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This is an essential guide for educators, administrators, policymakers, and the media. Glossaries are dynamic expressions of current language usage. Education has changed dramatically in recent years, and so must also the language used to describe and define them. We believe this glossary is useful for a wider field of educators promoting student success. This glossary provides precise language and definitions to use when communicating with peers and more effectively influencing administrators, legislators, and the media.
Copyright and Academic Integrity
These terms apply to instructors, program managers, and students on how they handle curricula, media, and publications created by others and attribution to previously published works. These can be enormously complicated issues that may require consultation with institutional legal services to avoid violations and potential legal proceedings. Modern technology has made violations easier than in the past. More comprehensive glossaries on this topic are available in Intellectual Property in the New Technological Age: Volume II Copyrights, Trademarks, and State IP Protections (Menell, Lemley, & Merges, 2019) and The People’s Law Dictionary (Hill & Hill, 2002).
Two terms not added to this glossary are derivative work and fair use. Those two terms were left out since they have been improperly used to justify the current situation of flagrant copyright violations by some in the higher education profession. See Hill and Hill (2002) and Menell et al. (2019) for their definitions.
attribution of intellectual property
1. Definitions: (a) Giving credit to the creator of something. However, ATTRIBUTION OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY does not absolve the person of potential COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT which can lead to financial damage awards and charges of PLAGARISM. ATTRIBUTION OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY is required when using material covered by one or more of the six types of CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES (Creative Commons, 2019; Hill and Hill, 2002); and (b) Appearing to be similar, a citation is a formal way to provide detailed information of where the quotation or idea could be found.
2. Examples: Articles, books, and images.
3. Compare with COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT, CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, LITERARY PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, and PLAGIARISM.
copyright
1. Definitions: (a) “The exclusive right of the author or creator of a literary or artistic property (such as a book, movie, or musical composition) to print, copy, sell, license, distribute, transform to another medium, translate, record or perform or otherwise use (or not use) and to give it to another by will. As soon as a work is created and is in a tangible form (such as writing or taping), the work automatically has federal COPYRIGHT protection. COPYRIGHT covers the following: literary, musical, and dramatic works, periodicals, maps, works of art (including models), art reproductions, sculptural works, technical drawings, photographs, prints (including labels), movies, and other audiovisual works, computer programs, compilations of works and derivative works, and architectural drawings. Not subject to COPYRIGHT are short phrases, titles, extemporaneous speeches or live unrecorded performances, common information, government publications, mere ideas, and seditious, obscene, libelous, and fraudulent work. For any work created from 1978 to date, a COPYRIGHT is good for the author's life, plus 50 years, with a few exceptions such as work for hire which is owned by the one commissioning the work for a period of 75 years from publication. After that, it falls into the PUBLIC DOMAIN” (Hill & Hill, 2002, pp. 114–115); and (b) COPYRIGHT violations are inconsistent with ETHICAL STANDARDS for the profession.
2. Compare with COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT, CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES, ETHICAL STANDARDS, INADVERTENT USE OF COPYRIGHTED MATERIALS, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, LITERACY PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, AND PUBLIC DOMAIN.
copyright infringement
1. Definitions: (a) “…someone takes work that is subject to COPYRIGHT law and deprives its lawful owner of (actual or potential) benefits by distributing it. COPYRIGHT law was enacted to protect the legal rights of COPYRIGHT holders to benefit financially from their work” (Fishman, 2009, p. 4); (b) “Whereas attribution of intellectual property can negate the act of PLAGIARISM, it does not mitigate COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT which can occur whether or not the author of a work has been properly identified. Thus, even without addressing the question of material benefits, it is clear that COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT is not co-identical with PLAGIARISM” (Fishman, 2009, p. 4); and (c) “Even though the infringement may be accidental (an inventor thinks he p. or she is the first to develop the widget although someone else has a patent), the party infringing is responsible for paying the original patent or COPYRIGHT owner substantial damages, which can be the normal royalty or as much as the infringers' accumulated gross profits” (Hill & Hill, 2002, 114–115).
2. Compare with COPYRIGHT, CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES, INADVERTENT USE OF COPYRIGHTED MATERIALS, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, and LITERARY PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT.
Creative Commons licenses
1. Definition: “Developed by a United States non-profit organization devoted to expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. Based upon the general principles of COPYRIGHT but not designed to replace them, they created six COPYRIGHT licenses for creators to communicate which rights they reserve and which rights they waive for the benefit of recipients or other creators. The six license types are: (a) Attribution - others permitted to distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon your work, even commercially, as long as they credit you for the original creation; (b) Attribution sharalike - others permitted to remix, tweak, and build upon your work even for commercial purposes, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms; (c) Attribution-noderivations - others permitted to reuse the work for any purpose, including commercially; however, it cannot be shared with others in adapted form, and credit must be provided to you; (d) Attribution-noncommercial - others permitted to remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms; (e) Attribution-noncommercial-sharealike - permits others to remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms; and (f) Attribution-noncommercial-noderivation - only permits others to download your works and share them with others as long as they credit you, but they can’t change them in any way or use them commercially” (Creative Commons, 2019, para. 1—6).
