Wikipedia talk:Education program archive/University of California, Berkeley/Politics of Digital Piracy (Spring 2013)/Week 12 assignment

Reading Responses
Group B, please post below a brief synopsis on:

What do you believe are the most common views of content theft and digital piracy from the general public? Are there certain demographics that may view this topic differently? Do you remember the first time you heard the term/concept of digital piracy, and what was the concept? How have your ideas of what constitutes concept theft changed over time?

I believe that the common view of content theft and digital piracy, in contemporary society, is that it is not really a crime. I think over the years people have become so oblivious to the fact that it is illegal due to the sheer volume of illegal downloading that occurs every day. Sites like the Pirates Bay have only exacerbated this issue but they still serve a valuable purpose of providing a platform for aspiring musicians to launch their careers. In terms of whether or not certain demographics are more likely to have different views on piracy, there is no doubt. I believe that in affluent demographics it is viewed as just another thing to do. I do not think people even see it as a crime as everyone seems to own an Iphone or other device and subsequently this has led to people advertising these piracy sources to their friends and family. The first time I heard about it, in fact, was in my freshman year of high school. I remember it was framed as nothing illegal and something that "you will never got caught doing". At the time I did not really think about it but over the last few years my viewpoint on piracy has changed drastically. I have morphed from believing that it was nothing to understanding that it is a crime, but one with some beneficial aspects that can stimulate the new music market.

-Dkingg (for some reason I keep putting my posts in talk but they do not light my name up blue)

I think depending on what one does for a living determines their view on piracy. If you work somewhere where you are putting your time and hard work into something that will be effectively given away (ie a website with ads), your view on piracy might be "why not?". There is a more subtle relationship between the work you do and how you make your money. You may work on a sweet website, and making all of it free, and get paid for it through ads. So you wouldn't see stealing content as wrong, because the content you produce you give away for free. However, the people who work on other forms of content production, where the relationship between what they work on and money made is a little bit clearer, are more worried about piracy. If you are directly charging people for the work you do (for example making music, or paid-only games), piracy becomes a clearer wrong because piracy is now viewed as a direct subtraction from the money you are making. Cp123127 (talk) 22:03, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

The most common views of content theft and digital piracy in the general public is music. Most of us think that music is the number one thing that is being digitally pirated ever since the birth of Napster and Limewire. I believe that, honestly, most people could care less if music is being pirated. However, the main group that would be upset is the folks that are suppose to be making money on the music that they produced. Although, I don't remember the first time that I heard the term I am quite certain that whatever and whenever it was, was during Napster. My views over time have not really changed. I believe music is a commodity and like any commodity people will do anything to get it if they want it regardless of established or illegal means. ORambo (talk) 21:39, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I think it's tricky - I feel that much of the public feels that downloading music and movies without paying is "wrong" - but will proceed to do it anyway. That is, they feel it's socially not approved of but don't actually have many deep-seated moral compunctions about it. In particular, though, one demographic that I'm involved with has interesting politics about copyright: the anime and manga fandom. One of the reasons is that copyright violation - via the importation of copies of videos or comics which are then translated and distributed among fans - was initially the only way to access these foreign works, as most american audiences didn't speak enough japanese to understand the original version, likely couldn't get ahold of them due to the difficulties of importing, and there were no official outlets interested in providing a legal alternative. Basically, these fandom communities would not exist without copyright violations. And even now, though there is an increase in legal distributors, "illegal" fan translations remain dominant - they often cater more to core fans, bring over a much wider variety and number of works, and otherwise outcompete many legal distributors (although they are slowly catching up). Because of the odd mix of a desire for legal options but also still depending on illegal ones, there's some interesting "rules" around what is considered morally acceptable. For example: Another interesting area is in transformative works, especially fanart - while technically the use of copyrighted characters is a violation, there is nonetheless a thriving industry for such fanworks at conventions and online, with a great deal of money changing hands. Interestingly, anime and manga fandom (especially in Japan, with japanese fanworks) is much more permissive of such derivative works - whereas, say, Disney is quick to strike down any such use of it's own works. Adrianvallence (talk) 21:31, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
 * scanlating (scanning and translating) works that have not been licensed by a US distributor is considered totally acceptable and commonplace
 * scanlating recent chapters of licensed manga (since official versions are often months behind) is considered more morally dubious but still very standard
 * scanlating licensed works is somewhat frowned upon; many groups will stop all distribution when a work is licensed
 * copying legal official english versions and posting them online is considered extremely crass (though it happens anyway)
 * asking for pay or profit for any translated pirated works is considered completely unacceptable

