Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main point of the passage?

Victoria on June 20, 2021

Hi @rinavaleriano,

Happy to help!

Let's start by going through the passage.

The author begins by telling us that the World Wide Web raises legal issues about the rights of owners of intellectual property (IP). The author specifically highlights those who create documents for webpages.

The author ends Paragraph 1 by introducing us to a debate. One side believes that copyright law must be strengthened to ensure that IP on the internet is protected. The other side believes that copyright law should not be strengthened because this would limit the internet's potential as an open medium for communication and the dissemination of information.

In Paragraph 2, the author clarifies that this debate arises when documents are linked on the internet. The author likens this to citations in a printed work with one key difference: users of the internet, unlike reads of printed text, can immediately access the document by clicking on the link.

Why is this a problem? Because current copyright law allows owners of IP to sue anyone who distributes "unauthorized copies of their material even if that distributor did not personally make the copies" (lines 19 to 23).

The author ends Paragraph 2 by raising a question: if the author of a document (the "creator") puts it on a webpage and another webpage links the document on their page, is the creator of that webpage (the "distributor") committing copyright infringement?

The author then spends the remainder of the passage answering this question.

To begin, the author presents us with an analogy. When the creator places their document on a webpage, this is akin to recording an outgoing message for their voicemail. The distributor providing a link to the creator's document is akin to sharing the creator's phone number with others, thereby allowing them to hear the creator's outgoing message.

How does this relate to the question? The distributor is facilitating access to the creator's document by providing the link; however, by placing the document on the webpage in the first place, the creator is offering it for distribution.

This is further supported by the fact that the creator ultimately controls access to the document e.g. by restricting access through password protection.

Therefore, the author of the passage concludes that sharing a link to a document is not the same as copying or distributing a copy of that document. Therefore, copyright law should not be strengthened because the creator still controls access and strengthened protections would "impede the development of the Web as a public forum dedicated to the free exchange of ideas" (last line).

Notice that the running thread throughout the entire passage is the question of copyright infringement. The ultimate goal of the passage is to weigh in on the debate presented and to answer the question posed at the end of Paragraph 2.

Answer choice (A) is correct because it provides us with the answer to the question posed by the author at the end of Paragraph 2.

Answer choice (C) is vaguely similar, but it does not directly address copyright infringement, which is an essential aspect of the passage. Additionally, it is not necessarily true that preventing access to documents will not inhibit the rights of others to exchange ideas freely. The author even hints at this when they discuss the possibility of password protection, highlighting that this "solution would compromise the openness of the Web somewhat" (lines 49 to 50).

Hope this helps! Please let us know if you have any further questions.