passage from free culture that our video is based on

We were born, in this sense, a pirate nation.

Piracy comes in many forms. The most significant is commercial piracy, the unauthorized taking of other peoples content within a commercial context. Despite many justifications that are offered in its defense, this taking is wrong. No one should condone it, and the law should stop it.

But as well as copy-shop piracy, there is another kind of taking that is more directly related to the Internet. Before we paint this taking “piracy,” however, we should understand its nature a bit more. For the harm of this taking is significantly more ambiguous than outright copying, and the law should account for that ambiguity, as it has done so often in the past.

All across the world, but especially in Asia and Eastern Europe, there are businesses that do nothing but take others copyrighted content, copy it, and sell it—all without the permission of a copyright owner. This piracy is wrong.

Many kinds of piracy are useful and productive, to produce either new content or new ways of doing business. For (1) like the original Hollywood, p2p sharing escapes an overly controlling industry; and (2) like the original recording industry, it simply exploits a new way to distribute content; but (3) unlike cable TV, no one is selling the content that is shared on p2p services.

It might therefore seem hypocritical for us to insist so strongly that other developing nations treat as wrong what we, for the first hundred years of our existence treated as right.




These are some pieces pulled from Chapter Five: "Piracy" Pages 62-66

final project video

Sources:

All video clips were pulled from youtube.

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2008/10/judge-rejects-m/

my favorite mashups

revised 2nd web writing assignment

The 21^st Century Dictionary

          According to Wikipedia.com, Wikipedia is defined as a free, web-based, collaborative, multilingual encyclopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation.  Wikipedia boasts over 16 million articles that have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world.  Nearly all of these articles can be edited by anyone who has access to the site and has a Wikipedia account.  Wikipedia was launched on January 15, 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger.  It started out an English-only website but as its popularity grew, it was translated into many other languages to include an expanding global audience.  Wikipedia encompasses everything the internet has become, especially as a way for people all over the world to share knowledge.  Because anyone with an account can edit and submit information, it is one of the best examples of participatory culture on the internet.  It is also a source of convergence on the internet because anyone who has internet access can find information on Wikipedia to be used in whatever way they choose.

            In “Worship at the Altar of Convergence,” Jenkins defines convergence as “the flow of content across multiple media industries, and the migratory behavior of media audiences who will go almost anywhere in search of entertainment experiences they want (Jenkins, pg.2).”  Jenkins uses this definition to describe how a picture of one of the most notorious terrorists in the world can appear next to a Sesame Street character on a poster being used in an anti-American protest in the middle-east.  The picture of Bert and Osama started as a joke created by someone using Photoshop on their home computer in a basement in the United States.  It eventually ended up halfway across the world as anti-American symbolism.  This is a perfect example of convergence on the internet in the sense that this information traveled across several sources of media before ending up in the middle-east.  It started out as a children’s television show before pictures and video were posted on the internet.  Someone took a picture of Bert and cropped it together with a picture of Osama and then posted it on the internet.  This picture was then discovered on the internet by someone in the middle-east who printed hundreds of copies and distributed them at an anti-American protest.  Before the internet was so popular and accessible around the world, this picture would have never made it to the middle-east.  Thanks to websites like Wikipedia, anyone in the world that has internet access can now find this information.  Just by typing the words “Sesame Street” into Wikipedia’s search bar, you can find out anything you ever wanted to know about the show, including the history, its creators, and even its educational goals.  Just ten years ago this information would have been much more difficult to find.  Because of convergence, a television show in the United States can be discovered and used by anyone in the world, even in an anti-American protest.  The fact that anyone in the world can find and share information through Wikipedia has created a whole new base of knowledge for the world that was not possible before.  This alone would make Wikipedia an example of participatory culture on the internet, but there are also other features that contribute to this claim.