2. Compare with COPYRIGHT, COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT, INADVERTENT USE OF COPYRIGHTED MATERIALS, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, LITERARY PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, OPEN ACCESS, OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCE, and PUBLIC DOMAIN.
ethical standards
1. Definitions: (a) Criteria that provide requirements and guidelines for behaving in a manner that is fair to all individuals; (b) In assessment, criteria ensuring that data are collected, recorded, and reported with honesty and integrity; and (c) (In writing and use of COPYRIGHTED materials), the professional uses other people’s created materials in an appropriate fashion.
inadvertent use of copyrighted material
1. Definitions: (a) Common statement made by administrators who discover someone reporting to them in the chain of command has committed COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT. Remedy of the situation requires the institution to reimburse the COPYRIGHT holder for previously lost revenue and stop the practice immediately institution-wide unless usage rights or purchases of new publications or software each term is completed; and (b) A related term is innocent misrepresentation, in which people accused of COPYRIGHT violation defend themselves by stating that they were ignorant of the law. An owner of a COPYRIGHTED item in such a situation may pursue economic damages for lost revenue regardless of the carelessness or ignorance of the person committing the act.
2. Examples: (a) Purchasing one consumable training material or self-scoring assessment instrument and reproducing it for use by many; and (b) Purchase of commercial materials and reproducing them for distribution online or through the distribution of PDF documents.
3. Compare with COPYRIGHT, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, and LITERARY PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT.
intellectual property use copyright
1. Definition: Based on COPYRIGHT law, people and businesses have property rights to information and intellectual goods they create for a limited period of time so the authors can profit from the information and intellectual goods they create (Menell et al., 2019).
2. Compare with COPYRIGHT, COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT, INADVERTENT USE OF COPYRIGHTED MATERIALS, and LITERARY PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT.
liability exposure
1. Definition: “Breadth of damages for which an institution can be held legally responsible” (Hill & Hill, 2002, pp. 248–249). Depending upon the situation, PROFESSIONAL LIABILITY COVERAGE through insurance may or may not protect the individual or institution charged with the incident.
2. Compare with PROFESSIONAL LIABILITY COVERAGE.
literary property
1. Definition: Based upon general principles of COPYRIGHT and INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY, the writings of authors entitle them to the use of the work, including publication, and sale or license for a profit to others who will then have the right to publish it. The literary property includes books, articles, poetry, movie scripts, computer programs, and any writing relating to publication or other use. To protect any literary work and profits from it, the writer should mark it as COPYRIGHTED (Hill & Hill, 2002; Menell et al., 2019).
2. Compare with COPYRIGHT, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, and LITERARY PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT.
literary property use copyright
1. Definition: Literary works protected by COPYRIGHT with property rights in addition to what courts identify as COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT (Hill & Hill, 2002; Menell et al., 2019).
2. Compare with COPYRIGHT, COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT, CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES, INADVERTENT USE OF COPYRIGHTED MATERIALS, and LITERARY PROPERTY.
open access
1. Definitions: (a) Research is freely available online with little to no restrictions on its use. While the OPEN ACCESS movement began as an alternative to subscriber fee-based, peer-reviewed journals, it has expanded to various publications including conference papers, theses, book chapters, and monographs. A more recent manifestation of OPEN SOURCE is self-archiving by authors of their publications on a website like one maintained by a college or university to preserve its availability regardless of what happens with the journal or publishing company; and (b) Institutions that accept students without college entrance examination scores or college preparatory coursework.
2. Compare with COPYRIGHT, CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES, OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCE PLAGIARISM, and PUBLIC DOMAIN.
open educational resource (OER)
1. Definition: Freely accessible, openly licensed text, media, and other digital assets useful for teaching, learning, assessing, and researching. There is no universal usage of open file formats in OER. A key characteristic of OER materials is that they permit any user to use, re-mix, improve, and redistribute under a free license. Often OER materials are designated with one of the six CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES. Compare with COPYRIGHT, COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT, CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES, OPEN ACCESS, and PUBLIC DOMAIN.
plagiarism
1. Definitions: (a) “Occurs when someone (1) Uses words, ideas, or work products, (2) Attributable to another identifiable person or source, (3) Without attributing the work to the source from which it was obtained, (4) In a situation in which there is a legitimate expectation of original authorship, and (5) In order to obtain some benefit, credit, or gain which need not be monetary” (Fishman, 2009, p. 224); (b) Can occur by students with their homework assignments and by teachers who distribute COPYRIGHTED material. ATTRIBUTION OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY is insufficient to avoid PLAGIARISM since it may not identify the scope of the material used and the location from which it came; and (c) “Taking the writings or literary concepts (a plot, characters, or words) of another and selling and/or publishing them as one's own product. Quotes that are brief or are acknowledged as quotes do not constitute PLAGIARISM. The actual author can bring a lawsuit for appropriation of his/her work against the plagiarist and recover the profits. Normally PLAGIARISM is not a crime, but it can be used as the basis of a fraud charge or COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT if prior creation can be proved” (Hill & Hill, 2002, p. 314).
2. Compare with ATTRIBUTION OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY, COPYRIGHT, COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT, INADVERTENT USE OF COPYRIGHTED MATERIALS, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT, LITERARY PROPERTY, and LITERARY PROPERTY USE COPYRIGHT.
public domain
1. Definition: “In COPYRIGHT law, the right of anyone to use literature, music or other previously COPYRIGHTED materials after the COPYRIGHT period has expired. In general, the last possible date for COPYRIGHT protection is 50 years after the death of the author. Thus, the works of William Shakespeare, Mark Twain, Jack London and other classic writers are in the PUBLIC DOMAIN and may be published by anyone without payment of a royalty” (Hill & Hill, 2002, p. 337).
2. Compare with CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSES, OPEN ACCESS, and OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCE.