Argument Paper

OPEN SOURCE IS GREAT

Introduction

The new millennium brought about changes that forever changed the ways that we do things, at the forefront of these changes was the internet. We can now access millions of websites full of information with the press of a button, using only one or two words. We can now pay all of our bills online and check our bank accounts using the World Wide Web. We now have electronic mail available to us and may use it more than the telephone. There are social-networking sites, like myspace and facebook, where an individual can have millions of friends. There are video sites such as, youtube, where anybody can become a star. And pioneering most of this was Napster, the file-sharing website which allowed peer-to-peer swaps of media files.

Napster, founded by Shawn Fanning, went online in June of 1999, and ran 13 months successfully before being shut down due to copyright violations. The heavy metal rock band Metallica, and later rapper Dr. Dre, sought legal action against Napster in 2000, after discovering that their entire studio works were available for free on the website. Both responded in writing, asking that their respective catalogs be removed from the service, but were forced to file in court. One year of litigations later, Napster was forced to settle both suits, however this happened only after a mandatory shut down by the Ninth Circuit Court, due to a separate lawsuit from several major record labels.

In retrospect, not everyone agreed with the idea that Napster was ruining album sales. English rockers Radionhead found glory in the form of a #1 album, thanks mostly to Napster. It's estimated that millions of free downloads of their album, Kid A, took place in the month prior to its release. However, that didn't seem to hurt sales any, as the album took top honors in its debut week. The band Dispatch owes Napster for its rise to fame. Being independent and having no real promotion or radio play didn't stop Dispatch from selling out concerts across the country, thanks to the sharing of their music on Napster. So I ask, is file sharing hurting the recording industry, or has it helped fuel the rise to stardom that some performers may have never seen?

What a week it has been…

Well, I am finally getting time to write my blog post. Where do I start? I guess since it is a blog, I am allowed to share what's been going on with me… First the brakes on my truck went out and I had to replace a caliper and brake lines. Then the thing wouldn't start, so I had to test every little thing, finally narrowing it down to the ignition module. This is the first time I have been online all week. I have been reading and discarding numerous articles that I had hoped would help me with my research paper. I think that I am finally starting to get a few that are useful, one being: http://www.albany.edu/~pm157/research/The%20Impact%20of%20Illegal%20Peer-to-Peer%20File-Sharing%20on%20the%20Media%20Industry.pdf. I still have several more to read and decide if they are going to be of any use to me or not, I hope that I will be making another post either tomorrow or Saturday.

Just Kicking the Can Around…

I'm not 100% sure about which topic I will be writing my research paper, but these are a few ideas I have: 1) the decline of concrete media sales due to digital formats; 2) the modern day DJ: digital vs. analog; and 3) is file-sharing good or bad for the music industry? Over the next week, I will be doing preliminary research on each of these topics to help myself discover which direction I would like too go with my research paper. All three of these topics present a level of interest to myself, and hopefully others also.

A Brief Introduction

Welcome to MY World… My parents named me Joseph when I was born, but I now go by Joe, it's much more casual. I attend Purdue North Central in Northwestern Indiana, where I am seeking a Bachelor's of Science degree in Biology, in hopes of one day becoming an orthopedic surgeon. I have an eleven year old daughter, who wants to attend Harvard Law School and become a lawyer. After many ups and downs through my life I feel I am now on my way to becoming the person I was meant to be. Who exactly that is, I am still unsure of, but I cannot wait to finally meet him.