Category: Copyright

Digitalization has enabled the transformation of intellectual property into electronic format. In this context, the importance of copyright becomes impossible to ignore. Copyright, as we know it, was creating during a time when digitalization had not happened. Thus, there are certain limitations that appeared with the coming of the digital era. Due to digitalization, copying art, of any form, has become easy, fast and cheap. Thus, the incentive of the artists that they used to get due to copyright has become jeopardized. According to researchers, the loss of royalty is depleting the desire to discover new ideas. The main idea of copyright has changed from what it was meant to do. The copyright was created so that content could be distributed widely and safely among willing users and seekers of knowledge. The copyright protected the interest of the author or creator and gave them a monetary compensation when their sources were used. Rather, in recent times, copyrights have been used by copyright holders to prevent people to access several materials and ideas, thus defeating the idea of copyrights. Due to digitalization, the idea of copyright is slowly becoming obsolete and copying ideas and information from someone else is becoming easier without giving them the credit. In this essay, the question whether the digital age has rendered copyright obsolete has been argued.

Copyright laws are rights of authors and creators to protect their original works from copy, counterfeit and illegal use. The works may range from literature, research, music, and artistic works to computer software and architecture. Earlier the copyright was generated the moment somebody produced their original work and there was a tangible medium for expression and was much easier to protect, manage and control. With digitalization, the works produced are in de-materialized form and thus can be copied, transformed and modified as the user pleases. This leads to creation of new ideas based on those modifications which the present copyright laws are not able to keep up, as the publication of original work in digital media allows free use, reuse, modification and remix of the content.

According to Fiesler, Feuston & Bruckman (2015), due to the popularization of social media, the idea of copyright is becoming much more important. Social media is used as a medium to showcase and promote artwork by several artists. The creative places that they use to showcase their talents have a grey area of rules regarding reusing and remixing the content of those places. This has given rise to several debates over the use of copyright and how digital media can use and enforce copyright in social media. Another issue that surfaces through the use of social media is the privacy and intellectual property statement written in the websites. Due to readability issues and non-compliance to the intellectual property laws, the users of social media and other digital media do not know what they are offering and engaging in. This creates further problem in protecting the copyrights of art and writing. Different websites have different terms and conditions regarding sharing and reproducing their website content. Many of the social media believes that when it comes to recreating content inspired from another work, the intention is what matters. If the reproduction or remix is intended for non-profit purposes, they are generally acceptable.

Many researchers believe that digitization has brought forth chances of preserving the precious material and books and has made accessing information much easier and universal. The libraries are enabling digitally accessible storage of their resources so that people all over the world is able to use them (Greenstein, Lerner and Stern, 2013). This has some negative implications as well. Due to the freedom that digitalization offers, violating copyrights have become much easier and harder to detect. Thus, people are having mixed reactions in producing and releasing their work over the Internet. Pandey and Mishra suggest that though digital transformation has its drawbacks, it is necessary evil and the academicians must be overly conscious of the ways they might violate the intellectual property rights of other researchers as the technological advancement makes the transformation mandatory (Fiesler and Bruckman, 2014).

The problem arises when copyrights are violated unwitting of the user. Many times, due to the limitations of the terms of use and privacy policies as well as people’s lack of knowledge about the copyright issues, content and ideas are used by people even without them knowing that they have violated someone’s copyright. It might also happen that some content, music or ideas are conceived from ideas or experiences that users are unaware of. For example, a recent news published in a well-known newspaper shows that famous artist Katy Perry has been accused of copyright violation by a Christian rapper Flame, where the former was ordered to pay $2.78 million as damage. Though the pop star claimed that they have never heard of Flame’s track, there was enough evidence to show that Flame’s track has been quite popular. This blatant copying of the song and its tunes begs the question whether the copy was intentional or not. While it seems that the copyright violation of copyright was obvious and intentional it is also possible that the copying had been inadvertent, an influence remaining in the back of mind that implemented during the creation of the pop star’s music.

The music industry faces the most complex and frequent copyright issues as is evident from the above incident. In this industry, the laws for copyright are truly blurred and is complex. This has happened due to the newly emerging technologies. Applications like Spotify has led to growth in the music industry and revenue collection. The music industry, the trends and style are constantly evolving while the copyright laws protecting the content and the music is not evolving much. The live streaming apps have made the lines more blurred as the existing copyright laws do not include any clause about live streaming or interactive music. Due to this complication and outdated regulations, the music industry is suffering setback in payouts. The music industry also suffers the theft problem that has emerged due to digitalization. Earlier, the music was available only in tangible form and had to be bought. This helped in maintaining sales which diminished significantly after the introduction of digitalization. The revenues decreased dramatically within some years. Many of the researchers opined that this fall in revenue is due to online theft of copyrighted items.

There are several other issues related to digitalization that affect the intellectual property rights and makes it more complex. The digitalization and technological advancement have enabled cheap reproduction of artwork and literature, it has enhanced the importance of copyright laws as a source of income, it has enabled the worldwide users’ access to copyrighted material for both profit and non-profit purposes and the globalization of intellectual property law. There are certain conditions that are mentioned in the intellectual copyrights which includes clauses like attribution, share-alike, non-commercial and no derivative work. The digitalization also has created problem in inheritance of copyrights. Previously, proprietorship of copyrights could be transformed to another person which has become almost impossible due to digital technologies. Many of the researches have argued the point that the span of the validity of copyrights should be reduced so that free flow of ideas and intellect can take place. Many of these scientists believe that copyright hinders the flow of ideas and intellect, blocks the birth of new concepts and ideas. By reducing the longevity of the copyrights, the problem that copyright brings with it can be minimized.

Despite all the debates that are going around in the matter suggesting that copyright has become obsolete, there are equally pressing arguments and instances that shows that copyright is still equally relevant and supports the free flow of knowledge and ideas if used properly. In this instance, the mention of fan fiction becomes mandatory. Fan fiction as genre became mainstream literary initiative, a phenomenon born purely due to digitalization. Fan fictions base their stories on characters and plots drawn from an original work of another author and provides their own storyline, climax and ending for the story. The production of these stories is mostly non-commercial and thus they do not violate the copyrights of the original work. This genre is extremely famous and draws millions of followers to read, share and enjoy the world that is held dear by them. The most popular example of this is the Harry Potter series, where thousands of authors take the basic plot and takes the story in a completely new direction. It brings out imagination in many people and common readers are introduced with the idea of freedom of expression and thinking. They understand that one story can have different endings each viable in their own way. This also enables the literary work to remain in people’s mind for a longer time and increases the sale of the original work for many years. Many of the authors while encourage fan fictions, there are also some that do not support it in any way. They believe that the characters that the fans portray do not capture the essence of their characters. Though there are mixed reactions of authors regarding fan fiction, the popularity of it cannot be denied.

The importance of copyrighting or protecting intellectual property is increasing due to the open nature of online interfaces. There are multiple platforms that are trying to protect the owners or creators’ interest. Platforms like YouTube and Spotify is ensuring the rights and interest of the users. The popularity of the channel suggests that they have successfully managed to safeguard the interest of the artists. There are young entrepreneurs and influencers appearing in the social sites that are earning substantial amount of money through original work. They also perform caricature, mimicry and parody of well-known works through giving the original writers credits. This enables them to maintain a fair use of the content. It also helps the original writers and artists as it increases their popularity as well.

