Lori Powell Mayhew

Copyright, Piracy, and Ethics

Assignment: Read each of the following scenarios. Select two of them and write a paragraph for each that explains the law and if the described activity is allowable or not.

Mr. Hamer is tutoring for the functional writing test out of a copyrighted series of workbooks from Houghtin Mifflin. He has 27 students but only 20 books were purchased for his class. The same material is available at the HM web page. She prints enough pages for her kids each morning for today's class.

• Workbooks fall into the category of consumable works and they may not be copied. This use violates the “fair use” criteria from the 1976 Copyright Act because it affects the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work. This action infringes on the copyright owners rights. Only the copyright owner has the right to reproduce the copyrighted work. The action also keeps the copyright owner from earning financial compensation for their work.

Mr. Jamweimer, the parent of one of our most intellectual students, has paid to download a wonderful computer software program for his little Einstein. Mr. Jamweimer wants "our school" to be the best and sends a copy of the download file to be used by the students on the computers at school. P.S. all of the kids use it and win Nobel prizes in science, literature, physics, chemistry, and playground.

• While it is permissible to have an archival copy of software this does not extend to copying for multiple use. This is a direct violation of copyright law. Copyright gives the creator the exclusive right to reproduce, distribute, sell, lend or rent their creations. Mr. Jamweimer only paid to download a single copy of the computer software program. Unless he purchased enough site licenses for all of the students at school, or he contacted the copyright owner and obtained permission to use the program in this way it is a copyright violation.