I think that generally the public feels that content theft and digital piracy is wrong, but they are certainly even gradations within this view. Is is possible to be critical of people who commit theft while also being critical of the legal regime that keeps intellectual property under lock and key with draconian punishments for people who violate the law. One demographic example is the people in Brazil who listen to and produce technobrega. While consumers of this genre may feel that to some level IP theft is morally wrong, they are more likely than most to be for greater liberalization. When I first heard about IP theft I originally took a much more aggressive stance than I do now. Much of this change comes from my conception of how much of IP theft is different from stealing tangible goods, in that if a song is pirated it is a duplication of the original rather than the original copy, which is significantly different than say stealing food from a store. Radeonhead (talk) 17:31, 16 April 2013 (UTC)Benjamin Porter

The American general public is most likely to have a neutral to negative view on digital piracy. However, public opinion on this issue varies greatly among nations and cultures. For instance, the general public in China or Vietnam, or any other developing country, does have a much more positive perception for digital piracy because it provides affordable digital products and entertainments. Digital piracy is most used by young demographics who do have certain degree of technological affluence. Because of their frequent usage of digital piracy and as the main benefactors, the young demographics are likely to have a much more positive view on digital piracy comparing to the general public. I first knew about digital piracy back in Vietnam when I was in middle school. When I enjoyed the benefits of affordable software in Vietnam, I did not really think about digital piracy. However, as I began to realize where I got my software, I started to appreciate digital piracy as an affordable mean for citizens in developing nations to quickly and cheaply adapt to the current productive and entertaining world standard. Most people in my country think of digital piracy as a form of “Robin Hood” action that helps to equally redistribute wealth to the general population. However, as some are rapidly gaining higher disposable incomes, more voices are arising, advocating and supporting for anti-piracy in the music industry. I now view content theft as an inevitable force in the market as a result of technology advances and mispricing. It can never be avoided under the current distributive system that is heavily and fundamentally burdened by mispricing due to excessive monopoly in the market. New distributive methods should be developed to resolve the mispricing issue in the current one. The music industry with ways of distributing music like Spotify is the current pioneer in creating a more just and efficient entertainment distributive system for both creators and users. Pphan1991 (talk) 21:15, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

In my opinion, although the general public considers content theft and digital piracy somewhat morally wrong, however most of the material being extremely overpriced leaves no other option then trying to obtain it “illegally”. While considering the demographics in light of the financial aspect it is easy to see the pattern that the worst the financial conditions of the region are the more public would take the “illegal” approach of obtaining the material needed. While I realize that digital piracy is illegal and hence some punishment should be carried out against the ones who do pirating, however the history of past 15-20 years shows that there is no adequate solution for this problem. My view on this problem is that there should be a compromise between the owners of the content and the users. Examples like Spotify proved that it is a possibility. Tigstep (talk) 22:24, 16 April 2013 (UTC)Tigstep

I believe that the most common views of content theft and digital piracy that the general public constantly abuses is music. Music is one of the most universal things that is incorporated into every part of the world somehow. In a way you could say that every human being on the planet listens to some kind of music which makes it a very distributive content. I feel that in a way some demographics might look at it this being the socio-lower economic people in their perspective could say that it isn't stealing an those artists are making tons and tons of money while the artist or people with a higher economic status could say directly the opposite. The first time that I heard the concept was when i actually came to college and they introduced us freshmen to the doors and had a seminar about bandwidth and other internet rules and restrictions. The main concept was thought to be derived was that if you downloaded enough illegal music that you would eventually be caught and fined a hefty sum. My idea has changed someone of what constitutes of theft but I still believe that some content should be open and readily for the public Chadyy (talk) 22:48, 16 April 2013 (UTC)Chadyy

Curent Events
Group A, please post current events below.

Verizon Asked to Share “Six Strikes” Alerts for BitTorrent Lawsuit MarkDavidoff UCB (talk) 09:46, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/14/opinion/yu-stealing-books-for-the-poor.html?_r=0 (Editingcontent2 (talk) 05:00, 16 April 2013 (UTC)).

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/04/feds-may-use-subpoena-powers-to-study-patent-trolls/ Jimmyslope (talk) 17:01, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Supreme Court Debates Human-DNA Patenting Gloudas (talk) 18:03, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Spotify arrives in Singapore, takes aim at music piracy Kaylaholderbein (talk) 19:48, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-founder-charged-with-hacking-companies-and-a-bank-130416/Pringles012 (talk) 19:50, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

"BitTorrent Domain Crackdown in Italy" IanElli (talk) 23:01, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I stopped PiratingBearcat223 (talk) 00:27, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Other Updates

 * You should have received feedback on your wikipedia project. So log on to your Wikipedia account and check those out, and proceed with the next steps.  Your final contributions will be due on April 30, and we will do class presentations that day as well.


 * I'm going to have you guys fill out course evaluations this week for my own purposes, so please start to think about what kind of things you like, and would want to see more of for future semesters. Also, what topics and content you think are important to the class.