An Analysis of An Analysis: Copyright Laws

           After browsing the FAIR website for a while, there was one specific article that was particularly interesting and eye-catching. It was a criticism of a New York Times article calling for a strengthening of copyright laws, specifically musical copyright laws. While this Times article argued that the current laws in place already should be strengthened, FAIR thought otherwise. Unlike the Times, FAIR argued that strengthening them would only cause harm to America's overall GDP by 0.24 percent, which in monetary terms is $4.3 billion. Because of this, FAIR argues that instead of strengthening current copyright laws, new creative licensing laws must be put in place that are adapted to the technology currently in place.
          While FAIR does make a good point, the fact of the matter is that technology in modern society is growing so rapidly, and new platforms for music distribution are popping up so frequently, that it is nigh impossible to come up with a proper set of laws that deals with every nook and cranny of music streaming or viewing on the internet. If laws were set in place that did something along the lines of possibly forcing users to pay to view music videos on a site such as YouTube, the backlash would be unfathomable. Dealing with a site like YouTube that provides viewers with free access to music is only one of the many difficulties that lawmakers are facing in terms of dealing with copyright laws. The main flaw with this FAIR article is that it simply points out the flaws in other arguments without presenting a concrete counter solution on what should be done, it only says that something should be done, without doing a thing about it. While it does contain an insightful, and correct view, the article itself is simply complaining about the changes that need to be made without actually trying to invoke them.

FAIR article: http://fair.org/home/nyt-calls-for-stronger-copyright-protection-without-calculating-the-costs/