LESSON 1

• Social Issues:

  • Concerns about cyberbullying, communication breakdown, defamation of character, identity theft, cyberbullying, gaming addiction, and privacy issues
• Legal Issues:

  • Issues and questions regarding laws and the internet
  • Copyright laws protect original works, but not ideas or facts
  • Copyright Act of 1976 grants exclusive rights to the copyright holder
  • Copyright protects various works such as literary, musical, dramatic works, pictorial, graphic, sculptural works, motion pictures, sound recordings, architectural works, compilations, written words, and software programs
• Copyright holder has exclusive rights such as reproduction, derivative works, distribution, performance, display, audio & video transmission
• Copyright is automatically created on original works
• Copyrights created after January 1, 1978 have protection during the life of the author plus 70 years
• In the case of more than one author, the protection term is 70 years after the death of the last surviving member
• In a 'Work-Made-For-Hire', the protection term is 95 years from first publication or 120 years from the year of creation
• Once copyrights expire, they become part of the public domain and are free to use by anyone
• In a 'Work-Made-For-Hire', the person hiring holds the copyright, not the designer or author
• If work was prepared by an employee within job duties, the employer holds the copyright
• Websites are an odd variation to the 'Work-Made-For-Hire' rule, where the website designer holds the copyright unless specified otherwise in the contract
• Child Online Protection Act (COPA) makes it a crime to publish harmful sexual material to minors for commercial purposes without restricting access
• Online harassment can occur through email, chat rooms, instant messaging, newsgroup posts, or message board posts
• When writing in a blog or posting to a message board, avoid writing untrue things about people that may affect their reputation
• Hate speech is protected under the first amendment in the U.S. except when it crosses into threats, intimidation, racial slurs, or hostility
• Web speech under Communism is heavily controlled, with actions to block certain websites and monitor users' online activities
• Ethical issues include ensuring equal access to media and technology to avoid the "digital divide" and enforcing acceptable use policies
• Privacy online is a key ethical question, balancing creativity and freedom of expression with concerns about mass surveillance
• Big data collection raises ethical questions about who the data is collected about, who makes decisions about it, and how reliable it is
• Net neutrality is the principle that all internet content should flow freely without discrimination, but it is increasingly challenged
• Access to the internet raises ethical questions about whether it should be seen as a human right and how to create equality in internet access