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Understanding Copyright

Copyright is a type of intellectual property law that protects a person’s creative work. It is designed to prevent the unauthorised use of a work. Copyright is automatic for works created in Australia, and there is no registration process involved. It is important to keep in mind that copyright law varies from country to country, so what someone in the USA can do with copyright material is not the same as what you can do in Australia.

Why do I need to understand copyright?

If you breach copyright on your research work, Moodle site or in your lectures and tutorials, you may be held personally liable under the Copyright Act.

You need to think about what you use and how you use it to ensure that your Moodle sites and lecture materials are copyright compliant. Copyright is complex and whether or not you can use something is going to depend on a number of factors.                                   

Accessibility/disability provisions

The Australian Copyright Act contains disability provisions allowing content types to be converted to assist those with accessibility issues access content, without infringing copyright as per the fair dealing for disability access exception. 

Please contact Student Accessibility and Equity service on accessibility@cqu.edu.au for more details.

Training

All CQUniversity staff and students should be familiar with the University Copyright Policy.
Mandatory copyright training is located in EMPower for all CQUniversity staff. This training needs to be repeated every 2 years.
Copyright basics and use in teaching is an online training module for:

  • Academic staff – Both HE and VET
  • TaSAC Staff
  • Moodle staff
  • Library Staff

All other staff need to complete the Copyright basics module.
You will need your staff log in to access the Copyright training modules.

Copyright for Students

Learn how to be copyright compliant while completing your studies.

Copyright for Teaching Staff

Use our guides and online training to ensure you are meeting copyright requirements in your course content

Copyright for Research

Learn how to be copyright compliant when conducting and publishing your research. 

Copyright for University Events

There are differences in copyright uses for teaching and learning activities to other activities across the university.

Copyright and Social Media

Learn how to not breech copyright on social media platforms.

Open Access and Creative Commons

Learn how to utilise Open Access and Creative Commons content.