Teacher Discussion Forums

I find that many of the texts I want are just too bulky to travel with. So, I have started scanning EVERYTHING. I would like to share what I have, and also find others with different texts. As far as I know, in the same way that I can lend a photocopy (non-commercially) with a fellow teacher, likewise it is not illegal to share electronic versions. There is a burgeoning non-industry doing it with music and film. Check out Pirate Bay in Sweden.

On a related note...

I notice that many audio materials are simply not available on CD, and if they are they are priced way out of my ability to pay (like $70 for a few CDs, versus half that for cassettes) I would be happy to pay $25 if the materials were available as downloadable aiffs or mpegs or jpegs or whatever. I spend an incredible amount of time with software and hardware breaking up audio tracks from cassette, labelling tracks etc. I would like to share what I have.

Pirate Bay has virtually no listings for ESL materials. Any ideas which listings service has a better selection?

eslbiz wrote:As far as I know, in the same way that I can lend a photocopy (non-commercially) with a fellow teacher, likewise it is not illegal to share electronic versions. There is a burgeoning non-industry doing it with music and film. Check out Pirate Bay in Sweden.

If what you are proposing -- the sharing of electronic versions of classroom material conceived, written, edited, designed, and illustrated by someone other than you without that other person's permission -- if this is being offered as a free alternative to people having to pay the creator of ESL material for the use of their intellectual property, then I'd say it is quite illegal.