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An author against the book pirates

Copyright By John A Walker

In a 2010 special 301 report on copyright protection and enforcement by the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA, based in Washington DC) a recommendation was made that Indonesia remain on its Priority Watch List of worst offenders. This was because in Indonesia, piracy problems, including end-user piracy of business software, mall piracy including mobile device piracy and CD-R and DVD-R burning, book piracy, illegal cam cording, pay TV piracy, some factory optical disc piracy, and emerging Internetbased piracy cause serious economic harm to right holders. In many instances, organized criminal groups engaged in other criminal behaviour are suspected of or have been detected engaging in piracy. Piracy levels in Indonesia remained among

the highest in the world in 2009. This is in spite of the Indonesian Governments promises to protect copyright and to prosecute the pirates. Among the items pirated are many books by Western academics. Although there are guesstimates of the large sums of money lost by Western publishers because of piracy, the figures are disputed because no one knows if the source titles would have been purchased if they had not been pirated. However, it is clear that income from foreign and translation rights are being lost due to piracy. I discovered this to my cost last autumn when I googled the title of one of my books - Design History (1989) - and found that it had been translated into Indonesian by a company Jalasutra.com (founded in 2000) - located in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Since I could not recall being told about the translation or being paid for it, I contacted my publishers foreign rights

specialist. It was news to her too; our conclusion was that the book had been pirated. I fired off an email to Jalasutra demanding to know more and asking for a copy of the book. Initially, there was no reply. Researching the subject of book piracy in Indonesia I discovered a 2002 article in the Jakarta Post which stated: However, books published by new publishers [Jalasutra was mentioned] in Yogyakarta are not without fault. Translated books, which are mostly published without permits from copyright holders, are of very poor quality. It's one of our problems. If a permit is obtained, it would increase production costs because it means we would have to pay royalties. Our biggest problem is money," Ade Ma'ruf said.

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2002/08/31/yogya karta039s-new-publishers-offer-alternative-

debate.html If such companies cannot afford to employ a skilled translator, the translated text may well be a travesty of the original. Later I found another article on piracy dated 2010 in the same newspaper which included comments by the marketing manager of Jalasutra as if his own company was not indulging in the practice! We are aware of piracy practices but we can do nothing to prevent them" said Apri Dhian, cooperation and promotional division coordinator of the Association of Indonesian Publishers' (IKAPI) of Yogyakarta Dhian blamed the practices partly on weak law enforcement, saying that book piracy cases in the province had never been handled thoroughly. Filing legal suits were likely to cost publishers a huge sum of money. "What we can do is just expect the authorities to pay more attention to book piracy cases," Apri said. Book piracy is mostly done by copying the original books or reprinting

the books without the publishers' permission. The copied version or the illegally printed ones are made in such a way that they look original and sell for much less. "Customers sometimes can even make an order for copied version of the original books that they can not find in the seller's shelf," said Apri, who is also the marketing manager of Jalasutra publisher.

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2010/02/25/bookpiracy-rampant-yogyakarta-publishers-lose-rp10b.html Examining Jalasutras list on their website I discovered titles in the cultural studies/critical theory/feminism fields by such luminaries as Umberto Eco, Pierre Bourdieu, Louis Althusser and Terry Eagleton. There were also over a dozen books by lesser known British and American academics such as Judith Williamson, John Fiske and Francis Mulhern. I decided to track down the latters

emails and contact them. Most were ignorant of the fact that their books had been pirated. In a few cases their publishers were aware of the problem. Only one Western author that I contacted had been paid anything. (He was the author of a book about a famous pop music group.) It seemed clear, therefore, that Jalasutra was systematically ripping off Western authors and had been doing so for years. One problem for the West is the piecemeal response of authors and publishers. Also there seems to be a defeatist attitude - what can we do? - but if they acted in concert a class action could occur and at least the pirate company could be shut down. I decided to write letters of protest to the Jakarta Post and to authorities in Indonesia because news reports indicated that the Indonesian Government was worried about piracy and wanted to stop it. I forwarded my protest letter to Jalasutra. One immediate effect was that my book

and Mulherns book vanished from the Jalasutra website. An email to the chairwoman of Indonesian Reproduction Rights Foundation was forwarded by her to Wandi S. Brata, the Executive Director of Gramedia Pustaka Utama, a general book publisher which is doing its best to take legal action against those who commit piracy and plagiarism. He introduced me to an Indonesian lawyer who then agreed to investigate Jalasutra. Shortly afterwards I received an effusive email from Andri Martias, Director of Jalasutra, admitting guilt, praising my book as a quality textbook, apologising and pleading the poverty of the Indonesian people as an excuse for their piracy. (Mulhern received a similar email after he complained.) If I had been contacted for permission in the first place I might well have given it without asking for payment given the facts that the stated print run was small and the price set low

but the fact that they are pirating so many other titles seems to indicate a criminal gang rather than a group of poor idealists. As a consequence of my making a fuss, the Jalasutra website was removed from the Internet and the publisher agreed to pay my British publisher a translation fee. They also sent me a copy of the pirated book. Victory!

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