Exam II

Technology increasingly dominates both the economy and society.

§In all fields, the previous state of the art is being replaced by new high-tech developments at an ever faster rate.
▪Computers are fast becoming part of our environment, rather than just tools we use for specific tasks. With wireless modems, portable computers give us access to networked data wherever we go.
▪Mundane commercial and service jobs, environmentally dangerous jobs, and assembly and repair of inaccessible equipment such as undersea cables and space-station components in orbit increasingly will be done by robots. Personal robots will appear in the home by 2010.
▪Global sales of packaged software are growing at a rate of more than 15% per year.
▪Wireless links such as satellite-based telephone systems and Internet connections will simplify relocation of personnel, minimize delays in completing new installations, and let terminals travel with the user instead of forcing the user to seek out the terminal.
   By 2005, artificial intelligence, data mining, and virtual reality will help most companies and government agencies to assimilate data and solve problems beyond the range of today's computers. AI's uses include robotics, machine vision, voice recognition, speech synthesis, electronic data processing, health and human services, administration, and airline pilot assistance.

▪By 2005, expert systems will permeate manufacturing, energy prospecting, automotive diagnostics, medicine, insurance underwriting, and law enforcement.
▪Superconductors operating at economically viable temperatures will be in commercial use soon after 2015. Products eventually will include supercomputers the size of a three-pound coffee can, electric motors 75% smaller and lighter than those in use today, practical hydrogen-fusion power plants, electrical storage facilities with no heat loss, and noninvasive analyzers that can chart the inter action of individual brain cells.
▪The engineering, technology, and health industries all will grow rapidly, and many new biotechnology jobs will open up as new developments continue to appear.

Implications:

▪New technologies often require a higher level of education and training to use them effectively. They also provide dozens of new opportunities to create businesses and jobs.
▪Automation will continue to cut the cost of many services and products, making it possible to reduce prices while still improving profits. This will be critical to business survival as the Internet pushes the price of most products to the commodity level.
▪New technology also will make it easier for industry to minimize and capture its effluent, a crucial ability in the environmentally conscious future.

Business organizations are in the midst of a fundamental restructuring.

In order to provide a framework for better understanding where and how people will work in the future, we examine how the work organization changes in a technology-rich environment.

Three main forces are driving how firms evolve:

(1)the application and evolution of information and communication technologies

(2) the globalization of markets

(3) the development and deployment of advanced manufacturing and logistical technologies, often supported by information technologies. These interdependent forces pose formidable challenges and will radically alter the work organization in the coming decade. Herein we primarily examine the influence of information technology (IT) on the workplace of the future.

The combination of three related innovations

1)information technology (IT)

2)  complementary workplace reorganization

3)new products and services

Constitute a significant skill-biased technical change affecting labor demand in the United States. Using detailed firm-level data, we find evidence of complementarities among all three of these innovations in factor demand and productivity regressions. In addition, firms that adopt these innovations tend to use more skilled labor. The effects of IT on labor demand are greater when IT is combined with the particular organizational investments we identify, highlighting the importance of IT-enabled organizational change

▪Technologies, such as Internet-based desktop video conferencing, application sharing, collaborative communications software, and intranets/extranets collectively are changing the way that organization members work and interact. These and other advanced applications of information technologies are creating a rich infrastructure that is both empowering and at times overwhelming. Consider that employees can communicate more efficiently, with more individuals, across larger distances, on more complex topics, share more information, manipulate more data, and use a wider variety of media choices than ever before. Moreover, this "brave new world" is continuing to evolve at a rapid pace.
▪The effects of this new infrastructure on the organization are not well understood. Managers are experimenting with new organizational structures and changing relationships in search of organizational and technological configurations that can thrive in this environment. To this end, we examine some of the key IT-related trends and organizational responses that are reshaping the business world and discuss the research opportunities that these changes present.

▪ Assessing the impact of information technologies on organizations can be difficult because these technologies affect almost all business operations. At its core, IT is concerned with creating meaningful connections among various stakeholder (internal and external) groups. Thus, we focus our analysis by examining how information technologies empower changes in the relationships among important organizational stakeholders. Table 1 lists key organizational relationships and current trends influenced by recent applications of IT.

