How a Teacher Made $1 Million Selling Lesson Plans
businessweek.com
businessweek.com
I am not sure what you mean about captive audience. Are you saying they should just build their own marketplace?
TPT is able to sell lesson plans at extremely low prices, in large part, because they're not burdened with the task of identifying and paying rights holders.
I'm close friends with an independent book packager. Literally one woman who works from home, packaging book ideas. Book packaging means taking a manuscript from an author, building a book design, and sourcing/creating the associated media (images and illustrations) that make up the book. The only staff she employs (part-time) is dedicated to identifying and obtaining images for her books.
It's a surprisingly difficult task. You can't just perform a Google Image search for a topic, because the site you land on is rarely the rights holder of the image. You end up chasing a rabbit down the hole. She ends up using sites like Getty. While their pricing might seem ridiculous, it's a lot less expensive than dumping hours in to tracking down and negotiating with the person whose photo you found in a Google Image search.
It's easy to see TPT as this awesome, disruptive, middle-man slaying startup, but it's also easy to see how they're not playing by the same set of rules as everyone else. Maybe the rules are wrong. I'm open to hearing that argument. However, I am certain of one thing: it is not OK to hold people like my book packager friend to one standard while TPT is held to another.
The teaching exception means that a teacher in a classroom can show a copyrighted piece as part of her lesson plan. It does not mean that you can "package" a lesson plan that includes the same materials, then sell them to other teachers.
If it were possible to use the teaching exception in this way, all educational book publishers could use any image they want without paying for it. I've worked with a children's educational book publisher for the last 10 years. They have to buy all copyrighted materials used in their books.
A caveat. I've never seen a TPT lesson plan, so maybe I'm unclear on how they "package". Specifically, I use the term package to mean that the actual copyrighted materials are included with the file you receive. TPT could get around the copyright issue by inserting reference placeholders, then instruct the purchaser to acquire the images on their own, but that's a significant amount of work. I would be surprised if that's how they were packaged.
> If it were possible to use the teaching exception in this way, all educational book publishers could use any image they want without paying for it.
Your logic is flawed here. TPT is selling lesson plans and live teaching materials, not books. (Or at least they could reasonably make this argument)
Also, the packages typically include references. Teachers using these materials should be aware that they are potentially infringing on copyright, thus could be sued.
Like I said, TPT could be saved via DMCA, and the teachers are the ones that could be sued. The teachers would then be protected by the teaching exception. My point was that the lawsuit is not an obvious winner.
I think the reverse is true here. An individual plan isn't that different from a compilation of plans. The rules of copyright still apply and the teaching exception does not apply as distribution (for sale no less, though there are free plans on TPT) is not exempted.
Including a reference to the source doesn't remove the liability of distributing/selling a copyrighted work which the distributor doesn't have a license for.
> Like I said, TPT could be saved via DMCA, and the teachers are the ones that could be sued. The teachers would then be protected by the teaching exception. My point was that the lawsuit is not an obvious winner.
I stated this elsewhere but the teaching exception doesn't cover copying or distributing a work to other teachers or for sale. It provides an exception for the purposes of teaching face to face or in the case of an online course, electronically to a registered student.
It might be, but we're talking law, not logic. Copyright law has no obligation to logic.
> TPT is selling lesson plans and live teaching materials, not books. (Or at least they could reasonably make this argument)
They can call them moon modules, and it wouldn't matter. Copyright law has no concept of "book" or "lesson plan". Copyright protects the work. It doesn't matter if you're redistributing prints of a photo, or selling a JPG over the internet. Copying and redistributing a copyrighted work (in any form) is the violation.
> Also, the packages typically include references.
As do many books, but it doesn't exempt them from copyright obligations.
> Teachers using these materials should be aware that they are potentially infringing on copyright, thus could be sued.
This is where you have it backwards. The teachers who use the materials (probably) aren't breaking any laws by using the materials. They're covered by the teaching exemption. TPT, however, has copied and distributed the works in exchange for money. That is a pretty clear violation of copyright expectation.
> Like I said, TPT could be saved via DMCA, and the teachers are the ones that could be sued. The teachers would then be protected by the teaching exception. My point was that the lawsuit is not an obvious winner.
TPT, being in the position of a facilitator, might be safe, but there are two types of teachers in this equation. There are teachers using the lesson plans, and teachers selling the lesson plans. Those selling the lesson plans are at risk, IMO.
Simply being in the teaching profession doesn't automatically exempt you from copyright law. Laws are largely concerned with acts and context. Copying and distribution are both acts. If the context is that of teaching (as in the act of teaching, not the employment), then there is an exemption. Specifically, a teacher may copy and distribute (by incorporating it and showing it to students) a copyrighted work without penalty, provided the teacher is in the act of teaching.
I agree that the lawsuit is not a slam dunk -- very few lawsuits are -- but I don't think this for the same reasons as you.
I fully agree that there are teachers on this site ripping off copyrighted materials and making a profit from doing so. They can and should be sued, and they will likely have no protection from their school districts nor unions.
I am tempted to find out who this person making $1M and find the dinosaur drawings in the dinosaur lesson plan, and then find who paid the illustrator to draw these things and let them know they are someone is making $1M on their back.
You have successfully reversed my opinion on this company 180 degrees.
It's also possible that particular plan author is doing everything by the book. There are plans that I've seen that are using properly licensed materials or that use original artwork. My wife is putting together some plans that contain her original materials and illustrations created specifically for the plan by another teacher as an example.
The reason for my comment at the top of this thread is largely due to the number of plans that appear to be not compliant with copyright law and continuing press about how much money some (very few) individuals have made on the site. I have no opinion on any suits resulting from use of the site being winnable for either side.
I've only seen a fairly small number of plans (less than fifty) but it's hit or miss on how sources are credited or listed at all. Font names are common, license and purchase information is almost never included. Image sources are hit and miss though there's a lot of use of scrappindoodles.com and they explicitly list how their resources can be used, how they have to be credited, and name TPT explicitly in their ToS which I found interesting. Other sites have pretty typical license terms with lots of personal, non commercial use restrictions.
Here's the terms for scrappindoodles.com which specifically calls out TPT use as acceptable for license holders. http://www.scrappindoodles.com/index.php?main_page=condition...
The linked article points out that Scholastic bought the site from it's creator and then sold it back when it didn't become an overnight viral success.
"Kindergarten Teacher Earns $700,000 by Selling Lesson Plans Online"
May 2012
http://www.macon.com/2012/06/12/2056692/north-carolina-compa...
It seems a natural progression from generating Bingo Cards, to branching out to lesson plans to facilitating the sale of user-generated lesson plans.
Standardizing the lesson plan eliminates (or greatly reduces) the ability for the teacher to be creative in their classroom and teaching. On top of that, a standardized lesson plan would also be hard to work around in case there were areas that took the students longer than expected.