Press Release: Georgia State University Copyright Infringement...

["Olga Francois" <OFrancois@xxxxxxxx>]

Of interest...

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Contact: Judith Platt/Deidre Huntington
Ph: 202-220-4551/202-220-4550
Publishers Take Action Against
Georgia State University Copyright Infringement
Suit filed in Atlanta Federal Court

Atlanta, April 16, 2008: A group of publishers filed suit in federal
court late yesterday to stop widespread copyright infringement at
Georgia State University (GSU). The complaint, filed by Oxford
University Press, Cambridge University Press and SAGE Publications and
supported by the Association of American Publishers (AAP), charges that
GSU officials are violating the law by systematically enabling
professors to provide students with digital copies of copyrighted course
readings published by the plaintiffs and numerous other publishers
without those publishers' authorization. The lawsuit seeks injunctive
relief to bring an end to such practices, but does not seek monetary
damages.

The lawsuit asserts "pervasive, flagrant, and ongoing" unauthorized
distribution of copyrighted materials, despite attempts to reach an
amicable and mutually acceptable solution without the need for
litigation. GSU distributes the unauthorized materials through its
electronic course reserves service, its Blackboard/WebCT Vista
electronic course management system, and its departmental web pages and
hyperlinked online syllabi available on websites and computer servers
controlled by GSU. U.S. copyright law applies to digital course
offerings as it does to paper offerings, and does not distinguish
between different methods of distribution.
While many U.S. colleges and universities work with university presses
and other publishers to ensure their uses of published materials are in
accordance with U.S. copyright law, the lawsuit states that GSU has
flatly rebuffed efforts to reach similar agreements.

"University presses are integral to the academic environment, providing
scholarly publications that fit the needs of students and professors and
serving as a launch pad from which academic ideas influence debate in
the public sphere," said Niko Pfund, Vice-President of Oxford University
Press. "Without copyright protections, it would be impossible for us to
meet these needs and provide this service."
"Publishers must protect their interests and those of their authors when
they believe that this spirit of cooperation-and the law itself-is being
willfully and blatantly violated," said Pfund. "We take this action in
sorrow, not in anger, as we consider universities, librarians, scholars,
and presses to exist in the same, mutually supportive ecosystem, and
believe librarians especially to be among our most important publishing
partners."

"Of all places, we would expect universities to respect laws protecting
intellectual property and to instill their students with such respect,"
said Frank Smith of Cambridge University Press. "One of the key values
underpinning teaching and research in colleges and universities is the
responsibility to credit academic work to its creator; and any attempt
to take credit for work that is not your own is widely viewed as
unacceptable. We think the majority of faculty would recognize that the
same principles apply in respecting copyright law and the work of fellow
authors and that these principles apply in the digital world, just as in
the print world."
"Respect for copyright law is integral to the higher education process,"
said Patricia Schroeder, AAP President and CEO. "It provides the basis
for publishing operations of university presses and scholarly societies,
and makes possible the contributions of innumerable other authors and
publishers to the educational process. Georgia State University's
disregard for basic copyright protections undermines this very premise."

"AAP members and the publishing industry recognize the advantages of
making course content available electronically for students, and offer
licensing and permissions processes designed to allow such uses on a
cost-effective basis," continued Schroeder. "We are simply asking
Georgia State University to take the necessary measures to respect the
law."

Click here to view a copy of the complaint.
http://www.publishers.org/main/PressCenter/documents/GSUlawsuitcomplaint
.pdf

Cambridge University Press
Cambridge University Press, the publishing house of the University of
Cambridge, is one of the world's largest academic publishers and is
acclaimed for its list of journals, research monographs, and textbooks
in subjects from medicine and law to literature and classics. The
American branch of Cambridge, founded in 1949 and headquartered in New
York, publishes 500 academic books annually and imports more than 700
additional titles."

Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press, Inc. (OUP, Inc.) is affiliated with Oxford
University Press in the United Kingdom (OUP-UK), a department of Oxford
University. OUP, Inc. is a nonprofit publisher and the largest
university press in the U.S. OUP, Inc.'s diverse publishing program
includes scholarly works in all academic disciplines, Bibles, music,
school and college textbooks, business and economic books, online
scholarly resource sites, dictionaries and reference books, and academic
journals. OUP, Inc. produces approximately 500 new titles a year, of
which about half are scholarly research monographs, and imports close to
800 titles from OUP-UK and other branch offices around the world.

SAGE
SAGE is a leading international publisher of journals, books, and
electronic media for academic,
educational, and professional markets. Since 1965, SAGE has helped
inform and educate a global community of scholars, practitioners,
researchers, and students spanning a wide range of subject areas
including business, humanities, social sciences, and science, technology
and medicine. An independent company, SAGE has principal offices in Los
Angeles, London, New Delhi, and Singapore.
www.sagepub.com.

Association of American Publishers
The Association of American Publishers is the national trade association
of the U.S. book publishing industry. AAP's more than 300 members
include most of the major commercial publishers in the United States, as
well as smaller and non-profit publishers, university presses and
scholarly societies. AAP members publish hardcover and paperback books
in every field, educational materials for the elementary, secondary,
postsecondary, and professional markets, scholarly journals, computer
software, and electronic products and services. The protection of
intellectual property rights in all media is among the Association's
highest priorities.