The disciplinary committee of Tamkang University met on March 17 and decided to add the “infringement of intellectual property rights” to the list of offences punishable according to the student disciplinary regulations. In the future, any student found violating intellectual property rights will be given a “second-degree offence” record as a punishment.

The proposal for this new rule was based on the instruction from the Ministry of Education. Under the heading of “Infringement of Intellectual Property Rights”, the new rule is added to paragraph eight, item fourteen, of the student disciplinary regulations. The new rule, after the confirmation by the governing council meeting of TKU, will be reported to the MOE for inspection and come into effect from next semester at the earliest.

Because of the wide coverage of “infringement of intellectual property rights”, the Office of Student Affairs asks students to be aware of their own actions so as not to violate the laws unwittingly. The Guidance Section says that students tend to break the laws regarding “copyrights”, “integrated circuit layout protection”, and “compact discs regulations”. Examples of these three types of infringement are abundant: some students make photocopies of books in their entirety, some sell counterfeit CDs, some steal the IC layouts designed by other people, and some copy, forward, or appropriate materials on the internet without the authorization of the original authors.

Prof. Fu Hsi-jen, Dean of Academic Affairs, said at the meeting that the some of the expressions in the student disciplinary regulations sounded too harsh, and he moved that the wording be revised and refined. The motion was passed; an additional committee meeting will be held this semester to discuss the rewording.

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