The major protections granted via copyright are:
Reproduction rights - the right to control copying of your works
Public Performance and Display Rights - the right to prevent display of your work to large groups or for profit
Distribution Rights - The right to control transfer of your work
Derivitive work rights - the right to exclusively use ideas that are "spin offs" or modifications of your original work.
The major exception, of course, is fair use.
Thus, if you want to make a digital recording of your old record and then burn a CD for use in your car CD player, your fine. But when you buy a new CD, you are paying the copyright holder to waive his reproduction, distribution, and possibly (in the case of a remastered album, directors cut, or software upgrade) derivitive work right.
Bottom line - copyrights are intended to foster innovation in writing, performance, art, etc. by granting authors (of books, software, whatever) a monopoly over their work product. You can make legitimate arguments that monopolies don't foster innovation, or that the costs of limiting access to particular works outweighs the benefits of the monopoly. But you can't argue that the album you purchased 30 years ago gives you the legal right to a shiny new CD.
Check out the language in Article 9 of the 1999 revision of the Uniform Commercial Code, which will go into effect in most states in 2001. It already recognizes digital signatures as valid, using the word "authenticated" instead of "signed."
One point that hasn't (I think) come up - While I agree with the preceding points about granting what we all think of as ISPs (MSN, AOL, etc.) common carrier status, we haven't looked at how the statute defined ISP. I don't have a copy in front of me, which is unfortunate, but as I remember the definition of ISP falls along the lines of "any computer or network of computers that is used to send and recieve data over the internet." I am probably overbroadening it, but that's the gist. As a result, it is definately arguable that a whole lot of things we wouldn't normally think of as "ISPs" fit the definition - for example, corporate email servers. What happens when a disgruntled employee uses the company internal server to disseminate false information about another employee? Do we grant the corporation immunity as an ISP? Even if they have a screening process in place, as many corporations do? It will be interesting to see how this plays out. I don't believe that anyone has tried to stretch the definition of ISP to increase the scope of the common carrier immunity. But it'll happen...
Re:More money = better grade at the end?
on
Laptop Exams?
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· Score: 1
My law school has been using a program called Examsoft for four years or so. Examsoft locks out your hard drive and limits you to a simple word processing program which saves your answers at the end of the exam period. The idea is that you should not be able to wholesale cut and paste answers from pre-written documents.
You have a choice between using a laptop or writing in bluebooks. Purely a matter of personal preference.
Our registrar told me that when they started using the laptops, there was very little change in the class rankings that was attributable to the use of computers v. bluebooks. How she can determine that, I'm not sure, but that was her opinion.
The point is, at least in this context, the ability to use a laptop is not discriminatory. If you want to use one, you can. If not, no problem. If you are not used to taking notes/writing papers on the smaller keyboard, you are probably better off writing by hand anyway. In fact, last semester, the "new and improved" version of Examsoft caused about 80% of the laptop users in my exam room to lock up midstream, anywhere from 10 minutes to 2.5 hours in to a 3 hour exam. Law students being complete stress monkeys, we all blew a gasket. The professor ended up having to offer a special grading scale because of the problems with the program, as there was an obvious difference in the grades of those who handwrote the whole thing v. those who (tried) to laptop.
The moral of the story? It's just a tool. And you may be better off without it, depending on whose software you are forced to rely on.
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The major protections granted via copyright are: Reproduction rights - the right to control copying of your works Public Performance and Display Rights - the right to prevent display of your work to large groups or for profit Distribution Rights - The right to control transfer of your work Derivitive work rights - the right to exclusively use ideas that are "spin offs" or modifications of your original work. The major exception, of course, is fair use. Thus, if you want to make a digital recording of your old record and then burn a CD for use in your car CD player, your fine. But when you buy a new CD, you are paying the copyright holder to waive his reproduction, distribution, and possibly (in the case of a remastered album, directors cut, or software upgrade) derivitive work right. Bottom line - copyrights are intended to foster innovation in writing, performance, art, etc. by granting authors (of books, software, whatever) a monopoly over their work product. You can make legitimate arguments that monopolies don't foster innovation, or that the costs of limiting access to particular works outweighs the benefits of the monopoly. But you can't argue that the album you purchased 30 years ago gives you the legal right to a shiny new CD.
Check out the language in Article 9 of the 1999 revision of the Uniform Commercial Code, which will go into effect in most states in 2001. It already recognizes digital signatures as valid, using the word "authenticated" instead of "signed."
One point that hasn't (I think) come up - While I agree with the preceding points about granting what we all think of as ISPs (MSN, AOL, etc.) common carrier status, we haven't looked at how the statute defined ISP. I don't have a copy in front of me, which is unfortunate, but as I remember the definition of ISP falls along the lines of "any computer or network of computers that is used to send and recieve data over the internet." I am probably overbroadening it, but that's the gist. As a result, it is definately arguable that a whole lot of things we wouldn't normally think of as "ISPs" fit the definition - for example, corporate email servers. What happens when a disgruntled employee uses the company internal server to disseminate false information about another employee? Do we grant the corporation immunity as an ISP? Even if they have a screening process in place, as many corporations do? It will be interesting to see how this plays out. I don't believe that anyone has tried to stretch the definition of ISP to increase the scope of the common carrier immunity. But it'll happen...
My law school has been using a program called Examsoft for four years or so. Examsoft locks out your hard drive and limits you to a simple word processing program which saves your answers at the end of the exam period. The idea is that you should not be able to wholesale cut and paste answers from pre-written documents.
You have a choice between using a laptop or writing in bluebooks. Purely a matter of personal preference.
Our registrar told me that when they started using the laptops, there was very little change in the class rankings that was attributable to the use of computers v. bluebooks. How she can determine that, I'm not sure, but that was her opinion.
The point is, at least in this context, the ability to use a laptop is not discriminatory. If you want to use one, you can. If not, no problem. If you are not used to taking notes/writing papers on the smaller keyboard, you are probably better off writing by hand anyway. In fact, last semester, the "new and improved" version of Examsoft caused about 80% of the laptop users in my exam room to lock up midstream, anywhere from 10 minutes to 2.5 hours in to a 3 hour exam. Law students being complete stress monkeys, we all blew a gasket. The professor ended up having to offer a special grading scale because of the problems with the program, as there was an obvious difference in the grades of those who handwrote the whole thing v. those who (tried) to laptop.
The moral of the story? It's just a tool. And you may be better off without it, depending on whose software you are forced to rely on.