Fair Use Rule

U.S. Person has heard rumblings among you that Persona Non Grata infringes copyrighted material from time to time.  Allow him to set the record straight.  As a lawyer and published author, he understands and respects copyright.   There is never an intentional misappropriation of copyrighted material in this blog.  All authors paraphrase sources or use short quotations without attribution.  It is the way transformative commentary is done, and is recognized as "fair use" under United States copyright law.  Here is an example from the 1962 work of historian Lerone Bennett, Jr.  See if  you can recognize a more recent use of his terminology: "The slaves...transcended their environment, creating a new structure of meaning and putting their oppressors in debt.  And no one can read the record of that transcendence without a sense of awe at the audacity of the slaves' hope."

 

U.S. Person makes a conscious attempt to give credit where credit is due.  The following types of uses are usually considered fair uses at law of copyrighted material:

• Criticism and comment--what is done here when paraphrasing, quoting or excerpting a work for purposes of illustration or comment;
• News reporting --summarizing an address or article, with brief quotations in a report
• Research & scholarship--quoting a short passage in a scholarly, scientific, or technical work for illustration or clarification of the author's observations;
• Nonprofit educational uses--photocopying of limited portions of written works for educational use;
• Parody--imitation of another work for humorous effect.
  

U.S. Person wants the readers of this blog, which is a totally non-profit undertaking, to benefit from its contents by increasing their awareness and understanding of current events and particularly conservation issues without concern for possible copyright infringement. Thank you for your continued interest in Persona Non Grata, where you can get the facts, straight.