 ▪ Employee-to-Employee Relationships. The primary way that IT has changed how employees collaborate is by facilitating richer and more complex computer-mediated interactions (Lucas, 1999). For example, desktop video conferencing (DVC) systems provide a broader range of communications media (voice, video, and text) than either e-mail or telephones. In addition, the use of a video interface allows nonverbal cues in these interactions

▪ These systems also provide the infrastructure to allow real-time application sharing so that participants can collaboratively view, edit, and create information. When DVC is combined with intranets/extranets and collaborative software, such as Lotus Notes, employees are able to work, archive, and schedule future work sessions entirely online. The end result is the recreation of the dynamics of face-to-face communication and simultaneous participation in online collaboration, using sophisticated tools to achieve this collaboration. Thus, online interactions actually provide new ways for people to collaborate beyond traditional face-to-face business meetings, telephone conferencing, and e-mail.

▪ The cumulative effect of these changing organizational relationships has been to greatly increase the importance of IT to strategic decision making. From an organizational perspective, IT has moved from a relatively minor staff function that primarily supported the accounting area to an instrumental role in most major decisions. Given the current trends in the marketplace, the impact of IT on businesses is only likely to increase in the short and longer term. Thus, competence in IT use may be a necessary condition for development of competitive advantage in the future.

 ▪ Information technology is also critical to the development and maintenance of other core competencies. Recently, it has been argued that a firm's core competencies must be dynamic. That is, they must be continuously developed to remain on the forefront of knowledge (or changed).  Because IT is critical to the flow of information, advances in information technologies have helped firms to maintain their knowledge structures at the forefront in their respective areas. Employees' knowledge bases and skills can be updated using IT itself (software and electronic media). As such, IT will continue to play a critical role in the development and maintenance of organizational knowledge and employee skills.

▪ The economy is becoming more service and information based, which also facilitates the growth of telework. Thus, a larger percentage of jobs can now be accomplished through telework channels because they primarily involve the creation, dissemination and management of knowledge and learning.

▪ Telework offers substantial benefits to both employees and organizations Telecommuters benefit from the elimination of daily trips to a central office, thereby allowing more scheduling flexibility in both their business and family relationships. Telecommuters have more choices regarding where they live in relation to a particular employer. Additionally, the number of potential employers for whom a telecommuter can work without relocating is expanded, which also expands opportunities for two-income households to have both partners employed to their maximum potential.

▪Telecommuting encompasses home-based work, satellite offices, neighborhood telework centers for multiple employers, and mobile workers. Telecommuting is a forerunner of working in a boundary-less organization that takes work to the worker. Work is performed wherever it makes the most sense to perform it.

▪ Telework can reduce the size of office facilities, and their related costs, and can greatly expand the organization's potential labor pool by eliminating geographic barriers to recruitment. The organization may also benefit from increased employee satisfaction and commitment and decreased turnover because of the greater flexibility in the work schedules provided to employees.

 ▪ However, telework does present some challenges in management practice and work design. Most traditional jobs are structured so that employees accomplish them onsite, with relatively regular face-to-face interaction with supervisors. To effectively implement telework, organizations must redesign both jobs and managerial roles to take full advantage of the efficiencies afforded by IT infrastructures. Thus, managers in a telework situation must find appropriate ways to supervise, direct, and motivate people with whom they infrequently have face-to-face interactions onsite

▪ An unanticipated consequence of the restructuring of jobs and management practices in organizations to accommodate telework is the creation of positions that are more amenable to the use of contingency (or contract) workers. This occurs because telework requires standardization of procedures and job requirements, and this is usually accomplished by automating and embedding procedures within the IT infrastructure. Thus, employee training related to telework positions is often based on learning to use IT tools (e.g., following onscreen prompts and completing tutorials) rather than on learning specific organizational requirements or procedures.

▪ Several researchers have investigated the impact of computer usage on wages and have documented an unambiguous positive relationship between computer usage at work and wage levels. Using U.S. data, Krueger (1993) concluded that employees who used a computer at work earned 10 to 15 percent more than workers who did not. However, Krueger did not answer the question of whether the wage premium paid to computer workers was due to more productive workers selecting jobs requiring computer usage or to the productivity enhancing power of the computer.

