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Ask Lawrence Lessig About Life And Law Online
Lawrence Lessig of Stanford Law School, and before that of various other places, is one of the best-known voices in the world of electronic freedoms. Lessig's new book, The Future of Ideas, is the latest work of many in his efforts to illuminate and create a freer world online. Lessig has agreed to answer your questions; please be courteous by limiting your questions to one per post.
Is there really some kind of way to expect that the net will forever remain free as we know it?
The death of one man is a tragedy; the death of a million is a statistic --Joseph Stalin
What is your opinion on things like Microsoft's .NET or the Liberty Alliance (I believe that's what it's called - the one being developed by AOL and other companies to counter .NET)? Do you see these as a potential problem in terms of a free online world?
There is no escape from The Muffin.
What, in your opinion, are the chances of getting the DMCA declared unconstitutional?
Given the recent court defeats in both the Felten and 2600 cases, do we even have a chance?
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
Should he be fired, impeached, or both? And am I aiding and abetting terrorists by asking such a question?
sulli
RTFJ.
We seem to be living in "Interesting Times". The events of 911 have given law-makers the impetus to have acts passed which would have been at the very least debated for a lot longer pre 911. Up until now the Internet has been an incredibly open network with minimalist intervention and legislation from individual countries governments (a few notable exceptions). It seems as if we are going to enter a new legal phase for the internet where legislators in many countries will try to enact and apply laws to take control of this wild beast. Each countries individual efforts will hamper their own citizens without overly effecting the rest of the net.
My question is how much of the above do you disagree with and why? And what body (UN, w3.org, wipo, coporation of ISPs, Microsoft) do you forsee holding the international legal legislatory responsibility for the net at large in 1/5/10/25/50 years time?
Never underestimate the dark side of the Source
Big name companies (with lotsa money to throw at lawyers) are hovering over the net (AOLTW, MS), and Microsoft is getting off so lightly with their monopoly suit. Will the internet become dominated by big companies with no real way to freely get in, or will the law allow the net to stay free and kick out the big companies? To load the comment, I think that its only a matter of time before the big companies close in on the internet. How long and how do you anticipate the law will keep the wolves at bay??
:-P
(1 question per comment, I know, but everyone else does it)
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
It seems like a lot of judges who face abstract technology questions -- code as speech, DMCA, etc. -- just don't get it. And can we really blame them? Technology is complicated; can we expect every judge to be an uberhacker?
Perhaps it would be helpful to have some bright programmers set up some concrete examples for judges to consider, which clarify the problems we all see, and help judges refine their intuitions about code and digital information.
For example, to further the "code is protected speech" cause, we could create a full-fledged programming language which reads as plain English, then use it to implement a copy protection circumvention program (DeCSS or the like). This raises all sort of interesting questions: it's English and code; is it protected under the first amendment? Presumably it was before it could be run as a program, so does my inventing a programming language change the status of existing speech? If it's protected as only source code, is an interpreter for that language illegal? Is bundling the English script with the interpreter illegal? And so forth....
...but that's a very thorny example. Are there examples of this kind that we programmers should be producing -- software that makes these theoretical arguments more concrete? Is there anything in this spirit that won't just confuse and/or piss off a judge? What examples do our causes need? We're ready to implement them!
Many years ago, in the early days of the WWW, Laurence Tribe proposed a "Cyberspace Amendment" to the US Constitution that would explicitly extend all the rights and freedoms of the Constitution to all forms of speech, regardless of the medium. The idea was brought to many of us geeks in a Dr. Dobbs article by Michael Swaine. I know what many of my fellow Slashdotters opinions probably are, but I'd like to have yours: how have our Constitutional protections held up on the Internet, in e-mail, and in WWW publishing? Do we still need a Cyberspace amendment - or do we perhaps need it now more than ever?
--Jim
Do you think that the gradual increases in the length of time that works can remain copyrighted (most recently the "Mickey Mouse Protection Act" of the 1990s) will continue every time that the media companies feel that they are about to lose control of some of their "intellectual property"?
Or do you think that the public interest will reassert itself and hold or even turn back some of these copyright extensions?
When a work's copyright is extended, one person (the author or the corporation that owns it) benefits. But when its copyright expires, everyone benefits by being able to copy, modify, expand on and extend it. Can we convince lawmakers with this kind of social and economic argument?