There are several measures that online content publishers and websites that publish such contents might take to ensure that both the users and the viewers are well aware of the rights that they have and what constitutes violation. Another challenge in safeguarding digital intellectual content is the categorization. Due to digital methods of transmission and storage of data, no work can be particularly categorized into only one genre. This categorization is the key which will determine the rights and benefits that the creator will enjoy from his work. For example, it is difficult to categorize a poetry recital. It is on one hand a sound recording and a performance while on the other hand it is a dramatic and literary work. The traditional boundaries or conditions of categorization is greatly disrupted in the digital age and experts find it difficult to categorize artworks. In order to mitigate these problems, new copyrighting methods and approaches are taken. One method is popularizing in this aspect which is the modification of the copyright laws, copyrighting software that embed codes invisibly and development of software that can detect copyright violations. These methods are further inspiring the creators of art to generate new ideas. Moreover, information literacy and awareness regarding the copyright laws will also enable protection of the intellectual properties.

The above discussion clearly indicates that digital age has brought forth new challenges and difficulties in the context of copyrighting and protection of intellectual property. The ease that digital mediums provide for copying and transmitting data gives way to the rising problems. In this regard, copyright laws and awareness of the people regarding intellectual property and creator’s right is the way to mitigate the risks.

References

1. Aguiar, L., and Waldfogel, J. 2014. ‘Digitization, Copyright, and the Welfare Effects of Music Trade’.
2. Anderson, J., and Christen, K. 2013. ‘’Chuck a Copyright on It’: Dilemmas of Digital Return and the Possibilities for Traditional Knowledge Licenses and Labels’. Museum Anthropology Review, vol. 7, no. 2 pp.105-126.
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I have been asked to create this essay in which I have to provide an account for how copyrights and royalties work in the music industry and to show my understanding of the importance of collections societies. I have thoroughly researched these topics and have gained full understanding on each matter.

Copyright

There are many issues surrounding the downloading side of today’s music industry. And one of these issues to mention is illegal downloading. With music now being so easy to access, there are now ways in which it can be downloaded and exploited, this is an example of copyright. The main ways in which music can now be exploited is firstly, by ‘performance’. One can copyright someone else is work by performing it live without the original composer’s consent and calling it their own work. Another example of this would be, music being ‘sampled’. This means that if somebody were to create and officially release a piece of music and someone else was to take a section of this work and put it into their own song without the original composer’s consent, this would also be another example of exploitation of music. ‘Altering’ is another example of exploitation of music. This is when a piece of music is completely changed all together. Altering is where each section of a piece of music is re-arranged so that they are played in a different order to the original piece. Lastly, music can be exploited by being ‘copied’. This is where parts of a song are copied and then placed or recorded on to a different recording and released or distributed under a name that is not of the original owner.

Royalties

Royalties are payments to owners of a certain material for when it is distributed or used. Royalties often take care of intellectual property (IP), such as copyrights, and trademarks. There are six different types of royalties that are involved within the music industry, they are:

1. Streaming royalties – when fees are paid to owners of a song each time it is played on a streaming service, e.g., Spotify, SoundCloud, Apple Music.
2. Neighboring rights and royalties – when fees are paid each time a song is broadcast on the radio or on television.
3. Digital performance royalties – when certain organizations can monitor an online performance.
4. Sync licensing fees – when fees are paid to a songwriter when a song is played with visual images.
5. Public performance royalties – fees which are earned when a piece of music is performed publicly.
6. Mechanical royalties – fees which are paid for when a vinyl or CD is pressed.

Radio airplay is an example of a public performance. These collect performance royalties for both songwriters and musicians. However, broadcasters such as ‘AM’ or ‘FM’ stations only pay songwriters. In many cases, both recording artists and also songwriters are paid royalties every time their work is played. Under what is called the traditional recording agreement, royalties for owners usually range from approximately 10% to 25% of the usual retail price for any release. In simpler terms, songwriters are often more likely to make far more money than singers and artists themselves. However, there is high potential income for both. Songwriters usually get paid for every song plus they receive royalties for life, whereas singers and performers receive royalties only when the song is performed live.

Collection Societies

Now moving on to collection societies. Copyright collection societies act on behalf of certain copyright owners to facilitate the administration of copyright licenses.

There are now ways in which copyright can be tackled and prevented to a degree, the collection societies that do this are firstly Performing Rights Society or PRS. Its objective is to simply collect all royalties for the composer of a piece of music. Similar to PRS, Mechanical Copyright Protection Society or MCPS is another collection society which pays royalties to composers when a song they have composed has been produced. So again, similar to Performing Rights Society, Mechanical Copyright Protection Society also collects royalties. Phonographic Performance Limited or PPL allows radio stations and other broadcasters to legally use an artist or band’s work on the air. It is also responsible for collecting license fees on behalf of an artist or band and their labels and rights owners. My final example of a collection society is called Video Performance Limited, VPL. This particular company works very closely with Phonographic Performance Limited, however they are not the same company. Video Performance Limited distributes license fees to the owners of an official music video. In simpler terms, both Video Performance Limited and Phonographic Performance Limited undertake the same targets, only Video Performance Limited is for music videos only.

Copyright Infringement

Illegal downloading is a criminal offence if the downloader dispenses the original material. If the offender is caught downloading illegally, there are harsh penalties in place for this crime. Illegal downloading can realistically cause original owners of a certain material to inherit less profit from their work which they are entitled to. This crime however is very common. The reason for this is because people are so used to having quick and easy access to things like music on the internet therefore people tend to believe that downloading something illegally is not a serious crime at all. After nearly two decades of audio piracy and piracy-driven declines, the music industry’s revenue bottomed out at approximately 14 billion dollars in 2014. Since then, due to other factors regarding streaming, revenue has grown to 20 billion dollars in 2019, back in line with the exact same levels as 2004.

An audio recording will have a separate copyright to the underlying work that is featured within the recording. This means that a new recording will still be strongly protected under copyright, even if copyright has expired in the original work. For example, a new recording of a piece of classical music will still be protected under copyright, even if copyright has expired in the original music. The same logic applies to recordings of other pieces of works such as plays and books.

An example of a copyright case in music was between two bands called Radiohead and The Hollies. Radiohead were previously accused of copyright with their hit song ‘Creep’ of the famous The Hollies’ song ‘The Air That I Breathe’. Firstly, the two songs have a very similar melody, throughout although they were written in different keys to each other originally. It is very clear that that the melodies of both the vocals and the main instruments are almost exactly the same in these two songs. The choruses however are slightly different. ‘The Air That I Breathe’ has a happier and more uplifting feel to its chorus whereas ‘Creep’ on the other hand has quite sad and gloomy sound. They were also both written and released at different times. ‘The Air That I Breathe’ was released by The Hollies in 1974 and ‘Creep’ was released by Radiohead in 1992.

