As the UBC Copyright Office states, copyright is everywhere. We all read books and articles, watch videos, listen to music, and use various software and hardware technologies for learning, research, work, civic engagement, and entertainment. Copyright protects original works of authorship including literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works, such as poetry, novels, movies, songs, computer software, and architecture. Luckily, as you adapt your course for the online environment, copyright considerations do not change much. Most of the things you are able to do in person, you are able to do online, especially when your online access is limited to students enrolled in your course.

If you want to share materials with students or if you want students to share resources with each other, keep in mind some simple guidelines:

It’s always easiest to link. Linking to publicly available online content like news websites, existing online videos, etc. is rarely a copyright issue. Linking to subscription content through the Libraries is also a great option – most of UBC’s subscription content will have DOIs, PURLs, or other “permalink” options, all of which should work even for off-campus users.
Sharing copies and scanning. We encourage you to read and apply the Fair Dealing Guidelines when they are making decisions about posting copies of copyrighted materials to Canvas. Library staff members are available to help you understand relevant issues and help with formal permissions to provide copies when you exceed the fair dealing guidelines (contact copyright.services@ubc.ca for more help).
Sharing multimedia. Sharing an entire movie or musical work online does represent more of a copyright issue than playing it in class – but there may be options for your students to access it independently online. UBC has licensed streaming content which you can use in your online course. The UBC Library may also be able to purchase streaming access for additional media, but as this takes time, standard commercial streaming options like commonly subscribed to services like Netflix, Crave or Disney Plus may sometimes be the easiest for exclusive content. Students will need to purchase a subscription if you choose to use these services.

Please refer to Copyright at UBC and UBC’s Fair Dealing in Practice Guide for in-depth information and guidelines.

Information in this section has been adapted from UBC Copyright Office; University of Minnesota Libraries, licensed CC BY-NC 3.0. Additional content provided, with permission, by the Canadian Association of Research Libraries. It is licensed CC-BY-SA.