Annotated Bibliography Part 1

Altinkemer, Kemal, and Subhajyoti Bandyopadhyay. "Bundling and Distribution of Digitized Music Over the Internet." Journal of Organizational Computing and Electronic Commerce. 18 Nov. 2009. Web. 29 Apr. 2012

 This article discusses the idea of the distribution of a mass media, in this case music, through technological means rather than physical means. It discusses and presents arguments about the benefits of individual and bundle purchases of music tracks and the varying mindset between customers that decide whether or not they choose to get the individual or the bundle pack. This could be potentially useful, but as of now I believe I will have to write a separate paragraph to fit this in, so I don't believe it will make it in to my essay.

Jones, Steve. "Music and the Internet." Popular Music. Cambridge University, 11 Dec. 2000. Web. 28 Apr. 2012.

There is a lot jammed into this 14 page article, and I believe most of it can be used to some extent in my argument. It goes into a number of basics for how technology works with music these days, discussing his previous statements before going into a more detailed description of what the online music industry does, and how technology, specifically the Internet, has impacted the industry as a whole, and takes the viewpoints of many separate groups in this article, such as the bands, the fans, and the record companies, and reveals many things I believe will prove very useful in forming my argument as well as coming up with ideas should I get stuck in writing.

D'Astous, Alain, Francois Colbert, and Daniel Montpetit. "Music Piracy on the Web – How Effective Are Anti-Piracy Arguments? Evidence From the Theory of Planned Behaviour." Journal of Consumer Policy. Springer, Mar. 2005. Web. 29 Apr. 2012

This article presents an analysis of the illegal download, or piracy, of music on the Internet. It details the consequences that individuals face for downloading music, the inherent problems artists face when people do illegally download their music, and the unethical nature of the crime. I believe this will have a good impact on my essay as this is one of the big issues I believed would go against my claim, because without the Internet, pirating simply doesn't exist. As it stands though, I believe this essay could provide me with well thought out arguments that prove why the Internet isn't good for the music industry and cause me to think a good amount about this essay. 

Jones, Steve, and Amanda Lenhart. "Music Downloading and Listening: Findings from the Pew Internet and American Life Project." Popular Music and Society. Bowling Green, June 2004. Web. 29 Apr. 2012.

This article deals with the piracy on the internet, presenting both sides fairly, and is overall a very interesting read. Probably the best part for my essay was when they went into detail of people who taped songs that were playing on the radio or at live performances so they wouldn't have to pay for new music. The total averaged about 1/3 Americans took part in this act, showing that piracy wasn't an issue the Internet brought about, but that it was always in our culture to try and get music for free. I believe that this will have a great impact on my essay.

 Styven, Maria. "The Intangibility of Music in the Internet Age." Popular Music and Society. Taylor & Francis, 17 Feb. 2007. Web. 28 Apr. 2012.

This article deals with the issue of advertising for music in an age where most of it is bought through technological means rather than physical means. The article deals with how the music providers deal with such an intangibility, as well as the whole aspect of owning the music, while not having the music. I believe this could come in handy at some point, but similarly to a previous article, I don't think that it will have much of an impact if it does get in my essay at all. I'd need to force it in which is something I don't like trying to do with my sources.

Logical Fallacy

A logical fallacy I have come face to face with in real life was when my parents always backed up their arguments with “Because I said so!” That never sat well with me; firstly, there was no concrete reason behind why they denied me having what I wanted (which, looking back on it, was quite a lot more than I needed), and secondly, because I caught on that it was a way for my parents to say that the argument was over when they couldn’t keep going. Whether that reason was because of something I wouldn’t understand or they realized they were wrong but didn’t want to give up their beliefs, I don’t know and I’ll likely never know. This lack of knowledge as a child forced me to become cynical of my parents, and as a result, of most of the rest of the world. When you can’t trust your own parents to tell you the truth, who can you trust? It’s a vicious cycle of hatred and disgust which I was in for a period of about three years. It was terrible, made only worse with trying to deal with personal issues that were going on, and getting through it was probably the hardest part of my life to this point, and I’d be shocked if there’s any period of time which was as hard as that, where being cynical and bitter in conjunction with personal issues cause me to actually take a step back and evaluate my outlook on life and my lifestyle. Once I realized the cycle I was in, one where my life at home affected my life in school which affected my life at home, I was able to make myself better and remove myself from it my final year of high school, but it didn’t change the fact I was stuck in the cycle in the first place, and that high school was just a state of constant anger and depression. The one place I was safe was in my music, which was a callback to the time before this silly hatred of everything and before everything was bringing me down, and the music I wrote in high school reflected that. I can go back and read the lyrics, listen to what I wrote and I still am shocked at the state of mind I was in, how terrible of a shape my mind was in.

That actually turned very intospective; I think I lost track of what I was supposed to be writing about. Oh well.

