Blog #8: If you can get it for free, why pay for it?

I believe that the SOPA movement is wrong, and isn’t necessary. There are some things that I take into consideration when I think about what SOPA is trying to have done, and I think that it might not be that bad. However, overall I’m against what they want. I like going on the internet and listening to music, a site that I might do that on is Youtube. If the SOPA movement is passed, I wouldn’t be able to do that. At the end of the day, it winds up being stupid, mostly because musical groups have contracts with Youtube, and are paid for how good their music does. Another site that would most likely wind up shut down would be Fandango. This is even stupider, because when I go on this site it is because I want to see when a movie will be playing, if I’m looking at show times it is because I want to pay to see a movie. Then that money will be distributed with the company that made the movie I’m seeing. Sites like these shouldn’t be shut down, as a country we need to continue to change from generation to generation, and make things easier on ourselves. If we begin to shut down sites like these, then we will strip ourselves of whatever revolutionary elements we have added to our lives to make them easier. Another site that I see would be shut down is Twitter, while I don’t care for Twitter I do think that it’s is stupid for it to be shut down. It would be shut down because many tweets would have relation to things that have already been copyrighted by others. I think this is dumb because lots of people are influenced by things that famous people do. If a teenage girl is following her celebrity crush on Twitter, and he tweets that he just watched a movie and loved it. Then that girl will most likely be stupid enough to go and out make sure she sees that movie just because the man she dreams about “loved” it. Now you see how this would be something that would help people trying to sell their ideas. Now, if you go further and think about somebody who has millions of followers on Twitter, then millions of those followers will go and out and possibly pay for that movie. I hope you see my side of the fight that what SOPA is doing is wrong, however I do understand partially why they’re right.

I think about the tons and tons of people who make music, and that is their job so they need to make money from it. I wonder sometimes how people are still able to make a living out of being a musician. More than half the people listening to their music won’t buy their whole album, and more than half the people listening to their music might not even pay to hear it. I’m not just talking about listening to it on Youtube, but also downloading music off the internet for free. If you can get it for free, why pay for it? I think about my own personal life, and I think about how if I were a musician how angry I would be that people are basically stealing my music. I've come to the conclusion that you shouldn't steal people's music, even if you don't view it as stealing. I’ve downloaded music off the internet, and I feel bad when I do it. Even if it’s somebody who doesn’t “need” those fifty cents they’re going to get from Itunes, I still feel bad. In my thoughts it went how do people still have albums going platinum? Then it became how do people still make a living off of music? I hope you will think about these things next time you listen to a song on Youtube, or download a song off of the internet. I’ve made up my mind about whose side I’m on in this fight. I’m not saying that you should never listen to a song on Youtube, or ever download a song off of the internet. I personally don’t care what other people do. All I’m saying is that before you decide that SOPA is stupid, try and think about both sides of the fight.