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Lawrence Lessig did. He lost, as usual. That was Eldred v. Ashcroft, 537 U.S. 186 (2003)

At least he has a good idea what he did wrong. Whoever tries again will avoid that mistake, at least.

Yeah, that's the other parties' fees, I think. And the docket turns out to have a lot of activity for a case that only had one side chugging along. There's an "infringement report" (which seems to put this place over at least some of the caps for the statutory exemption). It looks like a banquet hall that hosts events, etc. There's a lot of correspondence (including what seems to be a BMI license application from the restaurant proprietor in which he allegedly underrepresented the restaurant's max capacity by a factor of 9 or 10). The law is, I and others have pointed out, weird here -- lots of rules that no one would guess.

Pretty much. This is an interesting (and depressing) read:

http://www.legalaffairs.org/is...

The latter, and Lessig explains it well. http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/March-April-2004/story_lessig_marapr04.msp

http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/March-April-2003/scene_marapr03_volokh.msp

Here follows my clear mistake. Like a professor correcting a student, I answered,

        Justice, we are not making an empirical claim at all. Nothing in our copyright clause claim hangs upon the empirical assertion about impeding progress. Our only argument is, this is a structural limit necessary to assure that what would be an effectively perpetual term not be permitted under the copyright laws.

That was a correct answer, but it wasn't the right answer. The right answer was to say that there was an obvious and profound harm. Any number of briefs had been written about it. Kennedy wanted to hear it. And here was where Don Ayer's advice should have mattered. This was a softball; my answer was a swing and a miss.

http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/March-April-2004/story_lessig_marapr04.msp

So why should we care who gets the merchandising deal from a movie or the song tie-in on a variety show? One reason is that the publishers' sights are set on the public. It is, for example, technically against the law for Girl Scouts to sing "This Land Is Your Land" and "Puff, the Magic Dragon" around a campfire without paying royalties. The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers tried to collect such royalties. It backed off only after it faced public outrage—which was fanned by restaurateurs wanting to play the radio without having to pay fees. It now charges the Scouts $1 a year, foregoing real profits while making it clear that the girls sing only by ASCAP's belatedly good graces.

From: http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/July-August-2003/feature_zittrain_julaug03.msp

ASCAP attracted media attention in 1996 when it threatened Girl Scouts of the USA and Boy Scouts of America camps that sang ASCAP's copyrighted works at camps with lawsuits for not paying licensing fees.[19] These threats were later retracted,[20] however they have drawn negative attention for cracking down on licensing fees on other occasions as well, such as when they demand that open mic events need to pay licensing (even if most or all of the songs are original).[21]

From the wiki page on ASCAP: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Society_of_Composers,_Authors_and_Publishers#Criticism

It was only public outcry that forced ASCAP to sell rights to the Girl Scouts for a dollar a year.

This is the criminal case. Anywhere else where there is a P2P related case, they are usually civil, like a record label suing for damages. Only in Japan would the cops take you away in cuffs based on a tip from Sony Records.

It is also interesting to note that, in Japan, the criminal conviction rate is 99.8%.

Lessig is probably the most knowledgeable person on the planet when it comes to US law on fair use.

In theory, perhaps - although I doubt it. In practice, he has the savant tendency to disregard that the law is implemented by humans, and the one thing that humans can't stand is a wise ass.

The idea that the Supreme Court decides cases based upon justices' political preferences struck me as extraordinarily boring. I was not going to devote my life to teaching constitutional law if these nine justices were going to be petty politicians. [Lawrence Lessig]

Is about as close as he's come. And yet even after saying that... somehow he didn't change careers.

As a law professor, I had spent my life teaching my students that [the Supreme Court] does the right thing, not because of politics but because it is right. [Lawrence Lessig]

Well, thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster for tenure, eh?

Tweaking aside, Lessig's experience is like that of a virgin with a giant porn collection. So I can see why he gets a lot of sympathy around here. Tweaking aside.

See his Legal Affairs Article: How I Lost the Big One.

Japan has a 99.8% conviction rate.
Pretty creepy, huh?

From taking patent law, this application reminds me of a case: Juicy Whip v. Orange Bang, involving a device meant to display a fake drink container to trick consumers into thinking their drink was being dispensed from a bubbling container instead of being made on-the-fly from mix. The courts concluded that the immorality of an invention was no bar to its being patented. Although the PTO reacted to Rifkin's stunt of trying to patent human/animal chimeras by saying there'll be no patents on monsters."