Another example of an official copyright case would be between English classic rock band Queen and American hip hop rapper Vanilla Ice. Rapper Vanilla Ice was accused of copyright with his hit single ‘Ice Ice Baby’ for Queen’s hit single featuring the famous David Bowie which was ‘Under Pressure’. Queen’s ‘Under Pressure’ was released in 1982 and Vanilla Ice’s ‘Ice Ice Baby’ was released in 1990. A case was opened on the matter and even Queen’s frontman, Freddie Mercury, himself said that the rap song was an act of copyright. In ‘Ice Ice Baby’ there is a direct use of copyright as the piano and bass guitar parts are exactly the same as ‘Under Pressure’, the only obvious difference between the two songs is that ‘Under Pressure’ has singing in it whereas ‘Ice Ice Baby’ on the other hand is purely a rap song.

One way in which copyright can be avoided is to simply not use work that does not belong to you deliberately, or to make something else by using that work or a part of that work. If one would want to use work that is not theirs, they should do some research and make sure that they have a plausible legal basis for using the work or obtain a valid license for use of the original work.

Conclusion

To conclude my work, I believe that copyright is a very important and hugely common aspect of not only the music business, but for various other aspects of the art sector such as art, film, and even text. Thousands of things are copyrighted every day and it is an extremely important issue. I am very confident in saying that I understand the purpose of copyright and royalties in the music industry. I am also fully aware of each of the collection societies which I have demonstrated in this essay. Everyone must be aware of copyright and of the consequences of copyright. I feel that knowing this information will benefit me in the future for working in the music industry myself.

The term ‘disc jockey’, now commonly abbreviated as DJ, was coined in 1935 by the American radio commentator Walter Winchell. They were originally the operators of machines that played phonograph or gramophone records (now known as vinyl records), but, with the technological advancement in the modern era, DJs have largely shifted from vinyl discs to compact discs and now to computer media files which are more portable and accessible. Copyright, itself is an already complex topic, but for DJs who are not only producers of music but also performers and consumers of music, there are many more layers to consider. This essay will give a brief overview on DJs, copyright, the economics associated with copyright, some key organizations associated with copyright, and how it all relates to DJing. It will also explore some of the contemporary shifts in music and how it might relate to copyright matters for DJs.

The Roles and Types of DJs

The term ‘DJ’ is now used as an overarching description of someone who mixes recorded music. DJ equipment has become increasingly sophisticated, but fundamentally, it consists of equipment to simultaneously play from at least two sources of recorded music. These sources are then mixed in various ways. DJs often utilize techniques like crossfading or beat matching to create seamless transitions between different recorded music tracks and they may also add many other elements such as speech, sound effects, filters, reverb, synthesizers or scratching to put their own unique elements into the mix. DJs also play their mixes to audiences, which could be in a number of different settings such as bars, clubs, weddings or on the radio. Some DJs are also music producers and compose original music or remix other works. The talent of DJs is perhaps one of the most underappreciated, after all, it looks like they are just playing a few recorded songs on a computer which almost anyone can do nowadays. DJs need to have a vast amount of knowledge, not just technical knowledge on operating their machines, but also knowledge on current trends in music and what songs or genres are popular. This is analogous to the responsibility of doctors, who must keep updated on current treatment options and current trends in disease. DJs select recordings from the seemingly overwhelming amount of new music and mold a unique performance which is often improvised and tailored to the crowd.

Presenting, performing or producing? DJing is a unique element in the music industry. It doesn’t seem to fit in with recorded music because it’s not just as simple as hitting ‘play’, but it is also not entirely live music either because recorded music is still being played. Like dancers who add their own elements to recorded music using movement, DJs add their own transitions, playlist and sound effects. DJing adheres to broad copyright practices in the music industry, but because of its unique hybrid nature it also has some unique matters, this will be explored in the following segment.

Copyright for DJing

As a foreword, it is important to point out that copyright is a deeply complex subject with many intricate details. However, this essay will explore some of the broader concepts. In addition, ‘public’ performance in a copyright sense is not necessarily restricted to actually performing in public. Any event or function involving music such as a club or even corporate events can be considered public even though they are not considered public in the traditional sense. There are, however, exceptions for any personal or family events such as weddings or birthday parties. In this essay, any mention of ‘public’ is regarding the definition of public in a copyright sense.

The Copyright Act 1968 is the fundamental act governing copyright matters. Contained in the Act is legislation about copyright, moral rights and performer’s rights which are discussed in the next segment of the essay. DJs primarily need to consider: Copyright in music, lyrics and sound recordings. Copyright owners in these materials can copy their own work (e.g., making a recording of their work) and can also perform or communicate their work to the public (e.g., broadcasting their work on radio). For DJs to be able to legally communicate copyrighted material as part of their performance in public, they require permission from the copyright owners of the works that they have used. Generally, the owner of the copyright material is the creator of the work, however, it could also be a record company, music publisher or a copyright organization such as the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA), the Australasian Mechanical Copyright Owners Society (AMCOS) or the Phonographic Performance Company of Australia (PPCA). These rights are often assigned to these groups when the artist signs a publishing or record deal or joins these copyright organizations. One way for DJs to obtain these copyright permissions is by purchasing appropriate licenses from these music copyright organizations.

Copyright Organizations and Licensing

The APRA was established in 1926 and originally dealt with public performance and communication rights. The AMCOS was established later in 1979 and dealt with the economics that came with music copyright, specifically the management of mechanical royalties. In 1997, these two organizations formed an alliance (APRA AMCOS) and now collectively deal with both their original roles. Currently, the APRA AMCOS claims to represent over 100,000 members who are songwriters, music publishers and composers. They issue licenses which are authorized by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), to groups or individuals wishing to play, perform, reproduce or record the music of its members. The Phonographic Performance Company of Australia (PPCA) is another organization involved in copyright licensing, also issuing licenses for the performance, communication, reproduction and recording of its members’ music. Recently this year (2019), the APRA AMCOS and the PPCA founded a joint licensing initiative called ‘OneMusic’ which aimed to simplify music licensing. Its establishment would eliminate the need for separate licenses allowing licensees to get a single bundled license that includes all the permissions required for the public presentation or performance of music. Not Unlike the APRA AMCOS, OneMusic also works with the ACCC for its licensing.

These organizations collect most of their revenue from the licenses they issue, and they distribute surplus revenue to its members and partners. The distribution policies vary for each organization, but for the most part, artists are paid royalties in amounts based on how much their music was used. Unlike mechanical royalties, where there is a set percentage payable to the copyright owner, public performance figures are estimated. Again, different organizations have their own policies for this. The PPCA policy mentions that the PPCA allocates royalties based on the frequency of use if that data is available, for example on television or radio logs. They also use data from third parties, such as music recognition technology data, which is compiled from recognized sound recordings played in households. DJs are also a major source of usage information as they have knowledge on the current trends in music. ARIA collects weekly data from several DJs working in active venues across Australia to make the ‘ARIA Top Charts’. The PPCA also uses this data collected by ARIA to help allocate royalties. In addition, the PPCA also analyses data collected from DJs performing at clubs, music festivals, and other music events. With all this information, an estimate of the usage of each song can be made and royalties can be distributed according to that.

