Week 2 Readings

The Wikipedia entry on computer hardware states that computer hardware serves as the physical component of a computer. It is installed on an operating system such as Windows, Linux, or Macintosh, and they contain a motherboard which contains the software necessary to execute all the processes of the computer, a power supply unit that regulates power usage plus fans to prevent the system from overheating, a graphics card driven video display unit that affects the resolution and quality of images the computer displays, media devices such as a CD-ROM drive that reads CD-ROMs and a DVD-ROM drive for reading and playing digital versatile disks. Some older computers feature floppy disk drives, a technology rendered outdated by CD-ROM drives and USB flash drives. Some computers even feature tape drives for editing digital video.

Moore's law is an observation that shows how rapidly computer technology increases over time. According to this chart, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Transistor_Count_and_Moore%27s_Law_-_2008.svg, the number of transistors required for computers to function at a high level is almost two billion more than what it was thirty years ago. As it is, the size, density, and speed of computer components are increasing at an exponential level today. This truly shows how far computer technology traveled over the past thirty-some years.

http://www.computerhistory.org/ features the development of computative technologies over time. It includes written descriptions on how computers evolved over time as well as images of various hardware elements with computers. Early on computers took up an entire room and they did the same functions as a standard pocket calculator today. The site also contains descriptions and accounts of the people who influenced the history of computers as well as a timeline of how computers progressed. By checking this website one gets an idea of how rapidly the technology with computers increased over the past forty-some years with computers.

In chapters four through seven of Digital Copyright Litman writes that most people do not understand copyright laws and often people violate them with computers, whether it is with downloading music or the manuscript to a book. The copyright law is very complicated and people do not care about intellectual property; as a result, they will often download things that they should otherwise pay for, thus undermining copyright law. While some are embracing the technology, such as with iTunes, other feel that the easy access to downloadable copyrighted material is copyright infringement and should be treated as such.