Scholarly Peers

Every time I hear the word scholarly I automatically create a mental picture of a room full of elderly gentlemen with grey moustaches and a stale feeling of smug superiority floating in the air like someone forgot to throw out the trash for a few months and no one has noticed. Once you tell me to write to an audience of “scholarly peers,” I see a bunch of hooded, shady figures hovering around a table with one light shining brightly in the middle of the table, but whose brightness fades before reaching the edge of it. Then again I’ve always had a slightly colourful imagination, for better or worse, which hasn’t been helped by the fact that I’ve seen and read so much fantasy media. Once I ground myself in the world of reality, one which is bound by the fact that nothing exciting or interesting ever bloody happens, the term is redefined as a bunch of snobs who overly critique things of their profession until someone can prove how much better a new way is to them through various means (actually that sounds a lot like me). I never see people such as myself when I think of scholarly peers, and knowing myself, I doubt anyone like me will ever consider themselves associated with a group such as that, because I’m about as far from the image of an intelligent person as one can find. I listen to heavy metal, have long hair, dress like a punk, and have a juvenile sense of humour, none of which are qualities of the high-brow intellectual image. Plus I know people in college, and considering them scholars just seems hilarious in a depressingly ironic sense. People taking basic classes and forgetting everything they learned in them before the next set of classes even starts being considered a member of an elite group of people who decide what is best for the future? Might as well launch a nuclear strafe run on the world as we know it once these people start forming ideas to improve their profession; in this case, that might be considered mercy killing. Wow I'm depressing, and I forgot where I was even going with this.

Coltan

A valuable resource that many of us take for granted instigated multiple bloody and terrible wars in Africa. Columbite-tantalite, known as coltan for short, is a heavily sought after material, due to the fact that when it is refined, it becomes Tantalum, which sells for $100 or more per pound, and is used in many items we use on a daily basis, including phones, computers, and more.

So what about such a seemingly harmless mineral could be so dangerous? Most of it is mined in Canada, Australia and Brazil, and they keep tight legal restrictions on mining operations. However, for nearly fifteen years, coltan funded the civil wars of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The cost of the mining in the DRC was 5.4 million human lives, a total unseen since World War II, and even after a peace treaty was signed in 2006 by the new president of the country, a heavily mined area of the Congo, Shabunda, has reported over 2.3 thousand rapes between 2006 and 2009. Many are done at gunpoint, by the soldiers of the Congo’s army.

In order to deal with the obvious problems of funding a civil war, the UN instituted a trade ban and asset freezes on the DR Congo, hoping to end the war by way of attrition. However, even trade sanctions were incapable of preventing companies from trying to get a cheap deal on it, as legal actions were put against a number of United Kingdom companies for continuing to trade for Congo-mined coltan.

The coltan industry is enormous, accruing a net worth of approximately $6 billion per year, and seemingly will only continue to grow as we develop our technology further. The need to be careful of where these companies acquire their resources will also have to grow accordingly. The largest reason the civil wars in DR Congo lasted nearly two decades was due to funding from developed nations for their coltan, and companies continue to purchase it despite UN sanctions preventing such actions. If anything is to be done about the situation, it is best to start now than any time else. Once the next technological breakthrough comes out, it might be too late to stop another civil war from breaking out.

Sources:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8234583.stm

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-10767692

http://www.globalissues.org/article/442/guns-money-and-cell-phones

Diagnostic Essay

Figured I'd start with a song, because why not?

Hello there, my name is Marcus Bienvenu. Ever since I had an understanding of how words magically got on my computer screen, I’ve been fascinated with writing, and over the course of the last seven or so years I’ve been writing various stories, which I shared with friends who enjoyed them to varying degrees, usually related to how much they enjoyed reading in the first place.

Technology as a whole has improved our lives by untold amounts, but it’s the routine moments in daily life that have been improved by technology the most. Being able to have a conversation with someone who isn’t in the same room, who’s across the street, or even across the world is something that wasn’t even possible fifty years ago; now, it’s commonplace to do that while walking down the street. This surge of technological advances has impacted me in a major way, as it allowed me to meet people I otherwise wouldn’t have through and keep in touch with friends who have moved away. To be overly dramatic about it, technology has made me who I am today.

When it comes to my writing, technology has significantly improved that as well. Since a young age I’ve been around computers; my father was a computer programmer, and as such, I have always been technologically literate. I started using computers regularly when I was a mere four years old, and once I started school, I made frequent trips to the computer lab of my little people school to practice typing with the programs they had there. By fourth grade, I had gotten my typing speed up to nearly 70 words per minute, and now it rests around 160, factoring out mistakes. This is both a blessing and a hindrance, as often times when I am writing, my fingers tend to move faster than my thought can continue, leading to awkward situations in which I am mid-sentence and get completely lost, having to push myself back and examine the sentence to try and reorient myself into the right mind set (the sad part is I had one of those moments writing that sentence). However, these instances are fairly uncommon, and my typing speed allows me to finish essays like this one in very tight timeframes once I actually get started.