Intellectual Property is receiving more and more media attention. The concept has existed since mankind began creating. Now, governments are trying to increase the protection people have over intellectual property. With the internet allowing for peer-2-peer file sharing it is easier than ever to pirate songs, movies, audio books, even programs that include cracks to bypass product registration. With the fall of Mega Upload, a once popular website allowing for users to upload files, get a link, and share the link with friends or whomever they pleased, torrents will become more popular. Now, if you go to the Mega Upload website you will be greeted by a FBI anti-piracy warning. Torrent programs have been punished in the past and are still being punished. Napster was one of the first. Allowing users to "illegally download" music back when 56k was big, when we all had @aol.com addresses, and when the idea of being able to download a three minute song in ten minutes was mind blowing. Napster didn't let that bring them down. They turned a new cheek and surfaced in the music community as a paid subscription service like iTunes.
iTunes allows people to download songs, movies, podcasts, and more at low costs to the users. Then, there are other services which allow people access to all the intellectual property that is so easily shared. Netflix, Hulu, Youtube, and the list goes on but those three names are universal to the majority of people. Videos and music are top commodities people want to find on the internet. The want people have for these two things is so big that it drives people to commit federal crimes, to be felons. Producers of intellectual property that comes in the form of audio or video entertainment/education lose money when people provide pirating services. Even though it is not killing the industry it still hurts them and in turn causes them to push back resulting in congress trying to pass bills like SOPA.
But then there is also Linux which is a free OS. The Internet is bringing on a change to Intellectual Property and how people treat it as never seen before. On one side people want to make money off of their creation but when it is put on the Internet the ability for people to pay nothing for it hurts the producer. And then there are people who ask nothing for their Intellectual Property or they ask for donations if you like it so they can continue to improve the product.