To be fair, non-consensual iris-scanning tech isn't innately evil, just evil in how it's going to be used. On a related note see this story claiming that leaked UK documents show a plan to upgrade cameras to use "T-ray" tech, spying on people through their clothes. (Not sure it's actually practical to do this from a street-corner camera; don't you need an active beam generator?) Add better AI and we will, presumably, have a government that watches all citizens at all times for suspicious behavior.

For anyone that hasn't heard of it yet, check out David Brin's The Transparent Society for a different take on the privacy issue.

Apologies for the dupe (I posted this link deep in another thread) but I thought it was worth highlighting at the top level.

Here is the URL http://www.legalaffairs.org/printerfriendly.msp?id =962 for the piece by author Julian Dibbell that is referenced in the article. It makes for very interesting reading, especially when an IRS specialist is quoted as saying...

By the way, the IRS does consider Internet Barter taxable, but the rules are complicated (doh!).

Which is of course why I used the word 'may'. The thing is...if the IRS observes a thriving market on Ebay for such swords then they 'may' decide that the sword does have a substantial real world value especially since by executing many skillful in-game trades you could eventually realize a substantial real world gain.

My hope would be that the IRS will, at best, stay well away or, at the very worst, percieve this as a Capital Gains issue.

Unfortunately hope is often all you have once the IRS looks your way and in fact a little more digging online came up with this nugget on legalaffairs.com regarding author Julian Dibbell's own investigation into this subject

See the whole article here...http://www.legalaffairs.org/printerfriendly .msp?id=962

Under current law, Saxton said if a transaction takes place solely within a virtual world there is no 'taxable event.'

On the other hand, reporter Julian Dibbell wrote an article on whether gamers should pay real-world taxes on virtual treasures and got a different opinion from IRS's Business and Specialty Tax Line.

"We just had this little discussion," [Mrs. Clardy, badge number 7500416] said, almost giggling. "And it sounds to us like [the online trades you've described] would be--yes--Internet barter."

This stuff is fairly interesting to me. Completely ignoring this "Internet barter" would open up fairly large loopholes in the taxation system. On the other hand, strictly enforcing such rules would be ludicrously burdensome on both the government and the taxpayers. Most likely what we'll see is essentially what we have now. Technically these transactions will be taxable, but such taxes won't be enforced unless someone started really abusing things.

If it were up to me we'd just eliminate income taxes altogether. The whole idea that the government would even consider taxing these innovative economies points out what's so wrong with the income tax. Free trade is a good thing - it should be encouraged, not taxed.

A quote, apparently from IRS publication 525:
"If you steal property, you must report its fair market value in your income in the year you steal it unless in the same year, you return it to its rightful owner"

Pulled from http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/January-Februar y-2006/feature_dibbell_janfeb06.msp

Their system works well for them and illustrates what Christianity *should* be. I don't mean the physical trappings, the dress, the low-tech, the separation. I mean the state of the spirit and how adherence to spiritual principles provides certain guidance even when the bad old world busts in and murders your family members.

Incest/rape is a boogy man. While it probably happens to a very small extent in all societies, it is against the social norm of virtually all societies and cultures for the last 500 years.

Did you read the article? How another article verifying this story from ABC News? Have you researched this or are you just pulling this argument out of your ass to be a contrarian?

However, rape, incest, and sexual deviancy fears are very useful to disparage a religion, culture, or group. From the old Nazi propoganda posters of charactures of "hooked-nose" Jews stealing away virtuous German woman, to the stereotypes in deep south U.S. about black men without sexual control, or the alternate stereotype of the inbred redneck, to the Communist propoganda about "Homosexual Capitalism"... over an over again you see stereotypes or generalizations about sex being used to disparage or spread fear about a certain group.

Yer knee's jerkin pretty hard there. Any insinuation that the Amish might not be so pious by bringing up very real civil rights violations is trying to scapegoat? Uh, yeah prosecuting civil rights violations is just like what the Nazi's did to the Jews and the Klan did to blacks. Got any more amazing feats of equivocation in that bag o'tricks?

As for spreading fear, I'm sorry but it's a simple fact that people fear rape, just like they fear death. Not to distract you too much from your horseshit abstraction, but rape is a very real thing that people fear. WTF, are you on the PA tourist board or something?

There is absolutly no evidence that rape, molestation, or incest is any more common amoung Amish than any other group of people.

You really are talking out of your ass now. Where is the assertion that these incidents are more common? The assertion is that these civil rights violations are not stopped. Victims are not protected from their assailants within this community due to it's specific belief that all sins are equal. You really should get that knee checked out.

