Crossing the Line: Piracy and the Internet

Lately I've been thinking about creativeness and what all goes into making something unique and I began to wonder at the talent and skills required to produce a movie or music.  It can take months to record a record or to edit a movie.  Hundreds of people collaborate and spend countless hours to perfect projects.  They don't want others to be able to take credit for their hard work so they copyright it as a means of protecting themselves and their work from pirates.  But why are there pirates in the first place? Why would people steal material that they didn't make?  Why would they not pay for movies or music that they like?  Almost everyone that owns a computer has at one point or another pirated material whether they know it or not.  I found the cartoon above on another blog that I came across (AJs Online Journal).  I think it portrays the duality of our society's ideals on piracy.  

Firstly, it depicts punishment for the crime of piracy, which is illegal and generally thought of as stealing  by the vast majority of the population.  It also highlights the ridiculousness of some of the actions that are considered to be piracy.  Something as seemingly small as downloading a Barney song online for personal use without paying for it can be punished to the same degree as making copies of movies and selling them to make money.  Yes, not paying for the material is wrong, but if I were an artist I'd rather people stole my music than the music of another artist.  What harm does taking one song really do compared to trying to make a profit off of someone else's work?  Does the crime really deserve the punishment?  The struggle between prosecution of wrong doing and putting the problem into perspective creates a great rift in society's thoughts about piracy.  

I also thought it was interesting that the cartoon was not colored.  Instead it is plain.  Black and white.  No embellishments or eye catching design.  It is simply laid out for the reader to see.  It's somewhat ironic because the issue it deals with is anything but black and white.  As I said before, there's a rift in the ideals about what piracy really is and what to do about it.  Theres no simple solution, in fact it's realistic to say that there isn't a solution.  The internet is a vast abyss with no defined beginning or end.  There is never a lack of room for information, its nothing you can hold in your hand or take a picture of.  In reality the internet is imagined.  We as humans are defined by boundaries.  Boundaries of the capabilities of our bodies and minds, the boundaries of the space we occupy, the boundaries of money, the boundaries of the law, and the boundaries of our morals and personal beliefs.  The internet has no boundaries.  Nothing is ever forgotten or erased completely, nothing is right or wrong, and theres never a lack of means or ability to do anything.  The internet is completely wild and therefore it cannot easily be controlled by the government or by laws.  That's why its easy to pirate information and not realize it.  Theres nothing that says you can't do it; no boundaries or rules to follow regarding its use.  What then, can be done about people pirating material off of the internet?  

The answer, like the problem, is both simple and complicated.  The internet cannot be subject to rules and regulations because it constantly grows and changes, unlike written laws which are usually only relevant for a certain amount of time before they have to be altered to keep up with the changing times.  What it all boils down to is what people think.  If a person thinks its not a crime to download a Barney song off of the internet, then they are going to download the song.  If they don't agree with the common definition of piracy and what it entails then they won't abide by the rules based on that definition.  The solution to the problem is not trying to harness the internet, but to re-evaluate what piracy really is and change how people see it.  This is not to say that if we change the working definition of piracy and therefore, copyright laws, that piracy will be completely wiped out.  There will always be individuals that steal, just as there will always be individuals that speed on the highway or smoke no matter how much they are told not to.  I'm saying that if people see piracy in a different, more modernly defined way, they will be less likely to do it.

Finally, I'd like to comment on the picture itself.  Its a picture of a child, a "Digital Native" according to authors of the book Born Digital John Palfrey and Urs Gassier.  Piracy, for now, is a crime that can be committed by even the most innocent of the population.  My idea of a pirate is a smelly old guy sitting in his filthy apartment in a stained shirt all day at his computer stealing music and software from unsuspecting victims.  In reality this isn't at all true.  It reminds me of the Geico commercial that says, "So easy, a caveman could do it."  Piracy is so easy, a child could do it.  It's crazy to think that, but its undeniably true and the problem can only be remedied if society's mindset is altered.