May be a futile question to ask, but we're in probably the intensest period of debate on freedom, law, justice, and crimincal conduct since the American civil war.
Since you are such a big figure in the realm of online freedom, where do you *hope* the level of online freedom is in about 2101, and where do you realistically *think* it will be?
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
Dr. Lessig,
Looking from the outside in on the legal community's response or lack thereof to the constitutionality and legal basis of recent court rulings (Napster, Eric Corley), the DMCA/SSCA, etc, I see very few lawyers taking a stand against this -- there's mostly a massive shrug. There's the ACLU, the EFF of which you're a part, and Jessica Litman, and that's all I see trying to do something about the co-opting of copyright and patent lawmaking by corporations through appeals based on the interest of business, lobbyists' dealmaking, and outright graft. By and large however there seems to be little interest even amongst lawyers and congressmen about the arcana of copyright and patent law, and thus it's left to such companies and libraries because they're the only ones who both have power and care about it. Has trying to fight this caused conflict in your professional work? Is it lonely being a "vox clamantis in deserto"? What's your game plan for beating these guys back, or do you have one? There's a certain sadness and resignation in both your and Litman's writing that's very disencouraging that would lead me to think that even our flag-bearers feel there's little hope at this point.
--Gregory Dyas
The only tool you've got against psychosis is experience.
Rather than ask about current copyright/patent laws, or pending ones, I would like to know what you think the ideal Intellectual Property laws are (assume you could rewrite them as you wish). Also, what sort of international agreements would have to be passed alongside this?
Do you like Japanese imports?
Back near the turn of the last century, book publishers printed contracts on their books, limiting the ability of the customer to resell or lend his purchases. This practice was halted by the US Supreme court and the consumers right to do what they wish with legitimately purchased copies (with certain limited exceptions) was eventually codified in the US code as part of the '76 Copyright Act.
Given that software is a work of authorship protected by Copyright law, how is it that software publishers get away with these old tricks of printing restrictive contracts on their works, claiming assent simply by using the software, denying people their rights under Copyright law?
burris
Is cyberspace part of some geographical territory, or should it have it's own legislation and jurisdiction (based on global interests), or will it be an anarchy by design?
As a European (Belgian) citizen, I'm wondering why US legislature is trying to take control of a network, that isn't US-only anymore for some time now. Both the DecSS/Sklyarov cases are quite frightening.
Okay... I'll do the stupid things first, then you shy people follow.
[Zappa]
With South Korean President Kim Dae-jung bringing the Digital Divide back into focus, the gap between the rich technology "haves" and the poor technology "have-nots" seems to get wider all the time.
What can we be doing "officially" to make sure that gap disappears? I know of several organisations that provide computers and technological assistance to the "have-nots", but should the government play a role? And if so, what should that be?
libertarianswag.com
Do you believe that it would be accurate to say that not much money is actually being "lost" to the internet? If so, how would you go about proving this?
The initial request for questions almost paints you as the Champion selected to fight the good fight of online rights. Meaning no disrespect, I appreciate people trying to be heard, but did you always want to champion a cause like this or were you drawn into it from a past incident?
-AlPhAbEt
How likely do you think that the DoJ's proposed settlement with Microsoft will be accepted by the Judge?
If the DoJ's seattlement gets accepted over the 9 renegade state's proposal, what effect do you think the DoJ's seattlement will have?
What's your take on the case between Ed Felten and RIAA? What we saw there was a poaching on the right to pure academic pursuit to safeguard selfish corporate interests. Do you see the legal infrastructure evolving to give (pardon the pun) the underdogs the upper hand?
What is your take on the proposed settlements in the antitrust and civil Microsoft cases? To most Slashdotters, the former seems like a slap on the wrist, the latter like a a punishment turned into a reward (increasing dominance of the U.S. education market). Is there something we're missing?
Stupid job ads, weird spam, occasional insight at
If you think it should not be legal, what remedies should the law consider, since these systems can have significant non-infringing uses as well?
If a thing is not diminished by being shared, it is not rightly owned if it is only owned & not shared. S. Augustine
How can we leverage the knowledge of the community to help educate politicians and the general population in terms of technologies, and the impact of the proposed bills? Briefly, how can we help better, not just sending letters to congress people or senators?
