Wimba Session - Week 2

Many of the myths about copyright that were discussed in the wimba session, I have heard them before, and I used to believe in a few of them until I started to get more information about copyright laws a few years back. Every time that I am doing something in which I want to include an illustration, graphic, etc. I make myself sure that it is copyrighted or not. Most of the time if I had the chance I prefer to create it myself, so I don't get into trouble.

One of the things that can be copyrighted that I didn't know about and really caught my attention was dance. It was a surprise for me to find out that you can copyright it, and thinking about it, it makes sense, after all if other works of art can be copyrighted then why a dance should be any different.

Costa Rica used to be a country were people didn't even think about copyright laws, for the general public, everything was public domain and fair use. This has been changing since the country decided to sign Free Trade Agreements with Canada, Mexico, and the USA. I believe that one of my duties as a teacher is to teach my students to respect the copyright laws, so in every assingment that they do for me, they must include and mention the source where they took the image, music, etc., in the case that they are including in their works things that were not made by them. It is only through this kind of actions that people would get accostumed to respect the rights that the creators have over their works.