Copyright Experience

Since my earliest experiences with the internet, I had always been aware of Copyright laws, but in the most part, chose to ignore them. When I was only 8 or 9 years old, I used to illegally download music and games from Napster. I had been told in school that downloading music on websites like napster was illegal and had always heard stories from friends who had friends who had friends who had gotten in trouble with the government and had to pay thousands of dollars in fines, but because I had never experience such punishments first hand, I completley ignored them. After Napster I moved on to Limewire and continued downloading music, videos, and games without paying. Later on after Limewire began making my computer run slower, I began file sharing off of applications like Mojo, where any users on the same network can transfer songs, videos, or pictures to one another through itunes.

In terms of the morality of what I am doing, I am deffinitley fully aware that I am stealing somebody elses property, and that it is wrong and illegal. This is especially a problem when it comes to illegally downloading movies as my family owns a chain of movie theatres and film piracy has led to major drops in the cinema market. At the same time, there is also a side of me that wants to simply state that if it is available on the internet for free, then there shouldnt be any punishment for viewing it, and that part of the responsibility and challenge of these media producers is to adopt to the online age and figure out ways to provide free media to audiences while still profiting off of advertisements, like Hulu, being able to pay off the media creators.

Copyright Experience

Copyright experience for me has been a constant battle and a very interesting experience. I grew up with a few CDs (from birthday gifts) but mainly relied on Limewire for my music needs. When I learned about torrents, that was the next great thing for me. I don't download all my music from online sources (I buy CDs from artists that I really enjoy and support), and especially now, I use Spotify for most of my music needs. However, I do remember having to struggle a bit in the past few years looking for new music blogs to replace the many outlets I use that are now shut down. Movie and Television show-wise, it is also a big toss-up. Copyright affects my experience only if I actually missed a TV show that I really want to watch right away. Since most shows are posted online by the network anyways, for me, it is pointless to download them unless I really wanted to watch that show the night after. Otherwise, I have hulu and Netflix to rely on for television shows that I don't get on broadcast TV. As for movies, I am also sort of split on the issue. On one hand, I love to own movies that I know I would watch over and over again. For movies that I am sort of interested in but aren't willing to drop $20 to buy it, I usually find it somewhere to watch once and dispose of the copy. It has been harder and harder however, to find and download movies fast and easy. New laws and crackdowns has made this a much harder task. I often just go to a nearby Redbox for movies that I want to watch once. These new copyright crackdowns and new laws have made online content experience a much harder one and a much more cautious one. It'll be interesting to see where this goes in the next few years.

Online Copyrights

My first thought is that copyrights don't really affect me online. When I was younger and had no idea what I was doing on the internet, I would download music using illegal file-sharing services. I didn't really realize I was doing anything wrong until my mom told me that people my age were getting in huge trouble with the law doing this. I stopped dead in my tracks and have been terrified of doing something illegal online ever since.

When I think about it more though, the internet is really a very unsure place. I've used images from websites on my blog or on Facebook without permission from anyone; I try to list the source, but sometimes forget or get lazy. I've also made videos with music in the background that I've posted online. I suppose that breaks a copyright law, but I've never even thought about that fact that it might be something wrong to do. It's just weird that something that I think would be so normal is actually something that you shouldn't be doing. I do run across a lot of videos on Youtube also that say they've been altered in some ways due to copyright laws.

Overall, I try to be very respectful of using someone else's property online, but there are times when it doesn't seem like you're doing anything wrong. In order for these laws to be more affective, I think they need to be more apparent. When something isn't apparent, that doesn't mean that it's ok to do or use, but I think it would stop a lot of people if it was more obvious that what you're doing is wrong.

Blog Post 5-Copyrighted Material Online

My experience with copyrighted content online is usually somewhat negative, but this is understandable. When I search for content such as videos/movies online and there is a copyright block it gets really annoying, especially if I'm just trying to find something harmless like Lady Gaga's latest music video or a TV clip of SNL. But it is somewhat understandable for blocking copyrighted content on some things because there is just so much of it and the people who created that content do not get the credit that they deserve.

Another copyright issue that I've had in the past is trying to download pictures. I am really into photography and am always looking at other peoples work. Sometimes I see a picture I really want on my desktop or to post to my Facebook, but most photography is highly copyrighted and will not let you download or do anything with it. In this sense I am very understandable of copyrighted content because a persons personal photography is something that they own but also want to share, but to download it would be like stealing it from a studio. So, in this sense I do agree with copyrighted material and its effect on internet users.