Selectivity Bias in Internet Usage

We assume that each worker faces two wage rates, the rate for the job using the Internet and the rate for the job not using the Internet. The individual becomes an Internet user partially by choice and partially by the selectivity of the employer for positions which require Internet usage. That is, the selectivity bias arises from the likelihood that the same characteristics that lead to Internet usage also produce higher wages. Thus, in the wage equation, the error term is correlated with the Internet usage variable, producing biased estimates for the estimated Internet parameter. That is, if Internet usage affects wages and is correlated with explanatory variables included in the wage equation, the estimated regression coefficient for the Internet variable is biased.

Estimated Hourly Wages by Internet Usage and Technology Intensity

䦋㌌㏒㧀좈໱琰茞ᓀ㵂Ü	Corrected for Selectivity Bias			Uncorrected for Selectivity Bias
䦋㌌㏒㧀좈໱琰茞ᓀ㵂Ü	Internet Wage	Non-Internet Wage	Percent User Gain	Internet Wage	Non-Internet Wage	Percent User Gain
Low Tech	$15.15	$13.02	16.4%	$14.94	$1305	14.5%
High Tech	$14.05	$13.39	4.9%	$13.23	$11.60	14.1%

 

▪ U.S. labor productivity improved sharply in the last decade of the 20th century. Many experts attribute much of the gain to information technology in the workplace. Our results confirm the impact of information technology, as proxied by Internet usage,on wages and by implication on productivity. We examined the impact of information technology on wages, using Internet usage as the proxy for information technology.  Employing the December 1998 Current Population Survey and controlling for selectivity bias, we find significant wage gains for Internet users averaging 13.5 percent, with a range between 4.9 percent and 16.4 percent depending on the level of technological intensity in the industry.

▪ These estimates are consistent with those based on data collected earlier in the decade. We also find larger wage premiums for Internet users in low-tech industries than high-tech industries in the manufacturing sector, so wage premiums may have declined for earlier adopters of technology. While the result may seem surprising, wage premiums for Internet users may diminish over time. We also find that sorting of workers by skill level is more of an issue for high-tech firms. This finding is also consistent with earlier research.

▪ Observation of employees is nothing new. Supervisors have always monitored their subordinates to make sure they worked steadily and well. All that has changed with the advent of the computer are the techniques and effectiveness of the observations.

▪ The new methods include monitoring work performance by means of software programs that record computer use, customer service contacts, and the like; limiting and monitoring employees' use of e-mail systems; limiting and monitoring employees' Internet use; and examining the stored contents of employees' computers.

▪ Averages aside, individual employers' policies on privacy and on use of electronic technology resources vary widely in detail and theme. Some provide lengthy rules that emphasize restrictions on employee activity.  Florida State's Information Technology policy, for instance, prints out to nine pages, most of which are devoted to detailed lists of requirements and prohibitions.

▪ The brief section on "Privacy and Security" first states that the University cannot guarantee that it will retain all critical data. The only other paragraph under that heading paradoxically provides that "unauthorized access" to computer files, "either by direct examination or by automated searching," will not be permitted "unless there is reasonable cause and access is approved by the director" of the facility supporting the system -- unauthorized access, in other words, is prohibited unless it is authorized.

WHY DO THEY DO IT?
 ▪ Employers offer -- or writers offer on their behalf -- several reasons for these sorts of investigations and restrictions. In addition, there seem to be a few plausible but dubious or even illegal unadmitted explanations. The "public" reasons center on profitability concerns, worries about loss of confidential information or compromising computer security, and fear of liability for employees' misuse of computers and communications systems.  The "private" reasons include curiosity, morality, and union avoidance.

 ▪ Profitability. Employers' profitability concerns involve the costs of the equipment and systems used by employees for non-work purposes and the time they lose from their duties. Equipment costs are impossible to estimate but likely to be extremely small. Once an employer has purchased a computer and necessary peripherals for an employee, employee misuse will not easily contribute to the equipment's depreciation. Cars and trucks rapidly deteriorate with use; computers normally don't. Obsolescence is a far more common reason than overuse for having to replace electronic equipment.

▪ The continued enhancements of information technologies facilitate and increase knowledge intensity in organizations. As such, knowledge and information technologies play critical roles in the development of competitive advantage by firms. For example, IT facilitates organizational learning and helps firms move into international markets by making it easier to coordinate geographically dispersed units and operations. Even entrepreneurial new venture firms are moving into international markets earlier in their life cycle.

