Copy, Right?

I thought I had it all figured out about referencing and plagiarism, but then the other day I was photocopying in the Library and I saw a sign on the photocopiers about complying with Copyright guidelines.

As defined by the Australian Copyright Council guidelines, copyright is a "type of legal protection for people who express ideas and information in certain forms. The most common forms are: writing, visual images, music and moving images".

There are certain limits as to what and how much of a work you can copy for university study. Through its Copyright information page, the Academy Library outlines the current copyright limits for various types of material, including books, periodicals, electronic works (e.g. websites or CDs), audiovisual materials etc.

Okay, now I'm all set to search and gather information for my assignment. Perhaps there is wisdom in being kind to the trees! When I'm carefully selecting and assessing various types of information, I'll now also have to monitor the legal amount of each item I'm entitled to photocopy or download. This will take a lot longer than I first expected.

With a little more guidance from the lecturer over the next few weeks and due diligence with my study routine, I think I have the assignment more than halfway done! It'll be a great assignment for sure - HD here I come!

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