Intellectual Property

This was a paper I wrote for one of my classes on Intellectual Property and how some of the ways it's misused or stolen, whichever word you want to use. So check it out, guys. Oh, if you do actually read this, leave some feedback. I'm taking this relatively seriously. It'll only take a minute of your time. Thanks.

According to the World Intellectual Property Organization’s website, intellectual property is a term that describes all different types of creations of the mind. Intellectual property is divided into two subgroups: Industrial Property and Copyrights. Creations that fall into the Industrial Property include:Inventions and Patents,Trademarks,Industrial Designs(Blueprints)and Geographic Indications of Source (Maps.Creations that are under the Copyrights heading include all different types of artistic works including:Literary(Novels, Poetry, Plays),Films,Music,Artistic(Sculptures, Drawings and Sketchings, Paintings, Photography)and Architectural Designs

It is important to understand all of the different creations that fall under the banner of Intellectual property. However, when it comes to ethics and Intellectual Property, we have to focus on the rights that are attached to the creations in the group Copyrights. These rights protect infringement on broadcasts and recording of radio, TV and film. It also included protection of songs and various forms of visual art.

When talking about the protection of intellectual property, the first thing that pops in the minds of most people is the legal battle between Shawn Fanning, the creator of Napster (the first online file-sharing service) and the band Metallica. Fanning created Napster as easier way to find music. Fanning created the service to find music both faster and easier than what was possible at the time. However his idea of P2P (peer to peer) bypassed all the channels that would entail paying for the downloaded music, which led to scads of copyright violations.

Fanning got into legal hot water in 2000 when the band Metallica heard that a demo of the at-the-time unreleased song “How I Disappear” was being passed along on the network, which led to the track being leaked onto radio. The leaked demo lead to Metallica and other artists, including Dr.Dre and Madonna, learning that their back-catalogs were being downloaded for free by Napster users all over the world. The lawsuits soon followed, not only from Metallica and other musicians but record label A&M filed suit as well. All of the suits claim that all Napster users were infringing copyrights with every download and Napster was liable for both contributory and vicarious copyright infringements. Napster was found liable on all counts and after filing various appeals shut down in 2002. However, Napster was the catalyst for the digital music revolution and also the steep and steady decline of album sales, over twenty-five percent in the decade so far.
 
Another form of copyright infringement when it comes to music is sampling. Sampling is taking a clip of a song (a drum break, guitar solo, bass line etc.) and reusing it in another song, mostly done with computer software. A lot of samples nowadays are used correctly and with the proper royalties and or the permission of the original writer of the music to use it. The most famous example of unauthorized sampling is the use of the bass line from “Under Pressure” by Queen (with David Bowie). The case that Vanilla Ice made that by the addition of one note at the end of the riff, it was now an original piece of music. The two groups reached a settlement before heading into litigation with Vanilla Ice agreeing to pay the band its due royalties.

Visual art has its own version of sampling which is called appropriation. Instead of using bits of music, artists used already created images when creating a piece of art. Famous artists such as Pablo Picasso, Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein all have used appropriation in some or all of their work. A more recent and prevalent artist is Shepard Fairey, who created the icon “HOPE” posters with a image of our current president on it.

Fairey has actually gotten to some legal hot water over his Obama poster. Fairey did not give credit to the AP for the photo, which was copyrighted by the Associated Press and were seeking compensation that was due to them. Fairey has since given credit to the AP for the photo. However, this isn’t the first time that Fairey has gotten into trouble over unauthorized use of an image.

In 1989, as an experiment in what Fairey called “phenomenology”, him and his friends started to plaster stickers with the image of famed pro wrestler Andre the Giant on them with the words “Andre the Giant has a posse” all over the world. Soon, the WWE (WWF at the time), filed a lawsuit claiming that the image of Andre which they have trademarked was being used without their permission. This suit drove Fairey to create the iconic “OBEY” print that has been in vogue for years now.

Intellectual property protection has become much more stringent and with the fairly-priced iTunes having not only music but movies and TV shows as well. However, as we saw with the news that the new Wolverine movie was leaked, that they will always be people out there that will do their best to subvert the law. Hopefully, they will be a day where that creation of all kind can be shared with all parties receiving what they want.