▪ IT has become especially important to smaller, entrepreneurial firms to facilitate their networking and cooperative ventures with other firms in order to compete more effectively with much larger firms for major projects. Furthermore, information technologies facilitate these firms' technological learning, a critical element to their survival and long-term success. IT has also helped firms from emerging markets (e.g., Korea, Mexico) compete more effectively against firms from developed markets that have more resources. Thus, IT has helped facilitate the increasing globalization of businesses.

Organized work could be simply described as a network of conversations for action.

Technologies such as electronic mail are now predominant in organizations, and their use is still rising (there are 209 million business email users in the USA alone, and this number is expected to double in the next five years

Organizations are born when there are individuals who are able to communicate

It has been estimated that up to 95 percent of a manager’s time is spent in written and verbal communication

Therefore, technologies affecting such a crucial organizational process deserve our particular attention.

Electronic mail, often referred to as email, is a paperless form of communication which allows messages to be sent from one computer user to another. Within and between organizations, email can be an effective tool that helps break down barriers to communication and promotes the free exchange of information and ideas.

On the negative side, however, email has the same security level as a postcard.  Thus, users of email may be exposed to breaches of confidentiality of their communications. In addition, email creates an electronic trail of messages that can be used to monitor individuals. Complex legal and ethical questions have emerged about the right to privacy of email users, particularly in the workplace.

Privacy Protection Principles

Intended to provide a framework for developing and implementing more specific policies on email. In developing these policies, there are many difficult decisions to be made.

The choices that are made will, to some extent, be determined by the technical limitations of email systems, the purposes for which email systems are used, the nature of the information exchanged via email, and the business of the organization.

However these policies should be guided by a commitment to offering the greatest degree of privacy protection possible for email users and subjects within an organizational context.

Principle 1

The Privacy of Email Users Should be Respected and Protected

Principle 2 

Each Organization Should Create an Explicit Policy which Addresses the Privacy of Email Users

§Purposes for which the email system may be used

§Business Messages

§Personal Messages

§Monitoring of E-mail for Non-specific Purposes

Monitoring of E-mail for Staff Evaluation Purposes

§Monitoring of E-mail for Violations of Policy or Security

§Access to email on the part of third parties

§Conditions for Access

§Use and Disclosure of E-mail

Procedures for Access

§Consequences of breaches in the email policy

Principle 3

Each Organization Should Make Its Email Policy Known to Users and Inform Users of their Rights and Obligations in Regard to the Confidentiality of Messages on the System

Principle 4

Users Should Receive Proper Training in Regard to Email and the Security/Privacy Issues Surrounding Its Use

§The email process is not inherently private

A message does not necessarily disappear when it is transmitted

§Deleting a message from one's personal files does not necessarily delete all copies of the message

Electronic files can be readily transferred

§Electronic mail systems may be networked to provide connections to other organizations or individuals, or to public access points

§The addressee may not be the only person who reads the email

Copies of messages are not necessarily duplicates of the original

§People can break into email systems

§E-mail technology may work against privacy

§E-mail can be monitored from a remote location without any indication that the monitoring is occurring

§Use of email at remote sites may result in the creation of records that the organization has little control over

§Not all email systems automatically encrypt files and messages

Wireless systems are more vulnerable to unauthorized interception of email messages than other systems

Principle 5

Email Systems Should Not Be Used for the Purposes of Collecting, Using and Disclosing Personal Information, Without Adequate Safeguards to Protect Privacy

Principle 6

Providers of Email Systems Should Explore Technical Means to Protect Privacy

Principle 7

Organizations Should Develop Appropriate Security Procedures to Protect Email Messages

Conclusions

Within and between organizations, email can be an effective tool that helps break down barriers to communication and promotes the free exchange of information and ideas. But without policies and procedures to protect privacy, the usefulness of email may be diminished. A commitment to protecting email privacy may not only promote effective communication, but enhance the work environment by letting individuals know that their rights in the workplace are considered to be important enough to warrant protection. In addition, implementation of a policy will help to protect the privacy of individuals whose personal information is transmitted via email.

Intellectual property is the term used to describe the intangible creations of the human mind

The concept of intellectual property privileges individual rights over social uses of these resources and by doing so, reinforces existing power arraangements. How is the ownership of internet documents determined? Who is the creator or the author of these kind of documents?

