Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Things that don't suck: 99-word essays that define "Fair Use"

This is from LiveJournal: a student is in the middle of a project. He needs to come up with a 99 word essay, with a one-word title. He chose to write about the Sony DRM fiasco:
Copyright

I love music, movies, and books. I also love technology. I want to use technology to deliver the media I love anywhere, anywhen, with anyone.

This is fair use: I bought it, let me use it. I will tell all my friends about my favorite music. I might play it for them or even give them a digital version of a song. This is evangelism, not theft. This is advertising you cannot buy.

Restrictive copyright is like a vegetarian knife. You bought the knife, but if you cut meat with it, we'll sue you. Excuse me? Let's think again.

My call: I don't buy CDs anymore, and I hate iTunes, especially after losing all my "legit" White Stripes albums when my Mac crashed. I'd rather pay for these things, but I won't until they come up with an agreement that makes sense, and quit going behind our backs to monitor our personal info. Get out of my hair. I'm just glad I have Sirius, because now I don't have a reason to download any of it, ever.

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