However, Amish are a religious minority, and they largely exist outside the realm of government control, corporate consumerist advertising, and modern day "political correctness".

Yeah cause keeping rapists away from their victims is something we just invented after we all got "politically correct". This idea that the Amish are somehow above criticism due to their lifestyle choice is beyond contempt. Polygamists who force 14 year old girls to marry senior citizens and kick teenage boys out on the street are a religious minority too, what's your fucking point? Are you actually insinuating that these gross violations of basic civil rights are to be overlooked because of some kook's religious beliefs? What if I suddenly decide the righteous hand of God is mine to smite sinners and go on a rampage? Any objections there? By your logic, am I not justified by my deep religious convictions and my determination to live "outside the mainstream"? I'm afraid you may be the one trying to inject some sort of "political correctness" here.

As one of the last groups to resist becoming assimilated into the rest of society and to come under control of the power elite, there is an agenda to disparage them, to undercut peoples respect for their lifestyle, and for building popular support for the final destruction and assimilation of the Amish people. The people with that agenda, both in the government and the media have been spreading FUD about the Amish being a bunch of perverts, based on a handful of isolated cases that were not really any different than what happens every day to non-Amish people.

Right, cause no one has anything better to do than worry about some farmers in the midwest who drive buggies and still churn butter by hand. Just out of curiosity, who are these people that are out to destroy the Amish, is it t

If this is a troll, masterfully executed and I salute you.

If not, then you have some fairly bizarre notions. I think it is not, so allow me to make some comments.

You knock “religious fundamentalists.”

Certainly the desired intent.

What happens if 80% of the world is right, and that God does exist? Are you prepared to roast in hell?

Alright, 80% of the world population is theistic. Seems right. But in addition to many divisions of belief, what has been believed has changed for all recorded human history. Religion that has fallen out of fashion is regarded today as silly nonsense. We do not revile people because they reject Zeus or do not call pharaoh a god. We have evolved improved sensibilities about the natural world and society. It may take a thousand years, but we will one day laugh at all the religions of today the same way we now laugh at river gods and fire spirits.

If you believe in God, and God doesn't exist, then you've lost what?

Perhaps a lifetime. Instead of engaging myself with the task of improving the human race, I have wasted it chasing after an invisible man in the sky. One might as well spend a life believing in Santa Clause or the Tooth Fairy.

A little time hanging out with nice people who have high morals?

I am an atheist and I too have morals. I know I should not commit violence against people because I would not want others to commit violence against me. I know I should not steal or cheat for the same reason. It is purely logical for me to follow certain principles and adhere to morals, without some supernatural entity threatening me with punishment. It is logical because I have a survival instinct which makes me avoid injury. Also, human beings are social creatures since society increases our chances of survival. Harming others harms the group, thus diminishing our prosperity. In my opinion, these are much better reasons to live morally than threats of eternal fire and brimstone. Morals do not come from religion and they never have. Furthermore, not all religious people have “high morals,” such as those whom use their religion to write moral blank checks which they cash to commit acts of rape and cold-blooded murder.

Or you could go back to whining and complaining about the world

But do you not see that critism is the only way to progress! I “complain” because I care. I see faults and I want to understand those faults such that they can be corrected. That is akin to the scientific method which seeks to disprove claims so that only those which are true become establish facts. And then they are questioned again and again. Critism is the crucible of knowledge and it is an ever-tempering force. If we resort to patting each other on the back, proclaiming to one another of how righteous and great we are, we will go nowhere.

[L]aying on the couch living off government welfare, eating cheesy poofs bought with government food stamps, drinking malt liquor and fortified wine, having abortions, and beating your 4th wife's stepchildren until they can't function in society, and then whine about the poor state of our education system, and then whine about the lack of taxes paid by the rich people.

Whew. Where to begin. Thank you for your concern, but I am well-employed. I prefer natural food to cheesy poofs, but I must admit I enjoy a fine glass of wine and even, dare I mention, a nice dry, gin martini from time to time. Such are lifes little pleasures. I personally have had no abortions given that I am a male, ho

This article also discusses the same topic. The author gives a good discussion on the topic and calls to ask the irs about the status of taxing his gaming income. The person he eventually talks with tells him that it probably is taxable income but that was just their opinion and its not covered by any existing ruling. He could pay a $650 fee to get a ruling if he wanted to.

