5.5 Legal and Ethical Concerns

Intellectual Property

Copyright

1. Economic Rights: rights to financial benefits from the use of the work
2. Moral Rights: rights that aren't financial, but are still important. For example, the right to claim authorship or the right to prevent harmful changes.

Plagiarism

Legal Ways to Use The IP of Others

• Creative Commons is a public copyright license that a creator uses when they want to give others the right to use their work. Many Wikipedia images, for example, fall under a Creative Commons license. Creative Commons provides six levels of licensing that you can read about here!
• Fair Use is an exception to copyright law that allows the use of copyrighted material without permission for limited purposes, such as educational or news-reporting. It can be very difficult to determine what is and isn't Fair Use, so don't use it as a cure-all!

Open sourcing vs. Open access

• Open sourcing, as briefly discussed in Big Idea 1, allows for work to be freely shared, distributed, and modified. Open sourcing is usually mentioned in the context of software.
• Open access, on the other hand, refers to research available to the general public that's free of many restrictions. For example, some academic journals are open-access or have open-access sections. Works that are under the umbrella of open access are often free of copyright use restrictions, but it's important to verify that this is the case with each work.

Websites like Unsplash and Pixabay offer free and beautiful stock images, many of which were used to help write these guides! Image source: Rubén García on Unsplash.

Other Legal and Ethical Concerns

• Streaming software allows you to watch your favorite movies and TV shows anytime, anywhere. Illegal streaming software, on the other hand, can violate copyright law and deprive creators of much-needed revenue. This software can also spread viruses and bugs. (For more about viruses, check out 5.6 Safe Computing!)
• Biased algorithms can misrepresent or exclude people, as seen in 5.3 Computing Bias.
• Some computing innovations use data that comes from the continuous monitoring of user activities. An example would be a step-tracker or screen-time tracker on your phone, which only works because it's constantly recording what you do. This process raises concerns about privacy and personal data use. (For more, check out 5.6 Safe Computing.)
• The digital divide itself also raises ethical concerns, for reasons covered in 5.2 Digital Divide.

• The internet can be used to spread misinformation that could be harmful to people's health and well-being.

• Algorithms designed to keep people scrolling on social media websites can create echo chambers, contributing to political polarization.

• Recently, there's also been debate about the role that internet platforms should play in free speech. How far does and should the principle of free speech go on Social Media platforms?
  • For more information about the First Amendment right to freedom of expression, go here: The 1st Amendment Note that the First Amendment does not apply to private businesses, which most Social Media platforms are.

• AI Art can be produced much faster and cheaper than traditional art but brings with it a whole slew of ethical questions about art theft, the rights of artists, and biased data sources.

In Summary…