Over the last 15 years or so there has been a huge debate about who owns and what is proper use of digital media such as digital music, books, software and videos.
Remember file-sharing sites like Napster? These sites let individuals share music on a large-scale instead of buying it.
I don't think at the time the users understood that they did not own the music but only had a limited license to use it.
There is a valuable lesson to learn from what happened with the file sharing disaster.
People have to learn the difference between real property and intellectual property.
Real property is generally concrete things such your house, car, computer or anything concrete that cannot be reproduced.
It is a timed honored tradition for people to sell their home when they are ready to buy a new one.
People will trade their car in when they want another one.
People sell their clothes, their T.
V their I-Pads, their I-phones and most other things you can name.
In fact many car companies will advertise their resell value as a number one selling point.
It's also OK for people to give these items away.
Then why is it a crime to resell or give away my music, software or other intellectual property? Intellectual property is vastly different from real property.
A person selling their Chevy would have to invest millions of dollars to have the resource to mass produce and copy the architecture of the Chevy.
So GM is not in any danger by some selling their use Chevy, in fact if the new owner likes the Chevy he or she may buy a new one when they are ready for a new car.
Some have argued that file sharing has the same effect on music but this is not true.
Intellectual property means you are putting your knowledge on talent on some kind of media.
That means this knowledge or talent can be easily reproduced so copyrights are the only thing standing in the way of the complete destruction of a company or industry.
If you notice anytime you buy software you have to register it.
Any time you buy things like royalty free music or music loops the policy always states that you may not give away or resell in its current form and that it may only be used as part of your production.
Even a powerful company like Microsoft would go under if people could just copy their software and give way or resell it.
The DMCA or digital media copyright act was signed into law to help prevent piracy and the total destruction of companies.
All of us are entertained by music, movies, books and video games.
Most our lives have been made easier by using some kind of software.
No person or company would continue to produce these products if they don't believe they can make a living doing it.