Intellectual property rights serve the public good by sparking creativity, production, improvement and innovation (Emerson 64). IP laws protect tangible expressions, not mere ideas. However, this tangible expression creates the possibility for fraud and intellectual property infringement. A&M Records, Inc. v Napster Inc. addresses the issue of copyright infringement in regards to peer to peer file sharing. Does this program constitute fair use? And how does this case affect the future of file sharing and the music industry? In this paper, I will be examining the effect of illegal peer-to-peer file sharing on the music industry and how this case has changed the way we buy and share music today.
Napster was founded in 1999 by college student, Shawn Fanning. This new program gave users access to
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This case specifically deals with copyrights, which are protective rights typically dealing with the arts such as music, poetry, etc. Copyrights held by an individual last life plus 70 years and corporate copyrights last 95 years. (Emerson 75) Copyrights are easier to obtain than patents and last a considerable amount longer, but are a weaker form of protection as they allow for fair use. Fair use is a copyright exception that in certain circumstances allows for use of the copyrighted material without the copyright holder’s permission. (Emerson) In accordance to section 107 of the Copyright Act, the following four factors constitute weather something can be considered fair use: the purpose of the use, the nature of the work being used, the amount of the work used and the effect of the use on the market or the effect of the use on the value of the original work. (Indiana 4) However, in this case, “The court’s analysis of the four factors was relatively succinct and blunt in its conclusion that the exchange of music files had little chance of surviving a test of fair use.”