Whats with SOPA and PIPA?

Now I know you cannot honestly say that you have not heard a single thing, good or bad, about the two bills senate is trying to pass to stop illegal piracy on the internet. I know that in the past couple days this week I have heard countless comments just on facebook about the two bills and not one has really been towards passing them.

Now I cant really say anything bad about them until I really found out what they were really trying to do. What I found was quite interesting. Now SOPA and PIPA are pretty much the same and their main act is to try and stop online piracy which we all know is clearly out there and have probable all done it for downloading music. I thought about the act and it all is for a good purpose but I also found that if it was enacted by the U.S. government it would end up shutting down countless websites including damaging some big name ones like Youtube, Wikipedia, and Google. All these big name websites are now protesting both bills. I mean just in this blog I used a link from Wikipedia. I do feel that trying to stop online piracy is a great thing to do but if we passed it and all these major websites were lost what would happen to all the people working for them. People need jobs, that we all can agree on. Youtube put out a statistic this past week that said they were going to protest the SOPA bill and shut down all copyrighted vides that SOPA would say were illegal but decided not to because that would mean shutting down 90% of all videos on the website. Thats just downright crazy!

There is also one more thing that I found but couldn’t quite fully prove but find it quite interesting. I read a post on facebook that said that for downloading a Michael Jackson illegaly you can be sentenced to a maximum of five years in prison which is one more year than the doctor who killed him is in jail for. Now, I cant fully prove it but I find that pretty dangerous and not supporting for the bill in itself. Now all in all I am truly down for stopping online piracy but I wouldnt vote for it until there are some changes made to it for sentencing and to help with keeping major websites in the U.S. Lets try and find a happy medium.

Are We all Losing Our Sense of Ethics and Morals ?

Found on osocio.org

As I have just found out this past week, there is a difference between ethics and morals. A big one at that. Ethics are recognized as the rules of conduct in a culture or society and morals are your own personal rules of conduct that you believe are right. I never had any clue that there was a distinct difference between the two but as I look around me and think about certain things I realize more and more that peoples ethics and morals are incredibly different.

One big thing I have been seeing is the the ethics of public media are sliding downhill. I keep hearing more and more stories about how journalists are coming up with more and more lies to try and get the next big ‘scoop’. They tell somebody they are not to get to talk to them and find out information, completely ditching the old ethics of journalism which was to interview somebody face to face and let them know who you really are and who you are working for. This is some of the stuff I think that needs to be stopped. Why do you need to lie to get something ?

Some of my morals that I have always lived with is the way I dress and my family shares the same morals about it to. When I look around at school I see pants around peoples knees and having to walk like a penguin to keep them up. I understand that sure it might be comfortable but there is a time and a place for everything. I dont see why you cant just buy the right size pair of pants and where them like they’re supposed to be worn. I know that I will never dress like that because of my own personal morals and views and I understand that the code of public ethics will never fully agree with me but I just want to know whats wrong with a pair of pants that dont show your boxers and use a belt for its purpose.

Is a Picture Worth 1,000 Words Anymore ?

I used to think that when you take a picture you got whatever you saw but now a days with new software and technology you can create anything with a few clicks of a mouse.

With these new advances in software and technology, photographers are trying to bend the rules with editing a seemingly boring shot into the headline of the week. The most unique story I found on distortion allegations was on a photographer for a newspaper in Ohio that was fired for a pair of missing legs in a photo of a memorial silence. Allan Dietrich was caught when somebody noticed a similiar picture, taken from the same angle of Dietrich’s, had a pair of legs in the background. The craziest part was that once the allegations were made he was under investigation for all of his submitted photos for the year. They found that out of the 947 photographs he submitted, 79 were visibly altered when viewed by editing professionals.

The number one way to distort these photographs is using photoshop, the number one, top rated online computer software training. Many photographers, in my opinion, are using photoshop right now but are just not being caught. I think that the creators of photoshop should make a software program that will detect an image if it has been tampered in any way, or photographers computers should be monitored and swept of any photoshop programs to stop it. There is no reason to photoshop anything. If you dont like the photograph you took, then you just missed your shot. Think about 50 years ago. You only had one shot to take it so you made that shot count. Now a days with cameras that take up to like ten shots a second you would think that you would have enough good shots to choose from but still we find photographers changing photos.

Now changing photos varies in the severe amount of changes, but any changes still count as forgery. I found another story of a photographer fired for just altering the sky colors in the background of the picture. Other photographers commented on both stories saying that editing brings shame to the profession. This just proves that editing is wrong in any form. If you cant get the good shot than just live with what you got. I only hope that we can crackdown on all the photographers editing their photos trying to make a better shot, even if it didnt happen. I hope that we can keep “One picture is worth 1,000 words” and not become “One picture is worth 1,000 different possibilities.”

Facebook & Twitter: New Evidence File for Libel ?

Found on nndb.com

So I was looking on google for recent cases of libel or defamation and I came across one that involved evidence from Twitter and I knew I had to read it. Apparently actress and musician, Courtney Love, lost a defamation case to a fashion designer and is now being forced to pay $430,000 for posting multiple defamatory remarks about her onTwitter in March, 2009.

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After reading into it some more I found out that the case was supported on the grounds that the designer had lost business and her reputation was damaged. It also said that the biggest reason why the case was looked at so much was because of the involvement of a social media site, Twitter. People have been questioning whether or not defamatory remarks on social media sites provide a bigger impact than if they are spokent to the public.

In this case I dont feel any guilt for the actress Courtney Love because she is the one that decided to post those comments on Twitter. We are all now in this day and age of technology and we all have to start realizing that once it is put out there on the internet it isn’t going away. I feel that she set herself up well knowing that everybody is going to do anything to make a quick buck if that involves suing someone. Now a days people are suing over the littlest things from tripping on a sidewalk outside a store to these cases of defamation and libel in a ‘she said, he said’ fight to prove you got a hurt reputation. In my opinion, if you want to say something bad about somebody publically YOU have to live with your consequences. My opinion with the news is just that they need to try and show every story from both sides because that is what is ruining everybodys reputation. Give people a chance to say what they believe from both sides.

Tebow Time!

This Sunday the beloved Minnesota Vikings face off against one the most popular faces in the NFL today, Tim Tebow. Many people are criticizing Tim on how bad of a quarterback he is and how he cant throw and that he will never make it in the NFL.

I firmly believe that Tim Tebow is what professional sports has been needing for a long time. He is a winner and nothing else. He will do whatever it takes for him to win. He completed two of eight passes in an NFL game as a quarterback and still won it! If that is not from just pure desire to win then I don’t really know what is.

Another huge impact why he is criticized is because of his faith and how he presents it openly. Not one other professional is seen doing that. I saw a story on him from former quarterback great, Jake Plummer, who criticized him about his faith and that the ‘Good ol boy’ routine is getting old.

Other players have gone as far as mocking him in a celebration after a sack. Is there a problem with showing your faith proudly? Apparently there is! I love the way Tebow is playing and how he is winning. I have no opinion on how he presents his faith because it seems to be working for him. I wish the Vikings the best of luck this weekend but it’s Tebow Time in the Dome this weekend!

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