Article: ” “Fair use” is a legal term that says some uses of copyrighted material are allowable, even without the owner's permission. This usually includes the use of a portion of the work for criticism, news reporting or teaching. For the use of a work to be considered within fair use, the use must be limited in scope, generally for a non-commercial purpose, and must not interfere with the widespread potential market of the original work. Copyright law is a federal system of statutes, and the statutes include several defenses that allow for use of a copyrighted work. Some of these include reproduction by libraries, educational use by teachers, and others. These statutory defenses of the copyright law appear at 17 U.S.C. §§107-122. You are not likely to get a demand letter from William Shakespeare for wrongfully using part of Romeo and Juliet, but it is possible that you may get a demand letter for using part of a work that is in the public domain. Copyrighted works are protected, approximately, for the life of the author and an additional 70 years. Beyond that, the work becomes available in the public domain and is free to be used.
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Raise the defense of the “fair use doctrine. Research available statutory defenses. Assert that the original work is now in the public domain.