[Exclusive] Megastudy, ‘paid collection’ of university test papers… File a claim of copyright infringement

Upload bulletin board without modification... Only paid members can download
Attorney Kim Tae-hwan, “Possibility of copyright protection… cannot be provided solely through payment”

Controversy is brewing over the university's lecture site 'UniStudy', a subsidiary of the education company Megastudy (CEO Seongseong Son), collecting university midterm and final exam questions in exchange for cash compensation.

In particular, criticism has been raised that the submitted test papers are inappropriate as they are uploaded to the bulletin board in their original text without modification and are provided only to paid members. There is also criticism that this behavior was used as a means to secure members for ‘Unistudy.’

On the 1st, Megastudy posted an event through its application 'Cube' and university lecture site 'Unistudy' announcements, offering Shinsegae gift certificates to college students if they submit mid-term and final exam papers and genealogy.

'Cube' announced that it collects the most recent five years' worth of test papers from each university's midterm and final exams in an email format. If you submit only the test questions, you will receive a 10,000 won Shinsegae gift certificate, and if you submit an explanation of the correct answers, you will receive a 15,000 won voucher.

According to the notice, the submitted test papers will not be returned and can be used as content creation materials for the subsidiary ‘UniStudy’.

'UniStudy' also stated that, limited to the most recent 5-year test papers, all who took a photo of the past exam paper and uploaded their genealogy would receive a 5,000 won gift certificate from CU Convenience Store and 20,000 won Unistudy points, and 7 people would receive a 30,000 won voucher from Shinsegae Department Store.

Article 32 of the Copyright Act allows the reproduction and distribution of published works only for the purpose of evaluating knowledge and skills, such as entrance exams or qualification tests, but does not apply for commercial purposes. Since Megastudy announced that it will use the test paper to produce educational content, it can be interpreted that it has a clear commercial purpose.

Another problem is that Megastudy uploaded the collected test papers to its bulletin board in their original text without modification. Since the test paper containing the test taker's original text is not a secondary work that has been summarized or edited, it is pointed out that it may be subject to copying and public transmission under copyright law. In particular, this material appears to be intended for commercial use as it is set to be downloadable only to paid members.

A similar case in the past is the ‘Jokbo.com’ incident, which collected and provided high school test questions without permission. Regarding this case, the Seoul High Court judge ruled that “the test questions are creative works, and unauthorized collection and commercial use is copyright infringement.”

The court ruled, "The plaintiffs, who are teachers, made a mental effort to measure the academic performance of students at their school and calculate their grades in accordance with their educational philosophy and created the test questions in this case without copying others. Since it is recognized that there is a minimum of creativity in the wording of the questions and the expression of the proposed answers in the questions presented, it is reasonable to believe that the test questions in this case are works protected by copyright law."

The legal community also pointed out that Megastudy's collection of university exam papers was inappropriate.

Kim Tae-hwan, a lawyer at Daeryun Law Firm, explained, "University test questions are likely to be protected as copyrighted works. There is creative expression in the part that makes up the question, and because the expression, not the idea itself, is protected, problems that involve the professor's expert knowledge and creative judgment can be protected by copyright."

He continued, "We cannot freely provide test questions to paid members because we did not obtain permission from the professor, who is the copyright holder, or the school, who is the transferee, but simply paid a monetary price."

A similar method can be seen in Megastudy’s ‘Unistudy’s ‘Unipass’. ‘Unipass’, a refund program for paid lectures, is a system that refunds tuition to students who achieve a certain grade standard, and requires submission of test papers as a condition for refund. This can also be interpreted as a structure to secure someone else's copyrighted work in exchange for monetary compensation.

Megastudy has taken a strong stance against illegal copying or unauthorized distribution of its textbooks. In fact, in the past, we have taken strong action, such as demanding an apology from those who illegally spread it and posting this on our website.

In this event, it is pointed out that it is inconsistent with the attitude it has shown so far in that it attempted to collect the works of university test takers and use them for its own content.

This paper contacted Megastudy, but Megastudy did not issue a statement on the related controversy.

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[Exclusive] Megastudy, 'paid collection' of university test papers... File a claim of copyright infringement (Go here)