In today’s class, we watched a 90-minute documentary called RiP!: A Remix Manifesto https://www.nfb.ca/film/rip_a_remix_manifesto/. This documentary covers the controversial discussion of copyrighting and the power struggle between corporate control and the public domain. I found this documentary eye-opening and interesting for several reasons. I knew about copyrighting and some of the implications that can come from downloading music and movies on websites, like LimeWire and UTorrent, but I didn’t realize the extent corporations would go to maintain ownership. This was shown in the documentary when it explained that large music corporations had sued up to 52 million people for copyrighting. The narrator described it as “the industry controlling the people while websites, like Napster, were just trying to take some of that control back”. The internet was made to be a network for people to share ideas, encourage conversation and creative expression but clearly, there is a fine line between creative freedom and who is in control of what. I understand that there are necessary precautions to take when protecting intellectual property but when companies are making millions of dollars a year off a song like Happy Birthday, of which the writers are no longer with us, I see the copyright law as a manipulative tool for the powerful and rich staying in control.