Book Piracy in Indonesia

Book piracy is a difficult problem to control in Indonesia. Many people are not responsible for selling and buying pirated books on the market. In Indonesia, the spread of pirated books is a common thing that we usually encounter everywhere. This activity is legally illegal, however, book piracy is unavoidable.

For people who understand the world of literature and the world of books, piracy like this is very detrimental to both writers and publishers. We often encounter various forms of book piracy, for example, such as:

1.       Reproduce and resell books that use newsprint or poorly textured paper.

It is undeniable that the development of information technology in the world of books is now experiencing a problem that can be said to be serious, the large number of people involved in book piracy has caused many disadvantages, one of the efforts to pirate books is to make and copybooks by the original author in the same form. and using a different material, such as recycling paper that is no longer used resulting in poorly textured paper shapes. These elements reprint the original author's books using this material so that a lot of profit can be obtained from it because the production costs are also small. Then the elements are not responsible for selling on the marketplace in online media.

2.       Quoting, capturing / screenshots, downloading, and selling the eboo6 version illegally.

This happens a lot among social media, nowadays a lot of books are circulating in the form of electronic books or e-books that are scattered. Maybe the books in e-books, even some writers make and buy and sell at a slightly cheap price. But again it cannot be denied, that book piracy in the form of online books like this can be found. Especially during a pandemic like this, there had been the distribution of books in the form of e-books for free by irresponsible individuals who were clearly detrimental to the authors and publishers of the books again.

3.       Photocopying books and resale, be it a few pages or a full book.

In the learning process, usually, the teachers give orders to students to photocopy parts of the novel as learning material on the grounds that it saves costs in the learning process which does not require students to buy the original book. This is of course very detrimental for writers as well as book publishers, where this should not happen, especially as educators should understand more about it.

Several large publishers also spoke up about the problem of book piracy, Public Relations of the Indonesian Publisher Association (IKAPI) Arys Hilman said that at present there are still many marketplaces or places to sell online that ignore pirated books. He said, there are still many sellers who openly sell pirated books.

In fact, there are lots of pirated books scattered in the marketplace, no longer hundreds or even thousands of books and hundreds of book titles that are scattered and sold at low prices. What is very unfortunate is that the market places involved do not investigate and resolve problems like this. Obviously, things like this really bother book publishers.

The marketing distribution of pirated books is not only done in online stores, but in the market, and overhangs that usually sell pirated books are sold. This kind of thing people do not take seriously and even people just take this matter as normal, society whatever form the book is, the important thing is the type of scientific book, so it should be disseminated.

However, this is a serious matter and this assumption is actually wrong. Because, once someone allows piracy, what happens is a slow killing of the creative world. The government must pay more attention to law enforcement, and it is hoped that it will be able to enforce firm law for the perpetrators of this piracy. Don't let the government just focus on increasing the marketplace to become a unicorn company, while people who work in the creative industry also have to stay alive.

The Indonesian Publisher Association (Ikapi) as the organization that houses publishers in Indonesia has made various efforts to tackle book piracy since 2007. Starting from direct raids by the Book Piracy Troubleshooting Team (PMPB), to the Director-General of IPR and the Indonesian E-commerce Association, campaigning through a car-free day event at the HI Roundabout and Ikapi social media, and collaborating with PRCI to form a Forum for Copyright Care in the field of literacy.

These various efforts seem to be unable to stop the piracy of books which is increasingly prevalent. Therefore, the Director-General of IPR and the IPR Consultants Association through the discussion said that they would be happy to help publishers who experienced piracy. Moreover, the system used to continue cases of book piracy into the realm of law is through a complaint offense, which publishers must first report to the Director-General of IPR.

Rosidayati as the General Chairperson of Ikapi also hopes that there will be significant follow-up from various parties related to this book piracy case. New policies to eradicate piracy online and offline, such as prohibiting the sale of pirated books in the marketplace and the use of pirated books on campus, must be implemented immediately.

With this discussion, it is hoped that the book piracy case will end soon and can be thoroughly investigated with the cooperation of all related parties so that publishers and writers can continue to work and advance Indonesian literacy.

Reference :

Nuratikah, Inas. 2019. IKAPI : Pembajakan Buku Sudah Jadi Industri di Indonesia. https://www.ikapi.org/2019/12/16/dkt-kemdikbud-upaya-hentikan-pembajakan-buku-offline-dan-online-di-indonesia/. Accessed on March 02, 2021.

Sayyid, Albin Agnar. 2020. Maraknya Buku Bajakan, Apa yang Harus Dilakukan?. https://ebooks.gramedia.com/blog/maraknya-buku-bajakan-apa-yang-harus-dilakukan/#gref. Accessed on March 03, 2021.

Sekretariat. 2019. DKT Kemdikbud : Upaya Hentikan Pembajakan Buku Offline dan Online di Indonesia. https://www.ikapi.org/2019/12/16/dkt-kemdikbud-upaya-hentikan-pembajakan-buku-offline-dan-online-di-indonesia/. Accessed on March 03, 2021.