Discussion

You are the original composer and performing artist of a hot, new pop song. Your music director, Christine, has praised you on your composition and she feels that your song is going to generate significant revenue. You are enthusiastic and talk to your sales manager, Robin, about the projected income. To your surprise, you learn that your composition has been illegally distributed among a large audience of music lovers and that the expected revenue projections seem to be unachievable. You try to figure out the reasons for the illegal distribution. Robin tells you about peer-to-peer (P2P) networks and how P2P—a social networking tool—is popular for sharing MP3 music.

With the consent of your entire team, you decide to have a press conference. Robin asks you to emphasize the following points to help your case:

• Violation of your copyright privileges, and how you feel knowing that thousands of users are simply copying and sharing your composition, for which they might have paid for otherwise
• Enabling your case as a consideration in the purview of "fair use" under the law
• Your feeling about the reduction in your expected income from your creative efforts that you will face due to the unethical and illegal file sharing technology
• Legal remedies that you will be seeking