1. “YouTube has no ethics, it's been created for the sole purpose of entertainment and money.” Do you agree?
YouTube is a popular free website where people can watch and share videos through websites, blogs and emails. There is no need to download codes or files to view the videos. Youtube makes viewing video content simple and pleasant. It also has a lot of free videos and shows without having the legal rights, thus attracting more people, who want to view the videos for free. Does YouTube has ethics in allowing its users to post copyrighted materials? My answer is no. To me, ethics is a set of principles of right conduct, and, using copyrighted materials without the permission of the copyright holder is not acceptable. Although the user is at fault if he posts copyrighted or insulting materials, the distributor is also to be blamed for not setting up restrictions. Thus, I agree that Youtube has no ethics in allowing users to publish copyrighted and offensive contents.
Recently, YouTube is banned in Thailand after a 44 second film showing graffiti over the king’s head was aired. Youtube declined to remove it even though the Thai government requested them to. While You Tube’s intention is commendable in promoting free expression and speech through the uploading of contents and medium of all types, it is however an infringement of personal privacy and rights if such contents are illegally obtained or published without the consent of the original holder.
Youtube is created with the sole purpose of entertainment. It has millions of users and viewers and up to 60,000 videos are uploaded each day, with unauthorized clips of popular videos being viewed more than 1.5 billion times. I believe almost everyone has at least viewed a video on YouTube before. The popularity of YouTube is increasing, with more and more people visiting the site for entertainment purposes. However I do not agree that it had been created for money and profit. The main purpose for the creation of YouTube was to allow others to watch and share videos for free. Moreover, the creators of YouTube didn’t expect it to be such a huge success in the first place. Therefore, I feel that YouTube has been created with the sole purpose of entertainment but not for money.
On mar 13, Viacom Inc. announced that it has sued YouTube and Google in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York for massive intentional copyright infringement of Viacom’s entertainment properties. The suit seeks more than $1 billion in damages, as well as an injunction prohibiting Google and YouTube from further copyright infringement. The complaint contends that almost 160,000 unauthorized clips of Viacom’s programming have been available on YouTube and that these clips had been viewed more than 1.5 billion times( http://www.viacom.com/view_release.jhtml?inID=10000040&inReleaseID=227614) The lawsuit is a clear illustration that YouTube business model is under challenge and the outcome of the ruling will have a major impact on many people and companies. Some people may be unhappy if all these unauthorized contents are removed as they do not want to spend unnecessary money viewing these clips and music videos. Still, copyright infringement is illegal and it is best if those clips were to be removed.
In conclusion, I feel that YouTube has no ethics as it allows users to publish anything they want, ranging from copyrighted to offensive contents. However, this situation is improving as the site has taken off plenty of copyrighted materials recently. But, no matter how hard they try, there will still be more videos which are violating copyrights and are offensive to others. Therefore, I urge users to think twice before uploading and publishing these illegal contents.
posted by shermaine @ 4/19/2007 10:32:00 PM
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