| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立臺灣師範大學 === 圖書資訊學研究所 === 98 === Since Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) published OpenCourseWare (OCW) in 2002, there has been worldwide reverberation. Universities continually and openly upload courses and teaching materials to the Internet and share with the people to use for free. When giving courses, teachers more or less use teaching materials designed by others. Once these courses are uploaded to the Internet publicly, however, the issues of copyright become hidden worries. To investigate the relationship between OpenCourseWare materials and its copyright, this study analyzes domestic and foreign regulations that are related to the copyright of digital teaching materials and current tendency of legislation. Besides, this study uses methods through semi-structured interviews with teachers who participate in the project of National Taiwan Normal University OpenCourseWare (NTNU OCW) to explore their usage of digital teaching materials and their opinions on issues about copyright as well as the fair use doctrine of OpenCourseWare materials.
The research has indicated that the definition of fair use in the Copyright Act has not yet covered the right of public transmission in Taiwan. As a result, there is no regulation on Web-based Instruction while many countries have passed laws allowing limited usage of Web-based Instruction. Legitimatization of OpenCourseWare, however, is difficult due to its characteristic of being public and charge-free. Regarding teachers’ opinions about OpenCourseWare and their usage of digital teaching materials, on the one hand, they praise OpenCourseWare for the idea of knowledge sharing, but on the other hand they also consider OpenCourseWare limiting. Visual and audio materials such as pictures, music, and videos are often indispensible in class. Although most teachers have their selfdesigned teaching materials, they find it hard to avoid using materials designed by others. When it comes to copyright, generally teachers do not regard in class usage as violating the Copyright Act, since educational purpose is not benefit-motivated. They also agree that avoiding violations of copyright is teachers’ responsibility. Thus teachers often have scruples about OpenCourseWare and violations of copyright because of its fundamental trait of being publicly transmitted and copied. Violation of copyright also occurs when teachers usually do not indicate the sources they use in class or seek for authorization. Regulations and limitations in the Copyright Act, too, influence the content of the courses offered as well as teachers’ willingness to offer courses. About teachers’ opinions on regulation of fair use, it is found that teachers expect legislators to define fair use from the educational perspective allowing flexibility to use materials for educational purposes. Most teachers consider the specific fair use criterion clear and objective, more applicable than the currently ambiguous regulations.
Suggestions of formulations of legitimate and fair use of Web-based Instruction are proposed in this study, with the goal to assist governmental, educational, and academic institutions and educators with improving future plans of OpenCourseWare.
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