We discussed social issues SOPA in Wednesday class. SOPA is the short for “stop online piracy act”. According to wikipedia: The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) is a United States bill introduced by U.S. Representative Lamar S. Smith (R-TX) to expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods. The law would expand existing criminal laws to include unauthorized streaming of copyright material, imposing a maximum penalty of five years in prison.

        The class started to discuss the matter that the government was trying to pass the law to enforce people to credit the artists whenever someone posts something on you tube or any similar site. If they post something and not credit the artist, they would be fined or punished. I absolutely support intellectual property protection. Each intellectual property is the result combining designers’ hardworking, time and money. It will take long time for them to create an awesome work, but piracy only takes a minute. Without protection, the designers will be lack of motivation for creation. However, if such protection is undue, like the matter we discussed in the class, I believe it will also slow down the popularization of the awesome work. Everybody has to spend more time in searching authors before each post. The fun thing will become a time-consuming duty. We always criticize Chinese government’s control in internet. If the matter we discussed becomes a law, how the US government enforces the law without watching our online behavior? Is it not a different type of control?

        The first project assignment was announced in the class. We will work with one partner to create two full-page print ads for an important or controversial issue. We are free to pick any issue we feel interesting. The print ads should persuasively communicate a -pro and a -con perspective. After the discussion with my partner, we have chosen a Health issue. We need to do some research and develop imagery to support that concept.