Job Discussion Forums

kimo50 · Joined: 24 Aug 2011 Posts: 119 Location: Guam

Is it common for foreign schools to photocopy copyrighted textbooks for classroom use? I am sure it is not legal, but is it common practice in certain countries? Do publishers ever take action to protect their copyrights?
I would be curious to learn of your experiences.

rtm · Joined: 13 Apr 2007 Posts: 1003 Location: US

kimo50 · Joined: 24 Aug 2011 Posts: 119 Location: Guam

No ... this is not copying a map or passage for personal use. I am talking about getting one hard cover copy then sending it out to be to a shop to beduplicated into 80-100 soft cover copies and then giving that to the students as their textbook

HLJHLJ · Joined: 06 Oct 2009 Posts: 1218 Location: Ecuador

It's common practice in some LatAm and Asian countries. I'd imagine it happens anywhere where copyright laws are non-existent or not enforced. As a rule of thumb, if you are in a country where knock off DVDs, CDs, clothes, bags, etc are ubiquitous, then knock off books are probably wide spread as well.

MotherF · Posted: Sun Oct 27, 2013 3:28 pm Post subject:

Yup!

So common that when I was a student in Chile the university bookstore was a small room with a one of each book, a copy machine and one of those contraptions that insert spiral binding.

Teacher in Rome · Joined: 09 Jul 2003 Posts: 1286

Happens in Italy, too.

Mind you, publishers don't help themselves either. One in particular is so useless at making its books available, that my local university bookshop asks us not to recommend books published by them if possible. (The books are also so expensive that photocopying is widespread.)