Moral and Performance Rights

In addition to copyright there are also moral rights that DJs need to be concerned with, these are: right of attribution, entitling the creator of the work to be properly credited; right against false attribution, entitling the creator of the work to act if his/her work is not appropriately credited; and right of integrity, entitling the creator to act if his/her work is treated in a way or modified in a way that could damage the creator’s reputation or honor. As DJs use many music tracks in their performances and/or compositions, they need to be careful to not infringe on any moral rights and should, in most cases, request permission for any remixing or manipulation of the works of other artists.

A negative example of this is a 2012 federal court case, involving Jaime Fernandez, a Perth based DJ known as ‘DJ Suave’, and Armando Pérez, a world-renowned rapper, better known as ‘Pitbull’. The case was concerning the infringement of Pérez’s moral rights regarding the song ‘Bon, Bon’. Fernandez had inserted an audio recording to the song, provided to him by Pérez, to promote an Australian tour, of which was cancelled. The audio recording, which was more specifically an ‘audio drop’ according to the court database, was of Pérez saying, “Mr. 305 and I am putting it right down with DJ Suave”, which the court found to falsely represent Fernandez as a subject in the song. Thus, because of the Fernandez’s infringement on moral rights, Pérez was awarded $10,000 in damages.

When DJs perform, they are also entitled to performer’s rights. This allows them to give or refuse consent to their performances being recorded, reproduced or communicated. As of the 1st of January 2005, non-commissioned performers will also share some copyright in the sound recording if they contribute to the sounds of the live performance. This is more relevant for less experienced or popular DJs.

Contemporary Shifts

With the evolution of technology, there have been several large changes in music recording, manufacturing, marketing and distribution. Modern digital music has better accessibility, mobility, and can be reproduced instantaneously. DJs can also manipulate them using computer software. The consumption of music has also largely shifted away from buying music as a physical item and is now more geared towards buying access to a lot of music. This could be seen in the recent success of music streaming services such as Spotify which provides access to large banks of music. It must be noted that streaming services are mostly licensed for private or domestic use, hence DJs are not allowed to use these services in their performance to the public.

There have also been copyright issues surrounding playlists on these services. One such example was a 2013 case, in which Ministry of Sound Group, a multimedia business based in London, sued Spotify in 2013 because of Spotify subscribers making playlists which were based on their playlists. Ministry of Sound Group argued that the playlists should be copyright protected due to the selection and arrangement process involved in creating them. The matter was later settled out of court with Spotify removing the playlists. This case highlights the significance of another important aspect in copyright that is relevant to DJing: making a playlist is essentially another role of a DJ.

For DJs and many other musicians, the Internet has allowed them to reach a much larger audience. However, this has also made copyright harder and harder to enforce with the overwhelming number of recordings on online platforms such as YouTube or SoundCloud. Ideally, if any copyrighted material has been used by a DJ in an uploaded recording (e.g., a remix on YouTube), an agreement should have been made with the copyright owner of the work regarding its use and any royalties involved (e.g., advertising royalties made from the streaming platform).

In some instances, it might be beneficial for a song to be used in a DJ performance by a popular DJ, which would expose the song to a larger audience. This is comparable to the marketing strategies employed by business ventures such as VEVO which upload music to online platforms like YouTube. VEVO is like the DJ in this analogy, being a large well-known business entity, which presents music giving the artists more exposure under the brand.

Conclusion

Disc jockeys originated from humble beginnings operating new music playing technology, but have since evolved to performing, producing and presenting. Nevertheless, they are also massive music consumers and fountains of knowledge. Innovation in technology has caused the music industry to dramatically shift, especially in recent years with the technological boom. However, these changes also bring about unique issues surrounding copyright especially for DJs whose art is a hybrid of music and technology. It would not be unreasonable to presume that with even more developments in technology in the rapidly adapting music industry, there will be even more factors and new issues adding to the complexity of copyright in DJing.

Bibliography

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4. Fisher, Mark. Something in the Air. New York: Random House, 2007.
5. Watt, Andrew. “Business of Music: Lecture – Week 4”. MUSI20206: Business of Music. Melbourne, VIC: University of Melbourne. August 23, 2019. Lecture recording. https://echo360.org.au/lesson/G_ef0160a2-eeb9-4e72-8141-20493eee9e69_5690fb7e-b960-4093-84f1-106387f6ebda_2019-08-23T14:05:00.000_2019-08-23T16:00:00.000/classroom

To creative individuals and consumers alike, it remains difficult to completely understand the complexities of copyright and the legislation that simultaneously runs parallel. Many view it as a challenging and theoretically intricate subject, but also realize its importance to almost every facet of our social and cultural world. Essentially, only the expression of an idea is protected by copyright but not the idea itself. Despite the well-established control of copyright practices for intellectual property in regard to how it is sold, disseminated and produced, it is inevitably unknown how effective it will be in its entirety and with a changing society. One of the main aims of copyright is so ensure society is rich with creative works as a result of its support for authorship. However, there are arguments both in favor and against the idea that without this copyright, creators would not create new works. This essay intends to discuss the particular statement and draw upon external notions such as enforceability, commodification and technological change. These concepts are significant because the ultimate purpose of copyright has been greatly debated over time and there are many factors to consider. Similarly, it will explore contemporary music and the different formats such as sampling, mash-ups and remixes and link this connection to copyright as an example.

Through theoretical frameworks, copyright law is generally known as a cultural product which subsequently provides ownership rights to the ‘creations of society’. This ensures the world is rich with creative works as well as their preservation and survival for generations to come. As stated by Burrows (1994), there are two justifications of copyright: the ‘justice argument’ and the ‘efficiency argument’. The first is concerned with the individual rights of the creator and the second focuses on the effect of copyright on the utilization and production of goods. However, Towse argues that copyright is about protecting the activities of the creative industries rather than encouraging the creation of content by individual creators, despite frequent claims to the contrary. The history of copyright can be traced back to the Stationers’ Company who claimed that if one was not a member of the company, they could hold copyright. As a result, this meant that copyright was essentially a ‘right of the publisher only’. However, with the emergence of the Statute of Anne in 1710, this allowed the contemporary idea of copyright as a right of the author to develop. The current law allows copyright owners to make derivatives off their work which essentially leads to profitability and also permits them to reproduce or copy a work, perform, distribute copies and display the work publicly. In addition, owners have the ability to prevent others from reproducing their work without their permission and can also sell these rights to another party. It is contained within the Copyright Act 1968 in Australia and is automatic. This highlights the common assumption that many composers are increasingly inclined to create content because they feel a sense of protection. It is viewed as an incentive or motivation to express freely without certain fears of plagiarism or going uncredited. Copyright is often considered a balancing system and there is a fine line between the competing interests of creators that own work and those that want to access it for consumption and creative use. Overall, one cannot justify and quantify the number of individuals who rely upon the notions of copyright to produce work.

