Protecting Copyrights Around The Campfire?

from the deja-vu dept

We always fear the worst when the film industry tries to "educate" children. A few years ago, they tried to brainwash school kids on the evils of file sharing. Apparently, that program hasn't had much success, as students saw through the transparent and one-sided "lessons" they were being taught. Now in Hong Kong, the Motion Picture Association is flipping this strategy around with nicer-sounding program: They have created an Intellectual Property merit badge for Boy Scouts to impress upon these kids the "value of intellectual property and of the importance of protecting it." We don't know the details of the program, but expect it to present similarly slanted messages of its earlier classroom effort (sharing equals stealing) with a new spin (not sharing equals protecting copyrights). So rather than saying outright that file sharing is bad, their new tactic is to say *not* file sharing is good. The difference is subtle, disingenuous, and potentially dangerous. Maybe the MPA learned from the recording industry's ham-handed attempts to force the Girl Scouts to pay royalties on campfire sing-alongs. The Boy Scouts should only be so lucky.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • identicon
    Mark, 3 May 2005 @ 3:44pm

    Intellectual property merit badges

    Man ... could a kid look any dorkier than to show up at school wearing an intellectual property merit badge? Even the nerds will want to kick his ass when they see that.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.