Lessig starts off with piracy. He talks about file sharing
over the internet of copyrighted and uncopyrighted information. The first thing
I thought about was google. I know that I use images from Google for my Facebook
cover photo, class assignments, and just for fun. I’m sure most of the photos
are copyrighted, but how am I supposed to know? Google has all of these images
available for everyone to look at and to maybe even use. Some images are
uploaded by personal users others are uploaded by professional users; professional
in the sense that they are a company or organization. The first thing that
comes to mind when I hear the word piracy is the video that used to be at the
beginning of most DVDs:
On page 32 Lessig says, “Creative work has value; whenever
I use, or take, or build upon the creative work of others, I am taking from them something of value. Whenever I take something of value from someone else, I should have their permission. The taking of something of value from someone else without permission is wrong. It is a form of piracy.”
I use, or take, or build upon the creative work of others, I am taking from them something of value. Whenever I take something of value from someone else, I should have their permission. The taking of something of value from someone else without permission is wrong. It is a form of piracy.”
This reminds me of a class discussion we have about creative
commons. Every idea we have is inspired by someone else. It’s inspired by
something we’ve seen or heard that has been created by someone else ranging
from a video, an image, a building, a website, etc. No one has original ideas.
All of our ideas are influenced and according to the above definition of piracy
we must ask permission from everyone whose work has inspired us, but that’s not
the way it works. We look at websites, images, and videos to get an idea of
what we would like to create for most of our DTC classes. We often even take
images we have found and add a filter or edit the image in Photoshop so that it
is no longer technically copyrighted because we altered the image. So, are we
committing piracy?
I am also very concerned about this. With so much free access to any kind of information or items that should be protected by copyright law open and available to the public and with downloading sights and torrents so available what is available to download and what isn’t is blurred together so much that black and white is now a very faded grey. This is something that is growing and growing in concern, et has yet to be discussed about in higher judicial level or even thought about revising the law for the technology, mediums, and the available sources of information.
ReplyDeleteI believe there are a couple solutions to this problem that needs to be discussed by everyone in the world. These are a couple of my ideas. Copyright law needs to be rewritten, redesigned, and reeducate the world. First, the world should all convening and discuss what should be done about copyright law. Considering the United States is the only one that has personal patents, so this means that it isn’t the world that needs to adapt to the US but the exact opposite. For once I strongly disagree with what the United States ruling and that the US has to adapt to the worlds needs, on a global level. Second, I believe every high school should require a Copyright law course. I say this because the amount of information any one person in the United States school system is usually just a paragraph briefly describing what you can’t do, and when I say briefly I mean a paragraph of words that make no sense at all. Finally, I believe strongly that there should be a group of people dedicated to constantly adapting and changing the Copyright Law, or whatever it ends up being called, for the new technology that is destined to come.