Retired history professor Renée Neu Watkins is not entirely
sure if she receives all the money she’s due for reprints of
excerpts of books that she translated, though she’s not too
concerned about it.
“I’m not convinced that copyright is such a good
thing. … I believe ideas should be common,” Watkins said,
taking a short break from vacuuming her home in Berkeley.
Still, she says it is important that authors get compensated
when their works are used in universities.
Though many agree that intellectual property should be honored,
the lines begin to blur when it comes to reprinting educational
materials.
The lines are certainly blurry in Watkins’ case.
Watkins says she does not recall directly granting permission to
the Westwood copy shop Course Reader Material to reprint an excerpt
from her translation of a fifth-century Italian text for an Honors
Collegium course. Maybe, she says, the book’s publisher gave
the store permission.
Representatives of the book’s publisher, the University of
South Carolina Press, say they never owned the rights to
Watkins’ translation of “The Family in
Renaissance,” so they would have no authority to grant that
consent in the first place.
At the same time, employees of the copy store maintain that they
make every effort to follow copyright procedure, but due to the
abundance of the material, it is inevitable that some cases may
fall through the cracks.
This confusion is not surprising, says UCLA corporate law
professor Lynn Lopucki, adding that this difficulty in enforcing
copyright laws illustrates what has been a large problem at UCLA
and other college campuses for for more than 10 years.
Two court cases in the 1990s changed the way copyright law is
applied to educational purposes.
Professors could previously copy freely for classroom practices,
Lopucki said, but now the law indicates that reprinting materials
for educational purposes is only permitted for small amounts of
work for spontaneous and immediate use.
Sometimes, the law is just not practical, Lopucki said.
Lopucki cited an example of a professor at Washington University
who wanted to reprint a speech given by Fidel Castro in the
course’s reader. The professor could not print through the
local copy store because it needed to obtain permission from
Castro.
In this case, “Fidel Castro is not going to sue you for
using his speech,” Lopucki said.
Due to the hassle and high price that copyright laws often
entail, many professors are opting to distribute copies on their
own or to direct their students to find the material online.
“I have a preference for posting things on the Web now.
… I also get pictures from the Web and use them, since they are
not sold for profit and are made freely available,” said Tad
Blair, an assistant professor in behavioral neuroscience.
“The Web works really well, and I will continue doing that in
the future.”
Physiological sciences professor Scott Chandler also puts
articles online to reduce costs for his students, but says
copyright laws should be followed when reprinting material.
“It could be a hindrance, but on the other hand people
have a right to get paid for their work. It is a legitimate
right,” Chandler said.
Still, Lopucki said it is unfair to put educational purposes in
the same category as other industries.
“There should be a broad automatic license to photocopy
for classroom use,” Lopucki said. “We write and we
publish not for money, but for ideas; but they are trying to mix us
with the same system as Disney and Mickey Mouse where everyone is
in it for the money.”
Money is one of the largest problems that faces students when
they flock to the various copying stores around Westwood at the
start of each quarter.
“My course readers have been really expensive, averaging
at about $80,” said third-year political science student
Trisha Daza, adding that she usually ends up buying all her course
readers simply because she is too lazy to work around the
costs.
But some students find alternatives to paying the full price of
readers, by sharing with friends or making photocopies
themselves.
Aki Abebe, assistant manager of Westwood Copies, said he has
noticed an increase in the number of students sharing readers in
recent years.
When employees of the copy store see students making photocopies
of readers, Abebe said they discourage the students, but said with
a shrug that “there’s only so much you can
do.”
“When students walk in, you see they get ticked off. …
Students have been very unhappy about the prices, but we have no
control,” Abebe said, adding that he believes the course
reader industry is a “dying business.”
A lawsuit was filed against Westwood Copies in February 2003,
including allegations of 40 counts of infringed works, and a
settlement was reached.
Since the incident, Abebe said his store strictly follows all
copyright regulations. Like most other copy stores around campus,
Westwood Copies clears most of its material with the Copyright
Clearance Center.
The stricter policy may cause many to lose out, Abebe said.
Students lose because of the costs, instructors lose because
they can’t expose the students to all the information they
want and the copy store loses profit, he said.
However, Watkins sees the bright side of the situation.
When she notes that students are still reading her books, she
says she is satisfied and would never think about taking legal
action against copyright violations.
“I can’t say I think about it that much,”
Watkins said.
With reports from Colleen Honigsberg, Shaudee Navid and
Narges Zohoury, Bruin reporters.