III. Copyrighting
A copyright is an intangible right granted to the author or originator of certain literary or artistic productions, under which he or she is invested for a limited period with the sole, exclusive privilege of making copies and publishing and selling them.
Copyright protection automatically exists from the time the work is created in fixed form. There is no requirement that the work be published or registered to obtain protection under copyright law. The copyright in the work of authorship immediately becomes the property of the author who created the work unless it is a work-for-hire or unless ownership has been assigned by written agreement.
As a condition of your enrollment in UNC-Chapel Hill, you have granted the University a limited, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to reproduce your dissertation, in whole or in part, in electronic form to be posted on the UNC-Chapel Hill Library database and made available to the general public at no charge.
While a legal formality, if you wish to copyright your thesis, UNC-Chapel Hill requires that you include a copyright notice following the title page. See Section I or the sample copyright page for the format of this notice.
You may also wish to register your copyright with the U.S. Copyright Office at the Library of Congress. As mentioned above, copyright registration is not a condition to copyright protection. There are, however, advantages to registration, especially if you have a claim of infringement of your copyright. Registration may be made at any time within the life of the copyright, but there are advantages to filling for registration within three months of publication. For more information on registration, consult the website of the U.S. Copyright Office, www.copyright.gov.
You may empower UMI to file the application on your behalf, or you may directly contact the Register of Copyrights, Copyright Office, The Library of Congress, Washington, DC 20559. See the submission site for instructions and fees.
Using Copyrighted Materials
Any copyrighted materials used in your work, beyond brief excerpts, may be used only with the written permission of the copyright owner. Book and journal publishers normally hold the copyright for all materials they publish. Therefore, even if you are the sole or one of several authors of material in a published book or journal, you must obtain written permission from the copyright holder if you are including this material in your thesis. Remember that use of reproductions or excerpts of other media, such as music, graphic images or computer software may also require permissions. You are responsible for securing all necessary permissions and paying any permission fees.
Your letter to the copyright holder should make clear that you seek permission to microfilm and publish your dissertation through UMI and that UMI may sell, on demand, for scholarly purposes, single copies of your dissertation, which includes the copyright holder’s material. Your letter should also seek permission to submit the copyrighted material electronically to be posted and made available to UNC-Chapel Hill Library database where it will be made available to the general public at no charge.
For additional guidance, please visit:
http://www.umi.com/products_umi/dissertations/copyright/Use of Your Own Previously Published Materials
Some departments permit you to include in your thesis/dissertation articles or other materials that you have previously published, that have been accepted for publication, or that have been otherwise presented to the public. In all such instances the following rules apply:
1. The material, if included in the body of your text, must be rendered in a typeface and citation form consistent with the body of the text.
2. If the material is co-authored, the department must approve its inclusion in your thesis/dissertation.
3. If the material is copyrighted (if you are the sole author but the copyright is held by the publisher), you must fulfill the conditions specified in Section III above. The date on the title page should be the year in which your committee approves the thesis/dissertation.
