LEGAL,

ETHICAL, AND
SOCIETAL
ISSUES IN MIL
Course Material 6
 OBJECTIVES
This module has been designed to help you:

• Discuss actions to promote ethical use of media and

information;
• Demonstrate proper conduct and behavior online; and
• Put into practice your understanding of the intellectual
property, copyright, fair use, and netiquette
guidelines.
When we want to use the resources
created by other people for personal or
professional purposes, there are certain
conditions that we must meet to use
them freely, and without legal
consequences. Otherwise, we are
criminally liable through plagiarism.
 Mainstream media in the 1990s
Picture it:

August 1990. Rob Van Winkle, popularly known as

Vanilla Ice, was having the time of his career as a
budding hip-hop artist, as one of his songs was the
very first hip-hop song to enter the Billboard Hot
100 charts, and stay at the Number 1 spot upon
entry. The song? “Ice Ice Baby”.
Mainstream media in the 1990s
But there was one problem:
the recurring melody of the song (more commonly
known in musical jargon as the “bass line”) was
very familiar with hard rock fans from the 1980s, as
it sounded pretty similar to a song that was
considered to be one of the most powerful
collaborations of that era. The song? “Under
Pressure”.
Mainstream media in the 1990s

“Under Pressure”, a joint musical operation by the

British rock band Queen (you know, the one with
Freddie Mercury in it?), and the Rolling Stones’
“Greatest Rock Star Ever”, David Bowie.
What happened?
Vanilla Ice admitted that he did
copy the bass line of “Under
Pressure”, but insisted that he
added an additional note to it,
therefore he claimed that it cannot
be considered an act of stealing
craft from other artists.
What happened?
To avoid the looming legal
consequences that the camp of
Mercury, et.al., and the Bowie estate
were preparing against Vanilla Ice at
the time, the rapper settled things out
of court by paying their dues that they
think they deserve from the popularity
that his track acquired.
What happened?

In addition to that, he credited all four

members of Queen, and David Bowie
himself as additional “songwriters” to
“Ice Ice Baby”.
 SAMPLING

- practice in hip-hop
music of borrowing
certain elements from
songs of past decades.
 Intellectual
Property
Defined as a category of property
that includes intangible creations
of the human intellect
(World Intellectual Property
Organization, 2016).
 Intellectual
Property
The key phrase here
Defined as a category of
is intangible
property that includes
intangible creations of the
creations:
human intellect whatever is a product
(World Intellectual Property of your mind.
Organization, 2016).
 Intellectual
Property
is the umbrella term to which two
of the major terms you are going
to encounter belong:
copyright and fair use.
Copyright
and Fair Use
 Copyright
is defined as a legal binding that
grants its owner the right to control
an intellectual or artistic creation,
including right to profit from others
using the work in specific ways
without permission, or from the sale
and performance of the work.
(Stony Brook University, 2020)

In simpler terms, you have all the rights in the

world to protect, manipulate, and share your
creative work with others.
 Copyright
When a copyright expires after
a certain amount of years has
passed, all of the content the
creator produced will enter
public domain.
It is properly defined as a body
of creative work to which no
exclusive intellectual property
rights apply.
 COPYLEFT
This is the copyleft sign which
is literally the opposite of the
copyright symbol. Copyleft
requires that the same rights
to the work also apply to
derivative works created from
that property
There are certain conditions
in which your song, story,
dance move, or poem will
enter the public domain;
their copyright will expire
when:
 Conditions
1 the length of effectivity of the copyright is expired;

2 you willingly waived the copyright;

the copyright has been forfeited by a ruling court in the country where
3 the content was created/distributed;

4 copyright laws are inapplicable.

In the Philippines, a certain creation will have its
copyright expired and automatically enter the
public domain when they reach a good amount
of years.
Refer to the table with condensed information
coming from the Republic Act No. 8293,
formally known as the “Intellectual Property
Code of the Philippines”.
 What is the content? When will the copyright expire?
Literary works Lifetime of the author + 50 years after
(e.g. story, book, poem, article) the author’s death
Visual art (i.e. painting, illustration) 25 years from the date of creation
Photographs
- published (commercial use) 50 years from date of publication
- unpublished (personal use)
Audiovisual work
(personal video footage, songs, 50 years from date of publication
movie, stage production)
Television broadcasts
(news reports, game and variety 20 years from date of broadcast
shows, etc.)
Patent (schematics for an
20 years from date of application
invention/innovative technology)
Any creation mentioned above done
50 years from date of legal publication
by an ANONYMOUS creator
(Official Gazette of the Republic of the Philippines, 1997)
 Fair Use
is generally defined as a provision of
copyright law that allows the use of
copyrighted work without permission
from the copyright holder under
specific circumstances.

(Creative Commons USA, 2018)

This means that you can use any copyrighted
content from another person without asking for
permission, provided that you clearly state the
intention of using such content.
Some of the circumstances that cover fair use include:

1 purpose (how will you use it?)

degree/intensity of the original work used (how much will

2 you use?)

impact of the original work on the target market/audience

3 (what’s in it for those who will see what you used?)
 Fair Use

“allows a rather limited amount of

copying without the copyright owner’s
permission for specific purposes”.

(Stony Brook University, 2020)

Some purposes/intentions where fair use is dominantly
enforced are:

1 news and current affairs

2 education-related materials

3 parody

4 sampling of music
Some purposes/intentions where fair use is dominantly
enforced are:

1 news and current affairs

• This includes commentary and criticism programs on all

forms of media.

