Running head: Critique of Copying Isnt Cool

Critique of Copying Isnt Cool

Iman Askari
American University of Sharjah

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The article Copying isnt Cool, is written by Scott Matthews, who works as a software
developer. He graduated in 1992 from Cornell University in New York, United States from the
discipline of Computer Science. Moreover, he often writes about file-sharing and builds
programs to help stream music on the internet by law and ethics. The author himself is a software
developer, meaning he has sufficient knowledge about the depth of the problem, and has
sympathy towards other digital authors, whose works are illegally being shared by breaching the
copyright laws. Additionally, he has won the first prize from MIT Media Lab for his digital
graffiti project called Curator. In this article, the author draws the readers attention towards
the subject of piracy related to copyright material, which are available online. Also, that the
current system of copyright reserves more rights, than other proposed systems, hence it should
not be replaced with its alternatives. The author has effectively created an article that is wellorganized containing arguments that fairly persuade the reader, but lacks the essence of having
sufficient supports for its arguments.
In the article, the author introduces the issue of illegal file-sharing over Peer to Peer
networks like the internet. Henceforth, a group of academics and civil libertarians have brought
together a new system of copyright, called The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) that intents
to establish a tax on every digital media downloaded over the internet. The amount collected
would then be distributed among the creators of the work. Further down the road, the author
states that as the number of file-sharing increases, the tougher it would be to halt it,
demonstrating how poor the copyright system is currently. However, Matthews believes that, this
would be of no proof to how bad the current system is. He rather thinks that it would be better if
EFF would present details of its system, and let the authors decide for themselves rather than
imposing it on them. On the other hand, for such a system to be running the government should

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take a role as well, by collecting the tax and paying it back to those whose music have been
downloaded. But, Matthew mentions a problem, the government is the one who collects the tax,
which is known to be an unreliable source, meaning the government would not pay those, whom
he considers to have created offensive work. Also to keep in mind, the author states that one
main goal of the new system is to compensate for un-popular works, which requires the
government to create a technical system that can monitor users activity in order to distinguish
less popular works, thus followed by privacy issue. Henceforth, to avoid the privacy concern,
the new system would impel the record companies to certify their work voluntarily, and then
people could download and pay voluntarily. This is indeed what the current system of copyright
is doing. Therefore, by changing the copyright system, nor there would be any improvement, but
also would cause more delusion.
The article was well written in the sense that, the authors ideas were well-organized with
good reasoning and coherence; enabling his reader to follow with the rhythm of the text.
Furthermore, the author was also quite fair by taking both sides into consideration. For instance,
he gives a statement that opposes his thesis, saying that the current system should be scrapped,
because of how file-sharing has already advanced so much, that it is now extremely hard to
completely terminate it. Nevertheless, in the succeeding paragraph, he was able to reject the
statement successfully with a suitable counter argument. Likewise, the author emphasizes on
copyright in general, not just music or softwares, but all digitally produced works. In terms of
information accuracy, the article did provide accurate data to show why the EFF copyright
system would fail without it even being tested. It firstly mentions that the governments are not
trustworthy nor loyal to their community, and would not fairly spread the tax earned to the
authors. Moreover, they would never be so kind and caring to invest such great amounts to

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monitor internet usage. In addition, that privacy debates would rise, and not let such monitoring
act take place, even if the government funds it.
The author seems to be an open minded person. He is not fully against the change in laws
of file-sharing, but instead asks for a debate to analyze the topic from all angles and perspectives.
This problem has merely risen from ignorant people, who do not respect others rights and engage
in file-sharing activities. In addition, mentioning the authors tone, the author is concerned, and
distressed by what he sees daily around himself. Moreover, the language he uses in the article is
academic, with fairly simple and appropriate vocabulary that can be easily interpreted by average
readers. However, in this article, as a reader, you could sense a bit of informality, followed by
some personal touches to add on the persuasiveness of the article. Henceforth, some of his
statements were based on opinions. For example, he states that It is just that the government is
not going to pay the author when they are. Without supports, the audience would not have any
background information about the reputation of the government. Hence, such a statement could
be classified as an opinion. In addition, he as well, says that this is also the same government
that has a long record of denying public funding for offensive art. The author has not
provided any evidence to the statement. He could have given the name of the government, rather
than marking the government as a bad reputed; not necessary all governments would break
their promise. There may not be many, but surly few successful governments that serve and
support their society with maximum capacity. Furthermore, the author talks about the destructive
effect file-sharing has had on the music industry, perhaps some numbers and statistics on how
much this industry has lost during the last decade due to illegal sharing of music would be
helpful. This is because figures and numbers can make the scenario more straightforward,
helping the readers to understand. This way the reader can realize the importance, of how

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terrifying the situation has become, from the time downloading is the only means of getting
digital media. Hence, this article cannot be used as a credible source, because, in some cases the
thoughts were not supported with examples, and are not based on facts.
In conclusion, the article in spite of its pros and cons was quite persuasive. The author
showed a great understanding of the topic, and was able to illustrate the scenario fairly and open
mindedly at the same time. The language he used to synchronize with the tone of the article,
enabled his readers to not lose track and stay dedicated. Even though some arguments needed
backup with facts and figures, the author could still demonstrate a good reasoning of ideas. The
article was overall a success in the sense of persuasion, but with some backings, it could have an
enormous impact on its readers. However, the article cannot be referred to as a credible source
for another paper; on its own, it has done a decent job in convincing its readers.