Different social, economic and cultural environments contribute to the development of the concept of intellectual property

•Intellectual property rights restrict the exploitation of knowledge to help inventors be rewarded for their innovations.

•However, a tradeoff exists.  Intellectual property grant monopolies to the inventor for a period of time.

•As a result, inventors can sell their inventions at a price greater than marginal cost.

•However, without Intellectual property to help recover the fixed costs of creating knowledge, the knowledge might not exist in the first place.

How is Intellectual Property Protected?

• Copyright

• Patent

• Trademark

• Trade secret

Copyright

• Protects the particular

expression or a thought or

idea in the form of words,

music, computer software,

choreography, pictures,

sculptures, audiovisual works

and sound recordings

• Denoted by the symbol ©

A copyright protects the fixed tangible expression of an idea and gives the copyright owner the right to prevent the unauthorized use of his work.  A copyright may exist in:  literary works, musical works, dramatic works, pantomimes and choreographic works, pictorial, graphic and sculptural works, motion pictures and other audio visual works, sound recordings, and architectural works.  A copyright is registered with the United States Copyright Office for either the life of the author plus 50 years or for 75 or 100 years depending on the authorship of the work and its creation date.  United States Customs protection of copyrighted works is primarily concentrated on works which have been recorded with the agency.

Patent

• Legal document issued

by the government

granting the patent

owner the right to

exclude others from

making, using, offering

to sell, or selling the

invention claimed in the patient

Patents

•Patents provide firms with temporary monopolies for their inventions.  The tradeoff is that the inventor makes the information public.

•Legal issues

•Patent protection extends from 20 years after the initial application.  This is known as the priority date. 

•Patent protection is country specific.  That is, US patents only have legal force in the US, even if the inventor is not American.

•To have protection in multiple countries, one must file applications in each country.

•Alternatively, one can file an application at the World Intellectual Property Office (WIPO) or European Patent Office (EPO) and designate the member states in which protection is desired.

•There is one application, but the patent application is still examined in each country.

•

•There is a fee for each country.

•As long as an inventor files abroad within one year of the priority date, he will be considered first, even if other file in the time in between.

•The priority date is the first application date for the patent and any related applications.

•Requirements for patent protection – The invention must be:

1.Novel – that is, the invention must be something new

2.Nonobvious – the invention must be a new contribution to knowledge

3.Useful – the invention must have some practical value.

•A patent consists of a set of claims.

•Claims are technical descriptions of the process, machine, method, or matter contained in the application.

•Each claim must independently pass the tests stated above.

•It is possible for only some of the claims to be accepted.

•Citations on the patent “narrow the realm” of the current invention.

•Citations are references to the “prior art.”

•They are an acknowledgment by the inventor of pre-existing inventions that are similar.

•The inventor cannot claim infringement against something also contained in a cited patent.

•In the US, patent examiners follow a “first to invent” principle.

•That is, if two or more parties claim the same invention, the one that can show to have invented the product first wins the patent.

•In other countries, a “first to file” principle is used.

•Enforcement of patents

•When a patent holder believes someone is infringing on the invention, they can take the defendant to court.

•In the US, all patent appeals from the US District Courts and the USPTO are held in the Court of Appeals of the Federal Circuit.

•Established in 1982

•Goal: to standardize interpretation of patent laws. Avoided the possibility of “forum shopping” for a district that would be favorable to your view.

•There was concern that the Justice Department, FTC, and lower courts tended to look at patents in terms of antitrust law.

•Most challenged patents tended to be ruled invalid.

•In 1980, the Supreme Court ruled that monopoly protection was the point of a patent, so enforcing them was not a violation of antitrust.

•Since the Court of Appeals was instituted, patents have been more likely to be held up in court.

•Data:

•Before 1980, a patent found to be valid was upheld on appeal 62% of the time. Between 1982-1990, this rose to 92%!

•Similarly, before 1980, a finding of an invalid patent was only overturned 12% of the time.  This rose to 28% between 1982-1990.

•Enforcement raises questions of patent scope

•Patent scope refers to how broad a patent can be – that is, how close must an invention be to the patent to be considered infringement.