The current answer appears to be that you shouldn't claim it. The IRS has taken the position of shrugging and meakly walking the other direction.

More detail here: http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/January-Februar y-2006/feature_dibbell_janfeb06.msp

As others have noted, GBLT-friendly != GBLT. I'd class myself as fairly GBLT freindly. I am not, however, GBLT; I'm "depressingly straight," according to one fellow who made a pass at me. (I like women.) This action by Blizzard would tempt me enough to buy the game so I could join such a guild as protest.... and then return it, again as protest, if Blizzard did not back down.

A more valid criticism from Blizzard might be that forming such a Guild implies that there exist guilds which are NOT GBLT-freindly. Which, ergo, means that Blizzard has not lived up to their terms of service. Which, unfortunately, is probably true... but if Bliz deny it, their lawyers might be able to color such as libel. (IAmNotALawyer.) And, as such, would be grounds for disciplinary action.

I'd say Blizzard's only hope of keeping their ass well out of the sling would be to code a 'bot to grep all chat for the harrassing "fag/gay" terms (and variant spellings), and subjecting those who use that language to rapidly escalating prohibitions. If you get a three hour ban for use of "LGBT", the term the community accepts for itself without offense, then the use of offensive terms ought to be grounds for permanent ban, with at least a 24 hour ban for at most one (if any) "first offense" warning.

Do I think they will? Mmm... nope. One reason I only play D2 on LAN, never Battlenet.

If the offended person really wants a scorched-earth revenge on Blizzard, they should spend a month quietly item trading on Ebay, and then cough up the $650 bucks and lawyer's fees for a Private Letter Ruling from the IRS that has about 50-50 odds to destroy the MMORPG industry. People in glass houses....

Google is the highest-profile player in the game of free access vs. government control, but the larger battle has been going on for years. Unfortunately, governments are winning. What's fascinating to me is just how much the law of unintended consequences comes into play here. The first shot in this war was French government's battle with Yahoo! over Nazi-related materials. Seems like a good idea to keep those nasty Nazis from using the Net to spread their vile beliefs. Unfortunately, once you put down a few barriers, before too long you wind up with the Great Firewall of China.

Yesterday in one of my law classes we had a discussion (related to the discovery process) about the DOJ's subpoena of Google. More than one of my fellow students stated that expecting any sort of privacy on the Internet was absurd. They simply didn't feel that it should be expected, given that they'd grown up with an Internet full of privacy warnings, cookies, GeoIP monitoring, and so on. I mentioned the infamous "On the Internet nobody knows you're a dog" cartoon and they just looked at me blankly, as if I were a 90 year old man whistfully recalling the days when ice cream sodas cost a nickel.

I thought it was common knowledge that many/most/(all?) cell phones have enabled GPS tracking technologies. It's part of the e911 efforts and was encouraged by the FCC http://www.fcc.gov/911/enhanced/ to better pinpoint emergency callers' locations. Here's an article that I haven't read that seems to take a closer look at the situation: http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/July-August-200 3/feature_koerner_julaug03.msp/

The february issue of legal affairs happens to have an interesting feature on this topic: "The latest American technology helps the Chinese government and other repressive regimes clamp down." Ofcourse there's nothing new under the sun here, since during the second world war when Hitler had a problem, IBM did it's very best to provide the solution (IBM and the Holocaust). Only differnce is, that back then, it was illegal to do so...

This lawsuit is less about facts and more about players identities. A newspaper saying ballplayer X has a .241 batting average is legal because of freedom of the press and the fact that the newspaper is not using the identity of the player for commercial reasons. However, selling a product, such as baseball cards, with a picture and stats on the back is commercially using the players identity. This is a fine line I know.

The battle going on here is whether using the players names and stats in a fantasy game amounts to using it commercially or not. This article gives a really good summary:
http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/November-Decemb er-2005/argument_schwarz_novdec05.msp

I'm not sure how this analogy applies to the RIAA and MPAA. They are not all-powerful, even among huge corporate interests, and certainly not in our government. Just because things are going their way right now doesn't mean that the slow mechanisms of representative government won't eventually force them to acquiesce.

Once the media company sells something to me then it is mine and I will do with it whatever I darn well please.

I doubt that even the most staunch advocate of fair use rights would say that the intent of copyright is to allow you to do whatever you please with copyrighted material.

I can't make photocopies of books then sell those photocopies, for example.

Based on the Grokster decision, when file sharing services are making money off of other people's copyrighted materials, and are obviously inducing people to use their service expressly to make money off of copyrighted materials, you're on the wrong side of the law.

