Teacher Tube Video Analyses

The first video I watched on Teacher Tube one about Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven." It was made by a student by the sound of it and was basically an overview of different literary devices Poe uses in the poem. Here's the link to the video if you're interested. I liked how the creator only used a few images and background music to supplement her voice over about the process Poe went through when writing the poem. She had a picture of Poe, a picture of the word "Nevermore" in the shape of a raven, and a still shot from The Simpson's parody of "The Raven" (so she didn't use more than 5 from the same artist). She also had background instrumental music. I don't think she violated copyright laws blatantly because she didn't have two-and-half minutes of a popular song playing (and could have gotten the background music from a site like Free Play Music). However, even though the images she used were only supplemental and not excessive, she didn't cite any of her sources. If she had included a references list or works cited page at the end I don't think she would have violated any copyright laws at all except by using the still shot from The Simpson's episode - somehow I don't think that qualifies as fair use but I'm not sure.

The second video I watched was one about Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken." Here's the link for it. I really liked this video a lot - it was a really creative way to discuss different interpretations of the poem. It was basically an animation (for lack of a better word - check it out to see what I'm talking about) showing a forest with two separate paths and a traveler trying to decide which one to take. It also included an image of the poem in its entirety which is okay because the poem is less than 250 words (144 to be exact). I don't think they violated any copyright laws because the animating all seemed to be done by whoever made the movie and did the voice over. The only copyright laws I can think that the creator may have violated depends on if they got the animation from another source and didn't cite it.