(A/N: I realised that half of my posts were never posted because they were all still – by accident- under “draft” …. oops my bad…. So there’s just going to be a huge amount of posts in the next 24 hours)
During this week’s lecture we raised the following questions (made by one of the classes)
- How much freedom do we have when writing critically of others or others’ work before we become liable for defamation or copyright infringement?
- Copyright protects published content, however this protection does not extend to the ideas or concepts that this content was based on. At what point does content or “fact” become an idea? And vice versa? For example, if someone were to publish the ‘secret’ or methods to creating content (for example someone were to reveal a magician’s trick, or the recipe to the big mac secret sauce) does that constitute copyright infringement?
- How are copyright laws policed, and who is responsible for policing them? *in a culture of remix, re-blog and re-post
Although as usual when discussions and tension’s run high we never got through answering most of the questions, however there was a crucial point that I learnt in this lecture: what you said on the internet is public and it can come back to bite you.
Yes my little Interwebs, as much as we feel like the internet is our little slice of heaven, where we could just vent our sorrows and wishes, it is not. The internet is a very very very very public forum where anyone can see what you have written and what you have to say. Now when I was younger and foolish, I ran a blog where all I did was rant and bitch about the experiences in my life, of course now I know better and those posts are long gone… mainly… HOWEVER that is not the point! The point is that you keep your online persona… reasonable? If that’s the proper word to use, the internet is not your diary so please don’t treat it like that. Think of it more as your… decoy diary, if your little brother was going to creep into your room and read something it would be this.
Secondly, talk about what you know and what is the truth, in Australia, there are no laws protecting you against this whole idea of “Freedom of Speech” if you go around trolling and spreading nasty lies about someone/something the chances are they’re going to see it. Now if they’re as useless and small as you are on the internet, the chances are you’ll be alive and kicking. If by poor chance they’re a super hardcore CEO of a giant industry… Better you wear some clean knickers I say. Even if you write something with the intention to cause no ill or harm, this is all dependant on the interpretation of the information your present.
So for the sake of humanity and your criminal records, don’t slander people for their: gender, age, race or religion online!!! You may present an argument if you’re ready for the onslaught, but make sure you differentiate between criticism and opinion. Despite that I do know many who present their own opinion of these topics online (more on that in a different post).
“The main thing that you have to remember on this journey is, just be nice to everyone and always smile.”
– Ed Sheeran