Situations that fall short of obvious copyright violation and inducement to violate copyright are still open to legal interpretation. Right now the RIAA is suing the crap out of people not because they feel they can win the cases, but because they are trying to frighten people into submission.

The Congress has thus far been acting at the behest of the entertainment industry, but the courts aren't beholden to the legislature or the entertainment industry. They make their decisions in a rather different fashion. As Lessig wrote in his post-mortem of the Eldred case,

Kennedy in good faith wanted to be shown. I, idiotically, corrected his question. Souter in good faith wanted to be shown the First Amendment harms. I, like a math teacher, reframed the question to make the logical point. I had shown them how they could strike down this law of Congress if they wanted to. There were a hundred places where I could have helped them want to, yet my stubbornness, my refusal to give in, stopped me. I have stood before hundreds of audiences trying to persuade; I have used passion in that effort to persuade; but I refused to stand before this audience and try to persuade with the passion I had used elsewhere. It was not the basis on which a court should decide the issue.

The entertainment industry is obviously run by people who are trying to hold on to an outmoded business model, as you pointed out. But I'd argue that having or not having pity for them isn't really the point. The point is that taking music isn't necessarily the most effective way to fight the entertainment industry. Impatience with the slowness of the legislative and judicial systems is a tenuous argument for breaking the law, particularly when we're not exactly talking about stealing a loaf of bread for your starving family.

Interestingly enough, there's at least one group of farmers who aren't so keen on it today. Looks like the Hoosiers keep arguing about adopting daylight savings time, but some "farmers fear their cows will come home at the wrong time." http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/May-June-2005/s cene_sangor_mayjun05.msp Evidently, there are also some questions of political identity going along with adopting DST: "Others simply dislike Eastern time and all that it represents. 'We're in the Midwest, not in the Mideast,' said Gary Cook, a former state legislator who is now Plymouth's mayor. On the floor of the Indiana House recently when the measure was being debated, similar sentiments were aired: 'In my part of the state, they know we've got more in common with Evansville and Chicago, Illinois,' Representative Dave Crooks declared, 'than we do with Bangor, Maine; Boston, Massachusetts; and New York City.' His fellow legislators burst into cheers."

The article tells of systematic rape and abuse with no punishment, and with generations of incest producing an inbred and backwards society, condoned by the american govt. giving them the legal right to police themselves, dealing out their own justice where they see fit.

After reading the entirety of the article, it would be hard to dismiss this as an isolated case, but if you do and still consider that they represent some noble return-to-basics society and that their rejection of technology is somehow endearing, there are other sources, and a dedicated blog that may help to change your mind.

Yeah, everyone is disgusted with incest and it's built into everyone.

Incest is a common problem in some Amish communities.

http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/January-Februar y-2005/feature_labi_janfeb05.msp

That inbreeding mentioned isn't necessarily just among distant cousins as one would hope. This article in Legal Affairs magazine points out that some of that is from much more direct relations, such as brothers raping their sisters.

6 weeks of the silent treatment doesn't strike me as an appropriate punishment for raping your sister or daughter.

It sounds like you're saying drug companies should be run like Walmart (focusing on low prices instead of innovation), like European drug companies. If it sounds so easy, you might try your hand at financing the approval of a new drug. You may find it a more expensive and risky proposition than you imagine.

I agree. The root of the problem is that the maintenance costs on patents are only loosely tied to their economic value. This makes all sorts of perverse tactics (submarine patents, blocking patents, huge patent portfolios for the sole purpose of horse-trading) economically viable. So why not target the economic basis of these perverse techniques by tying patent maintenance costs to their economic value? One way to do this is an ad valorum tax on patents. Not only would this address the hoarding problem, it would help fund the basis science and research being cannibalized in the enclosure of the information commons.

Shameless self-promotion -- I've written on this at http://legalaffairs.org/issues/May-June-2005/argum ent_rosenblum_mayjun05.msp

E911 enabled cell phones, i.e. all of them currently being manufactured, allow remote tracking over the cell network with GPS receivers embedded in phones.

Exactly -- There's no direct economic tie between the size of the patent and its maintenance costs. (Litigation is the primary maintenance cost today, and it's one with a very high variance relative to the underlying patent.) If there was some way to guarantee that a more expansive patent would cost you more throughout its lifetime, we might see a reining in of "whole world" patents and better usage of those which are granted. One way to do this and fund the basic research necessary for future competitiveness: keep the patent system exactly as it is today, but tax patents based on their purported value and apply that tax to basic R&D.

