A Closer Look at Copyright Infringement Lawsuits
My final project is posted here on Podbean, the Zombie-5 page. I discuss copyright laws, lawsuits, and their affect on culture. The pod cast follows my original outline.
The format for my video has changed slightly:
Part 1: ~4 min
Part 2: ~2:10 min
Part 3: ~4:50 min
Part 4: ~2:10 min
Part 5: ~1:10 min
Total time: 14:18.
Enjoy
-Andrew Hogan
Final Podcast
I chat about the current state of intellectual property laws and Creative Commons and interview a student/musician.
http://umwcampustalk.podbean.com/2009/12/07/final-podcast/
Karla’s Final
I talk about the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, innocent infringement victims, and more!
Final Podcast: A Sum Up
Check out my final podcast, a sum up of my favorite blogs I’ve done and how they’ve remixed our generation. From Girl Talk, to Blogging to Video Chatting, check it out!
Final Podcast: The Long Tail Discussion by S. Petrov
My Podcast (The Long Tail Discussion) is posted in PodBean under the Zombie 5 group name. Here is the upload link.
In my podcast, I provide an in-depth interpretation and additional examples to prove the existence of the long tail that Chris Anderson has described in his “The Long Tail” article. Additionally, I incorporated several speech excerpts by Chris Anderson, as well.
Further, I discuss the idea that products residing on the long tail are deemed to become more profitable than the products found on limited shelves of common retailers. Thus, according to Chris Anderson, the more profitable and better products such as books, music, and videos are often located on “the long tail” or on the opposite side of the megahits.
I further expand upon this ironic reality and accumulate more examples that prove that products on “the shallow end of the bitstream” are predicted to reshape the foundation for the entertainment industry as online services expand their product availability, create unlimited “shelf space,” and offer more consumer choice by masking the limited choices the mega-hit-carrying retailers offer.
Enjoy.
- S. Petrov
Shhhh!
On the topic of online anonymity, I welcome you to the world of a positive impact that is may have. The website post secret, where secret keepers can send their homemade mail postcards containing simple words that they wish to remain anonymous.
People who send their secrets in relieve a stress, find a way of cope and even just release a smile as they share something about themselves with either just the mail carrier, the creator Frank Warren, or possibly all the viewers of the website.
The creation of postsecret began on January 1 in 2005. Frank Warren developed this project with “No restrictions are made on the content of the secret; only that it must be completely truthful and must never have been spoken before. Entries range from admissions of sexual misconduct and criminal activity to confessions of secret desires, embarrassing habits, hopes and dreams.”
Trouble came for Frank when he turned his original post secret website into a website that could contain comments on secrets, merely a blog. The secrets were then seen as not-so-secret anymore, as judging and insight were placed upon peoples thoughts and wishes. To solve this problem, a community was created. “In October 2007, the PostSecret Community was launched (www.postsecretcommunity.com). Since its inception, more than 39,000 people have registered for the online discussion forum. Questions have been raised about how the forum affects the anonymity of the PostSecret project, but for those involved on the Community board, there seems to be a positive response of people who haven’t sent in a postcard or haven’t seen their secret on the site sharing their secrets with other PostSecret fans.”
Books have become published, hundreds of websites have been reproduced, and Warren travels around the world to many colleges and museums to give seminars on lives full of secrets and anonymity.
Sundays are the days that the new secrets are published online. I enjoy reading them, and have found that some of us all have secrets in common. This is such an interesting site to become attached to.
The Morals of the Entertainment Industry
As this is the last blog post of the semester, I thought it necessary to branch away from the normal topics of lawsuits and reviews of new technology and focus on something that I feel we have been overlooking so far. Although we have repeatedly discussed the ludicrous payments that prosecuted individuals must pay for stolen songs, there has never been a deep discussion on the morals that come into play during these scenarios. Morals, by definition, are the principles of distinguishing right and wrong behavior. This raises the question, what constitutes right and wrong behavior, particularly on the subject at hand, copyright lawsuits?
I have a deep, dark secret to admit: I DO believe that individuals who download pirated music should face consequences. In order to save myself from an inevitable onslaught by my peers in this blog’s comments, I would like to justify my statement. Artists are owed royalties for their creations, and using content for free is stealing. However, notice that I said “artists” not record companies. As Brett Gaylor mentioned in RiP: A Remix Manifesto, none of the money generated from lawsuits went to the artist that originally created the work that was pirated. All it did was increase the record companies profits. When I mentioned earlier that people should be punished for stealing music, movies, or whatever, I was inferring to monetary fines. However, there is a vast difference between what I believe the fine should be, a moral act, and what the record companies charge, which I believe is immoral, if not downright evil. For example: say I have roughly 2,000 illegally downloaded songs on my computer. If I were to purchase them legally, it would be logical for me to shop online at the iTunes store, where songs cost roughly one dollar. Thus, the revenue lost would be $2,000. In court however, I would be sued for thousands of dollars per song, sending the total in to the millions; a debt that would financially cripple me for life.
The entertainment industry is, essentially, one giant paradox. In an ideal world, there would be no record labels, and artist would distribute their works themselves. Unfortunately, not everyone can follow the Immortal Technique method. Labels are necessary for distribution, but that does not give them the right to do whatever they want. I understand that they want to make money, but the way they extort people in unacceptable. Their massive fines are a crime that is much greater than those committed by the people they are prosecuting. Earlier I asked, “What constitutes right and wrong behavior?” I believe that that point is when it stops being about business, and becomes greed.
