Assignment 1 Part 2

Week 8 Exercise

WEEK 8: Additional Assignment for CISB412

Each Team is to work on the questions during today’s class and upload the answer through their blog by Friday 11th November, 5 PM. It is recommended that the teams finalize this assignment during the class time and not take it outside the designated learning time for this week. You need NOT MORE than 2 hours to get this done. Manage your time right. You need not send any email to indicate that you have updated your blog.

1. Many cell phones now come equipped with cameras. Managers of health clubs are concerned that people in locker rooms may be secretly photographed by other members carrying small cell phones. What do you think about this? Discuss your answer based on one ethical principle of your choice.

2. Before offering a job candidate a position, some potential employers do a criminal background check of the candidate. What are the pros and cons of this policy? Is this ethical? Discuss your answer based on one ethical principle of your choice.

3. Refer to the lecture slide for this week on Intellectual Property. Explain with example the following:

o Copyrights

o Patents

o Trademarks

o Trade secrets

4. Discuss software duplicating from the perspectives of act utilitarianism.

1. Many cell phones now come equipped with cameras. Managers of health clubs are concerned that people in locker rooms may be secretly photographed by other members carrying small cell phones. What do you think about this? Discuss your answer based on one ethical principle of your choice.

In today’s world, mobile phone has become a necessity for everyone even the younger generation as old as 8 years old. Together with the development of mobile phone, sexual criminals has also advanced by using the camera technology in mobile phones to perform their pervert stuff. This has become a new trend for perverts that is to photograph other person secretly for their own use. Pictures taken secretly in public is still considered legal whereas pictures taken secretly in non-public areas is illegal and unethical. The pictures taken can end up in wrong destination which can be a threat to the person in the picture. For example, Princess Diana once sued a national newspaper publication and the gym owner in year 1993. This legal action was taken to ensure that the photo’s will not be published outside United Kingdom. Some people needs privacy and people in health clubs might be wearing sports attire which are revealing. They certainly would not want this pictures to be taken and published.

The person who are taking the pictures secretly is practicing the Kantianism principe (2^nd formulation) which it is wrong for a person to ‘use’ another person. The photographer might be using the photographs to pose threat or to become famous by publishing the photo’s in the Internet.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/november/9/newsid_2515000/2515739.stm

2. Before offering a job candidate a position, some potential employers do a criminal background check of the candidate. What are the pros and cons of this policy? Is this ethical? Discuss your answer based on one ethical principle of your choice.

PROS

Most of the companies do background check of the applicants before the interview session. Normally, the first thing they will look into is on criminal background. Employers practicing this to increase the applicant quality which results in an immediate reduction in number of applications. Although there is fewer candidates, there will be candidates who are serious with the job. This does discourage applicants who masks the truth in order to get a job.

Reputed companies do background check to avoid workplace violence and to increase the company’s profit and reputation. By doing the criminal background check, the employer can eliminate applicants who have previous criminal records so that no violence will occur in future. Although this might be seem to be unethical for the candidate, all the employer’s have a moral and legal obligations in order to provide a safe working environment. This ensures that there will be no potential threat to other employees.

CONS

Although background check seem to a reliable procedure to be done, it has few cons. Information about a candidate might not be accurate and erroneous. For example, his or her identity might be mistaken and the outcome will not be favoring the candidate. If the employer questions about this to the candidate, he or she then can prove by providing the reliable sources such as the school management or previous working management. Some people do not like their information to be available to others because it might posses threat to them. This background check is unethical to them as it invades their privacy.

Another cons is that some old mistakes and problem will be uncovered and it might give a wrong perception to the employer. The candidate might have repented for doing mistakes in the past and he or she feels that they should not be punished currently.

In conclusion, this situation represents Rule Utilitarianism where the employer believe they have the rights to do background check on applicants based on the company’s policy and it is completely ethical.

Based from the applicants, they might practice Kantianism in which they believe that their information is completely private and it is unethical for another person to use the information.

3. Refer to the lecture slide for this week on Intellectual Property. Explain with example the following:

o Copyrights

o Patents

o Trademarks

o Trade secrets

Copyrights

Copyright provides protection to creators of materials in a tangible or fixed form. The creators obtain an exclusive right to his/her creative work within a period of time. The creative works can be classified as literary, dramatic, musical, artistic and others. According to Harvey Sells (1999), the U.S copyright have give the protection to the creators up to 95 years as the material been published or registered in U.S before January 1,1978 which under the Sonny Bono Extension Act of 1998. Copyright Act generally gives the author or owner of copyright an exclusive right to control how a copyright work is used, reproduced and distributed. The range of creative works subject to copyright is not always obvious. A computer program, for instance is covered as a literary work. What a copyright does not cover are titles or short phrases used within a copyrighted work.

Patents

A patent for an invention is the grant of a property right to the inventor.Generally, the term of a new patent is 20 years from the date on which the application for the patent was filed and been registered. However, under certain circumstances, patent term extension or adjustment may be available. There are three types of patents:

1) Utility patents - May be granted to anyone who invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, article of manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement.

2) Design patents - May be granted to anyone who invents a new, original, and decorating good design for an article of manufacture.

3) Plant patents - May be granted to anyone who invents or discovers and asexually reproduces any distinct and new variety of plant.

Trademarks

A trademark is literally a “mark” that one business uses to distinguish its products or services from another. The “mark” can be classified as a word, design, number, two-dimensional or three-dimensional form, sound or colour, or a combination of two or more of these elements. Most of organization use trademarks for marketing purpose so that other companies or competitors can’t use the same trademark. For example, McDonalds’ company use the unique letter “M” while KFC use the combination of white and red colour as their trademark to representing their company.

Trade Secrets

Trade secrets are information that companies keep secret to give them an advantage over their competitors. The unauthorized use of such information by persons other than the holder is regarded as an unfair practice and a violation of the trade secret. Depending on the legal system, the protection of trade secrets forms part of the general concept of protection against unfair competition or is based on specific provisions or case law on the protection of confidential information. The subject matter of trade secrets is usually defined in broad terms and includes sales methods, distribution methods, consumer profiles, advertising strategies, lists of suppliers and clients, and manufacturing processes. For example, the formula for Coca-Cola is the most famous trade secret and Colonel Sanders as the KFC founder use the trade secret to protect the recipe of fried chicken.

4. Discuss software duplicating from the perspectives of act utilitarianism.

Software duplicating is an illegal business because it is an unauthorized copying. From the software developer’s view, it is unethical to copy a software and to distribute it. Copyright law protects the developer but it can only incur a legal liability towards a organization or institution. Many people are using duplicated software without getting caught as there is no enough time and money to investigate each person and to take action on them.

Eventhough some softwares lack of copy protection, it does not means that anyone have permission to copy the software in order to sell or distribute it. Some people may have bought a legal copy of the software, but shares it with their friends and family. It is also considered illegal if the license permits only one machine to be installed to.

Most of the students will hesitate to buy original software as they are very expensive but this does not mean it is ethical. It might be cheaper to buy the duplicated software but the developer will not be getting a single cent for his hardwork. If the software is very useful and they are going to use it, its better to buy the original to support the developer.

In conclusion, the users who are using the duplicated software will be happy to use it but the developer will be losing and gets nothing out of their hardwork.

http://www.uwo.ca/its/pps/softethics.html