What is Fair Dealing?
Fair dealing is a section in the copyright act which permits the use of a copyrighted work without permission from the copyright owner. Fair Dealing allows you to copy a short excerpt from a copyright-protected work. Short excerpts mean you can copy up to 10 percent of a copyrighted work such as:
- One chapter of a book
- A single article from a periodical
- An entire artistic work (including a painting, print, photograph, diagram, drawing, map, chart, and plan) from a copyright-protected work containing other artistic works
- An entire newspaper article or page
- An entire poem or single musical score from a copyright-protected work
- Entire entry from an encyclopedia, annotated bibliography, or similar reference work
You can use these materials for the following purposes: research, private study, education, parody, satire, criticism, review or news reporting.
It is NOT fair to copy multiple short excerpts from the same copyright-protected work.
The 6 Fair Dealing Factors
You must consider the following Fair Dealing Factors before you copy or distribute a work:
- The purpose of the copying
- Is the copying for one of the following purposes: education, research, private study, criticism or review, news reporting, parody or satire?
- The copy is not meant to replace your course text
- The amount of the copying
- How much is being copied? One chapter from a book or one article from a journal may be considered fair.
- The character of the copying
- How broadly will the work be distributed? Will it be accessible only to eligible students?
- Alternatives to copying the work
- Is the same or equivalent work available in the library databases? Is there a non-copyrighted alternative?
- The nature of the work
- including whether it is published or unpublished
- The effect of the copying on the work
- Will the copying undermine the market for the work?