Copyright and the Internet: The case of Napster

Authors

  • Gülbin Kıranoğlu Kocaeli University

Keywords:

Internet, Information Society, Information Revolution, Copyright, Intellectual Property, Postindustrial Capitalism, Globalization, Mp3, Peer-2-Peer Sharing, Napster

Abstract

In the postindustrial world, information is not only a revolutionary phenomenon but also a valuable commodity of exchange, thereby protected by intellectual property rights, copyrights and patents. The interactive nature of the Internet, however, has complicated the notion of intellectual property leading to the debates of whether or not the Internet should be regulated on such basis. This article aims to understand the turn-of-the-21st-century tension between the record industry and the innovative technology of Napster, regarding the question of validity of the legal concept of copyright in an age of Information Revolution. In this paper, the record industry’s attack on Napster due to its development of “peer-2-peer sharing” service, as one of the earliest sample cases concerning the criminalization of the Cyberspace in relation to the issue of copyright will be examined. To achieve this, following an outline of different approaches to the concepts of information society and information revolution, I will address the fundamental question of whether the notion of intellectual property promotes or controls innovation by focusing on the lawsuit of Napster, Inc. vs. A&M Records, Inc. 

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Author Biography

Gülbin Kıranoğlu, Kocaeli University

Lecturer, Kocaeli University, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Department of Western Languages and Literatures, TURKEY, [email protected].

She holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in American Culture and Literature from Başkent University, Turkey where she also worked as a research assistant. She wrote her MA thesis on the cultural production concerning Generation X, the American youth of 1980s and 1990s. She recently received her PhD degree in Communications from Ankara University, Turkey. In her doctoral dissertation, she studied the urban nostalgia of İstanbul in the mid-20th century. Currently, she is working as a lecturer at Kocaeli University and teaching courses such as "American Literature", "Introduction to Literature", and "Cultural Studies" since 2006.

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Published

2016-06-07

How to Cite

Kıranoğlu, G. (2016). Copyright and the Internet: The case of Napster. Journal of Human Sciences, 13(2), 2758–2767. Retrieved from https://j-humansciences.com/ojs/index.php/IJHS/article/view/3839

Issue

Vol. 13 No. 2 (2016)

Section

Journalism & Mass Communication

License

Uluslararası İnsan Bilimleri Dergisi ISSN:1303-5134
International Journal of Human Sciences ISSN:2458-9489
 
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