BioMed Central's BMC Medical Education journal has an article, Langlois et al's Restrictions impeding web-based courses: a survey of publisher's variation in authorising access to high quality on-line literature, a research study which looks at the difficulty in getting permission to use electronic versions of journal articles in online education.

From the abstract:

Eight of 16 publishers were willing to grant permission to store electronic versions of articles without levying charges additional to the subscription. Twenty of 35 publishers gave permission to reproduce extracts of published work at no fee. Publisher's responses were highly variable to the requests for access to published material. This may be influenced by vague terminology within the 'fair dealing' provision in the copyright legislation, which seems to leave it open to individual interpretation. Considerable resource costs were incurred by the exercise. Time expended included those incurred by us: research to identify informed representatives within the publishing organisation, request 'chase-ups' and alternative examples being sought if publishers were uncooperative; and the publisher when dealing with numerous permission requests. Financial costs were also incurred by both parties through additional staffing and paperwork generated by the permission process, the latter including those purely borne by educators due to the necessary provision of photocopy 'course packs' when no suitably alternative material could be found if publishers were uncooperative. Finally we discuss the resultant bias in material towards readily available electronic resources as a result of publisher's uncooperative stance and encourage initiatives that aim to improve open electronic access.