shamu726 Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 In recent weeks the music industry has started to target the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) website over tens of thousands of copyright infringements. The deviant behavior doesn't come from typical pirates though, but from children using the Scratch project to share 'their' creative expressions. Kids love to be creative and in today’s world, tablets and computers offer a wealth of options to do so. One of these creative playgrounds is the visual programming language Scratch, which has been in development at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for over a decade. “With Scratch, you can program your own interactive stories, games, and animations — and share your creations with others in the online community,” the project explains. Scratch targets children between the ages of 8 and 16, who can create and remix works of art through an easy to use web-based interface. The tool has become quite popular in recent years with over 12 million projects being shared. More recently, however, it also gained the attention of copyright holders. Over the past months music industry group BPI sent tens of thousands of takedown notices targeting the creative playground, pointing out the use of various pirated tracks. Indeed, upon closer inspection it appears that many kids projects feature songs of popular artists. “Credit to the Internet for pictures” Many of the young creators may not be aware of their infringing acts, but the major music labels certainly are. MIT doesn’t publish any details on takedown notices but Google alone has received close to 40,000 alerts referencing infringing “scratch.mit.edu” URLs. This makes the MIT website one of the top pirate sites on the Internet, and definitely the most infringing educational domain. Interestingly, the youngsters are not completely oblivious to the concept of copyright. One user addresses the issue in the Scratch forums, asking whether it’s okay to use copyrighted music in his creations. Other members quickly chimed in concluding that this type of use is permitted. “Yep! Scratch has a special license that lets you use copyrighted music and other things – just be sure to give credit to anything you don’t own,” one commenter wrote. “We’re technically protected under fair use because scratch is ‘educational’,” another comment added. While this may sound reassuring it’s also a bit misguided. Scratch certainly doesn’t have a license to use all copyrighted music and even the educational argument could be contested in court. The people behind the Scratch project seem to be aware of the potential issues. The site has a DMCA takedown policy in place which allows rightsholders to remove content, but not before giving it a second thought. “In assessing whether or not a Scratch user has violated your copyrights, please keep in mind that Scratch is an educational and not-for-profit initiative, seeking to aid children’s learning by providing the tools for them to learn and express themselves using digital technology,” the Scratch project writes. “We hope you also see Scratch not only as a good way of popularizing your creations/website but also as an opportunity to do something good for children’s education,” it adds. If copyright holders still want to take down the kids’ creations they are welcome to do so, but they should think of the children first… Luckily for the BPI and other copyright groups Scratch isn’t all bad. They would certainly appreciate this home-made anti-piracy PSA created by one Scratcher, for example. “Don’t steal things” Source: TorrentFreak Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SURbit Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 The little bugars got game - no wait scratch that ! Instead of artists seeing dollars lost (which I'm sure some of these kids probably have bought some of their works) and then looking at it as a form of flattery to themselves - is beyond me... Look now we have many articles of clothing and non-clothing that we buy with someone's name on it, in essences paying to advertise for them, is this not then advertising for these artists in a way too. You can't wear a song per se. I think there needs to be some limit to the powers of copyrights and DMCA in the world, just as in SubWay trying a coining of the term "footlong" - if that was allow and not shot down - others would have to use log(s) or some other description. *An abstract view - words of songs couldn't be sung by anyone, more or less using the words that are part of a song, as part of everyday speech wouldn't be allowed. Profits are alright and art is alright but, when and where do you draw the line, art is for the enjoyment of many but, profits are for the pockets of the few. No I'm not talking of taken something of somebodies and re-something to it and making money but, re-something it to the enjoyment of others without any profit ! I'd hate to see greed stifle creativeness and expression. Our bodies are composed of one of some things and two of other things, but look how advertising has a way of giving us many options for these oneies and twoies . Shouldn't it also be true of art in this digital age with the forms of expression and creativeness but, without profits ? I think artists for profit are afraid of competition in a sector of not for profit or at the least of being bested at something they did that makes them money... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VileTouch Posted January 28, 2016 Share Posted January 28, 2016 On 25/1/2016 at 4:52 AM, SURbit said: just as in SubWay trying a coining of the term "footlong" https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=foot+long Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.