English centre found pirating teaching programmes

The chairman of Langmaster English Centre has issued public apology after it was discovered that the centre had been reproducing teaching programmes and methods from various sources without credit.

Nguyen Tien Dung, chairman of Langmaster English Centre, issued public apology on May 10 after it was discovered that the centre had been reproducing teaching programmes and methods from various sources without credit.

  

Nguyen Tien Dung, chairman of Langmaster English Centre, issued public apology

The centre was found to have been using teaching programmes and methods on the BBC and from a university in Japan in their free videos. The authors and sources aren't asked for permission or given credit.

Langmaster also lied about their co-operation with AJ Hoge, the author of the Effortless English Course. According to Hoge, many centres in Vietnam have stolen his teaching method but Langmaster is the most disappointing case since he and Langmaster have held many conferences together. Not only Langmaster lied about the co-operation, it also claimed that it held exclusive rights over the effortless English teaching method in Vietnam.

Nguyen Tien Dung, the founder and chairman of Langmaster, held a live stream on the Facebook fan page of the centre to apologise about the violations. They had taken down the reported violating video clips and were reviewing other clips on YouTube.

Dung said the centre's reputation had been severely damaged. He apologised to the partners and students of the centre while saying that he would take all of the responsibility for releasing copyright violated contents to the public. He said they had learned from this case to be better and promised that such violation will not be repeated and they will follow the laws on copyrights in the future.

"We hope we'll be given a chance to right this wrong and be able to continue contributing to the community," he said. "As the head of the centre, I apologise again and will take responsibility."