Final exam study guide
The final exam will be at our usual time and in our usual room on Wednesday, May 2.
The format will be "factual short answers".
Sample:
- What is the central socal justification for software patents?
- Describe some reasons sometimes given for why software
should not be patentable.
Topic areas from which such questions may be drawn may include the following:
copyright
rights of copyright holders versus rights of users
The term "intellectual property"
file sharing
fair use
DMCA
privacy
from employers
from government
security
matching / fraud prevention
patriot acts
from marketers
personal profiles
rfid
from copyright holders (RIAA lawsuits, ISP actions)
per-use content management
software patents
open source
speech
encryption
dmca again (and "circumvention speech")
anonymity
libel
hoaxes
trust and the web
e-commerce
jurisdiction
security: phishing, certificates, etc (no technical details!)
trusting your software
spyware
voting & democracy
hacking
kutztown 13
randall schwartz
Some sample questions
Some of these are from old exams where the questions were intended to
be a little longer; as such, they may not be representative. A sign of
this might be the keyword "discuss".
1. List the four Fair Use factors and discuss their applicability to the following situation:
Music "sampling": including brief 1-3 sec snippets of other songs as background for a new song
2. It is sometimes suggested that music file copyrights could be
enforced by encrypting them and by having the content owners
supply proprietary players (with built-in decryption keys) that would
check the license. List some drawbacks of this scheme.
3. Discuss some universal principles applicable to user rights and obligations
relating to listening to digital music. That is, discuss music
copyrights from a deontological perspective. If you argue that
listeners have no fundamental rights here, you should support that;
otherwise, state what those rights are and why they are fundamental.
4. Jolene collects software from friends. She copies the installation
CD, installs the software on her computer, and gives it a try.
Generally she then does nothing more with it, but she has plenty of
disk space and so doesn't usually delete it. "I might need it someday
to open a file I receive" is what she says to herself. In fact, she
seldom does even that. When she finds software she does
use, however, she usually (though not always) ends up buying it; if not
right away, then when the next version release comes out. Discuss this
situation from a copyright perspective; in particular; rate the
"severity" of the copyright/license violations here. Are the software
companies facing financial harm from Jolene's actions?
5. Many sites offer music lyrics on the Internet. One argument in favor
of these is that making lyrics available does not affect CD sales at
all: nobody buys a CD just to find out what the lyrics were. List some
of the ethical implications of supplying online lyrics, and also
briefly address the business issue of whether musicians and the RIAA
would be better off suppressing such sites or encouraging them.
6. Consider the development of a single medical-records database in the
US. What are some of the privacy implications of such a database?
Should the records be available to any hospital or doctor, on the
theory that they wouldn't ask for your records unless you were a
patient? Or should you, the patient, have to authorize access to the
records? How would that authorization work, especially in emergeny
situations?
7. At one point the US government proposed rules on the use of
encryption systems that would have required that decryption keys be
placed in "escrow": that is, decryption keys would have to be turned
over to a newly created office of the federal government which would
only release them to other government offices if there were a search
warrant or the equivalent. List some of the concerns citizens might
have about such a "key escrow" system, and how they might be
handled.
8. Suppose the movie industry arrives at the following marketing
arrangement. One can buy movies as before, in DVD format, for $20 each.
Alternatively, you can download the movie (in protected format) and for
$10 receive a license to watch the movie for one week. Older and less
popular movies would be discounted proportionately. Describe some of
the privacy issues. Assume that movie license purchases (unlike cash
purchases) cannot be made anonymously, and that the movie licensing
bureau keeps track of such purchases.
9. Suppose an online technical site has space for users to post
pseudonymous comments. Recently, however, the posting section is being
abused, as some users post hostile flames directed at other users. In
order to restore civility, the site proposes that users will continue
to be allowed to use pseudonyms, but must register with a real name,
and the real names will be revealed to anyone who complains. (At the
other extreme are policies guaranteeing real names will be released
only with a court order.) Discuss this proposed revelation policy, and
describe some possible consequences. Is there any intermediate position
a site might take, in between revealing to all and revealing only under
court order?
10. In the very early days of file sharing, the argument was sometimes
made that file sharing would free musicians from recording companies.
Musicians would be able to reach out directly to listeners, and make
their music available (either free or for purchase) on the Internet.
Concerts would be handled as before (possibly using the Internet to cut
out Ticketmaster; possibly not). Comment on this as a business model.
Consider in what cases it might work and in what cases it would likely
not. Finally, draw a connection between your conclusions regarding the
viability of this model and the sometime-popular theory that file
sharing is justified when the bulk of the commercial losses falls on
recording companies and not musicians.
11. The "fair use" doctrine was introduced in the 1976[?] copyright law. The US constitution states that
Congress shall have Power ... To
promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for
limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to
their respective Writings and Discoveries;
Discuss whether or not the fair use doctrine is constitutionally
guaranteed, or whether it is just another law that Congress can repeal
or diminish as necessary (eg with the DMCA).