Code of Best Practices in Fair Use

The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) presents the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Academic and Research Libraries (PDF), a clear and easy-to-use statement of fair and reasonable approaches to fair use developed by and for librarians who support academic inquiry and higher education. The Code was developed in partnership with the Center for Social Media and the Washington College of Law at American University.

In dozens of interviews with veteran research and academic librarians, the researchers learned how copyright law comes into play as interviewees performed core library functions. Then, in a series of small group discussions held with library policymakers around the country, the research team developed a consensus approach to applying fair use.

The Code deals with such common questions in higher education as:

When and how much copyrighted material can be digitized for student use? And should video be treated the same way as print?
How can libraries’ special collections be made available online?
Can libraries archive websites for the use of future students and scholars?

The Code identifies the relevance of fair use in eight recurrent situations for librarians:

Supporting teaching and learning with access to library materials via digital technologies
Using selections from collection materials to publicize a library’s activities, or to create physical and virtual exhibitions
Digitizing to preserve at-risk items
Creating digital collections of archival and special collections materials
Reproducing material for use by disabled students, faculty, staff, and other appropriate users
Maintaining the integrity of works deposited in institutional repositories
Creating databases to facilitate non-consumptive research uses (including search)
Collecting material posted on the web and making it available

In the Code, librarians affirm that fair use is available in each of these contexts, providing helpful guidance about the scope of best practice in each.

Such codes have a powerful effect both in law and practice. “Courts care what affected communities think about fair use and so do the other policymakers and gatekeepers,” noted co-facilitator Peter Jaszi, Professor of Law at American University. “Now librarians are on the record with a powerful statement of their values.”

The development of the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Academic and Research Libraries is supported by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

For more information about the Code and this project, e-mail This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Additional Information

Chinese Translation of the Code

Know Your Copy Rights: Using Copyrighted Works in Academic Settings

Inside Higher Ed: Defining Fair Use (Feb. 2012)

What If We Asked the Librarians? Or, How The Librarians’ Code Is Different

FAQs for the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use

Students, Librarians, and Professors may have questions about how to best use the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Research Libraries. Below you can find additional resources that will better explain how you can use the Code at your institution.

Videos Related to the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use

ARL, in conjunction with the Center for Social Media at American University and American University Washington College of Law, developed a series of videos related to the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Academic and Research Libraries. Also, several events and webinars related to the Code have been recorded and are posted here.

Further Information on Fair Use & Libraries

Why take an approach to determining fair use that is rooted in professional consensus, rather than (for example) negotiating standards with right holders or consulting legal experts? Here we collect some of the latest scholarship showing the key trends in fair use, the flaws in old approaches, and the theoretical foundations of the best practices approach.

Briefing: Success of Fair Use Codes of Best Practices

Does the approach of creating a code of best practices, anchored in professional practice, actually work to expand the utility of fair use? What has happened to others who used codes of best practices to gain access to their rights?

This topic is discussed at length in Aufderheide and Jaszi, Reclaiming Fair Use (University of Chicago Press, 2011), but some specific examples include:

Briefing: Copyright Education, Academic Integrity Codes, and Fair Use

Does your university offer intellectual property education to incoming students, or have an academic integrity policy that addresses copyright issues? These are important areas where librarians can be of service in offering balanced information about copyright and fair use.

Briefing: Demystifying Technical Protection Measures (TPMs) in the Library

The Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Academic and Research Libraries suggests at various points that librarians consider the use of appropriate “technical protection measures” when making digitized materials available on-line, as a way of bolstering their fair use claims. Many libraries already employ such measures as a risk-management strategy.

Briefing: The Cost of Conservatism to Academic and Research Librarians’ Mission

When teachers bring Stacey, a librarian at a Midwestern private university, their course materials to upload on the university’s e-reserves system, she always checks to make sure that the course material has not been uploaded before—or at least, not in the last three years. If it’s fresh material, and it’s only a small fraction of the original work, she’s pretty sure that uploading it for the students to study could be considered a “fair use.” If it has been uploaded before, she tries to license the material, or have the professor find a substitute that the professor hasn’t used before. She knows that at some universities, e-reserves policies are more liberal, but her institution can’t afford a legal challenge, so she likes to err on the conservative side. After all, you can’t be too careful.

Briefing: Accessibility, the Chafee Amendment, and Fair Use

The Fifth Principle in the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Academic and Research Libraries is entitled "Reproducing material for use by disabled students, faculty, staff, and other appropriate users." It describes in some detail the circumstances in which making and providing copies of collection materials in formats that are accessible to persons with disabilities constitutes fair use, as well as certain limitations to which that general principle is subject.