It is important to note that the concept of creativity is usually based upon previous works of creativity and does not occur in a vacuum. These creative modes may be variously plotted along continuums between direct and indirect, conscious or unconscious, aggressive or passive. Most works are transformed from one state to another and are often considered products in the globalized and capitalist world. Over the years, copying work has become a ‘common practice’ and it is one of the many reasons for the existence of copyright. This is dependent on the specific marketplace for the creative work and many individuals are capable of making a viable living through this relationship between product and market. In many cases, this is a method in ensuring society is rich with creative works because one can gain financially and make a name for themselves. The legislation of copyright seemingly offers no definitive standard for creativity, it merely suggests they are required to be ‘original’. In Australia, ‘originality’ is afforded to those that exercised nominal skill, labor and effort in the creation of the work. Under copyright legislation, creative works that are protected can include dramatic, musical, literary as well as artistic works, such as novels, poetry, films, computer software, songs and architecture. This reinforces Lawrence Lessig’s notion of a ‘free culture’ that supports and protects creators and innovators. There have been debates raised on the topic of intellectual property law. The role of copyright in supporting authorship could potentially underscore the value of fresh ideas and individual contributions to our public discourse. This suggests that society relies on copyright and it is a driving force behind the production of creativity rather than passion of the art. It hypothesizes that although we are maintaining the richness of creative works in society, there is lack of new ideas and concepts because everything is built upon one another or for a specific commercial purpose.

The arrival of the digital age can be considered the catalyst of the evolving context in which creative works are shared around the world as well as the frameworks for their copyright. Since one of the main aims of copyright is to ensure society is rich with creative works, many argue that the enforceability of the legislation plays an influence in whether individuals will actually make the content. Prior to the ability of online media sharing, most creators that would commit acts of copyright infringement would, for example, photocopy sheet music. This was highly time-consuming and also easily detectable, however, nowadays it is harder to track and control those that share illegally with the rise of the Internet. The technological advancements in reference to digital file-sharing across the entire world has made it difficult to enforce international intellectual property law as it is essentially anonymous. The material shared online cannot be pertained to a single geographical jurisdiction. Although this theory has the ability to promote the elicit production of modes of art, it reinforces a sense of society being awarded copious amounts of creative works. However, on the other hand, it also makes creators cautious of whether their work is genuinely being protected or not. In spite of, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), as known in the United States, works to strengthen the protection conferred by intellectual property law to digital information. It focuses on the technical measures used to protect digital information, but is unfortunately not designed to enable fair uses, making it a threat to the public domain. Significant effects of particular legislation such as the DMCA render copyright in a negative way and can impact the extent that society is enhanced by creative works. However, overall, it has been argued that copyright has indeed served as an engine of free expression, despite there being some issues often debated. There is an underlying reliance on the protections of copyright for individuals who create in the public area but that is not to say society will be devoid of all types of work without it.

One of the most important aspects of our modern world is the music industry and it also can be demonstrated as an example when understanding copyright. Many would agree that our current society is incredibly rich with creative works in regard to songs and albums. However, it is uncertain how to justify if copyright was a driving factor in their production. Copyright legislation that pertains to the re-use or remix of original material is a common discussion between intellectuals and law-makers as it becomes difficult where one should draw the line between legal and illegal use. In a piece of music, ownership is awarded to the composer, lyricist, artist and typically record company. The basic principle is that one cannot copy or distribute music without permission from owners unless in limited circumstances. This highlights a sense of a ‘permission culture’, where creators get this specific permission from ‘the powerful’. Through this dynamic, one can start to question the extent of copyright’s purpose in developing the richness of society. It offers a debate of whether copyright’s existence actively allows the creative quality of content to actually enhance society or if it just adds to a ‘property approach’. In addition, some argue that because creators are just transforming, mashing or sampling already existing pieces of music or backing tracks, it is difficult to view anything as ‘new works’ as most songs are recycled. There is no definitive answer to this though as it leads back to the idea of originality and how society categorizes a creative work. The concept that ‘appropriation is inevitable’ plays in action through this debate. An example on the opposing side is the genre of hip-hop and how many artists in the 1980’s experimented with reggae and Latin-influenced music samples, eventually creating an entire new genre called reggaetón. Nevertheless, individuals who desire to use these samples are subject to licensing fees from the copyright owners and they are frequently beyond the scope of many musicians in the financial sense. The statement that without copyright, creators would not create new works can be retracted in this case because even when predisposed to these heavy fees, individuals still choose to purchase them. This evidently reiterates that despite occurrences where there may be limited copyright, creators will still create because of sheer passion or impulse

Copyright owners receive exorbitant fees for the work they own and allow for distribution and use. The commodification and opportunities for high profitability is one of the main incentives for those to continually create works. They have the ability to gain financially for the content they permit for use as well as earn from within the public domain from individuals who desire to consume their work such as songs on iTunes. According to Wikstrom (2013), copyright legislation is what makes “it possible to commodify a musical work, be it a song, an arrangement, a recording, etc.”. Many rely heavily on copyright to make a living and its absence could potentially lead to a lack of income. If artists did not have access to copyright and the earnings from derivatives, they may have to turn to other employment fields. The time they spent on producing creative works would now be used on non-creative employment, evidently reducing the richness of society. Similarly, there is still the stereotyped cliché of the ‘starving artist’ with their artistic capabilities and hunger for the arts including Michelangelo who slept in his clothes and boots. It remains an obstruction in assuming that without copyright, there would be no new works.

As copyright is an exceptionally dynamic body of law, there are many arguments and questions up for debate. It remains true that one of the main aims of copyright is to ensure society is rich with creative works but there are also many other reasons as stated above such as individual profitability. Throughout this essay, I have remarked upon the alternative notions of legal enforceability and technological changes including digital file-sharing. By analyzing examples within contemporary music, it is evident that copyright is an influential topic in all realms of the public sphere. In closing, it is difficult to say for a fact that without copyright, creators would not create new works as there are many other factors to consider both for and against.

Copyright legislation is said to be part of the wider body of law known as intellectual property. In ancient period authors wrote for fame and recognition and it was not their bread and so the question of copyright never arose. The need for copyright protection arose after the introduction of printing as it enabled reproduction of books in large quantities. It came to be regarded as a property right and hence required protection.

Copyright in a given country is regulated by the national law it has in existence. National laws are, however, generally concerned only with the acts accomplished or committed in the country where the law is enacted. Since this applies also in the field of copyright, hence protection provided by a national law on copyright is effective only in the country concerned. It has no effect in other countries. The principle on which the provisions of these legislations are made, is that a person who creates something in the field of literature, printing, painting, sculpture, architecture or any other craft should have the right of getting financial benefit as well as recognition of the same. If and when it is copied the author should be approached for permission to do so. For such permission, he may or may not ask for a price. If any person entertains doubt that the work produced by him will be used by others without making payment of royalties to him, then he will be discouraged and either will stop putting labor to produce a new work or will not disclose it in public for the benefit of society. In recent times, the subject of copyright has become very significant. It has to play a vital role in the modem economic and industrial world. The copyright protection is an important means to promote, enrich and disseminate the national cultural heritage. The newly developed technologies have made it more important. The higher the level of protection, the greater the encouragement for authors to create; the greater the number of a country’s intellectual creations, the higher its renown. Due to enormous development in transportations and telecommunications, the fear of the works produced by authors being copied with impurity has increased. Hence, it is considered by international community to extend the protection of their copyright acts to areas beyond the territorial limits of a country. Almost all the countries in the world have joined and decided to extend the benefit of their national legislations to other countries. In pursuance of these resolutions and needs, the different countries have been amending their laws from time to time.

