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OFF THE WIRE:
- How College Students Are Using the Net
U.S. Copyright Office Says Current Law Restrains Distance Education

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Newsletter  BACK ISSUES:
 Volume 4 Issue 8 September 2000

OFF the WIRE

How College Students Are Using the Net

A new joint study by Greenfield Online and YouthStream Media Networks confirms the Internet has become an integral element of college life. In fact, the 120-page study of 1,135 students, drawn from an online research panel of 30,000 four-year-college students, shows that nearly a third of students (31 percent) describe themselves as "Internet dependent" and more than a quarter (28 percent) consider themselves “cybergeeks.” The vast majority of students (81 percent) have made at least one online purchase. This number has increased significantly since November 1998 (51 percent). The most common items purchased are CDs (64 percent), books (58 percent), clothing (42 percent) and concert/ theater/ event tickets (32 percent).

A quarter of college students have purchased textbooks online. Those students who buy textbooks online describe the process as “inexpensive” (77 percent), “more convenient” (49 percent) and “easier” (42 percent). Ten percent also like the sites' guaranteed book buy-back.

Nearly all the students surveyed (92 percent) own a computer. The majority of students (78 percent) have been using the Internet for at least three years, and 90 percent go online at least once a day. They spend an average of three hours online every day, and 20 percent spend four or more hours online each day. The most common regular online activity is sending and receiving e-mail (92 percent). Other frequent online activities include surfing the Internet for topics of interest (72 percent) and using instant messaging (60 percent).

For more information contact: Mark Fusco at mfusco@greenfield.com, or call 203-846-5778 or 203-858-1771.

© 2000, Association for Interactive Media


U.S. Copyright Office Says Current Law Restrains Distance Education

The head of the U.S. Copyright Office told a congressional commission recently that current copyright law inhibits the growth of online education. But the president of a publishers' group retorted that changing the law could hurt copyright holders' ability to maintain control of their works.

Marybeth Peters, the U.S. registrar of copyrights, said that the provision for “fair use” should be expanded so that any copyrighted materials that can be used freely in classrooms can also be used online for distance-education courses.

But Patricia Schroeder, who is president of the Association of American Publishers and is a former Democratic U.S. representative from Colorado, said Congress needs to be careful of how far it loosens the copyright restrictions, or authors may be hurt in the process.

The commission, known as the Congressional Web-based Education Commission, is made up of members of the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate and representatives of higher-education institutions and organizations. Its members heard testimony on Wednesday as the commission ended its fourth meeting. It is scheduled to make recommendations in November on what laws Congress should change to accommodate the growth of online education.

The current copyright law was written in 1976 and limits the “fair use” of copyrighted works for educational purposes to settings in which students meet in a classroom, Ms. Peters said. The law makes it much more difficult for a professor to use a clip of a movie in an online course than in a face-to-face course, she said.

The law's “fair-use” exemptions do not extend to online education, Ms. Peters said, and the law therefore limits the growth of distance education. “Emerging markets should be able to develop with minimal government interference,” she said.

The Copyright Office released a report in May 1999 that called on Congress to make the copyright law technology-neutral, so that all its provisions would apply to the Internet. But Congress has taken little action on the issue, she said.

However, Ms. Schroeder said putting copyrighted works, such as videos and sound clips, on the Internet could be dangerous. She said security measures available today don't prevent people from capturing the materials and distributing them without the authors’ permission. If they lose control over their own material, she said, authors may lose the incentive to produce creative works.

Distance education, Ms. Schroeder said, seems to be thriving now and can continue to coexist with the current copyright law. “I don't think you need to change any of the laws to make this market work,” she said.

Sen. Bob Kerrey, the Nebraska Democrat who is chairman of the commission, said after the meeting that the recommendations made in the copyright report last year and reiterated by Ms. Peters should be studied so that the law can be updated. He said he hoped that the Copyright Office and publishers could reach a compromise on rewording the law.

“Some kind of exemptions need to be provided,” Senator Kerrey said. “There clearly is an access problem.”

©1999, The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Reprinted with permission. This article may not be posted, published, or distributed without permission from The Chronicle.



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