Term 2 '07 Blogging Online Portfolio a.k.a. WORK

now what, work. Okay, time to get serious again -.-

Article:
Pub Date: 08/04/2007 Pub: ST Page: 40
Day: Sunday
Edition: FIRST
Headline: Nipping online piracy in the bud
By: JESSICA LIM#EMILY LEK
Page Heading: gen y
Source: SPH

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Many youngsters do not know the risks and implications of sharing files. A
public education drive aims to change this.
MUHAMMAD Mahriazul gets his weekly music fix by downloading at least a song a
week from his classmates’ computers.
And he helps his friends out, too, by letting them download songs from his
computer just as frequently. He and his classmates use a technology called
“peer-to-peer” (P2P) file-sharing.
It is based on the cooperative sharing of thousands of individual users. It
works by having participants voluntarily install special file-sharing software
on their machines.
Once that software is in place, these users start to trade music MP3 and AVI
files of their favourite songs and movies with others using the same software.
Some of these programs are Morpheus, Kazaa, LimeWire and iMesh.
There is no charge, no cost.
When The Sunday Times asked Muhammad to define “piracy”, the 16-year-old
thought it referred to pirates at sea.
He pointed out that he often saw the word pop up when he was downloading
software but did not know what it meant.
Thus it was not surprising that the Sec 4 student also did not realise it was
illegal.
The Greenview Secondary School student said: “But it is our music from our own
computers. What is wrong with that?”
Quite a number of the activities of these boys and many other teens like them
are illegal – as revealed in a Motion Pictures Association brochure launched in
a public education drive last week.
The brochure points out that peer-to-peer file-sharing devices, through which
most of illegal file-sharing occurs, also exposes computers to harmful viruses,
worms, Trojan horses and annoying pop-ups.
It also brought attention to the risk of sharing personal data, which can lead
to identity theft.
Not forgetting that it is against the law.
Three men, aged 16 to 22 were arrested in their homes in 2005 for sharing more
than 20,000 pirated digital music files over a local Internet relay chat (IRC)
channel.
And in October last year, content owners swooped in on Internet users trading
songs and movies illegally online. They reported 25 offenders here to the
police, part of a worldwide haul that netted 8,000 file-swappers.
Offenders face jail terms of up to five years and fines of up to $100,000. And
although one or two songs may not be on a large enough scale to warrant a
criminal offence, it can attract civil liabilities when infringement is
established.
Still, some who know they are stepping on the other side of the law could not
care less.
A polytechnic student who wants to be known only as Xue Wen stopped downloading
songs for a year because it gave her computer a virus. The student, who started
downloading songs when she was 15, has downloaded about 500 songs in all.
She said: “I would definitely continue downloading songs if not for the virus.
It’s free as well. Now I have to get my friends to send songs to me.”
The 18-year-old “rarely” buys CDs and is not swayed by “those anti-piracy ads”.

Another student, who is known to her friends as Quan, 18, downloads songs
because she thinks it is ridiculous to “buy the entire album for just one
song”. She has downloaded about 50 songs so far and stopped for a month because
she feared getting caught, but started downloading again when “the hype died
down”.
Others simply do it because they do not know the risks. Said Sitee Quraishah,
15, a Sec 4 student at Ang Mo Kio Secondary School: “I used to think that
downloading music was legal and that piracy meant burning DVDs and CDs for
sale. It was only after my teacher taught us what piracy was that I knew.”
Another teenager, who wants to be known as VV, lets others download songs from
her computer because she “can help people save money”.
Intellectual Property Organisation of Singapore (IPOS) director Liew Woon Yin
said in a speech at the launch of the brochure: “Copyrighted material is the
result of someone’s creativity and hard work.
“When distributed on file-sharing systems, the original creators do not receive
due rewards because they are being distributed freely. The creators may
therefore feel less motivated to continue their creativity blitz.”
But such illegal online activity is difficult to curb, say experts here. Said
Mr Michael Ellis, the senior vice-president of the Motion Picture Association
(MPA): “People downloading from their own homes make it difficult to clamp down
on the problem.
“We can’t compete with free. Nobody can. We have to educate and help people
understand the consequences of their actions.”
Parents agree with this.
Said Mr Bernard Wan, who has two daughters aged eight and 14 : “I can’t monitor
my children around the clock, but as a parent I have to remind them about the
seriousness of piracy and how you might get arrested. Then they have the tools
they need to make their own decision.” Both his children are on the computer at
least two hours a day.
Education and information might well be the key.
Students like Mahriazul say the sharing and downloading will cease now that
they know the legal implications.
For others, it is about understanding.
Said Lestor Chua, 13, a Sec 2 student at Maris Stella High School who was
present at the talk: “I didn’t understand how piracy hurts an artist at first,
but now I do. It’s difficult to stop ripping off songs through the Internet
unless you can relate to the person suffering on the other side.”
limjess@sph.com.sg
Additional reporting by Emily Lek

SOURCE: http://enewslink.asia1.com.sg/brsweb/read_44.brsw?this=result&QDT=1&QFLST=HD%3AHG%3APD&DB=BT%3AST%4005-07&QSTR=teen&DTSTR=%28%28PD+%3E=+20051126%29+and+%28PD+%3C=+20070428%29%29&PSZ=10&MAXL=200&SUMY=1&HLT=0&LSTN=40&ID=000016244@ST07

REFLECTIONS:
It's online piracy again. The subject that has been on many tongues for the past decade. But only now has it become some really serious topic. Wow. Really interesting. But what's more interesting is that the IT-savvy generation has found even more ways of downloading illegal music and movies and games and other software. Basically, for the side of the consumers, who really has that much $$ to buy all this digital media anyway? Maybe Bill Gates or even Warren Buffet. But to the oppressed underprevelieged general consumer population such as myself, the rich people made their day of the general population, who is still trying to get by day by day. If you guys won't let us continue letting us enjoying the simple pleasures of life, well, thank you very much. Most of us actually, well, maybe know what piracy is, but who would admit they had moral knowledge but no moral courage? Even if the artists 'stop' their 'creativity blitz', more will join the ranks of the knowingly scammed, there's just that many people in the world. If you quit today, someone will replace you the next. If the long arm of law tries to actually start to take action to track down and arrest everyone, even if they download one song illegally. Good luck to everyone, half of singapore will be in prison, 99.9% of our generation will be behind bars, and then, who will lead singapore to it's 'bright' future? Really, if the law starts to mobilise it's police forces, good luck to it's waste of energy catching and arresting every citizen for the merest offense, taking them to trial which will take months, and then obtaining the funds to feed the prisoners, to clothe them, to accomadate them etc. Now that may be abit exaggerating, but it is painfully true, it is just too troublesome to catch everyone.
However, to empathize with those artists who painfully try to make a living, not to mention they already have better conditions than we do, but then, if you find out you are not making as much $$ as you should have because some lame person out there is copying your creative product, distributing for free or even making YOUR MONEY, now if i were Josh Groban I'd be pretty pissed off too.
But the real threat is the viruses that may infect your computer. Where there's something free, there's always a catch. Just like the insurance companies who have 'terms and conditions apply', all these free things are bound to come with a virus. Some just attach themselves to the file, others just disguise themselves as the file with nothing useful inside. Lame. So my conclusion to those who consider themselves 'virtous' and 'upright', no matter what, don't download illegal music and software. And to those that prefer their own survival and entertainment, don't download illegal music unless you want to spend another thousand on a new computer.