            Anyone with internet access and a Wikipedia account can log in to the website and edit content, as well as submit their own content.  This makes Wikipedia a legitimate member of the internet’s participatory culture.  Although Wikipedia started out as nothing more than an online dictionary, it has evolved to encompass information about entertainment, popular culture, and almost anything else you could ever want to find.  Many other forms of participatory culture on the internet have also evolved beyond what they were originally created to do.  Zuckerman makes this argument in his article “The Cute Cat Theory.” He explains that participatory culture on the internet was originally intended to be used in practical ways, such as helping college students find apartments, but that people have found ways to make it their own.  He uses Google Earth as an example of how people have found creative ways to use participatory culture in ways that they were never intended to be used.  An activist in Tunisia used Google Earth and another website called Planespotter to make a video that tracked the Tunisian Presidential airplane on some of its ventures.  He exposed the Tunisian First Lady using the Presidential airplane to take shopping trips to Europe and then posted his video on the internet.  Just like the activist who used Google Earth in a new and creative way, Wikipedia has expanded into much more than just an online dictionary.  If someone were to open a Webster’s Dictionary and try to look up Sesame Street they would not find it.  That is the beauty of Wikipedia.  Not only can you find definitions and other academic information, but you can find information on just about anything.  Wikipedia has become a library of information for almost any aspect of global culture.

           Since its early beginnings as an online dictionary, Wikipedia has come to embody convergence and participatory culture in every sense of the words.  Since Wikipedia’s content is available to anyone with internet access, information can be obtained anywhere in the world and used for whatever purpose someone desires.  All it takes for a person to edit and submit information on the website is an account with Wikipedia.  It has become a way for people all over the world to share information about their interests and culture.  Wikipedia has become a way for people around the globe to interact and share information, creating a true online community.

link to my screencast 

Web Writing Assignment 2

The 21^st Century Dictionary

            According to Wikipedia.com, Wikipedia is defined as a free, web-based, collaborative, multilingual encyclopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation.  Wikipedia boasts over 16 million articles that have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world.  Nearly all of these articles can be edited by anyone who has access to the site.  Wikipedia was launched on January 15, 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger.  It started out as an English-only website but as its popularity grew, it was translated into other languages to include an expanding global audience.  Wikipedia encompasses everything the internet has become, especially as a way for people all over the world to share knowledge.  It is one of the best examples of how participatory culture and convergence take place on the internet every day.

            In “Worship at the Altar of Convergence,” Jenkins defines convergence as the flow of content across multiple media industries, and the migratory behavior of media audiences who will go almost anywhere in search of entertainment experiences they want (Jenkins, pg. 2).  Jenkins uses this definition to describe how a picture of Osama Bin Laden standing next to Bert, a character from the cartoon Sesame Street, appeared on posters being used in an anti-American protest in the middle-east.  This picture started as a joke created by someone using photoshop on their home computer and ended up half-way across the world.  While this may be a somewhat far-fetched example of convergence it really illustrates how the internet can be used to do almost anything.  Before the internet became so popular the only way that people in the middle-east could possibly know the Sesame Street character Bert is if they saw it on television somewhere.  The access to American television networks and cartoons in the middle-east is pretty rare, so the chances of that happening are slim.  But thanks to websites like Wikipedia, anyone in the world that has internet access can now find this information.  Just by typing the words “Sesame Street” into Wikipedia’s search bar, you can find out anything you ever wanted to know about the show.  The information includes a history of the show, its creators, and even the shows educational goals.  Anyone in the world has access to information that would not be possible without the internet and websites like Wikipedia.  Because of convergence, a television show that was once popular in the United States can be discovered and used by anyone in the world, even in an anti-American protest.  The fact that anyone can go on Wikipedia and define words or look up definitions gives a whole new base of knowledge to the world that was not possible before.  It truly illustrates the beauty of participatory culture and the fact that it is taking over the internet.

            As I mentioned before, anyone with internet access can log into Wikipedia’s website and edit content on their page.  This makes Wikipedia a legitimate member of the internet’s participatory culture.  Zuckerman’s article, “The Cute Cat Theory,” illustrates all the ways that participatory culture has evolved.  He uses the example of the Tunisian presidential aircraft to explain how participatory culture has evolved beyond what it was originally intended for.  He explains that it was originally intended to be used practically in ways such as helping college students find apartments, but that people have found ways to make it their own.  In the case of the Tunisian presidential aircraft it was used to expose the Tunisian first lady using the presidential plane to take shopping trips to Europe.  The same goes for a website like Wikipedia, which was originally intended to be used as an online dictionary.  People have used participatory culture to make Wikipedia their own.  If someone were to open a Webster’s Dictionary and try to look up Sesame Street they would not be able to find it.  That’s the beauty of Wikipedia.  Not only can a person look up Sesame Street and find information, they can look up physics and find reliable information as well.  People can search and disclose information about whatever it is that interests them.  Wikipedia is a library of information that encompasses entertainment, academic knowledge, and every other aspect of global culture.

