Diapers, Pacifiers and Piracy

I looked around for pictures for awhile, and decided this picture was a perfect connection of my previous post and the discussion of piracy. Although this is a humourous picture, it has a very serious underlying meaning. This cartoon is most likely directed to people that are illegally downloading music, songs and videos off the internet. This chosen group of people are most likely teens and young adults, but I'm sure there are plenty of middle aged people that participate in such activities.

This cartoon is a heavily sarcastic piece to exaggerate the idea of piracy. Obviously a baby would not actually know how to put illegal dowloads on a rewritable dvd, but this cartoonist gets the point across. I think it's a good use of persuasion, especially because the parents are supporting there young child in breaking the law at such a young age. This cartoon is interesting because it really evokes two completely separate emotions. The first emotion is laughter due to irony, because a baby is doing something that adults would do. However, the second emotion comes after reading the text, and it's a kind of "Oh, I get it" realization that they are discouraging piracy.

The artist of this cartoon is painting a picture of our world's views on piracy, or at least the direction we are headed. This cartoonist is arguing that people of our world are so mislead about the truth about piracty that parents are watching their baby do illegal activities right in front of them. I think the artist could have drawn another drawing of the same family right next to this drawing; except that in this drawing the baby should be stealing something from the store and the parents would be scolding the child. This would show the way that our society incorrectly differs piracy and theft.

Starting at a Young Age

I was hanging out with my little cousins a few weeks ago, and they do many things that annoy me. They always want to play ridiculous games, ask me questions about every little thing, and blame me for things that they have actually done. However, they also have a particular talent that is quite impressive. These three girls that are the ages of 6, 8 and 11 are extremely advanced when it comes to technology. They are very actively involved in online activities such as Club Penguin, NeoPets, and simply searching the Web for whatever it is they are curious about.

When I was their age, I barely knew how to operate a computer, let alone performing the detailed things they are involved with. My family had a computer in the house, but it was still not as common for kids at such a young age to be so educated on these very modern developments. These young girls have the privilege to wake up and dive into a world of possibiltiy, and they have the intelligence and experience to allow them to do this. Even a strong understanding of the iPad, which I don't have, is held by all three of these young girls.

I know this extended type of freedom could lead to bad or addicting habbits, and that is why their parents have many regulations. They have strict settings on their internet use and don't hesitate to "hover" when the kids are operating this new, scary technology. Also, their parents only allow a certain amount of time to be spent on the computer; because they know this type of behavior can lead to addictions. I believe this type of parenting is so important in this era because so many kids spend absolutely all of their time on the internet, and get involved with things that are extremely bad for their young age. However, they encourage and mentor their kids on this developing technology.

To sum up this post: I am amazed that my 6-year old cousin is nearly as efficient on a lap top as I am.

Creativity or Just Lack of Effort?

I would like to start out by saying that I am not a person of great knowledge about this new digital age we are living in. Sure, I can do basic operations on a computer or figure out how to set up an Xbox, but I am no technology whiz to say at the least. This is the main reason I chose my category, "Creativity, Piracy and Intellectual Property"; these young digital natives that are very talented with computers and such are some of the most impressive people to me.

Creativity is the main aspect that I am interested in out of this category, because people post more and more amazing things on the internet every day. However, creativity and intellectual property somewhat overlap when I think about  the act of "borrowing" ideas from other people and using these ideas as if they were their own. In today's day and age, it is extremely easy for anyone, even an average user of technology like myself, to gain ideas for anything and everything imaginable. It prevents students from doing everything on their own, and therefore could prohibit the maximum amount of learning that could have possibly occured.

Piracy is a somewhat different topic than the previous two to me, but still contains some relevance. This crime is extremely easy to commit and fairly hard to be caught, which is why it is so favorable to so many people around the world. For some reason it is okay to steal music and movies, but these people would not just waltz into a grocery store and steal a gallon of milk. This creates a skewed idea of what is right and wrong, which could lead to some taking advantage of the easy system and eventually getting in some serious trouble with the law. I have definitely heard some horror stories about students getting caught at large universities and paying the price.