• When you hear your favorite newscaster or radio

commentator use a quotation from his favorite movie to
launch a tirade against, say, a candidate running for Senator,
the production company that created the movie cannot call
for copyright infringement, since it can be considered fair
use.
Some purposes/intentions where fair use is dominantly
enforced are:

2 education-related materials

• Just like the example regarding teaching “Mi ultimo

adios” absolutely free to students, any copyrighted
material is constituted for fair use if it is used for
educational purposes.

• This includes mentioning trademark names when

teachers give examples to students in a class.
Some purposes/intentions where fair use is dominantly
enforced are:

3 parody

• Parody is generally defined as a comedic commentary

about a work, that requires imitation of the said work
(Copyright Alliance, n.d.)

• Fair use, in this case, guarantees protection against

copyright infringements as parodies imitate, mock,
ridicule, or even criticize items of pop culture.
Some purposes/intentions where fair use is dominantly
enforced are:

4 sampling of music

• Just after the Vanilla Ice-Queen/Bowie fiasco, it has long

been accepted afterwards that hip-hop songs, or even
songs from other music genres borrow some elements
and mix them along with their original content.

• Prominent examples include the theme song of the Men

in Black movie franchise, which borrows elements from
the 1970s disco hit “Forget-Me-Nots” by Patrice Rushen.
For your content to strike the clauses of fair use, three
(3) common guidelines must be met::

1 the majority of the content must come from you

you must give credit to the creators of the copyrighted

2 material

you must assure that your material is for non-commercial use

3 only
Plagiarism
 KEY POINT

Using someone else’s work without

proper attribution and calling it your own
is a gross violation of ethics and standards
of academic honesty, not to mention
intellectual property rights.
 Plagiarism
The term comes from the Latin verb plagar, which
means “to steal”.

With the origin of this word we also derived the word

“plague”, which is, technically, stealing the strength of
one’s body (as in the Bubonic Plague), or spirit (the
figurative expression “plagued with problems”).

Plagiarism, in your context as a student, is the gravest

form of academic dishonesty.
 Plagiarism

For professionals, plagiarizing any

copyrighted material is automatically in
violation of RA 8293, also discussed
previously in this CM, which, according to
the Official Gazette of the Republic of the
Philippines (1997) guarantees:
Plagiarizing any copyrighted material guarantees:

1-3 years of imprisonment, and a fine ranging from

1 Php50,000 to Php150,000 (for the first offense)

3-6 years of imprisonment, and a fine ranging from

2 Php150,000 to Php500,000 (for the second offense)

6 years and 1 day, to 9 years imprisonment, and a fine ranging

3 from Php500,000 to Php1.5 million (for the third and final
offense)
Most Common Types of Plagiarism
Committed by Students
Harvard University (2011)
 Most Common Types of Plagiarism Committed by Students
Verbatim Plagiarism
● From the Latin “word”, this is the
fundamental kind of plagiarism that
the majority commit, student or
professional alike.
● This is also known in other references
as cut-paste plagiarism, and copy-
paste plagiarism, due to the ease
with which you can do this kind of
plagiarism through the computer.
Mosaic Plagiarism
● It is the act of compiling parts of
different resources, changing some of
the words to accommodate the topic,
then combining them into one single
new content, much like stained glass
mosaics in churches.
● Mosaic plagiarism is easier to detect,
because the major giveaway of
outputs plagiarized in this manner is
the inconsistency of one sentence
with another.
 Most Common Types of Plagiarism Committed by Students

Misattribution Plagiarism You can commit misattribution

plagiarism by:

This can come in ● leaving an uncited

paraphrase/quotation
various forms and is
composing an inadequate
one of the most ●
paraphrase of the original source
dangerous kinds of
● linking information to an
plagiarism. incorrect/false/made-up citation
 Most Common Types of Plagiarism Committed by Students
Self-Plagiarism
Self-plagiarism is
committed by submitting
the same output you had in
a previous course to a
current course, again
without prior
acknowledgment.
Self-plagiarism may not just involve
whole outputs. When you copy parts of
an output that you made previously, and
used it in a current output, you’re
cheating on yourself, as well as
disrespecting your craft.
● What academics do is to cite their
own paper, no matter how arrogant
it may seem.
● The more pressing issue here is
academic honesty and integrity.
Netiquette
 Online Fora

An online forum is a community in which people on the

internet (called “members”) communicate with each
other through posted messages (vBulletin, 2020).

It is also known as an online bulletin board, paying homage to

the old school way of getting noticed within one community
by posting.
 Netiquette

Netiquette is a portmanteau or
mixture of the words “internet” and
“etiquette”, and is generally defined
as a set of conventions facilitated and
implemented in various online
networks.
 Some of the general netiquette that we commonly practice:

DO DON’T
● Maintain relevance, appropriateness, ● Flame other people who don’t share the
and tact. same line of thought as you.

● Think before you click. ● Send a barrage of unnecessary messages.

● Secure your privacy. ● Talk in straight uppercase letters (i.e.

all caps).

● Respect a netizen as you would a ● Share critical personal information.

“real” one.
● Record/Take a screenshot of your
● Wait for your turn, otherwise, excuse
conversations without the consent of
yourself during arguments.
the other party/ies.
“Memento publicum”.
Remember that you are in public.

What you say, and how you present yourself

online is regarded nowadays as constitutions of
your digital self.
THANKS!
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