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China Cracks Down On Pirated Teaching Materials?

Overhype

from the for-the-children,-of-course dept

Wed, Sep 16th 2009 2:59pm — Mike Masnick
To hear the US entertainment industry talk about it, China doesn't respect any intellectual property at all. The truth, of course, is a lot more nuanced than that, but it's still a bit odd to read that China is proudly cracking down on the threat of "pirated teaching materials," which the government deems dangerous because it "harm[s] the healthy development of the country's youth." It's unclear how cheaper or even free teaching materials "harm" youth, but the speculation is that it's more about the government not liking the content than any real worry about "piracy." But, these days, due to pressure from other countries, China doesn't mind an excuse to pretend that it's being tough on piracy.
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Filed Under: china, pirates, teaching materials

9 Comments

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  • icon
    :Lobo Santo (profile), 16 Sep 2009 @ 3:10pm

    Aarrrr!

    Aw-right me buckos! Lissen up!!

    Fer today's lesson tern yer booty bookies to page 13: 'How to Pirate Teaching Materials'

    Aye mateys, that be some good learnin!

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Josh (profile), 16 Sep 2009 @ 3:37pm

    What they mean

    What they mean by "pirated" is "not government approved" teaching materials. Can't teach those kids anything that might lead them to question those in power. Being able to hide behind the laws those pesky western countries want is just bonus points.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 16 Sep 2009 @ 5:33pm

      Re: What they mean

      I suppose you don't realize that book piracy is a huge huge issue right now, hundreds of millions of books are being pirated with dollar figures surpassing the world's GDP. If this isn't stopped book publishers would go out of business, our economy would collapse, and the world would come to an end. So, yes, China is doing the right thing.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Bob Vila, 16 Sep 2009 @ 5:37pm

        Re: Re: What they mean

        This post is hilarious is you meant to leave a /s tag. Otherwise, it's the dumbest comment I have ever seen on Techdirt.

        [ link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 16 Sep 2009 @ 6:02pm

    You know what bothers me about textbooks is I had to pay $200 for an accounting textbook for an introductory accounting class that's for non accounting majors. They keep on changing the book and charging so much under the pretext that lots of research and development needs to go into these books. Yes many of these books AREN'T GRADUATE LEVEL BOOKS, they're INTRODUCTORY BOOKS often times for books that are for classes that are for people who aren't even majoring in the class subject matter. What possible research and development could possibly be required to justify such high book prices to an INTRODUCTORY course for a student who's not even majoring in the course subject matter? I can go to a book store and get an updated book on all sorts of subject matters for like $30 written by Ph.D's in the relevant field for like $30 and most of the info there would be accurate and up to date (not to mention they also have editors and such). There is NO JUSTIFICATION for these high book prices. The same thing is true for those overpriced graphing calculators with a few kilobytes of hard disk space.

    http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=526262#post11389876

    http://boards. ign.com/teh_vestibule/b5296/184675173/p2

    http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies-archive.cfm /1137557.html

    http://controversialskepticism.blogspot.com/2008/03/are-graphing-calculators-too-ex pensive.html

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 16 Sep 2009 @ 7:29pm

      Re:

      Also, if patents help foster innovation, why haven't graphing calculators innovated much in the last 10 years. Prices are about the same and their technology is about the same despite the fact that it's DIRT CHEAP technology.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 16 Sep 2009 @ 7:41pm

      Re:

      Also, this is a good site I just found but couldn't find before.

      http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?t=40879

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 16 Sep 2009 @ 7:43pm

        Re: Re:

        (or rather, I found it a long time ago but couldn't find it about fifteen minutes ago but kept looking and I just found it now).

        [ link to this | view in chronology ]


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