I found Professor Sikand’s discussion to be very interesting and eye-opening. The points that stuck out to me most is what the viewers don’t see: the money involved when a song is on the radio, how shots are altered, etc. As viewers, I think we assume–or at least I often do–that the shots are displayed were filmed just that way and did not require much thought. Much to the contrary, filmmaking is incredibly detail oriented as Professor Sikand pointed out on Thursday. We only seem to notice, however, when things look wrong or out of place.

I found the discussion that we had about the haka on Thursday to be very interesting. It exemplified the complications of international copyright law. I went on Youtube to try to find different groups who performed the Haka.

Here is the closest clip I could find as an “original.” You’ll notice that it much longer than the other clips that I have linked to this post. The people also seem to have more passion when performing it.

This clip is the Haka plus a translation performed by the All Blacks. I found it interesting that the Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable defined the haka as “A Maori ceremonial war dance involving chanting, an imitation of which is performed by New Zealand rugby teams before a match.” It has become a trademark (perhaps not in the legal sense) of the team.

This clip is the Haka as it was shown in the movie Invictus. Lastly, this clip is the Haka as performed by the University of Hawaii swim team. Is it right that the Maori’s chant to be used in these contexts?

The New York Times included an article about Mr. Chinua Achebe today because he passed away at the age of 82. I remember being captivated by Things Fall Apart when I was required to read it in 8th grade and then sophomore year of high school. I included the article in my blog post, though, because of the following excerpt:

He continued to believe that writers and storytellers ultimately held more power than army strongmen.

“Only the story can continue beyond the war and the warrior,” an old soothsayer observes in Mr. Achebe’s 1988 novel, “Anthills of the Savannah.” “It is the story that saves our progeny from blundering like blind beggars into the spikes of the cactus fence. The story is our escort; without it, we are blind.”

This course has pushed me to think about the importance of literature. The Tedx video, Brooks talk, and this article all highlight the power and influence of storytelling. This influence is not bound to authors and literature. Rather, we communicate through stories all of the time.

http://www.abc15.com/dpp/sports/sports_blogs_national/ncaa-basketball-tournament-2013-pres-obama-reveals-final-four-picks

Despite this articles goal I thought of it a different way.  Everyone seems to fill out a bracket around the time of March Madness.  Often the opinions of analysts are listened to by the many fans and they use it to make certain picks.  My question is is this copyright if someones uses someone else’s article to pick a team and they aren’t given credit for it?  This may seem like a ridiculous question but my point is where does the use of others ideas stop being copyright and start being allowed.

The Brown Bag was very informative and once again it was curious to see the opinions of someone who actually has to deal with copyright.  She was a very good speaker and I liked how she incorporated media into her presentation.  I also found her opinion on copyright to be interesting as it was negative.  This opinion was probably formed by the many hoops she has to jump through to simply have a song in her movies.

“For the purpose of this honor system, the use by a student of someone else’s material with intention of using it for credit as if it were his own”   This is a quote which the is the definition of what plagiarism is.  I found it interesting the use of the word “intention.

Recently, Nintendo lost a lawsuit to Tomita Technologies over the 3DS, more specifically, the 3D technology used on the 3DS. Tomita Technologies owns the patent on a specific technology for 3D viewing without the need for extra devices, which ended up being used on the 3DS. Once this was found out, Nintendo was found guilty of infringement  and fined over $30 million.

The interesting thing is, while the idea and patent belong to Tomita Technologies, they did not use it. In the mean time, Nintendo used it, released a product and made a huge profit. In that regard, was Tomita Technologies actually “harmed” in anyway? Or were they merely fighting to say they had the idea first?

Article: Here

One sentence in Goldstein’s book Copyright’s Highway that really stuck out to me is when he plainly states, “private copying cannot be regulated”. As simple as this statement is, I feel it could not be more true. It was refreshing to hear Goldstein state this since I think it is something everyone has thought at one point or another in relation to America’s copyright system. No matter how much the copyright system improves in the years to come, I don’t think that private copying will ever become totally extinct. There will always be people who know how to get around copyright laws and possess both the technology and wit for doing so.

I recently stumbled upon this website that lists and discusses a bunch of famous copyright infringement cases in relation to the music industry. I thought it was really interesting to find that so many well-known artists have been accused of copyright infringement. It makes me wonder which of these artists are actually guilty of intended infringement and which of them simply chose an unlucky string of words to be in their song.