The aim of copyright protection is to make conducive environment for creativity which further motivates others to create, the continuance of which paves way for the economical, and social development of society. Copyright ensures certain minimum safeguards to the right of authority over their creation. The law of copyright has necessary exception and limitations in order to maintain a balance between the interest of creator and community.

It provides the strongest protection for individual authors of creative works, advocates the provision of appropriate compensation in case of infringement of right in a given legal system, copy right enable us to distinguish between those moral principles that can be justly enforced and also controls the exploitation by others of the works created by the authors.

The concept of right expresses the idea that something is owed to individual and a certain performance or certain form of non-interference are his due or that he is entitled to them without a system of rights, individuals could only make request or beg or ask favors, but cannot demand certain treatments from others.

To be sure, copyright law and policy in different places may emphasize one or another particular object over another. An emphasis on consumer welfare is the hallmark of copyright jurisprudence in common law countries such as the UK, USA and India, just as an emphasis on author’s rights is the hallmark of the continental regimes. But viewed globally, and in the round, it is authorship that provides the cohering theme.

Copyright in fact means the sole right to produce or reproduce whole the work or any substantial part thereof in any material form whatsoever and the ‘copyright in a work’ shall be deemed to be infringed by any person who, without the consent of the owner of the copyright, does anything, the sole right to do which is conferred on the owner of the copyright. Copyright law is, in essence, concerned with the negative right of preventing the copying of physical material existing in the field of literature and the arts. Its object is to protect the writer and artist from the unlawful reproduction of his material. It is concerned only with the copying of physical material and not with reproduction of ideas and it doesn’t give a monopoly to any particular form of words or design. It is, thus, to be distinguished from the rights conferred by patent, trade mark and design legislations, which give to the registered proprietor an exclusive right to the registered material, even as against a person who has reproduced such material innocently and from an independent source.

Defined by the Oxford English Dictionary, copyright is an exclusive law, which protects the creative works of an individual for a fixed amount of time. Copyright laws have been implemented worldwide to limit the use of copies of an existing work without making compensation to the creative originator for their ‘intellectual labor’. However, copyright does not protect an idea but the form of expression. Nowadays, the regulation of copyright material has become increasingly difficult with the introduction of multimedia. Which includes text, images, sound and video.

For example, Mickey Mouse. With the passing of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, this increased 20 years to the title of aged works, including the copyright of Mickey Mouse. The passing of this act would mean that 1923 creations would continue to be preserved under the law of copyright until 2019. These copyright works from 1923 are now universal property, meaning everybody now holds the right to republish or modify these works.

In Australia, the law of copyright is maintained under the Copyright Act 1986. Within this act, creators are provided with the motivation to produce new works and a legal structure which places jurisdiction over their works. Copyright is free of cost and applies conditionally when material is produced. Under the law of copyright in Australia, text (including books and journal articles), images, video (including film), audio recordings (music recordings) and computer software are all preserved by copyright.

A famous example of copyright is Vanilla Ice’s 1990 ‘Ice Ice Baby’ and Queen and David Bowie’s 1982 ‘Under Pressure’. The issue in this situation was that Vanilla Ice copied certain parts of the 1982 hit without crediting the primary creators. The result was that Vanilla Ice decided to pay Queen and Bowie in royalties and all members of Queen and David Bowie have been given songwriting accredit to the 1990’s hit, ‘Ice Ice Baby’.

However, not all materials are restricted by copyright, materials which are copy-left and royalty free are assessable within the universal domain. Creative Commons is an international non-profit organization that provides free licenses and tools that copyright owners can use to allow others to share, reuse and remix their material, legally. Creative Commons is just one of many organizations which offer royalty free materials for the public domain to utilize.

In conclusion, copyright is a form of intellectual property. Individuals are owed the right to have their creations protected, and under the law of copyright allows individuals to utilize material how they choose.

Bibliography

1. Athique, A., 2013. Digital Media and Society: An Introduction. Polity, Cambridge.
2. Australian Copyright Council, 2019. ‘An Introduction to Copyright in Australia’. Viewed 1 November, https://www.copyright.org.au/acc_prod/ACC/Information_Sheets/An_Introduction_to_Copyright_in_Australia.aspx
3. Creative Commons, n.d. Creative Commons. Viewed 1 November, https://creativecommons.org
4. Flew, T., 2014. New Media (4th ed.). Oxford, South Melbourne.
5. Killelea, A., 2016. ‘As Ed Sheeran Is Sued for Copyright Infringements, Here Are Ten Other Artists Used for ‘Stealing’ Hits’. Viewed 1 November, https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/ed-sheeran-sued-copyright-infringement-8147915
6. Lee, T., 2019. ‘Mickey Mouse Will Be Public Domain Soon – Here’s What that Means’. Viewed 1 November, https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/01/a-whole-years-worth-of-works-just-fell-into-the-public-domain/
7. Lexico, 2019. ‘Definition of Copyright in English’. Viewed 1 November, https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/copyright
8. Pearson, M., 2012. ‘Blogging and Tweeting Without Getting Sued: A Global Guide to the Law for Anyone Writing Online’. Allen & Unwin, Crows Nest.

While we used to pay for certain media products such as songs, films or newspapers. Nowadays, it is available to us for free thanks to the work of the Internet ‘pirates’. In today’s Internet age, sharing content is one of the most favorable parts of the World Wide Web. The computer-aided communication technologies such as e-mail and Internet have added altogether a new dimension to today’s communication process by making it more speedy, informative and economical. While all these have made communication among people more effective and efficient both in terms of time and cost, they pose the greatest threat to the copyright world. Modern communication channels, being intensively relying on a variety of copyrighted products, are liable to be pirated on a large scale. All the advancement in today digital technology and communication networks that are giving great challenges to the copyright owners make it is difficult for copyright laws to follow. Piracy has created a remix culture and as a way to fight the exclusive distribution of media from large corporations. Furthermore, copyright laws cannot keep up with today’s communication era where everything is being shared and distributed in a matter of minutes. Therefore, I would argue that today information age has constructed a lot of threats towards copyright laws to the point of it being expired or not fit anymore in today’s era of communication.

First of all, I would consider that copyright laws cannot keep up with today’s modern Internet. Copyright is a property right which exists automatically on creation of certain works (movies, songs, photographs, etc.). It gives copyright owner the exclusive right to do certain things with their work, including making and selling copies of their work or authorizing others to do so. However, the rapid advancement in technology has become one of the main reasons why copyright law is facing many challenges in present times. The development of peer-to-peer file-sharing technology, a method of distributing electronically stored information such as digital media over the Internet, has enabled any individual with Internet access to consume and share copyrighted works with unprecedented ease and speed, often without any compensation to either creators or distributors of these works (Barnes, R.F. et al, 2009). While these technologies of file-sharing often being regarded as ‘piracy’ by how people when sharing these files are considered stealing the intellectual property of the author. This means that the moment an individual is able to gain access to a digital file of a piece of media such as a song, a video or a book, it can be easily reproduced and sharing again to other users through the Internet. However, the basis of our major media business today is born out of piracy, as an example would be how in the beginning age of filmmaking when filmmakers often ‘pirated’ by using imported film stock with illegal equipment to escape from the monopoly towards filmmaking by none other than Thomas Edison (Lessig, 2004, p.54). Thus, when the Internet has been made widely popular to the common people, while copyright has existed for so long, I would think that copyright laws and regulations are not keeping pace with today’s modern age. As Lessig (2004, p.18) mentioned in his book ‘Free Culture’, the World Wide Web does not discriminate between the sharing of copyrighted and uncopyrighted content. Furthermore, the copyright laws now no longer differentiate the action of republishing someone’s work on the one hand and building upon or transforming that work on the other. Therefore, the struggle between copyright laws and file to file sharing is now still a constant problem.

