Brady Bryan
Protecting original works has always been a subject of controversy, especially since the internet has become more and more prominent since its creation. Original books, artwork, videos, and the like have a way of finding themselves onto the creations of others' works, and while most features of others' works fall under fair use, more often than not, original works are used in ways that do not fall under fair use, let alone are given credit to the creator. Because of this, those that fail to properly use unoriginal works have their content reported for plagiarism and removed and in extreme cases, charged. While this is an agreeably fair punishment, most platforms (especially online) with rules and terms regarding use of copyrighted material blur their lines on what counts as fair use. The general use of "three seconds or three-percent, whichever comes first," doesn't always apply on platforms such as YouTube, and sometimes videos that drew information or inspiration from another person's content can be falsely accused of plagiarism, getting them caught in the net despite being inherently innocent. It is for this reason that I believe that tougher copyright penalties would further blear what constitutes as copyright infringement, thus hindering creativity. Copyright infringement already hurts the media industry by damaging its reputation, but incurring harsher penalties would prove more destructive. The art, music, and film industry heavily rely on creativity, so when a case of plagiarism or infringement occurs, the culprit loses all credibility, earnings, and respect as a blemish on the industry. Therefore, it is understandable that it is preferred that measures are taken to ensure that doesn't happen. However, unnecessary measures prove detrimental to the cause. One such incident can be mirrored in Europe. Germany and Spain had implemented laws tantamount to inhibiting mere snippets to/of others' content, but it did more harm to publishers than good and was considerably unsuccessful. Another European method was to essentially have a system auto-detect what was fair and what was infringement. As with most automated technology, however, creative works such as parodies were indistinguishable from infringement, and would fall victim to the auto-bot. Modern problems do require modern solutions, but only if the solution is foolproof. Otherwise there would be more harm than good. Copyright is not an easily solved issue. Therefore, it should be handled with the utmost importance such as by a government department. After all, freedom of speech and freedom of the press are constitutional, but when the line between infringement and expression are so unclear that those abiding by copyright terms are hurt, it arguably bridges unconstitutionality. Organizations such as Creative Commons make it easier for content creators to publish their own works by providing a catalog of free-use material without fear of infringement, and is favorable to schools (especially art schools such as DSA) where that is the main focus. Had the criteria for copyright infringement been made clearer, schools (and by extension, students) would have a wider access to online material, but sadly, this is not the case. Citation(s):
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AuthorBrady B. is quite familiar with blogs since he had to frequently post on his blog in 6th grade. Although its been a long time since then, he still knows what a proper blog should look like. Archives
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