[webmaven]

> Obviously this wasn’t Kinko’s official stance. Just one obstinate, over zealous employee.

You might think that's obvious, but you'd be wrong. Software publishers were cracking down on duplicating manuals as a means of trying to curb software piracy.

I can practically guarantee that the "obstinate employee" was given clear direction by their manager on the subject.

Though you do have to keep in mind that depending on when exactly this happened, Kinko's might still have been a collection of hundreds of largely autonomous regional partnerships, each of which could set their own policy.

[jasomill]

I once had a Kinko's employee, in consultation with the manager on duty, refuse to slice the binding off a textbook because "copyright".

They were, however, willing to three-hole punch the resulting pages if I removed the binding myself.

Later that day at another, nearby Kinko's, an employee, who happened to be the manager on duty, cut and punched the pages with no questions asked other than "have you seen our selection of binders and report covers?"

This was around 2008, so many years after the corporate consolidation, subsequent acquisition, and rebranding as FedEx Kinko's.