it’s more likely to be done electronically and posted online, sometimes on a site controlled by the library (i.e., library e-reserves), but more often on a site controlled by the instructor or an IT staff member using course management software such as Blackboard. This change has shifted some of the responsibility for reserve away from libraries, but libraries will still face copyright questions when instructors ask for guidance or ask for electronic copies to post online.
We think that course Web sites and library e-reserves are not very different from paper reserves, and that the Model Policy can provide a framework for electronic copies. The Model Policy views library reserve as an extension of the classroom, and provides that at the request of a faculty member, a library may copy and place on reserve an entire article, a book chapter, or a poem. Some of the Model Policy’s guidelines apply equally in a print or online environment:
- The amount of material copied should be reasonable in relation to the total amount of reading assigned for the course;
- The material should include a notice of copyright;
- The effect of copying should not be detrimental to the market. To this end, the library should own an authorized copy of the work;
- Avoid repetitive copying: do not copy the same materials semester after semester;
- Do not copy consumable works (such as workbooks); and
- Do not create anthologies (including coursepacks).
We can also borrow some ideas from the Conference on Fair Use’s (CONFU) Fair-Use Guidelines for Electronic Reserve Systems, even though the conferees never reached consensus on them,[1] and The Code of
- ↑ The Conference on Fair Use, Final Report to the Commissioner on the Conclusion of the Conference on Fair Use (Nov. 1998). The Final Report notes (at pp. 15–16) that the working group reached an impasse over the scope and language of possible electronic reserve guidelines. However, some members of the working group continued to meet, and drafted for comment proposed guidelines. At the CONFU plenary session on September 6, 1996, several organizations, including the American Association of Law Libraries, the American Council on Learned Societies, the Music Library Association, and the Special Libraries Association, supported the draft. Others, including ASCAP, the Association of American Publishers, the Authors Guild/Authors Registry, and the Association of Research Libraries, did not. It was ultimately decided that the proposed electronic reserve guidelines would not be disseminated as a formal work product of CONFU.
The Final Report, which does not include the draft electronic reserve guidelines, can be found at the Patent and Trademark Office website http://www.uspto.gov. The proferred