This is one question, with multiple parts. Some of your defenders have asserted that you are only opposed to Intellectual Property in the hands of corporations. Is this true? Do you favor strong protection for IP produced by individuals as opposed to corporations, or are you opposed to strong IP protection generally?
Also, many people in the AIP movement frequently cite the fact that IP has not been historicly enshrined as a "natural right". However, isn't this just an academic question, important only for lawyers when formulating the basis of the law? After all, we have rights to our physical property, but that doesn't bar the government from confiscating it when such confiscation is deemed to have an overwhelming public benefit. In light of that, why do so many people in the AIP movement feel motivated to make it a point that IP is not a "natural right". My own view on this is that it is simply a rhetorical technique designed to nudge people towards the AIP movement's point of view, but I'd be interested in your take on this.
Finally, what say you to the irony of the fact that if I OCR your book and post it on line I'll get in trouble?
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
When the industrial revolution hit, the United States saw a major change in the legal rights of industrial workers. At first the government supported the businesses, but later gave in to popular demand that workers maintain rights above the employers.
Due to popular beelifs, do you think that we are going to see a major legal shift in IT rights from business to individuals, similar to the way rights shifted about 100 years ago?
Moderation: Put your hand inside the puppet head!
(For this, I'm going to beg you to ignore any nicities, political considerations, and even the Constitution. We're talking purely feelings here, intellectual rationalizations on what is either possible or likely need not apply. And since this is Slashdot, you don't even need to care if anyone likes it.)
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Talking about various slashdot issues with friends and family has made me realize that ensuring that (new) technologies are not detramental our social values, rights and freedoms is a very difficult cause due to the lack of knowledge by the casual user (ie, end user).
I'm curious about what you think are effective ways of ensuring that our technologies continue to uphold our basic and civil rights when the populations you are attempting to protect will never be well versed in the details of both the technologies and the cause? Or, more generically, how do you amass popular support for issues that are too complex for the popular vote to comprehend?
"Old man yells at systemd"
Lessig,
Given that intellectual property ownership is justified by the need to provide an incentive to create new ideas, what is your view of the of the appropriate time duration of intellectual property ownership? Lifetime of human inventor/creator? Fixed period of years? Indefinite?
Is there a coherent rationale for duration of ownership other than arbitrary legistlative choice?
Also, does IP ownership serve other goals (have other justifications) besides fostering innovation, that might be met by other means more effectively?
I just wrote out way too long of a question, so I'm deleting and starting over.
Members of the judiciary are largely unqualified to comment or judge upon issues of a technical nature, simply because their careers do not incorporate a great deal of technical knowledge, and also because they have not sought it (and I don't blame them, probably didn't have time) on their own.
Now, they *are* qualified to comment on matters of criminality, which are supported by a huge amount of precedent, legislation, etc that has been repeatedly modified, challenged, or simply let stand.
However, there are new "crimes" coming into being, called "cybercrimes" by the buzzwordish. Our judges, lacking technical skills or a real awareness of digital culture, are passing judgement in cases that have either very loose or no precedent to be found, or that are the result of new and innovative legislature (see: DMCA).
My concern is that the judges who are making the decisions are the least qualified to do so -- that we won't have a lot of judges with a high awareness of the intricacies involved for several years. However, the judges presently seating are essentially creating a body of law to govern what they do not understand.
My question: How large of a threat will these precedents pose to the continuation or reclamation of freedoms? Will we be able to take back the ground we've alrady lost, or will the intricacies of the legal system vis-a-vis tort & precendent, ensure that we cannot?
-l
(this one is way too long too. I just can't seem to make it fit)
In the early days of the automotive industry, GM was effectivly immune to lawsuits (what's good for GM is good for America!). In the earliest part of this century, there was an attempt by the publishing industry to prevent the resale of books. Similar events are now happening in the tech sector with attempts by the BSA to ward off liability issues related to software, laws against software resale, and even new problems such as patenting of genes and other expansions of IP law inconsistent with the goal of moving information into the public domain while rewarding its creator.
My question is; will the influence of the software industry fade as these new technologies become less new or will these trends, which seem to contradict legal precedent, only gain legitimacy as they establish a precident of their own?
