Blown to Bits: Ch. 6
Statutory Damages - correct answer ✔The rationale for statutory damages is
to ensure that the penalty is sufficient to deter infringement even when actual
damages to the copyright holder are small. The scale of the damages has
dreadful consequences in the age of digital reproduction, because each time a
song is copied (uploaded or downloaded), it counts as a separate
infringement.
Copyright infringement - correct answer ✔Copyright infringement was not
even a criminal matter in the U.S. until the turn of the twentieth century,
although an infringer could be sued for civil damages. Infringement with a
profit motive first became a crime in 1897. Without a commercial motive, there
was no crime
No Electronic Theft (NET) Act - correct answer ✔The 1997 No Electronic
Theft (NET) Act. Described by its supporters as "closing the loophole"
demonstrated by the MIT bulletin board, NET criminalized any unauthorized
copying with retail value over $1000, commercially motivated or not.
Peer-to-peer Architectures - correct answer ✔Peer-to-peer architectures
make vastly more efficient use of the network than centralized systems. In a
centralized system, if many users want to download files, they must all get the
files from the central server, whose connection to the Internet would
consequently become a bottleneck as the number of users grows. In a peer-
to-peer system, the central server itself need communicate only a tiny amount
of directory information, while the large network load for transmitting the files
is distributed over the Internet connections of all the users.
Secondary infringement - correct answer ✔Copyright law distinguishes
between two kinds of secondary infringement. The first is contributory
infringement—i.e., knowingly providing tools that enable others to infringe.
The second is vicarious infringement—i.e., profiting from the infringement of
Statutory Damages - correct answer ✔The rationale for statutory damages is
to ensure that the penalty is sufficient to deter infringement even when actual
damages to the copyright holder are small. The scale of the damages has
dreadful consequences in the age of digital reproduction, because each time a
song is copied (uploaded or downloaded), it counts as a separate
infringement.
Copyright infringement - correct answer ✔Copyright infringement was not
even a criminal matter in the U.S. until the turn of the twentieth century,
although an infringer could be sued for civil damages. Infringement with a
profit motive first became a crime in 1897. Without a commercial motive, there
was no crime
No Electronic Theft (NET) Act - correct answer ✔The 1997 No Electronic
Theft (NET) Act. Described by its supporters as "closing the loophole"
demonstrated by the MIT bulletin board, NET criminalized any unauthorized
copying with retail value over $1000, commercially motivated or not.
Peer-to-peer Architectures - correct answer ✔Peer-to-peer architectures
make vastly more efficient use of the network than centralized systems. In a
centralized system, if many users want to download files, they must all get the
files from the central server, whose connection to the Internet would
consequently become a bottleneck as the number of users grows. In a peer-
to-peer system, the central server itself need communicate only a tiny amount
of directory information, while the large network load for transmitting the files
is distributed over the Internet connections of all the users.
Secondary infringement - correct answer ✔Copyright law distinguishes
between two kinds of secondary infringement. The first is contributory
infringement—i.e., knowingly providing tools that enable others to infringe.
The second is vicarious infringement—i.e., profiting from the infringement of
