Digitalizing video collection in a school library

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• September 6, 2006 @ 4:28pmtahaniothman says:

  I have a nice video collection that my teaching staff can no longer use due to our district getting rid of tv sets and VCRs. Can I legally burn them on to DVDs if they're being used in the classroom for educational purposes?
• September 6, 2006 @ 5:35pmMKardick says:

  While the advice given here should by no means be considered a legal opinion the answer is probably not. Unless the videos are damaged, not available on DVD or the copyright has lapsed, there is not a valid reason for you to alter the original medium of the movies. Looking at the Fair Use Checklist (shown on the home page) there are too many factors against Fair Use specifically using the entire work, repeated/long term use, and replacing the sale of a copyrighted work. The condition under which this might be allowed is if any of the videos are no longer available from a distributor but you would need to be sure that is the case.

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