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
Effectively, as I have understood the term "common", the land, or perhaps rather the right to recreation on any land is a common around here.
While this has a very long tradition, the law has come under attack from various groups, often arguing that if no money is invested in preparing recreational areas for people, people will not be able to use the land for recreation.
Would you think that this attitude has some resemblence to the notion that without the labels, no music will be made, as there will be no money to be made from making music?
Employee of Inrupt, Project Release Manager and Community Manager for Solid
Dr. Lessig,
To me it seems that for the majority of my lifetime (Reagan administration - now) has been a time where the United States government has to an increasing degree used the inherent 'checks and balances' in a much more forceful way than perhaps they were intended. To be more specific, congress seems to be passing many more laws at are questionably, and even at times blatantly unconstitutional. The large amount of time involved in judiciary process allows lawmakers to pass such questionionably unconstitutional bills knowing full well that they may only last four to eight years or so.
While this delay may have been less effective in the past, in the "Internet Age" four to eight years is enough to wildly shape emergent technologies and processes to the government's whims (which by extension is the lobbyists' whims in this day and age).
Do you feel that these 'temporary' laws (such as the new anti-terrorism bill, which I believe even has an explicit expiriation date) have a place in modern US government as it is now?
Will I retire or break 10K?
It seems increasingly appearent to me that Intellectual Property law generally and Copyright law specifically, has become a corrupt instrument whereby campaign finance coffers are filled by metering out favors to large monied special interests. I am basing this on personal observation after having attempted to participate in the process. For example, I participated in several of the Copyright Office requests for public comment that produced easily 10X as many anti-DMCA comments as pro, only to see the Copyright Office ignore what seemed to me to be the clearly expressed objections of actual people in favor of the large corporations who lobbied for the bill. Worse, no serious attempt (in my view) was made to respond to the issues raised by the public. Congress is even less responsive, in my observation.
If and when I conclude that the deck truly is stacked, such that the political process producing copyright regulation is a sham, should I not also conclude that the best course of action is to engage in covert civil disobediance targeted to deprive the specific entities responsible for the corruption of profits? My question is not whether the DMCA is a corrupt law, but rather what moral obligation one has to obey a law that you earnestly believe symbolizes corrupt government.
After all, if push comes to shove, the anti-circumvention provisions are utterly unenforcable (to the point of being a joke) if they are disregarded in ways that do not attract attention. I'm not someone who has decrypted any DVD's or downloaded many MP3's, but I'm wondering what reason there could possibly be not to start.
Should an eleventh circuit be established to
handle cyber cases which span geographic
boundaries and require understanding of
things not imagined before Bill Gates and
Al Gore invented the internet.
And do you see this trend changing anytime soon, and why?
A strange game. The only winning move is not to play. How about a nice game of chess? - Joshua (Wargames)
The SSSCA is for now, presumed dead, but mutant varieties will most likely appear in the future. With the protectionist environment towards intellectual property in Congress today, future digital rights management variants would continue to provide the means to positively identify individuals online.
A lawyer friend tells me that nothing in the US Constitution grants the right to anonymity (as opposed to privacy) and that a means of identifying individuals online is inevitable. That said, do you think the OSS world should preempt efforts such as the SSSCA and provide an open means of positively identifying individuals online? Has it come down to choosing the path to walk vs. being forced down it?
"It remains to be seen if the human brain is powerful enough to solve the problems it has created." Dr. Richard Wallace
What solutions do you see to Congress's current trend of accepting legislation written by the industries that they are trying to control? (Ex: Copyright legislation written or heavily contributed to by MPAA and RIAA)
What trends do you see on the Internet today that give you a glimmer of hope about what the Internet is becoming? With recent DMCA rulings, the growing power of WIPO, etc, it seems like a lot of the freedoms people assumed were built into the Internet are getting eliminated quickly. So given that, what do you see that gives you hope?
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
In round two of Valenti vs. Lessig a crucial question arose but due to the to-and-fro of debating was only addressed anecdotally.
The question was one Valenti posed to you. To paraphrase it roughly: "Who cares? I would like someone to explain to me what harm is being done to the world by Mickey Mouse's copyright being extended twenty years. How does that harm anyone's ability to be creative or incentive to be creative."
