alternative to the vagueness of the "four factor fair use analysis," to fear of lawsuits and frustration with uncertainty? Maybe it is reasonable to simply throw up our hands and say, "What's the use?" After all, many legal scholars, politicians, copyright owners and users and their lawyers agree that fair use is so hard to understand that it fails to provide effective guidance for the use of others' works today. But the fact is, we really must understand and rely on it.

So wouldn't Guidelines help? Many people who think so recently gathered in Washington to negotiate Guidelines for Educational Uses of Digital Works in a two-year-long Conference on Fair Use ("CONFU"). For many, the Guidelines that emerged satisfied the need for clarity; but for some, considerable objections remained. Some CONFU participants and their constituents complained that the Guidelines were too narrow; others that they were too broad; or unfounded in the law; or too premature; or too long; or unclear; and so on. In the minds of many, the Guidelines asked the right questions, but for some, they provided the wrong answers.

We have reviewed all the Guidelines and have decided to take a different approach to protecting our component institutions and our faculty, staff and students from the dangers of the no-man's land while supporting our exercise of fair use rights. We call our approach "Rules of Thumb" for the Fair Use of Copyrighted Materials. Like the Guidelines from which they are in some cases derived, the Rules of Thumb are tailored to different uses of others' works. But unlike the Guidelines, they are short, concise, and easy to read. And they are part of a larger strategy to meet our needs for permission when fair use is not enough; to reduce our need for permission in the future by licensing comprehensive access to works; and to take a more active role in the management of the copyrighted works created on our campuses for the benefit of our university community.

Copying, modifying, displaying, performing or distributing another's work beyond the suggestions of the Rules of Thumb may still be a fair use, so we'll use the four-factor fair use test to determine that. If you are part of U.T. System, you may confer with the Office of General Counsel or follow our published procedures for making fair use determinations. If the use seems risky or is clearly not a fair use, we'll try to make getting permission as easy as possible.

Please keep in mind that the information presented here is only general information. True legal advice must be provided in the course of an attorney-client relationship specifically with reference to all the facts of a particular situation. Such is not the case here, so this information must not be relied on as a substitute for obtaining legal advice from a licensed attorney.