•Broader scope makes patents more valuable to firms after the invention is complete, yet may lower incentives to do the R&D, since the likelihood of infringing on another patent is greater.

•The tradeoff is most apparent in fields where invention is cumulative.

•Currently, the debate is over whether too many “obvious” inventions are patented.

Trade Secret

• Information that is not

generally known within

the trade or industry, and

that provides a

competitive advantage

Trademark

• Identifying words or symbols

associated with a company’s

goods or services which

distinguish them from those

manufactured or sold by others

• Denoted by the symbols

® and ™

A trademark is defined as a word, name, symbol, device, color or combination thereof used to distinguish goods.  U.S. Customs protects trademarks that are registered with the United States Patent and Trademark Office.  Customs administrative enforcement entitles certification marks, service marks and collective marks to the same protection as trademarks.  Registration of a trademark covers a specific class or classes of goods, for a period of ten years and is renewable.

A trade name is the name under which a company does business.  Trade names are not registered with the Patent and Trademark Office but may be recorded with Customs if the name has been used to identify a trade or manufacturer for at least six months.  The recordation of trade names is published in the Federal Register and the Customs Bulletin to provide notice to the public and interested parties an opportunity to oppose the recordation.  Protection for a recorded trade name remains in force as long as the trade name is in use.

Recording devices, and digital technologies in particular, turn prior recorded sound into the raw material for new work.  Samplers have replaced electric guitars as tools of the trade for many musicians; remixes and sonic collage are musical staples from the Top 40 to obscure electronica and hip-hop.

But the law has not looked kindly upon unauthorized sampling. In the first sampling-based copyright infringement case, the court's opinion began with scripture - "Thou shalt not steal" - and ended with a referral for criminal prosecution.

Is recorded sound simply private property, and is its re-use simply theft? Or is recorded sound the raw material of creative expression, a resource without which artists' voices would be stifled? Sampling raises copyright law's characteristic tensions: the sound recording is both private property, enabling an author or musician to get paid for her work, and an element of communication and culture. But the fair use doctrine, statutory compulsory licensing, and the First Amendment, which may permit unauthorized creative re-use of copyrighted materials in other cases, have never been brought to bear on sampling. The only clearly legal sample is an authorized sample.

As the Internet has became more prevalent, the need for copyright protection there has also become a necessity. Today, copyright law has been adapted to protect Internet items, just as it has been adapted through the years to protect various other new mediums. It protects original work or work that is fixed in a tangible medium, meaning it is written, typed, or recorded. But because it was not designed specifically for the Internet, in some areas copyright law on the Internet can be as clear as mud.

Technically, when a user visits a Web page, the computer puts the page into RAM memory, and then when it is viewed online, some browsers put it into the computer's cache so that it will load quicker the next time the page is visited by that viewer. Thus, the entirety of the page is copied, which is technically a violation of copyright law. There is, however, an out. That is because by placing the page on the Internet, there is an implied consent by the owner for people to view that page.

That is splitting hairs, but if people do not want the page to be seen, they could leave it off the Internet or password protect each page. That, however, defeats the purpose of the Internet, making it basically empty and mindless — a lot like reality TV.

The problem is that people can easily copy the words verbatim, steal the photos, or copy the design as it is. Those actions are violations of copyright law and just not nice to do. They are also frequently hard to track down.

When a Web page is created, its contents are immediately copyrighted, whether or not it carries a copyright notice. The copyright can belong to the creator or, in the case of a Web site that is created for someone, it can belong to the client. It is a good move to include a copyright notice in the form of: copyright or ©, the date of creation, and the owner. It is an even smarter move to register that copyright with the U.S. Copyright Office.

Not everything put on the Internet is afforded the protection of copyright. Titles, names, short parts of works, slogans, ideas, methods, or concepts are fair game, although they may be covered by Trademark law which would protect them.

There is also a thing called "Fair Use," that is not a copyright infringement. "Fair Use" includes items for use in nonprofit educational purposes, if the amount of the work used is minimal (such as a pull quote from a story), or the degree to which the use of the work will have on its commercial value.

The problem is that one person's view of "Fair Use" can be vastly different from another person's view, and there is no assurance that the courts will agree with you should you find yourself in such a situation.

