Rampant Illegality

I bought books for my class. Some of you may wonder why I stopped to do air quotes while I typed the word books, and the reason is simple. These books (more air quotes) are in fact admittedly illegal copies of actual textbooks from America. The copying is a service provided here at the university, and we go and buy these books (you know the drill) from a book store (aka. copy room). They're bound and stuff, but none of them are hard back, none of them are original publications, none of them are legal, and it's all school sponsored. Interesting.

If anyone knows anything about international copyright law, my curiosity has been piqued. If a book is published in America and copied in Korea, whose copyright laws apply? America's or Korea's? If it's the former, who the hell is enforcing it? If it's the latter, what stops people from just setting up copy machines in a huge line in Mozambique (or somewhere with comparably non-existent copyright laws) and making millions of illegal copies and distributing them for cheap?

I've also recently learned that most of what happens on the road is in fact illegal. There's abundant illegal parking, illegal turns, driving on the wrong side of the road, running stop lights, insane lane changes, and stopping in on coming traffic. One reason some of it can happen is because towing is government operated, and police don't get commission from tickets. Therefore, there's little motivation for law enforcing, and the community has adapted to this.

In addition, all those vendors on the streets are in fact unlicensed and (you guessed it) illegal. Occasionally the cops will tell them that they have to move or their cart will be towed, but they never follow through with it. Why? When I asked a government teacher, I was told that "the cops realize that those shops are the only livelihood of those people, so to force them to close would starve and kill them." In effect it's making the laws flexible, and who can believe in a flexible law enforcement system? On the other hand, wow! Cops with compassion and judgment! What a breath of smoggy Seoul air.