When faculty members consider copyright in the digital age, it is often in relation to things they can't (or shouldn't) do. For example, they can't have too much material placed in online reserve, they can't scan journal articles to create digital versions of what used to be called "course packs," and they can't post an excerpt from a work of scholarship on their blogs without appropriate permissions. Yet copyright also empowers faculty authors, and that flip side of copyright, especially as it relates to challenges posed by the posting of teaching materials on the public web, is the subject in this article. The web offers great advantages for the dissemination of scholarly information, but that same technology, in its uniqueness, can also endanger faculty authors' ability to ensure that their teaching materials and the products of their research are not exploited for ends they might not have imagined. The authors believe it is in the best interest of both faculty members and their institutions not to post either teaching or research materials to publicly accessible websites unless the faculty copyright holders provide explicit permission. The web is a unique medium, and any institutional claim to a "shop right" to use faculty-created materials for internal purposes should at least exclude requirements to post them to the public web, just as materials more commonly understood to be protected, such as research data or publications, should not be posted without permission. If access through the web seems to be an academic imperative, the authors suggest limiting access to specific groups, such as students currently enrolled in a course. Doing so meets the avowed educational goals of faculty and their institutions without unnecessarily exposing either party to conflict over intellectual property. Yet another reason faculty members should be concerned about controlling their copyrighted material in the digital age is that a loss of that control could threaten their personal privacy. Ultimately, it is only when faculty members fully recognize the rights and powers they possess as the original owners of the copyrights to their academic works that they will be able to use the web and other digital communication technologies in a way that avoids the unintended consequences: an erosion of their academic freedom and an unnecessary limitation on the flow and advancement of academic and scholarly knowledge.