Copies

[Catholic]

I was asked to distribute some material to students of mine that, unbeknownst to the person who directed me to do so, is copyrighted. I confronted him, and he took the noble step of contacting the publisher and asking for permission to make the copies, informing me that the school will make purchases if our permission is denied. My thought is that even though we would not have permission at the time, it would it now be o.k. for me to distribute the copies since we are in the process of making things right. There is no time to wait for the permission, and the person did not seem to think about the copyright situation seriously until I mentioned it. Any comments?

 

[BobP123]

I don’t think you have much choice but to wait. You may still be violating copyright laws even if you are willing to pay. The author may not be willing to sell.

 

[otjm]

If you are teaching in an offical position or for an organization of some sort, there should be legal counsel available to some degree. This is a question that should be run past them, rather than the forum. And particularly since it appears that the step has been taken to request permission, which in turn has the possiblity of greater visibility than before the question was brought up, it would seem advisable to get further (name removed by moderator)ut. If the material is necessary and cannot be provided in any other format than copying, perhaps the material should simply not be used if the answer is not immediately forthcoming either from your own legal counsel (that is, for the organization) or from the copyright source.

If it is truly not accessible to the students except for your copying right now ( and if you had access to it, they should also), then perhaps the information needs to be summarized to the students and go from there, providing them with the source so they can research it themselves if needed in the future.

 

[Romans12]

I was asked to distribute some material to students of mine that, unbeknownst to the person who directed me to do so, is copyrighted. I confronted him, and he took the noble step of contacting the publisher and asking for permission to make the copies, informing me that the school will make purchases if our permission is denied. My thought is that even though we would not have permission at the time, it would it now be o.k. for me to distribute the copies since we are in the process of making things right. There is no time to wait for the permission, and the person did not seem to think about the copyright situation seriously until I mentioned it. Any comments?

I believe you have to wait on permission also…

You know that Stealing is wrong, and if for some reason it was “knocked back” and you were told you could not distribute…

Well I’d say that you have just esculated that Grave sin to a Mortal/Deadly sin.

-Grave sin
-full knowledge
-complete consent

 

[Catholic]

Thanks everyone for your advice. I was set to have the guy fill in for me so that I wouldn’t be taking part, but he received permission notification right before the scheduled activity, so we are good to go.

 

[otjm]

I believe you have to wait on permission also…

You know that Stealing is wrong, and if for some reason it was “knocked back” and you were told you could not distribute…

Well I’d say that you have just esculated that Grave sin to a Mortal/Deadly sin.

-Grave sin
-full knowledge
-complete consent

Well, let’s look at that again. Copying some material (I am assuming it is not a full book) is hardly a serious matter.

To give an analogy - stealing $5 from a very wealthy man is not considered as serious as stealing $5 from a very poor person. That is a holding of Moral Theology (and is age old; it is not some “new” theology from some dissenting theologian); both deprive another of what is rightfully theirs, but the wealthy person is not deprived of much, as they have much; the poor person is deprived of much because they have very little.

Copyright protection in civil law is designed to protect the writer, so that they receive just compensation. Pirating their material and selling it widely is more serious than copying for students, where one copies only a small amount, distributes it very narrowly, and receives no compensation. It should also be ntoed that often the “just compensation” is simply the acknowledgement that the material is copyrighted, and the author’s name; that is, “just compensation” often is not a cash payment.

So no, this is not a grevious matter. In most instances, the writer only asks for proper recognition of their work, and normally for students, asks no compensation, or very minimal compensation. That, too, supports the fact that this is not a grevious matter.

Schools can get into seriuous trouble -usually with a publishing house, rather than the actual writer - if they flagrantly violate copyright law repeatedly. Schools get into almost no trouble at all if they have a minor incidient, as this was. That, too supports the fact that this was not a grevious matter.

 

[Romans12]

Well, let’s look at that again. Copying some material (I am assuming it is not a full book) is hardly a serious matter.

To give an analogy - stealing $5 from a very wealthy man is not considered as serious as stealing $5 from a very poor person. That is a holding of Moral Theology (and is age old; it is not some “new” theology from some dissenting theologian); both deprive another of what is rightfully theirs, but the wealthy person is not deprived of much, as they have much; the poor person is deprived of much because they have very little.

Copyright protection in civil law is designed to protect the writer, so that they receive just compensation. Pirating their material and selling it widely is more serious than copying for students, where one copies only a small amount, distributes it very narrowly, and receives no compensation. It should also be ntoed that often the “just compensation” is simply the acknowledgement that the material is copyrighted, and the author’s name; that is, “just compensation” often is not a cash payment.

So no, this is not a grevious matter. In most instances, the writer only asks for proper recognition of their work, and normally for students, asks no compensation, or very minimal compensation. That, too, supports the fact that this is not a grevious matter.

Schools can get into seriuous trouble -usually with a publishing house, rather than the actual writer - if they flagrantly violate copyright law repeatedly. Schools get into almost no trouble at all if they have a minor incidient, as this was. That, too supports the fact that this was not a grevious matter.

Well its just my opinion… I am not a lawyer… but copywrite to me means you need permission first…

And I am only suggesting if you use without asking first and it is “knocked back” no matter what you might think… then it is stealing… just my opinion…

and that to me means Mortal/Deadly sin… because you stole the product whatever it is with full knowledge and free will.

In other words… make sure you get the all clear from the publisher or whatever before you start distributing copywrited material…

My mother does home tutoring… and she makes sure of this… because of this very reason… just my 2 cents worth

 

[otjm]

Well its just my opinion… I am not a lawyer… but copywrite to me means you need permission first…

Yes, that is correct.

And I am only suggesting if you use without asking first and it is “knocked back” no matter what you might think… then it is stealing… just my opinion…]/QUOTE]That is correct too.
Romans12;2620658:

and that to me means Mortal/Deadly sin… because you stole the product whatever it is with full knowledge and free will.

That is incorrect. Stealing is wrong, and stealing is a sin, but stealing is not automatically a mortal sin. You had the correct definition of a mortal sin - the matter must be seriously wrong - but just because one used a material without copyright permission (and we will agree for the sake of the arguement that this is defined as stealing - although in civil law and criminal law, probably not) does not make the matter serious. Serious, in matters of stealing, requires a weighing of not only the intrinsic value of the matter, but also the value of the matter to the indvidual; that is why I gave the analogy of the rich and the poor person.

In other words… make sure you get the all clear from the publisher or whatever before you start distributing copywrited material…

My mother does home tutoring… and she makes sure of this… because of this very reason… just my 2 cents worth

And I would not disagree with this. However, not all uses of copyrighted material require one to request permission to use; that is granted by law for personal use. In other words, if you were doing research on a subject, and in order to write your paper you needed to copy several pages out of a book, you have by law persmission to do so for your own use. While you are not required by copyright law to acknowledge the writer in your paper, a properly written term paper will do so even though that is not cionsdered “publishing” within the definition of copyright law; it is a requirement of teachers to know your source material.

 

[rwoehmke]

If I recollect any person doing research or studying has the right to make one copy for their own use. The individual students could do this, but it is a hassle and would not seem to me to be in good faith to tell them," The source is available in the library, you may make one copy" when there may be 20, 30, 50 or more students.

 

[BobP123]

Also the gravity of the theft increases if one makes or intends to make a profit off the unauthorized copyrighted material.