Napster and Apple’s Ipod Essay Example for Free

Napster and Apple’s Ipod Essay This paper deals with a through case study of the music industry in the face of change within the age of the Internet with the major focus on Napster and Apple’s ipod. In 2000 Shawn Fanning founded Napster – a file sharing program where people could download music for free and access the songs they have downloaded at any hour of the day. However, in 2000, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and a number of the big business recording labels argued that Napster was violating copyright laws, facilitating the illegal copying and distribution of copyrighted music. ’’ (Hill, 1) After Napster was in the lime light for allowing people to take advantage of free downloads, peer sharing technologies such as Kazaa were just coming into play where people were able to download music in a similar fashion. In very short order after Napster’s service was shut down, a number of new file sharing services started to rapidly gain users.’’ (Hill, 11) However there was one slight difference here, people were downloading through other people’s computers and not accessing the files via a central server and therefore it became difficult to stop this practice from taking place. The music industry responded as it had with Napster, filing lawsuits in attempt to shut down the services for copyright violation. But in this case it was more difficult to prove infringement.’’ (Hill, 11) Within the last 20 years since CD’s have been in vogue the music industry has changed. People have differing opinions regarding whether one is better than the other. It was Apple’s ipod and the Itunes online music service that revolutionized the music industry. These were the programs and applications that allowed you to purchase and listen to whatever you want but at the same time protect the artists that wrote and produced the music. It is important to look at the growth in the music recording industry since these changes took place and to see what the results and changes have been. There was strong growth in the music recording industry in the 90’s. However, when the 2000’s hit global sales dropped by 5% and continued to drop for the next three years. Many people have been blaming this negative trend on Napster. In 2003 sales dropped to a low of $32 billion in 2003. In the early 90’s the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) was concerned about consumers burning’’ songs downloaded over the Internet onto CD’s. This was such an easy process to do as you could download the files you wished to place on your CD from Napster and use a program by which you can copy CD’s. This concern was important to take into consideration because of the sheer amount of songs that were downloaded over the Internet for free and if people were downloading the songs they were not purchasing the CD’s from their favourite artists. There is a large cost in promoting an artist and the use of copyrighted material makes this process even more expensive for the artist as not as many people will be purchasing the CD’s. People would be more likely to download the songs instead of purchasing them because it is cheap (free) and easy. In the past, the music industry has always been concerned about the potential for piracy of copyrighted material. However, another trend that raised copyright infringement issues was MP3- compressed digital files that could be downloaded for free from the Internet. At the point where Napster was going through the courts certain lobbying groups were concerned with websites where people could download free MP3 files and in doing that listen to pirated music. The RIAA tried to shut down Napster because of piracy and the laws that the company had broken. During this time the music industry also tried to develop technology that would protect digital audio recordings from piracy and counterfeiting. The main problem in regard to Napster and the piracy issue is to do with the fact that Napster’s service was violating copyright, facilitating massive piracy of intellectual property and consequently stealing. There were talks about a paid subscription service to be created by Napster in 2001 but nothing ended up coming into fruition and on September 2, 2002, Napster announced its liquidation. It is clear to see why Napster has such an appeal to its audience given the fact that it was free and people could download any song that they wanted. In today’s environment people can still access peer-sharing websites however sometimes songs may be written down under a search engine listing and may even be a computer virus. Itunes is therefore giving users and artists the best of both worlds – consumers get to download the songs they want even if it is only one song off a particular album and the artist gets compensated for it. All in all, it is clear to see the vast changes that have taken place over the last decade or more and the fact that significant changes will take place in the future. The growing popularity and vast information available on the Internet is going to change the way people purchase and listen to music and people need to be aware of this as the world changes everyday and nothing lasts forever. References Hill, Charles W, The music industry in the age of the Internet: from Napster to Apple’s Ipod.

Cheetah :: essays research papers

Cheetah (Acinonyx Jubatus)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I chose to do my television project on the cheetah which I saw on the Discovery Channel. Although I knew some interesting characteristics on the cheetah, I did happen to discover some facts I did not know. Those of which are written in the rest of the paper along with some facts I thought were pretty cool.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The cheetah is an endangered species and has been for quit some time. This is mainly due to poachers who hunt and kill this animal for it’s illustrious fur of different colors. It’s coat is very coarse and a goldish color including some round black spots for camouflage. It has â€Å"tear strips† running from it’s eyes to it’s nose. The next part was surprising to me in that the cheetah is only 44-53 inches long. On the TV they always seem bigger somehow. And the tail is about 26-33 inches long! Their average weight is 86-143 pounds, surprisingly light for such a powerful animal.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  It’s low weight, it seems, is what allows it have it’s high top speed of sixty miles per hour. It is regarded as one the fastest hunters in the world and of course, the fastest land animal in existence. I also found that it’s habitat is in the grassy plains of Africa. This is definitely a great place for it to hide based on it’s coat color. It is because of this combination of tall grass and camouflage coat which allows the cheetah to stalk and catch it’s prey. These usually consist of gazelles, wild boar, or pretty much any animal it can handle. However, the regular range for it’s food is about 88 pounds. The cheetah then drags the meat to it’s â€Å"home†, away from prying animals, and feasts on it immediately.

