When you take a course, you implicitly agree to the teacher's method
for grading. Because you turn it your work to the teacher, the teacher then
has wide scope for performing the grading. Yes, turnitin receives and keeps
a copy, but it is easily arguable that this makes the grading fairer, not
perfect, but fairer. This is a substantial benefit for making a single copy.
To say that the teacher cannot make any copies of the work seems drastic
to me. Can't the teacher keep previous copies and perhaps check plagarism
of current classes against previous classes? Can't a group of teachers teaching the same course combine their copies to check plagarism? If the teacher can do that,
turnitin does not seem a big step.
Furthermore, turnitin does not sell or further
distribute copies of the
student's work, so this does not affect future sales of the work. The loss of
sales is probably the most important factor in a fair use argument.
Every professor I've had has warned us vehemently not to use Wikipedia. It's useless for scholarly work as you have no idea if the material is plagerized or just down right incorrect. I've come across multiple errors myself, especially concerning some of the more subjective material. To use Wikipedia for scholarly work you would have to double check virtually every word, defeating the purpose in the first place.
Professors warn vehemently not to use Wikipedia (or any encyclopedia) as a reference, specifically to cite it as an authority. However, to use it for other scholarly purposes, like getting started on a topic or contrasting it with other references is fine.
The fourth problem is anti-science politics. We say we want science, but please leave out evolution, global warming, and, by God, don't say anything about sex.
Current email is a security and privacy hole. All sorts of information goes though plain text email that is probably against university policy to make public. Having your email go through a third-party site makes creates an even bigger hole.
If Wikipedia is a "trusted", "factual" source of information, then it might get in all sorts of legal problems. Lawyers will be more likely to sue Wikipedia when it gets things wrong. However, if Wikipedia is an "untrusted", "biased" source of opinion, well, it makes Wikipedia harder to sue.
Look, your honor, our editors lie about their credentials, and we edit the articles about ourselves so we look good.
As a possibly useful analogy,
something you can download from a web site is subject to
export restrictions
(http://www.bis.doc.gov/licensing/exportingbasics. htm)
whether it is actually downloaded or not.
The analogy then is that making copies available
over the internet is subject to copyright restrictions,
whether copies are made or not.
The biggest loss of privacy comes from the commercial data brokers and credit agencies. Except for some restrictions on financial and medical data, they would like to gather up all the information they can about you and sell it to companies for mailing lists and to the government for fishing expeditions.
Encyclopedias are bad textbooks, but some sort of Wikitextbook is not a bad idea. In some areas, the textbooks are mediocre at best, but I wouldn't do any better myself because of the holes in my knowledge. A collaboration where experts provide the knowledge and readers help make it readable would be worthy.
Anyway, a single CD is cool. Does Redhat survey Fedora users to find out what packages they actually load and use? If I cared enough, I could probably remove 1/3 of the packages that Fedora seems to think I need.
If you like the way things are going, vote for incumbants. If not, vote against them. Surely, you are that informed.
If you want to make perfect decisions, then you are overthinking the problem. All you can ever do is a greedy algorithm, make a locally optimal choice with limited information.
All your students use LimeWire. They should be interested in why RIAA is suing them, how LimeWire is trying to defend itself, and, for the grand climax of the lecture, how the software will live on even if LimeWire loses.
Phone companies keep track of who calls who when in a record called the "pen register". These records are readily available to government investigators; all they need to do is tell a judge they're going to look, and no justification is needed. To actually listen to your conversations, they need to justify a court order for the wiretap.
The Internet equivalent (more or less) is what web sites you visit when. So the Feds (from this point of view) just want the same kind of information they can get regarding your phone calls. The problem is that ISPs don't need to keep this information to bill you correctly, so they don't retain it. Hence, we have lawmaking so that ISPs do retain this info.
Conclusion: This is not as big a deal as many here think.
Basically, federal and state laws have all sorts of different restrictions. Related to this topic, it says:
The Michigan law also
contains a prohibition against the use of SSNs on identification and
membership cards, permits, and licenses. Missouri's law includes a
prohibition against requiring an individual to use his or her SSN as an
employee number. Oklahoma's law is unique in that it only limits the ways
in which employers may use their employees' SSNs, and does not apply
more generally to other types of transactions and activities.