Secondly, I would think that piracy is a way to tackle the monopoly of distribution on a certain piece of media by large corporations. Entertainment industry plays an important role in our everyday life, especially a large part of it is streaming media. Barnes (2009, p.80) believed that the Internet is a way to bypass the traditional channels of distribution of contents, which enabled users the access to both copyrighted and non-copyrighted contents. However, while many distribution channels from large corporations created a high price for its media goods. A typical example of this would be how Microsoft Office while its price being distributed in Russia or Brazil is become five to ten times higher when a copy of the same software is being sold in the United State (Karaganis, 2011, p.1). Thus, piracy in this case is fueled by a combination of high media prices with low local incomes. Thus, these proved how piracy can turned copyright into obsolete when people in different places of the world with the need to access contents can be shared easily and with no cost. In addition, Mason (2008, p.38) believed that piracy and people who participate in piracy not only defending the public domain form corporate control, but also they are tackling major business and government due to the fact that the society is benefited from the work of pirates.

In addition, the royalties or profits often do not reach most of the work’s creator, but instead go to the pockets of other people who have not put any input in the production of the work.

As Mason (2008) mentioned in his reading about the so-called ‘pirate’s mentality’, where that is a way to mobilize communities, drive innovation, and create social change. This could servers as a motivation for a change in mainstream media ‘from the bottom up’. In his reading, Mason talks good works of the pirates in today’s Web 2.0 era, which he explained the purpose of a pirate is not to steal or ‘copying’ the work of others but to broadcast it to different users.

Finally, piracy has enabled a lot of different forms of media in creative culture. Lessig mentioned in his book (2004, p.184) that in around 10 years our generation is going to face “an explosion of digital technologies”, where human can capture and share contents worldwide. Undoubtedly, in today’s time, the World Wide Web has indeed connected people as different individuals to share ideas and produce contents through a larger online community. Nowadays, with the access to a computer and a connection to the Internet, people who with even modest technical skills can create and consume contents (Barnes, 2009, p.80). The rise of new digital technologies with the file-sharing among users on the Internet has helped this culture. The Internet gave the freedom to the people for not only to consume media but to create and produce new media works that can be freely distributed online. As Collin (2010, p.38) considered these new types of users as ‘prosumers’, which is now is on the rise. A typical example is the act of ‘sampling’, while it is a creative process but it is still portrayed as just another form of piracy despite the facts that sampling itself it a long tradition of the musical creativity. However, since hip-hop music started to gain profit millions of dollars, the licensing system now then been introduced into the recording industry as an ‘unwelcome addition to the music world’ (Collin, 2008). In addition, Lessig (2004, p.19) believed that the today copyright laws now are less and less to support creativity but more and more shifted to protect certain industries against competition. Music is just a domain in this culture of sharing, where the creativity is presented through many different forms such as films and even fan fictions. Nonetheless, the exclusive rights of the copyright owner towards reproduction and adaptation have reduced and limited the use materials to generate contents, unless permission has been given in advance.

In summary, the development of technology that has led to digital communications and technology has revolutionized the copyright environment. Although copyright laws have been passed, they have recently become obsolete in the sense that the digital age has revolutionized the way digital works are modified and distributed around the world. Although steps are being taken to create appropriate mechanisms to meet the challenges of the digital age, it is clear that to some extent copyright is becoming obsolete.

References

1. Barnes, R.F. et al., 2009. Youth, Creativity, and Copyright in the Digital Age. , 1(2), pp.79–97.
2. Lessig, L., 2004. Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity/ Lawrence Lessig., New York: Penguin Press.
3. Collins, Steve .2008. Waveform Pirates: Sampling, Piracy and Musical Creativity.
4. Karaganis, J. (2011). Media Piracy in Emerging Economies. Edited by Joe Karaganis. New York, NY: Social Science Research Council.
5. Collins, S., 2010. Digital Fair: Prosumption and the Fair Use Defence. Journal of Consumer Culture, 10(1), pp.37–55.
6. Mason, M. The Pirate’s Dilemma (2008). The Free Press: New York, London, Toronto and Sydney. pp. 33-67.

Today here, in our modern era world lies technology. According to computerhope.com, technology is an advanced set of tools used to make things easier and/or to resolve problems. An example of technology is computers, laptops, phone, tablet, TV, and many more. Another word for technology is ICT which stands for information and communications technology, this term mostly focuses for education as it works for giving information. Other than that, it is mostly has the same meaning as technology. Technology has many benefits such as increasing knowledge, improving health, entertainment, and many more that really improves generation today. Although, technology is used in so many ways it really depends on the user. Some ought to use technology in a negative (yet smart) way such as the black market, inappropriate content, addictive, narcissism, bad for your health and many more but there is one issue in the technology world that needs to be discussed.

Negative impacts in technology can be explained as illegal usage of technology. There are many illegal usage of technology such as online harassments, unwarranted surveillance, copyright infringement, cyber scam, cyber terrorism, cyber extortion, and cyber warfare. In online harassments there are online racism, cyber bullying, online predator, cyberstalking, and internet troll. Then in copyright infringement there is piracy, theft, and freebooting. One of the illegal usage if technology in ethical behaviors when using information communication and technology that I chose to learn more and get deep into it is freebooting.

Freebooting is named by Brady Haran from Hello Internet and it is defined as a type of copyright infringement where it is the act of piracy or in simple terms downloading copyright content and re-uploading without the creator’s permission. The reason for doing is to increase profit. Urban dictionary defines freebooting as “taking online media and re-hosting it on your website”. To evaluate, freebooting means the act of freebooters downloading copyright content and re-uploading without permission. This is similar to the act of theft because freebooters are basically stealing content that doesn’t belong to them.

One of the issues of freebooting happened at Facebook, which is an American social network company created in February 2004 by Mark Elliot Zuckerberg (Mark Zuckerberg), a technology entrepreneur. This application and website are a social media platform used to post pictures, videos, etc. Other than that, you can communicate with people anonymously or not. Anyways, when freebooters in Facebook took a video from YouTuber with 15 million followers, Casey Neistat, who uploaded a Halloween video with Jesse Wellens called ‘Aladdin in Real Life’ in October 31st 2015, which resulted with 10 million views. Adweek.com stated that it took weeks for them to complete this two-minute video. The two YouTubers spent a bunch of cash on costumes and used high-tech video shoot and shooting in the streets on Manhattan, New York. Neistat then took down 50 different posts on Facebook. He told adweek.com, “I spent roughly a week issuing takedowns on Facebook—a convoluted process, I crowdsourced the process of finding the freebooters because there is no way to search Facebook. In all, I took down well over 50 different posts— which was not nearly all of them. I simply gave up after a while. I anecdotally kept track of the view counts—over 20 million views on the videos I took down”. It is clear that he as a creator is mad over this issue and he is not the only one. According to Business Insider, the freebooting issue had gained more attention on this issue when Hank Green, a YouTuber and the co-founder of the Vidcon Convention, wrote about the problem in a website page called ‘Medium’.

