[Editors] Crediting student work online

[Jennifer Schmitt]

Hi Scott,

You're right about the credit not being required. Neither sites are getting ad revenue nor doing this for profit, which means that the reference would probably be considered "fair use" (commentary, satire, education, etc.) under U.S. copyright law (even if MIT had some kind of claim to the work).

My feeling is that asking the students to credit MIT for their work is a bit much. The blogs are clearly personal sites and the content belongs to the students. Moreover, many folks like to exclude personal information (like where they attend school) out on the web.

The diplomatic approach would be getting in touch with the authors and telling them how much you admire the posts. You could then ask if it would be possible to link back between MIT and their site in some way?

Beyond that, I wouldn't press them. But that's just my two cents.

Thanks,
Jennifer Schmitt
RD Communications

PS -- It seems that the parapractice site does mention MIT in the post?

On Nov 11, 2010, at 5:44 PM, Scott R Campbell wrote:

> Some of our students have posted photos online of installations they made for the architecture open house a few days ago. 
> 
> http://www.cookingarchitecture.com/?p=589
> http://parapractice.net/?p=449 
> 
> Since they did the work and they took the photos, it doesn’t seem to me that they’ve violated any crediting protocol.  But some feel it would be a courtesy for them to acknowledge MIT and the studio in which the work originated and they’re asking if there’s any kind of protocol for this.  Is there anything more to be done than simply to ask them to include acknowledgements when they make such postings?
> 
> Please share your opinions, advice and experience.
> 
> 
> Scott Campbell
> Director of Communications
> MIT School of Architecture + Planning
> Office: 9-422   .   Mail: 7-231
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