            Since its early beginnings, Wikipedia has embodied convergence and participatory culture in every sense of the words.  It has become a way for people all over the world to share information about their interests and culture.  Although Wikipedia started as nothing more than an online dictionary it has evolved into a way for people around the world to interact and share information, creating a true online community.

Revised first writing assignment

revised first writing assignment

Atlanta Braves Fan Page

http://www.appstate.edu/~eakerjh/page1.htm

My first internet experience

My First Internet Experience
It seems like so long ago when I think back to the first time I can really remember using the internet and understanding the significance of what I was doing. I was in the sixth grade and my best friend had just moved to Minnesota a few weeks before. We went to the same school, the same church, and our parents were good friends as well. We saw each other every day and would even spend the night at each others’ houses on the weekends. We were about as close as best friends could be. When his family moved to Minnesota I was devastated. Before he moved I could see him or talk to him whenever I wanted and now that seemed impossible. Before this happened I had an idea of what the internet was, but no real grasp of what it was really capable of. This was before cell phones had become so accessible and the only real way to talk to my friend was to wait until my parents and his parents were done with the phone and then call and talk. Our parents eventually got tired of us asking to call each other and came up with a new strategy. My mom and his mom got together and agreed to show us how to use email.
I can still remember, as many people my age and older can, the sound of the dial up connection. It would take a few minutes but eventually the browser page would come up and you would be ready to go. I will never forget the mixed emotions I felt the first time my mom showed me how to email. I was excited, confused, and overwhelmed all at the same time. Just the thought of being able to talk to someone halfway across the country by using a keyboard and computer screen blew my mind. I typed out my first message, which took me quite a while back then, and felt a rush of excitement when I hit send. All through the next day at school I could barely sit still waiting for the last bell. I got on the school bus and headed home to get on the computer and check to see if my friend had written me back. The last few tones of the dial up were excruciating as I waited. Finally I got my email account pulled up and there it was. My friend had emailed me back. Although we never really talked about anything too important, email helped me get over my best friend moving away. While it all seems so simple with all the technology we have now, it was a big deal to me at the time. Until that point, if your best friend moved halfway across the country, you probably did not get to talk to them very often. A year or two later another huge stride was made in communication via the internet: instant messaging. But I will leave that story for another time.
If for some reason you have not been able to guess yet, I side with Vannevar Bush. The internet was never intended to be used in many of the ways in which it is used today. It has evolved from a way to communicate and exchange information into something with potentially endless possibilities. Bush was definitely ahead of his time with the memex, but I do not think that he could ever have imagined what the internet would become. I was much the same way when I first used the internet. I thought of the internet as something that my parents used for work, but I was never really sure exactly what it did. Even after my mom showed me how to email, I assumed that this was the only applicable function that it could perform. This was approaching the year 2000 and the threat of y2k and there were many people that believed that the internet was evil and would bring about the apocalypse. Nathaniel Hawthorne would probably have been one of these people. He probably would have argued that the internet would eventually replace libraries and books and people would forget how to read. I, on the other hand, never really bought into any of that and remained open to all of the possibilities that the internet could provide. My early understanding of the limited capabilities of the internet quickly changed as it became more common, not only in households, but at school. The internet we know today is almost nothing like it was when I had my first real experience, but I will always remember it that way.

my favorite youtube video

doc ellis no hitter on acid

This is one of the best youtube videos i have ever seen for a couple of reasons.  First of all, the concept of throwing a no-hitter in professional baseball would be enough to make this interesting but there is more to the story.  Doc Ellis was a pretty good pitcher for the pirates in the 1970s.  He won 19 games for the pirates when they won the world series in 1971, but he will always be remembered as the pitcher who threw a no hitter in 1970 while high on lsd.  This is an interview that doc ellis narrated a few years before his death, recounting the day before and the day of his no hitter.  The video is also funny because of the clever illustrations that were added to give some visual pictures.