According to adweek.com, many video creators complained to Facebook for not solving the issue of freebooters for freebooting, and the writer agrees with this movement, because creators put their heart and dedication to it and in result, their video gets stolen. It is indeed sad and not fair meanwhile freebooters gets all the views even larger than the original post. This is because Facebook cheated. How? Videos in Facebook usually come up as ads, so whether you watch or scroll through it, it is still considered viewed and so the numbers of viewers rise up to billions of views. Kurzgesagt (which in English means, ‘In a Nutshell’), an educational Youtuber stated in his video ‘How Facebook Is Stealing Billions of Views’ that about 725 of the 1000 most viewed videos in Facebook were mostly stolen from YouTube in 2015 totaling on 17 billion views. YouTube is a place where you can share videos founded on February 14, 2005, created by Jawed Karim, Steve Chen, and Chad Hurley who used to be former employees of PayPal. Anyhow, Neistat claimed that “Facebook has a team of the greatest technologists in the world, they can crank out entirely new products in a matter of weeks. But here we are, 8 billion views a day later, and there is nothing in place to protect content creators. Beyond a technological solution—something YouTube has had in place for years—there’s a more pragmatic one: punish the freebooters”. How YouTube solves the freebooting issues does like this: when freebooters in YouTube are caught freebooting the third time, YouTube instantly deletes the channel. YouTube also has a system called ‘Content ID’, which it allows creators to block and track freebooters that steals their videos and took it without consent/permission. According to adweek.com, Alphabet-owned video platform said that it paid creators $1 dollar billion in 2014 all thanks to Content ID. So, what about Facebook? Why is Facebook still not doing anything?

It’s possibly because the freebooting issue is not Facebooks problem, and it is just a platform where freebooters can do anything and has no consequences, and in the writer’s opinion, Facebook is kind of like the egoistic dangerous (kind of) street where crimes have no consequences. It’s like a platform where they have its partners and everything they want and see will belong to them. According to businessinsider.com, “Facebook has said it will start making it easier for creators to report abuse, but it’s unclear how much progress the company has made. Meanwhile, creators are still very frustrated with the problem”. Smarter Every Day (an educational channel in YouTube) was one of the victims who got his tattoo video which got popular and got stolen by freebooters, and so he uploaded a video called ‘Facebook Freebooting’, where he discusses this freebooting topic distinctively detailed. He mentioned a process on taking down a freebooted video in Facebook (Kurzgesagt also mentioned the process in their video), where it goes like this: firstly, his subscribers or anyone can contact him about the freebooted video, then he fills out a very long (annoyingly to most people) form on Facebook, see as the views on his stolen content increase, and then finally Facebook takes down the video. It is clear in his video that around the freebooted video there are ads coming up everywhere, on the sides, the top, the bottom, and that’s how Facebook makes their money, and he explained that when Smarter Every Day’s subscribers mentioned him on the freebooted the video, the stolen content this is when Facebook starts to put more ads before the stolen content gets taken down. Another statement that is totally logical is Derek Muller who is a YouTuber with a channel called ‘Veritasium’ and in his video called ‘The Problem with Facebook’, he said: “On YouTube, creators are paid for every view of their content, whereas on Facebook it’s the opposite. Creators actually have to pay for views”. Which make absolute sense. In this case, most freebooting issues mostly happens in Facebook than in other platforms.

Many creators mostly on YouTube have been putting all dedication and spent hours on making videos that deserve to be viewed faster than the ones who stole their content and gaining more views in days on Facebook. Facebook isn’t really doing that much, instead they just act like as if there is a problem and they sarcastically said: “Oh oops sorry, I can fix that in a jiffy, you just got to do few things first”. Smarter Every Day made a very good analogy story that goes like this: the rich man has tons of sheep (which is Facebook), meanwhile there are commoners who don’t have a lot of sheep, but just only one sheep (the YouTube video) and they treat it like family (which they are creators). A traveler came (the freebooter) and worked with the rich man, they wanted to eat, but the rich man didn’t want to eat one of his sheep, so instead, the traveler insisted on eating the commoner’s sheep, and so they did. The commoner was very sad and asked the rich man for a sheep, but the rich man ignored. This analogy totally explained the cases of freebooting on Facebook. Which brings to the conclusion that Facebook cheats and freebooting is not fair.

Freebooting is a selfish egoistic case where freebooters steal content from creators that they had to spend days and hours to perfectly finish the video and upload it to YouTube and getting billions of views in months or years, meanwhile freebooters in Facebook uploaded their content and gets billions of views in just days and they re-uploads it in Facebook to gain profit. Casey Nesitat, Veritasium, Smarter Every Day, Kurzgesagt, and many more channels have experienced this issue almost every day and they deserve so much better. So, how can we stop this freebooting issue as viewers and as a creator?

According to Smarter Every Day, as a viewer we can do these three steps he proposed which are: capture, comment, and contact. Firstly, you want to get solid evidence on the freebooted video, so you can screenshot or document it. Then comment on the stolen freebooted content and comment the link to the actual original content on the comment section of the freebooted video. In there, people can actually see that the video is stolen. Then contact the content creator about their stolen video and send them the link to it so that they can access it. That can help the creator take down their stolen videos. Kurzgesagt also mentioned another way and that is to share their video ‘How Facebook Is Stealing Billions of Views’ and Smarter Every Day’s Video ‘Facebook Freebooting’ and that way more subscribers and viewers can help original content creators take down freebooted videos and possibly freebooters as well. The writer has also proposed a solution. Content creators and viewers can sign up a petition to block all freebooters instantly and get a system similar to Content ID in Facebook. It goes like this, so when freebooters re-upload a content that isn’t theirs, Facebook will have this system that is able to detect original videos. It could be like this, we should sign a petition that Content ID should be used for every channel and should be applied in Facebook, and so when freebooters re-upload in Facebook, they are not able to because with technological advancement tools we have today in this generation Facebook can be able to detect the original clip with Content ID. There is a thing called ‘copyright algorithm’ which is used to detect contents and match them with the original one created by creators and Facebook uses this algorithm to detect copyright soundtracks. With the copyright algorithm, not only Facebook can be able to detect copyright soundtracks, but also videos stolen from creators. Even though this solution isn’t thoroughly explained in detail, this solution may be possible.

It is safe to say that, freebooting, an illegal usage that is a part of copyright infringement of technology, is something that we all should defeat it and stand for what’s right. There are possibly many ways to punish freebooting and what we as viewers can do stop it. Freebooting is an issue that still happens until today and it needs to be stopped. As a writer, viewer, and creator, we should and want to live in a community where it’s equally fair and has rights.

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