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Intellectual Honesty in the Era of Computing
by DR. FRANK W. CONNOLLY, Associate Professor The American
University Washington, D.C.
Cyberspace, the electronic frontier, is the realization of the American
fantasy—the ultimate in freedom and rugged individualism. Whether
sitting at your stand-alone personal computer or surfing the nets, the
world of bits and bytes and electrons is the place where individuals
reign supreme. The good news is that for all practical purposes there are:
no police, few laws, great flexibility and power, and unlimited freedom.
The bad news is that for all practical purposes there are: no police, few
laws, great flexibility and power, and unlimited freedom.
But, freedom d'es not mean license; technical ability is not a mandate to
act; and, lack of enforcement mechanisms d'es not equate to
permission. Freedom means that one is expected to use judgment and
care; technical ability provides the power to act or not act; and, lack of
enforcement compels individuals to accept sole responsibility for their
decisions and actions. Like Plato's lesson regarding the Ring of Gyges,
the fact that one is unlikely to get caught is neither excuse nor
justification for unacceptable behavior.
Why Not Copy It?
Computers facilitate many things in higher education—teaching, learning,
writing, research, administrivia—and they do so by enabling individual
teachers, students, staff and administrators. Like the shepherd of Gyges'
ring, computers facilitate and enable these things under a mantle of
invisibility. Users can sit alone in their dorm rooms, or homes, or offices
and do wondrous things unobserved, and typically undetectable by
others.
Given this power and these conditions, why shouldn't computer users
scan pictures and copy software with impunity? To be blunt, there are
three simple reasons:
It's illegal;
It's unethical; and
It's not in their self interest, even if they never get caught.
Illegal. The intellectual property laws of the United States, as amended
and modified, cover numerous things including computer software and
other digitized works such as graphics, pictures and sounds. In its
simplest form the law says that it is legal to make an archival copy of
digitized works and illegal to make other copies without the permission
of the person or organization that holds the rights to the material. There
is an exception to this called "fair use," governed by four limiting
conditions and worthy of several articles all by itself. Since
constitutional times our laws have protected intellectual works and
failure to do so is a violation of the law.
