Everyone is talking about how Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are disrupting settled ideas about higher education. MOOCs have the potential to impact the fair use rights of educators and students. Policy choices we make now could have profound effects on those rights.

For over a century, the fair use doctrine has been an essential tool for teaching and learning. Its flexible allowance of unlicensed use of copyrighted works "for purposes such as criticism, commentary, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research" creates a safe space for teaching by blocking private censorship and leapfrogging market failure. From the Xerox machine to the search engine, fair use has grown and shifted to accommodate new technologies and new cultural practices. The doctrine's flexibility is also a kind of fragility, however: judges are influenced by community practices around fair use, and bad practice can make bad law. It is vital, therefore, that participants in the evolving practice of MOOC teaching are prepared to assert the strongest possible claims of fair use. Originally submitted by: Barbara DeFelice
Leading Voices in Higher Education: Brandon Butler