Week 2 (11/5/07-11/9/07) - Question of the Week

Question: You purchase a music CD, an iTune song, or a video DVD. Should you be allowed to make an archival copy of it? (This assumes you will not share it with others, but may put it on you home's wireless entertainment computer to broadcast to TVs and computers in your house.)


Background: A woman is found guilty and fined $9250.00 a song for allowing downloads (see http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2007-10-11-download-jury-award_N.htm). A mother is sued because her kids downloaded music. The charges were dropped, but now her kids are being sued. (see http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16293895/). All music and videos transmitted over the airwaves is part of the public domain and may be recorded. But, if you own a CD, making a backup is illegal under the Millenium Copyright Act. If you buy an iTunes song, it can be moved onto MP3 players or computers only 3 times. Then, you have to buy it again. If you have a record, you can put it onto cassette tape -- but, it may be illegal to make it into MP3s and move it between your iPod and PC.

Some references (but, you may look up more):
The United States Copyright Law: A Guide for Music Educators - http://www.menc.org/information/copyright/copyr.html


Millenium Copyright Act:
http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/iclp/dmca1.htm