How CopyrightX took me by surprise…and why you should try it, too

This guest post is written by Christine Daouti, who is the Copyright Support Officer at UCL. She is a previous speaker at our Icepops conference about her ‘Copyright for Humans’ game and runs an excellent UCL blog about copyright. Previously she worked in open access roles for over 20 years. She has a special interest in creating educational resources on copyright, including the UCL Copyright Essentials online module and the Copyright and your Teaching online module.

Christine writes: As many people already know, CopyrightX is a free course offered by the Harvard Law School and the Berkman Klein Center. The 12-week course runs annually from January to April and is offered in different formats. Here I discuss the ‘core’ online version taught by a Harvard Teaching Fellow; there are also affiliated versions run by copyright experts in different countries.

Several things attracted me to this course, besides the fact that it is associated with a prestigious institution. Obviously I was drawn to the topics covered, which include not only the subject matter of copyright, its mechanics, restricted acts and fair use, but also the underlying theories of intellectual property. What also appealed to me was the ‘flipped-classroom’ approach: course learners are expected to watch a 90-minute lecture recording and read 2-3 related cases every week, followed by an interactive online seminar in a group of 25 people. This format normally works for me because it combines independent study with critical discussion afterwards. Further, CopyrightX is promoted as a ‘networked’ course, supporting learner communities. I was looking forward to this for many reasons, particularly the opportunity to discuss copyright approaches across different countries.

The course did not disappoint; in fact, it surpassed my expectations in many ways. Here are some highlights that truly stood out.

• The course materials (all openly available online) are engaging and relevant even to those outside the US. Professor Fisher’s recorded lectures balance factual information with a more critical discussion of key cases, often referring to copyright reform and encouraging viewers to take a stance. These are complemented by incredibly useful mindmaps. I also found that the course readings were well-chosen and illustrative of key copyright debates.
• The weekly seminars were another pleasant surprise. I have to say that I attended the first session not knowing what to expect and feeling some copyright anxiety. The tutor quickly put us all at ease, being very approachable and engaging, introducing further cases and encouraging us to share our own perspectives. My seminar group was quite diverse, which meant that people brought different insights to the sessions. While I wish that the learner forum had been more active, there were opportunities to connect, which may well extend beyond the course.
• I didn’t expect the exam to be so much fun. This is an open-book exam comprising 7 short ‘issue-spotting’ questions based on a (fun) hypothetical case, and a longer essay involving IP theory. We were given 4 days to complete the exam. If, like me, you are a bit rusty with exam technique, you will need the full 4 days. It took me considerably longer to polish my answers and stick to the word limit without losing nuance than it took me to compose them in the first place. Despite this challenge, I felt this was the moment when it became clear to me what this course really seeks to achieve. This brings us to the biggest highlight of the course.
• The biggest surprise? The breakthrough that the course brought to my own thinking. The lectures, complemented by the seminars and concluding with the exam, gradually and steadily lead us to a fundamental question: what is the purpose of copyright? Does it currently serve this purpose? If not, how can it be reformed? Of course this is where it becomes most obvious that personal stakes and beliefs matter. Professor Fisher himself expresses a preference for cultural theories of copyright, which serve the public good and support distributive justice. This struck a chord with me more than anything else, but discussion of different theories focussing on different aspects (fairness, welfare, personality rights) also gave me overall insight into how copyright has been evolving. The exam offered the opportunity to explore how theory helps understand, and possibly resolve, current debates, including those around AI and copyright.

If you have already completed this course, some of the above may resonate with you. If you haven’t, I would strongly recommend it. Not only has it further my understanding of copyright, but it has also informed how I approach and support copyright literacy myself.

I would also advise that you get nominated by someone who has already completed the course. This may help you get a place, since it is a very popular course and places are limited. I am grateful to Jane Secker for supporting my application in this way: the moment she shared this on copyright channels I jumped in straight away as the endorsement was on a first come, first served basis. I feel I benefited a lot from this course.