Internet safety continues

With knowledge comes fear. The issues of cyber-crime has made internet surfing really insecure. A lot of the internet users today use the internet because no other option is within reach. The sophistication of these cyber criminals are growing daily. The question many internet surfers pose is whether cyber security is growing as well.

Well! Desperate criminals have to be fought with desperate measures.

Cyber security companies are not relentless in their fight to supersede the sophistication of these criminals. Just recently, the Apricorn Aegis soft wear company created a well- protected hard- drive. This hard drive is one of a kind, it assurance of security is awesome. The Apricorn Aegies Padlock Encrypted Hard Drive even, protects your data from a computer you just got done using. This video below gives a little glimpse about the sophistication of this piece of equipment.     

For Kids many educational videos are posted everyday on the internet to create awareness of the safety levels of social media. Some of these videos are also supposed to help parent reinforce these information about internet criminals to their children. Children using social media are warned in so many ways to know who to add and how to identify predators. 

Cyber-crime and Justification!

The World Wide Web is growing daily, so the world of crime never stops growing.  Nearly obsolete are big bank robberies with high tech machine guns and armory in developed nations. Though, cyber-crimes seem to have lesser amount of causalities, the financial loss seems to be enormously huge. To some cyber criminals– it is just a game, and not a crime.

Today, these so- called games have revolutionized in dynamic varieties making it difficult for people not to question even the most genuine enterprise. Recently, a lot of cyber criminals have started using “kick-starter– [which] is a public funding website for creative projects,” as a means to dupe their victims. Thereby, making a lot of donors question the authenticity of the original kick-starter website. Apparently, these donors would not be blamed for trying to save themselves from being duped. But, the financial support of these talented persons all over the world is in jeopardy.

Further, the number of people who have lost their life-savings to these- so called lucky gamers –is embarrassing. Just in 2000, an American lost his life savings to some Nigerian cyber- criminals known as 419. These guys send random email to their victims in promise for oil, land, and riches of some sort. Unfortunately, a middle aged lady bought into it and sent them her life-savings. If both parties were greedy it is not in my opinion to say. What matters is that the crime was committed.

Fortunately, there have been growing solutions to cyber-crimes. In some countries in Europe, the government have created some sort of strategies to improve cyber security. Some others have cyber police who monitor the web to make sure crime is controlled. In Nigeria, some American News reporters work with the government to track and catch cyber- criminals in internet cafes. There have been enormous improvements, but does this mean that crime can be abated? No. Like other crimes, it won’t be completely ceased, but a reduction in the amount of people engaging in these crimes will decline a great deal.

My property and My World: Intellectual property and a shared culture.

Creativity and creation goes together. Creation has evolved in its creativity from time to time, from generation to generation. The human mind was designed to think and create; so came, elegant arts, music, technology and all of human’s magnificent handiwork.

Apparently, humans do not just create; they create to gain gratification from their creation. We humans are social beings. We all have needs and these needs are the vehicle to creative thinking. In such manner, people seek for various means of solving their needs. Some depend on other people’s solutions of the same problem to fulfill their needs, and some create different methods for themselves and others to use.

Our world of today cannot do without both kinds of humans- the consumers and the innovators. Without the consumers there will be no gratification for the innovators, and without the innovators there will be no gratification for the consumers. Also, both categories are interchangeable based on need, time, place, and ability.

In the internet world, for example, properties are created and gratifications are given. People upload their intellectual properties in the internet for financial or appraisal gratifications from the world seeing, using, learning, exploring, and expanding on the uploaded ideas.

The internet help create a verse audience and more market for some innovators. Some of these innovators who use the internet to gain financial gratification of their intellectual properties complain that their properties are being reproduced illegally. But, very few of them will tell you that they lost money from some consumers pirating their products. For example, Gaimen, an illustrious writer in his video on Copy Right Piracy and the Web  agrees that Piracy has helped him gain more audience.

In conclusion, intellectual properties are meant to be shared by whatever means, so far gratification is achieved. The web is the best means of exchanging these properties no matter the problem that it faces. The Web reaches more audience through assumed problem like piracy. And when an innovator reaches more audience, more intellectual gratifications are reached. Our problem should not be stopping piracy, but using it to our advantages.

Intellectual Property and Cover Versions

According to U.S Copyright laws, the “Smooth Criminal” released by the Alien Ant Farm is a fair use.

Despite the fact that the Alien Ant Farm made some money from the music, they used the sound track and some wordings in M.J’s song as a cover to their music.  According to Wikipedia.org, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song. This is permitted by copy right so far tribute is given to the original musician and other necessary authorizations are gotten.

In addition, I do not think the Alien Ant Farm version of the “Smooth Criminal” sold more copy or devalued the original Michael Jackson’s Version of the song- Smooth Criminal.

I believe all parties benefited from the remix of the song. Though lots of critiques are saying that the remix was a mockery of the original version, but I think it makes the original version more appreciative. It reminds people about the Legend M.J. And the presentation would make anyone want to listen to the original version. For the audience, the creativity in the rewriting of the song is really interesting and fun to watch. This particular video has over 22 million viewers on youtube.com. So, I feel it is a brilliant job- not an original- but captivating.

In reiteration, the  I think the author  in “Walking on Eggshells,” Jordan Roseman, means that when your creativity is new to the market it is still yours, but when it becomes popular enough to have earned you enough credit, as deemed by the society, then, it becomes the property of the public. For example, the smooth criminal and most of Michael Jackson’s music have in one time or another being used as a cover for other artists’ music. All he receives is just attribute and No Cash Money.

Though I agree with Jordan Roseman’s central idea, I may not agree with her rationale using the numerical values; 100% and 0%. If she had use70% and 30% respectively, I would have agreed with her idea on remix/ reuse. In the smooth criminal by Alien Ant Farm, creativity was only used in the wording, which was not still 100%. Most credit will still go to the music legend M.J.