What you sow, the others will reap

I used to be afraid posting my ideas online (actually I still am but not enough to prevent me now) because I'm afraid someone might use that idea and claim that it was theirs, while they go smooching the fame, I'm just here rotting in regret.

These kind of things mostly holds into account of plagiarism and credit

pla·gia·rism 

 an act or instance of using or closely imitating the language and thoughts of another author without authorization and the representation of that author's work as one's own, as by not crediting the original author

pla·gia·rized pla·gia·riz·ing

transitive verb

 : to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own : use (another's production) without crediting the source

intransitive verb

: to commit literary theft : present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source

cred·it

: recognition by name of a person contributing to a performance

It's everywhere yet we are unaware. We think that just because we got it from the internet and used it in a school project or whatever, we will get away with it, well most of us do but I've also seen people getting caught in the act that it doesn't end very well.

When it comes to crediting, I make sure is as a truthful as it is. I never liked taking credit of something I didn't do because once someone questions me about it, I might fail to prove it, specially when my dad likes to brag about my achievements, I tend to correct his exaggerations, even though it will make me less amazing to people's eyes, I'd rather lay the truth in the first place.

Now, there are a lot of people who likes to take credit of something they didn't do, specially in forms of plagiarism. It's stealing, but this time, they are stealing intellectual property.

Definition

 Intellectual property is any innovation, commercial or artistic; any new method or formula with economic value; or any unique name, symbol, or logo that is used commercially. Intellectual property is protected by patents on inventions; trademarks on branded devices; copyrights on music, videos, patterns, and other forms of expression; and state and federal laws.

The Crime

 Stealing intellectual property is cheap and easy. All a thief has to do is copy someone else’s ideas or product. The other person or company—the victim—has done all the work, but thieves can reap huge profits. Intellectual property theft can cost people their jobs, damage the reputation of the original maker of the counterfeited product, cause sickness and bodily harm, deprive governments of desperately needed tax revenue, and even result in the spread of organized crime and gangs—which in turn can damage more lives and destroy neighborhoods. It isn’t a victimless crime

In graphic properties such as art, stock photos, images, and even videos and audios, they have a way in preventing their work to be stolen by adding watermarks

A watermark is a recognizable image or pattern in paper that appears as various shades of lightness/darkness when viewed by transmitted light (or when viewed by reflected light, atop a dark background), caused by thickness or density variations in the paper.

while a digital watermark is a kind of marker covertly embedded in a noise-tolerant signal such as audio or image data. It is typically used to identify ownership of the copyright of such signal. "Watermarking" is the process of hiding digital information in a carrier signal; the hidden information should,[1] but does not need to contain a relation to the carrier signal. Digital watermarks may be used to verify the authenticity or integrity of the carrier signal or to show the identity of its owners. It is prominently used for tracing copyright infringements and for banknote authentication.

here are some examples of watermarks



some may be a form of signature, but that can be easily erased or cropped out, it depends on where the signature is placed. Here're some examples of my signatures/watermark, sometimes its barely visible

These people who commit such crimes are called Credit Alligators, they have ways to take your lunch money (its a figure of speech), but you also have your ways from stopping them.

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reference:

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/plagiarize\

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/plagiarism

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/credit

http://www.ncpc.org/topics/intellectual-property-theft

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watermark

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_watermarking

image sources 

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Life's Cold Side of the Pillow

Have you ever, in your sleep, wake up just one tiny bit to move your head onto the cold side of the pillow? Because basically the side you've been sleeping on had been warm enough to make you uncomfortable and as you settle on this new side, you find relief, and continue to sleep on.

Now I'm supposed to be talking about "What is multimedia and what fascinates you about it?", well then, let me (metaphorically) help you up the stairs, or cross the road so you can understand how was my intro even connected to my homework's question?

Let's see, sleeping, its something we usually do, we NEED to do, to keep living! Now I'm gonna connect it to our daily routines like go to school, or work, eat, ride the bus, talk to people, sleep etc. And now back to the sleeping on the warm side of the pillow, this warm side of the pillow is the pressing events, stress, or just simply getting bored of all this cycle we have to do everyday, and now when we move onto the cold side of the pillow, that's the relief, the moments when we entertain ourselves, where we loosen up and chill, and what do most people involve themselves into? Music, shows, movies, reading, games, nowadays, mostly are media related.

Multimedia is media and content that uses a combination of different content forms. This contrasts with media that use only rudimentary computer displays such as text-only or traditional forms of printed or hand-produced material. Multimedia includes a combination of text, audio, still images, animation, video, or interactivity content forms.

An example of this are video games, all of it in one package. Although I still enjoy reading novels, watching movies or shows, listening to music because even though its missing the rest of the media categories, I enjoy filling it up myself, just like how I like to drive my mind into imagination when reading books, or imagine myself in a certain place or situation based on the music I'm listening to, or how I like to speculate about what's gonna happen in the next episode, stuff like that. 

