Gateway or gatekeeper: The implications of copyright and digitalization on education

Abstract

Copyright represents a delicate balance between society's need to access important and enriching material and the rights of the creators. As technology transforms the means for creating and exchanging information, the challenges to copyright carry serious implications for education. This paper considers the issues surrounding copyright, education, and the digitalization of society and traces the history of copyright through the evolution of communication media‐its role in creating and, distributing knowledge. The dialectical relationship between communication as transmission and communication as dialogue serves as the theoretical basis for this analysis. Two suggestions for maintaining the balance include licensing arrangements and modification of fair use.

Keywords:

• copyright
• intellectual property
• communication technology
• interactive media
• digitalization
• distance education