Re: Academics and coursepacks

From: James Rogers <jetan[_at_]ionet.net>
Date: Thu, 9 Jul 1998 07:27:43 -0500 (CDT)

On 7/8/98, James Rogers <jetan[_at_]ionet.net> wrote:
>
> On 7/07/98, Michael Scarpitti <mscarpit[_at_]asnt.org> wrote:
> >
> > If [a] professor is teaching a Shakespeare class, and [...] he uses
> > the new Oxford Shakespeare (ed. by Wells?) and simply photocopies a
> > play or two for a class of 200, we have a serious problem [...]
> > For the prof to refuse to ask permission is outright arrogant
> > thievery.
>
> If I have bought a copy of your book of public-domain information,
> surely I've adequately compensated you for the making of it, and can
> therefore do with it as I choose. Certainly, when I buy furniture, or
> clothing, or household appliances, the designer has been paid an hourly
> wage or annual salary for her efforts, and the manufacturer has no
> further right to tell me what I can or cannot do with his product based
> on the "creativity" or even "sweat of the brow" inherent in that design.
> Why should it be different for the designers or publishers of books of
> public domain material?
>
> Obviously, the existence of photocopiers reduces the publishers'
> potential market, but is this a good reason to grant them special rights
> to control the use of public domain information? By those rules, we'd
> have to extend copyright to all material products if we ever invented
> matter-duplicators, which is absurd. Why not let the market decide the
> availability of public domain material?
>
> What you're describing as "outright arrogant thievery" may be
> technically illegal in the US, but I'd really like to know why you
> believe it's _immoral_ too.

     Under U.S. law , it is my opinion that there is probably no illegality involved in the Shakespeare example, unless one is considering some of the notes involved. I question whether simple typographical choices... in this case, more or less dictated by the format of the work... are sufficient to protect the Bard. I think that an instructor would have little to fear in this scenario. I understand where the publishers are 'coming from", but the bottom line is that they simply don't own the material.

                                        James

James Michael Rogers
jetan[_at_]ionet.net Received on Thu Jul 09 1998 - 12:26:24 GMT