Reading and ThinkingCopyright laws for technology have been used since before 1976. I felt that John Logie's article Champing at the Bits: Computers Copyright and the Composition Classroom was a good summary of copyright issues on the Internet that gave me some information I had not previously been aware of before. The section on the historical foundation behind copyright 1790 Act and the origin of fair use in 1841 s Folsom v. Marsh was well-presented offering up a lot of the information useful for a college composition course.
In much of my research into copyright laws, it struck me that the conflict through copyright and intellectual property often seems like a war. There are issues on both sides: RIAA suing individuals and families for songs they downloaded to the theme of hundreds of thousands of dollars per song; piracy itself which makes it possible for people to see an upcoming movie an entire month in advance; and in between are many of the situations we will continue to encounter in classrooms. I am sure there are several instructors unaware of these laws, and maybe the universities and school systems need to find better ways to fully educate their staff on this issue for legal protection.
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