Fair Use as Advocacy Laboratory: Best Practices and the Future of Fair Use
Channel: jim holmes
Date: 01/11/2012

As librarians, we know we are charged with both upholding the intellectual property rights of copyright holders and with staunchly defending and exercising our fair use. Unfortunately, uncertainty around which practices constitute fair use often leaves us apprehensive, over-cautious, or inconsistent. With the release of the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Academic and Research Libraries in January 2012, librarians gained a valuable new tool in our efforts to understand and use fair use appropriately in our daily practice. We will be joined, virtually, by members of the team that authored the Code who will help us understand its history and purpose. Following this informative session, Rachel Bridgewater will facilitate local discussion about application of the Code and the future of fair use.

Rachel Bridgewater likes to talk about copyright. She is a faculty librarian at Portland Community College where she teaches students most of the day either in the classroom or at the reference desk. In addition to her role as reference and instruction librarian, Rachel serves as PCC's Copyright Librarian. Rachel has taught online copyright classes for ACRL and will be leading a class on fair use for Library Juice Academy this November. Rachel is a member of the national faculty for Emporia State University's School of Library and Information Management.