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Affordable Instructional Materials & Linking to Library Resources Copyright

This guide will provide information on how to link to library resources in Canvas, copyright guidelines, and contact information for more help.

Copyright vs. Plagiarism

Copyright and plagiarism are two very different things. Copyright is a legal concept dealing with permission. Do you have permission to use a photo in your presentation or a quote in your paper? If not, you could be violating copyright. Plagiarism, on the other hand, is an academic concept that deals with failing to properly cite your sources or passing off someone else’s material as your own. Even if you have permission to use the material, failing to properly cite it could be considered plagiarism.

What are alternatives?

A good rule of thumb is to assume everything you find online is copyright protected even if it does not include a copyright symbol or other identifying copyright information. Creative Commons is a great place to find online material you can freely use without having to worry about getting copyright permission as long as you follow the requirements set out in the Creative Commons license. You can search Creative Commons at search.creativecommons.org.