The Ways in Which Managerial Role Has Changed in the 21st Century

THE WAYS IN WHICH MANAGERIAL ROLE HAS CHANGED IN THE 21ST CENTURY Globalization and advances in technology has brought changes to the business environment and the world as we know it today. Consequently, the nature of work has changed and it has brought on new challenges for managers (French et al, 2008). There is therefore the need to examine the ways the role of managers has evolved as a result of these changes. The role of managers is primarily to guide organisations towards the accomplishment of its goals. Certo and Certo (2009) identified four major activities that mangers use in achieving organisational goals.These are planning, organising, influencing and controlling. The way managerial role has changed with be assessed based on this four activities. Planning refers to objectives and goal setting. Traditionally, planning has been concentrated at the top with employees been told what the next strategy is. The changing nature of work implies that managers and employees plan and execute decisions together (Bouchikhi and Kimberly, 2000 cited in Mullins, 2011). Employees’ views are now being taken into consideration in taking operational decisions.Managers have to plan in an uncertain world as such they have to be proactive and know how to manage risks. Organising involves creating structures and the division of labour. Managers would have to constantly restructure their organisations in line with changes in the business environment and their strategy. There is the need for proper delegation of authority. Advances in technology have brought about the trend towards ‘virtuality’ which removes some aspect of the borders and design of the traditional organisation by carrying business operations with the use of information technology (Certo and Certo, 2009).Managers have to be able to organise work and find efficient ways of communicating within this virtual environment. Influencing has to do with creating enthusiasm in people and inspiring emp loyees to perform better. Changes in work environment mean that the organisational values need to be based on teamwork and trust because people are now seen as an important resource (Mullins, 2011). There is a greater emphasis on getting employees involved in the organisation and giving them the liberty to take initiative (Certo and Certo, 2009). It is essential that managers are able to attract and retain effective workforce overtime (French et al, 2008).Due to globalisation, the workforce is more diverse than ever. As a result, managers have to firstly recognize the differences in culture and modify their actions to deal with differing cultural norms (Molinsky et al, 2012). Controlling involves measuring performance and taking corrective actions. Advances in information technology impacts management control systems. The workplace is more interconnected with a speedy diffusion of information to more people (Mullins, 2011). Consequently, it is then necessary to manage information sy stems. In controlling people, managers need to be able to exude the right level of power over their subordinates.Bouchikhi and Kimberly (2000) claim that power is no longer concentrated at the top but is now shared. The 21st century marks the era called the information age which has seen themes such as globalisation, diversification and virtual organisations becoming at the heart of business operations. This has tremendous impact on the way a manager plans, organises, influences and controls his team. In order to be effective, a manger needs to be able to work in a virtual world where his team has as much input in the way plans are designed and decisions are made. The managers must also be open to the different cultures.

Security and Consumer Protection in the Information Age...

Abstract: At this point in time the ubiquity of personal and sensitive information of businesses and individuals who participate in the world economy is greater than ever. As in the past, your information could be found on an old credit card statement inside your garbage can at the end of your driveway; just waiting to be plucked by the next crafty criminal who can get his hands on it. Now your sensitive personal information is inside not only in your garbage can but as a result of the last couple of decades, information technology now has the ability to send your personal information in packets of data and over telephone wires. Extensive research has come up with empirical evidence that Internet Identity theft is on the rise in the†¦show more content†¦There are several key points and underlying themes that I have hinted to already but I will take the chance to further elucidate the main objectives for the rest of the paper: ul li The progressive compression of space and time as a result of the globalization phenomenon has had significant implications on businesses and individuals and has brought together in ways they never thought possible (Stromquist 2000). li Globalization has led to innovation in information technology, more specifically, with the invention of the Internet, information can be sent around the world at lightning fast speeds. li Within the new international data transmission infrastructure money can be exchanged in the form of data, giving birth to what is now the booming industry E-commerce. li The data required by E-commerce not only attracts businesses and consumers globally, but because of the profitable nature of the data used to exchange money, Internet criminals known as hackers electronically probe and loiter networked pathways with the intention of intercepting this valuable information. li The nature of newer, wireless technology has many more security issues because rather than data transmission through wire as before, the air is being used as the medium of transmission allowing less discrete areas for possible network access. li The most recent security measures are those in the practices of data encryption and electronic payment systems. /ul ConsumerShow MoreRelatedInternet Privacy : How Much Privacy Do We Really Have Anymore? 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