Fair use was created to primarily allow parody, commentary, news reporting, and education. Notice those are all written situations. Chances of getting away with taking a screen capture of Anna Kournikova on TV and posting it on a Web site while calling it "Fair Use" are virtually nil. Makes you wonder how there legally can be thousands of pictures of her on hundreds of Web sites, doesn't it?

Other items not covered would include information that is common property without original authorship, such as calendars, height and weight charts, tape measures and rulers. However, if you create a fancy calendar design, it can be copyrighted.

What About Public Domain?

Many people think that because something is on the Internet, it is in the "public domain," and therefore freely usable by the public. That is false. That would be true only if the author has denounced ownership or died more than 70 years ago.

For example, you go to a Web site that offers graphics for use on your Web site at no charge. That gives you permission to use a graphic on your site, but you cannot include that graphic in a collection for sale to other people. The graphic is not in the public domain.

Generally speaking, if something has been around for centuries and does not appear to belong to anyone, it is said to be in the public domain. If it has a copyright label affixed to it, no argument is going to convince a legal mind that it is open to public use.

What Can They Steal From Me?

While cruising the Internet, someone sees a site and admires the layout. It is very easy to see the source code, copy and paste it into a new document and use it for their own. It is also illegal because even HTML coding is covered by copyright law. The same is true for JavaScripts and Java applets.

But what if cruising the 'Net you see a page that looks just like one you earlier created, but it clearly was created before you did yours? Are you guilty of copyright infringement? No, because it just so happens the pages looked alike but were created independently, not because of theft on anyone's part. It is considered innocent infringement at most. However, one should not make the mistake of copying a page and then claiming innocent infringement, if they want to be assured of protection.

Thus, in addition to the obvious photos and words, the coding or programming involved in the Internet can be copyrighted, as can novels, e-mail, music, software, screenplays, Usenet messages, or short stories that appear.

Some think that if they change a few words, they are not guilty of plagiarism or copyright infringement. That, of course, is false. The idea cannot be copyrighted, but the words can, so to use that information and avoid infringement, it would be necessary to extensively rewrite the copy in your own words.

Otherwise, it is no different than making a bootleg copy of a performer's music CD or putting a different cover on a book, changing the byline, and publishing it for profit. You have to figure someone will notice.

While anyone can link to a page, it is only good manners to first get permission from a Web site owner to do so. That is called Netiquette. However, most people do not do that, and in most cases there is not really any harm.

In fact, linking is probably the safest way to go to bring attention to another person's page, while the use of frames (and opening links in them) is perhaps the most risky.

Even though linking to a site within your frames may not have any financial bearing on the site being displayed, copyright infringement can include the damage created by associating the one site with the other.

For example, if I had a porn site set up in frames, and I linked to a page of a famous person who is not involved in the porn industry, the appearance created by having that person's page appear on my site can be considered damaging. At that point, should the famous person wish to pursue the matter, it could get expensive for me.

Another issue involving frames is, using the above example, that if the famous person's site is used by you on a page containing advertising in another frame, it can appear that the famous person is offering an endorsement of the advertised product. That is a no-no.

Yet another problem with frames is that people may think the page of that famous person belongs to the owner of the Web site using the frames. Book 'em, Dano (a pull quote). That, too, is a no-no.

In these cases, we've discussed home pages. But what about the other pages on a site? Should a site owner wish to keep people from linking to interior pages of their site, it must be done so through technical means. Otherwise, copyright law won't prevent people from viewing the pages, although printing and copying and stealing images and words fall under the law in other areas.

For example, if I had a porn site set up in frames, and I linked to a page of a famous person who is not involved in the porn industry, the appearance created by having that person's page appear on my site can be considered damaging. At that point, should the famous person wish to pursue the matter, it could get expensive for me.

Another issue involving frames is, using the above example, that if the famous person's site is used by you on a page containing advertising in another frame, it can appear that the famous person is offering an endorsement of the advertised product. That is a no-no.

Yet another problem with frames is that people may think the page of that famous person belongs to the owner of the Web site using the frames. Book 'em, Dano (a pull quote). That, too, is a no-no.

In these cases, we've discussed home pages. But what about the other pages on a site? Should a site owner wish to keep people from linking to interior pages of their site, it must be done so through technical means. Otherwise, copyright law won't prevent people from viewing the pages, although printing and copying and stealing images and words fall under the law in other areas.