Ethics Pre-Finals CaseStudy

1. Think about Napster, both in its original free form and in its new incarnation as a paid music subscription service. Now think of Lessig's "modalities of constraint":

• Law
• Social Norm
• Market
• Code

How did each modality play a role in the history of Napster? What values do you think were embedded in each? Which modality "won"?

Answer:


- Napster is a name given to two music-focused online services. It was originally founded as a pioneering peer to peer file sharing Internet service that emphasized sharing audio files, typically music, encoded in mp3 format. Lessig's "modalities of constraint" of Law I think this is an absent in Napster because it is against the Copyright Law, its like copying it without paying for it. Just a click or two and a few minutes later you can have the music or audio files you want, you can also play it as many times as you want. If you like it, you might send it to a dozen of your closest friends. It affects the artists and the composers, why? Because they do not gaining profit for their work. Social Norm, the rules that a group uses for appropriate and inappropriate values, beliefs, attitudes and behaviors. These rules may be explicit or implicit. Failure to stick to the rules can result in severe punishments, the most feared of which is exclusion from the group. A common rule is that the some norms must frequently be displayed neutrality is seldom an option so that in this case this is not ethical to the Social Norm because Napster is also like stealing or like a theft. It also affects the Market because they also do not gaining profit from the albums that they are selling. Code Lessig means both hardware and software both computers themselves and the series of zeros and ones that program how they perform. The modality Law won, because these can protect the artists and composers work.

2. How do you think Michael Eisner of Disney would respond to Courtney Love?

Answer:

- When you look at the legal line on a CD, it says copyright 1976 Atlantic Records or copyright 1996 RCA Records. When you look at a book, though, it’ll say something like copyright 1999 Susan Faludi, or David Foster Wallace . Authors own their books and license them to publishers. When the contract

runs out, writers gets their books back. But re c o rd companies own our copyrights forever.

Last November, a Congressional aide…with the support of the RIAA, added a “technical amendment” to a bill that defined recorded music as “works for hire” under the 1978 Copyright Act. …

That subtle change in copyright law will add billions of dollars to re c o rd company bank accounts over the next few years — billions of dollars that rightfully should have been paid to artists. A “work for hire” is now owned in perpetuity by the record company.

3. Lars Ulrich would no doubt be as aware as Courtney Love of the "math" involved in signing with a major recording company. Yet he and his band, Metallica, joined the RIAA in suing Napster. In what way might he respond to love's argument?

Answer:

- In these way he respond to love's argument , Lars Ulrich: Obviously, it was our concern, 'our' meaning the four members of the band. The record company had nothing to do with it whatsoever. There has been no [support] from the record companies; they never instigated anything, so we took it upon ourselves, there was never really much in term of support. There's been the occasional pat on the back, the occasional call, but I would say that I'm quite, I'd say, more than surprised, I'm quite stunned at the lack of communication and input from the record company. Obviously, you know, with record companies we never really usually depend much on what they have to offer in terms of creative things, but I am stunned at the low volume of support from the record company, both publically and privately. That leaves the record company out if it.