Faulkner Press is suing Einstein's Notes for copying class notes without the professor's permission. Wait, what? I thought college was about passing on knowledge. I guess Faulkner Press disagrees.
This falls so neatly into the "Fair Use" clause of U.S. copyright law: "the fair use of a copyrighted work … for purposes such as … teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use) [and] scholarship… is not an infringement of copyright." Furthermore, "ideas, … concepts, principles" cannot be copyrighted.
And to nail the lid on the coffin, Einstein's Notes doesn't just blindly redistribute the source material verbatim; they offer a new product: a summary of the professor's lecture, and a compilation of useful material for the class. They cite their sources, which is all that is required when using these materials for their notes. Case closed.
The free flow of information is absolutely critical to a democratic society. The University of Florida is a place of learning. Let's not suffocate ourselves by depriving ourselves of knowledge.
