Before this week's readings my stance on intellectual property was that even though paying royalties feels like an unwarranted hassle sometimes, producers of the property should receive recognition and payment for copies of their work. Those lines for me, however, are usually blurred. There are situation where I know it is a clear violation of copyright. And there are times where it’s blurry. But in any case, when someone’s intellectual property is being copied, it should given royalties.
Let’s use some examples. Person 1 has burned their favorite cd for christmas stocking stuffers. They bought cd, bought the blank cds, and used a legal cd burner to make copies. They then distributed the cds to a small limited amount of people and made no money from it. They wanted to share their favorite music. Now people who haven’t paid for those songs have those songs and can enjoy them. Person 2 has a ton of gigs of songs and then distributes those gigs to their friends who transfer those songs to other friends,etc. Person 2 wanted to share music and let’s face it, when people do mass p2p sharing its to save money. Now people who haven’t paid for those songs have those songs and can enjoy them. Both of these people were wrong and I believe both can be prosecuted. Both of these people should have paid royalties for their distribution.
After reading Lessig’s Free Culture (ch. 10), I feel like Person 1 should not have to worry about being prosecuted or paying royalties. Ok, so both people under my argument should be safe, I just feel more inclined to argue for Person 1. Copyright protection in its original purpse did not stifle noncommercial publishing or transformation. It has changed over time to accommodate the changes in technology, but I don’t think it’s maintained a fair balance between producer rights and consumer rights. I honestly don’t think there’s anything wrong with noncommercial publishing or transformation. If you’re not making any money from it, where’s the harm? And if you are making money from it, then you should pay royalties. For example, I watch tv shows on YouTube all the time. I’m rarely availabe to watch the shows at the time they air and I hate watching commercials. Some of these shows are from Viacom. If YouTube is making money off those videos, then they should pay royalties to Viacom. (If that royalty fee trickles down to me I'll probably stop watching, I only watch because it's free)
And what’s the deal with targeting copyright circumvention technologies? I understand the repurcussions of putting out material that has the possibility to lead to copyright infringement, but to prosecute the possibility and not the action? I know that I’m on the consumer end of this and not the producer end, but that really doesn’t make sense to me. I think I’m going to sue the guy driving next to me on the highway that’s going 70 mph because one day he might just hit someone. *shaking my head and throwing my arms up with a perplexed look of confusion on my face* The emergence of techonology, especially Internet techonology has caused copyrighters to freak out. Isn’t techonology supposed to enable people and not hinder them? I mean, in the case of circumventing techonology, doesn’t that just mean the producers now have to make a better product? When you enable technology doesn’t that drive innovation so that better techonologies develop? Isn’t that better for people as a whole?
Whenever new technology emerges, people look at them with glossy eyed feelings thinking ”this is the answer we’ve been looking for” (think CMGT 530 telegraph and initial internet feelings). The Internet, for example, was supposed to be this free utopian world, without regulation from the “real world”. But as in Grimmelmann’s Virtual Borders, web designers are now having conflicting feelings about real world regulation in the online world. The original feeling was that there should be none. But now, as technology and online content and capabilites are changing, some real world regulation isn’t looking so bad. But real world regulation I think is taking it’s time in developing. Which is a good thing, because if it develops too fast, or if opposing sides are not represented well enough, it may turn into another copyright situation. Yes, I think intellectual property is very important but I think the regulation of it needs to be a compromise and not so one-sided. And what I gathered from both these readings is that there needs to be a compromise, a balance, a working relationship between the two factions and arguments.
And the Recap: Before: copyright is good. After: If you’re not making any money, where’s the harm? If you are, pay royalties. Stifling circumvention technologies stifles innovation. Copyright needs more balance to accommodate both consumers and producers.
1 comment:
hear, hear!!
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