A bit of shameless self-promotion, but Legal Affairs just published an article to this effect at http://legalaffairs.org/issues/May-June-2005/argum ent_rosenblum_mayjun05.msp. A subscription is currently required (or you can buy a paper version on a newsstand), but after it's moved to the archives, it should be freely accessible.

Fewer reservations about incest too?

And don't forget the cell phones. It's for "emergencies" only.

Cheack out this article, in the currently Legal Affairs to see some thoughts on the what rights should AI's be granted.

Anyway your argument is not at all persuasive. The Constitution clearly limits Congressional power of copyright and patent, and it even employes the word "limited" and gives a perfectly valid reason:

To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries

There ya go. Copyrights must be "limited" and they must "promote the progress of science and arts" whereas the Sonny Bono act satisfies neither.

Read all about the trial lawyer lobby here.
They are the real reason for the preponderance of frivolous lawsuits like SCO's.

I particularly found amusing the part about the American Medical Association considering not treating trial lawyers and their spouses at their annual convention.

If you want more info about Lessig losing that big copyright case, you can read his account of it. (very interesting, it half reads like an apology.)

Here, in Lessigs style, is an anecdote (from the 80's) : A Microsoft sales rep messed up a 1.5million dollar deal - so the rep is called in to Gates' office and he says to Gates' "I guess I'm fired, yeh?", Gate's replies: "What? you just learned a big lesson and we footed a 1.5million dollar bill for that lesson - there's no way I'm gonna fire and have some other company gain that experience you just gained."

Lessig is a good smart guy, and FSF/GNU have been doing the impossible for 20+ years now. Lessig lost a failed a big test, there'll be other tests, and he'll try again because he cares about the subject matter.

(yes, this is my second time replying to the parent, the first reply was knee-jerk. This post is hopefully more considered - or at the least, it's longer.)

(bleh, this post needs more thinking, but I should go do something else instead.)

make that here

There are some good examples of how crazy copyright law can get in this article by Jonathan Zittrain. My favorite is the bit about Teddy Ruxpin, the toy bear who moves in response to the sound on a tape put into the cassette player in his back. (Putting a tape of, say, Madonna in him and turning him on constitutes a performance of the work, or some such.) Also talks about TV sizes in bars, the "strangler" VHS comment, filesharing, and others. This was linked to in a previous Slashdot story.

I don't think so. for cover songs you need a "mechanical license" from the owner (eminem is owner/writer etc here).

didn't you hear, even the girl scouts can't cover campfire songs without permission. See here.

So he has a case unless your parody argument could be maintained, which I also doubt.

... "It is, for example, technically against the law for Girl Scouts to sing "This Land Is Your Land" and "Puff, the Magic Dragon" around a campfire without paying royalties. The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers tried to collect such royalties. It backed off only after it faced public outrage--which was fanned by restaurateurs wanting to play the radio without having to pay fees. It now charges the Scouts $1 a year, foregoing real profits while making it clear that the girls sing only by ASCAP's belatedly good graces.

Attempts to reconcile the colliding regimes of statute and practicality, law and life, have been hamfisted at best. A formal report by a commission chartered by the British Patent and Trademark Office suggests, without a trace of self-consciousness, that we encourage schoolchildren to include the (C) symbol on all their homework. The Business Software Alliance, a commercial software industry group, just unveiled playitcybersafe.com, a website for kids to inculcate the values of Title 17 over those of consumer praxis. There a kid can play Piracy Deepfreeze, becoming a crusading . . . ferret. "Stop the pirates from freezing the city! Throw your ball into the pirates and their stolen software before they hit the ground." " ...

I thought the article was brilliant. The bit about virtual world crime was just too much I cant believe people are actually trying to changes gamer's behaviour and placing artificial boundries in virtual worlds where the is no natural physical limits to what you can and cant do.

I can imagine the description about the virtual world fraud and killing etc would concern politicians, psychologists and other scaremongers but the whole point of visiting a virtual environment is that you _know_its_not_real and behave accordingly. total freedom for an hour then turn off your PC and snap back to the real world. I cant see the problem. It might reduce crime and thrill seekers in the real world if you ask me.
A bit tongue in cheek, but nobody complains about the millions of deaths of computer game characters every year. Some get shot, burned, fragged, melted in acid, run over by crazy taxis, vanished, or turned into inanimate objects. But people only complain if the characters that die belong to someone else. Its descrimination if you also ask me.