They say that TV shows degenerates the value of imagination because you won't have to imagine the scenes yourself, its already served on a silver platter in front of you, then what more in video games? In video games, the only thing you need to fill up (mainly) is the progression, and you enjoy this progression, you enjoy leveling up, you enjoy going further, you enjoy the challenge, the successions, and this makes us feel fulfilled in someway if we ever feel we fail at something else. In video games, you can make things happen that you can't do in reality.

I recommend watching this stand up comedy clip, start at 1:20-2:08 because that's what I'm heading out in this.

So basically, multimedia, or just media itself, it fills up tiny or even huge holes in our lives, and by tending to it, we also fill up these holes that these forms of media has. It's like coexisting, a pair complimentary objects, the hair to the comb, the chair to a table.

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multimedia

Walking the Tightrope of a Metaphorical Web

I've been out of school for more than 5 months, and I'm not the kind of person who enjoys going to the mall nor just basically going outside. I enjoy internet people more compared to people in real life, and in this, I spend more time in front of my laptop. And within this time span, I've observed a lot of things, and learned a lot of stuff about how things go down in the metaphorical web of bliss and lies. 

I love to blog on tumblr, and I've encountered arguments about cultural appropriation, racism, sexist, misandry, anon hate, suicide and a lot of things we take lightly.

Acceptance

One has to accept that Internet is not a value free-zone .It means World Wide Web is a place where values are considered in the broadest sense so we must take care while shaping content and services and we should recognize that internet is not apart from universal society but it is a primary component of it. 

We are obligated, in real life or in the internet, to be moral, to be kind to others. Yet an equal amount of people can't seem to follow so they just do whatever they want. I've seen death threats and you-should-kill-yourself messages thrown at people because of their behavior or just plainly because they don't like something. People should not tell other people to kill themselves just because they don't like something.

Pretending to be someone else

We must not use internet to fool others by pretending to be someone else. Hiding our own identity to fool others in the Internet world is a crime and may also be a risk to others.

I had a friend, he has a hobby of sending anonymous messages to people, sending hack threats, or just plainly "Trolling" or pranking people on the internet. He also sent me a hack threat at first before I actually met him via chat, at first I wasn't reacting violently to his threats, I just played cool and didn't show distress because I know that they enjoy what they do if people are fooled or giveaway a reaction they want to see. Even though I already met him, and were friends, he still tries to send me anon messages which could never fool me and I had to laugh because of his failure, but when he started targeting my other friends, that's where I drew the line. He's now my ex friend.

Avoid Bad language

We must not use rude or bad language while using e-Mail, chatting, blogging and social networking, We need to respect their views and should not criticize anyone on the internet.

I won't say to any of the readers to avoid it just because if I did tell you, I'd be a hypocrite. I still feel guilty and afraid if ever people who expects me to not use profane words, find out that I have betrayed them, that I have brushed their teachings under the rug. But I tell you this, I've never, EVER, in my memory, used cuss words to hurt someone's feelings, I only use it for laughs and exaggeration of certain things. And up to this day, I'm still wondering what have caused me to get used to a habit like it, I do wish I knew so I can avoid it.

Do the things you like as long as it doesn't hurt others, okay?

While Downloading 

Internet is used to listen and learn about music,It is also used to watch videos and play games we must not use it to download them or share copyrighted material. We must be aware of the importance of copyrights and issues of copyright.

"Why pay for it if you can get it for free?" A quote that has been in my life, and been in a whole lot of others. But I also go by the habit of buying softwares and games in legal copies if I can afford them, specially when I opened a paypal account, and also in my earlier teenage years where I used to listen to a rock band, I prefer buying their albums instead of just downloading their songs from the web, but I've never attempted to sell these copies for my own income.

Speaking of copyright, I really hate plagiarism, I loathe it. Just knowing someone posted my drawings somewhere else without crediting or sourcing makes me twitch. Specially if they've traced my drawings without permission nor credit, and the thing I hate the most: Art theft.

What Constitutes Art Theft?
Art Theft is taking something that you did not create yourself and reposting it/editing it and claiming it as your own.

Some examples of art theft include: Screen shots of an anime, manga scans, things found on google image search, photobucket, or deviantart/sheezyart/other art sites (ESPECIALLY art sites), photos of celebrities, etc.

All of these things belong to the original artist or photographer and are not "free use" just because they are on the internet.

I used to be cautious about posting my ideas online because I'm afraid that someone will snatch it and take all the credit.

I do my best to make original content and ideas, and I get all frustrated if someone points out that my ideas are similar to existing ones. I don't want to get bashed by people just because I made something that I wasn't aware of that I copied something. IF I do know that my ideas are inspired or references any other things, and also whenever I use a stock image, I'll make sure to credit the sources.

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Sources:
http://infosecawareness.in/students/internet-ethics
http://www.theotaku.com/worlds/eminor/view/174995/