The current law in the US allows the police to get a warrant to look at the web sites you are visiting just by telling a judge (the judge cannot refuse). This is treated as analogous to the police getting a warrant to look at the pen register, the phone numbers you call and that call you. The phone company maintains these records to bill you properly (one can hope) and to show that their billing is correct, so the government is used to getting old phone call records. However, almost no ISPs in the US bill based on the web sites you visit, so they don't keep them. If the ISP doesn't have old records, it seems to me the police can wait at that point for more evidence.
Slashdot Mirror
To say that the teacher cannot make any copies of the work seems drastic to me. Can't the teacher keep previous copies and perhaps check plagarism of current classes against previous classes? Can't a group of teachers teaching the same course combine their copies to check plagarism? If the teacher can do that, turnitin does not seem a big step.
Furthermore, turnitin does not sell or further distribute copies of the student's work, so this does not affect future sales of the work. The loss of sales is probably the most important factor in a fair use argument.
Nyet, in Soviet Russia, 15% sheep are humans.
http://www.redhatmagazine.com/2007/03/09/understan ding-your-red-hat-enterprise-linux-daemons/
Why not cooperate with your neighbor(s) on a wireless setup?
The fourth problem is anti-science politics. We say we want science, but please leave out evolution, global warming, and, by God, don't say anything about sex.
Current email is a security and privacy hole. All sorts of information goes though plain text email that is probably against university policy to make public. Having your email go through a third-party site makes creates an even bigger hole.
Don't forget the big data brokers like Experian with their own criminal databases.
Look, your honor, our editors lie about their credentials, and we edit the articles about ourselves so we look good.
As a possibly useful analogy, something you can download from a web site is subject to export restrictions (http://www.bis.doc.gov/licensing/exportingbasics. htm)
whether it is actually downloaded or not.
The analogy then is that making copies available
over the internet is subject to copyright restrictions,
whether copies are made or not.
This bill doesn't do squat on this issue.
Or worse.
Encyclopedias are bad textbooks, but some sort of Wikitextbook is not a bad idea. In some areas, the textbooks are mediocre at best, but I wouldn't do any better myself because of the holes in my knowledge. A collaboration where experts provide the knowledge and readers help make it readable would be worthy.
Anyway, a single CD is cool. Does Redhat survey Fedora users to find out what packages they actually load and use? If I cared enough, I could probably remove 1/3 of the packages that Fedora seems to think I need.
Teachers don't like encyclopedia articles for references. Why? Because they are summaries of the articles you should be referencing.
If you want to make perfect decisions, then you are overthinking the problem. All you can ever do is a greedy algorithm, make a locally optimal choice with limited information.
I generally have 4 windows at the 4 corners: terminal, email, browser, and editor. I use the 2nd desktop for superuser action.
... to upgrade to OpenOffice.
All your students use LimeWire. They should be interested in why RIAA is suing them, how LimeWire is trying to defend itself, and, for the grand climax of the lecture, how the software will live on even if LimeWire loses.
Exactly. Use Google to get to Wikipedia.
Phone companies keep track of who calls who when in a record called the "pen register". These records are readily available to government investigators; all they need to do is tell a judge they're going to look, and no justification is needed. To actually listen to your conversations, they need to justify a court order for the wiretap.
The Internet equivalent (more or less) is what web sites you visit when. So the Feds (from this point of view) just want the same kind of information they can get regarding your phone calls. The problem is that ISPs don't need to keep this information to bill you correctly, so they don't retain it. Hence, we have lawmaking so that ISPs do retain this info.
Conclusion: This is not as big a deal as many here think.
Basically, federal and state laws have all sorts of different restrictions. Related to this topic, it says:
The current law in the US allows the police to get a warrant to look at the web sites you are visiting just by telling a judge (the judge cannot refuse). This is treated as analogous to the police getting a warrant to look at the pen register, the phone numbers you call and that call you. The phone company maintains these records to bill you properly (one can hope) and to show that their billing is correct, so the government is used to getting old phone call records. However, almost no ISPs in the US bill based on the web sites you visit, so they don't keep them. If the ISP doesn't have old records, it seems to me the police can wait at that point for more evidence.
Given your experience defending folks on copyright violations, what do you think the law should be?
Is that 16GB in your pocket are you just happy to see me?