Greek Software Pirates: And You Thought Americans Had No Morals

Using Academic Search Complete from the TAMU website, I researched “software piracy”, the topic I am considering for my research paper. The article I chose for its scholarly attributes was called, “What do computer science students think about software piracy”, and was written by several Greek intellectuals. The first clue that it was a scholarly article was that the journal in which it was published, “Behaviour& Information Technology”, is intended for a narrow audience, and has the sound of being quite professional even though it does not come out and describe itself as peer reviewed.

This article contained an abstract and a long list of references at the end. The four authors were named, and the fact that there were four of them indicated that it was a group effort, which conveys that the information found must have been double checked in the writing process.

The content of the article concerned interviews in which the authors had asked Greek computer science students questions like, “How do you morally evaluate the use of pirated software?” and so forth. The results of this article seem a little worrisome, because although students generally admitted to knowing that pirating software was illegal, they did not seem concerned. The most common reason for using pirated software was the high expense of the “legal” software. 

This article was interesting to me because it took a very narrow subject (the way computer science students in Greece feel about software piracy) and did a very thorough investigation concerning it. The fact they interviewed 56 different students shows their dedication and their intent of presenting a fair representation of Greek computer science students.

Oh. And the article is ten pages long, which was another tip off used in ranking its scholarliness.

All jokes aside, though, I feel like this section of evaluating sources has been incredibly important. A lot of Americans have started to take information for granted, and will believe (mostly) whatever they read, both on the internet and in print. How do you feel about sources? Did you have a good feel for “credible” and “incredible” sources before we covered the section in class, or was this as big of a help for you as it was for me?

The Great Firewall

My group's research during class on China's internet censorship sparked my curiosity. Although it does not seem to be tied to the subject of piracy and creativity, I will do my best to link the two together.

Firstly, though, a little background. According to an "Electronic Frontiers, Australia" website, China first started its censorship of internet access in September of 1996. At first it was only about 100 sites, censored for offensive material or Western news sites. In 2002, Associated Press ran an article covering the extent of internet censorship in China, and the results are serious. If you google "Tianamen Square" or try to find any sites that "hurt China's reputation", you will not find them. China's censorship is known by the nickname "The Great Firewall," a reference to their famous landmark, as well as the solidness of their internet blockage.

Chinese blogger Michael Anti has seen firsthand how this censorship can affect both bloggers and the audience they address. Several times, Anti's blog was removed, not by the Chinese government (although the Chinese ISPs still blocked his blog from being read by other people in China), but by MSN, according to an article by Rebecca MacKinnon on her blog.

Ironically, the only way to get around internet blockage is by illegal means. While it is not illegal to use a "proxy server" (an handy way of getting around the government's censorship) to access legal sites, it is illegal to use it to access sites like Youtube. That doesn't seem to be stopping many Chinese citizens, though. As a Chinese man was quoted in an article on Time's website, "It is like a water flow — if you block one direction, it flows to other directions, or overflows."
The great thing about living in the U.S. is our right to free speech, and our ability to access the internet freely. The Chinese government may have intended their censorship for good, blocking only porn sites in the first few weeks of business, but I believe that freedom of speech must be total or it is pretty much useless.

What are your thoughts on censorship? Would you expect it to increase or decrease internet piracy and illegal activities online?