In the debate you only had the opportunity to present an anecdotal response. (A teacher whose class film projects couldn't be shared due to copyright infringement fears, I think.)
Beyond the anecdote, however, a clear answer would be very helpful. We can all see that the copyright extension bargain was one-sided: copyright holders profited and the public gained nothing. We see the inequity in the action, we sense that the fix was in, and we resent it. But resentment over seeming corruption and the copyright holders' good fortune can only take us so far.
A clear conception of direct harm to the public might be far more persuasive than the secondary harm of the copyright holders getting a really sweet deal. I kept hoping during the debate that the opportunity would come for you to address the question more fully, but it never did.
If the government refuses to prosecute a SPAMMER (in the USA) for violating the DMCA can we use that as a start to destroy the DMCA?
Fight Spammers!
Do you think that we have to outlaw webrowsers, ftp, irc, email that do not have a built-in check that prevents anyone from violating a copyright, trademark, or license agreement?
Fight Spammers!
I have tried to look for books which give an introduction and overview of the law and legal system to adults, but all I can find are Civics textbooks for high school students and practical howto books like those published by Nolo.
Any recommendations?
What are examples of protocols that exist (or are soon to exist or you feel will soon exists) that would limit the freedom we currently enjoy? By freedom, I mean the freedom to communicate my thoughts or creative works freely with anyone else on the internet. I don't assume that I have a general right to distribute or copy anybody else's material without permission though I think I should have the right to sell (with the result that I no longer own or have it) anything I buy.
It still reads like a math equation, there is simply no way to simplify it for the common person to be able to read.
That's completely beside the point. Comprehensibility is not a criterion for first amendment protection. The courts have upheld publishing of the details of making nuclear weapons as protected by the first adendment, even though such descriptions inevitable read like science and are incomprehensible to the layperson.
The simple fact that it is human language, clearly expressing ideas and not merely implementing them, is what needs to be proved to a judge. The fundamental question: is code a machine, or is code speech? The answer, of course, is "both" -- and we need to help judges wrap their brains around that fact.
Note that this is also true of Australia, France, and China and each of their respective populations/legislatures.
I like to play children's songs in minor keys.
"We're all sons of bitches now." --J. Robert Oppenheimer
Many of your bio-blurbs state that you clerked for Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who is the most conservative justice on the current court.
In contrast, your own recently published writings have taken a more liberal or libertarian viewpoint on many issues.
I'm curious to hear about how your time as Scalia's clerk affected your views. What did you learn about civil liberties and technology law while helping to draft opinions for Scalia? Have your views changed since then? If so, why?
I think one of the recurring questions that underlies many legal issues on the Internet has to do with jurisdiction: How do you even determine a location in which an activity is taking place in order to decide which laws might apply? This question arises in topics as diverse as suppressing so-called hate speech or levying sales taxes. It's inconceivable that every government on the planet could possibly agree on a universal set of legal standards for the global Internet, and yet it's equally implausible that governments will maintain a hands-off approach in perpetuity (as much as many of us might hope for it). Given the seeming catch-22 inherent in this situation, I'd be very curious to hear how Mr. Lessig thinks this will play out over the next decade or so. (I'm less interested in the philosophical arguments about why things should be one way or another than I am about a pragmatic assessment of what scenarios seem most likely.)
"Biped! Good cranial development. Evidently considerable human ancestry."
With most P2P systems, the solution is obvious: Law enforcement should connect to the networks themselves, seach for copyrighted material, download it to check that it really is copyrighted, identify the criminal by IP (hard, but not very hard), then prosecute. That sort of "undercover work" is essentially what they've been doing with prostitution for decades, a more victimless crime.
With Freenet, though, it's impossible to find the person who inserted copyrighted material. It's impossible to find which node you're getting it from. It is possible to tell which node you're immediately connected to is automatically caching and passing you copyrighted material, but is that enough to prosecute? If not, then the Freenet people are currently debugging and improving the ultimate piracy network. If so, then the very act of running a Freenet node would be illegal... and it would be very hard to distinguish the Freenet node's actions from those of, say, every router and proxy server on the internet.
Read thing you have written, Ideas (I will admit I have not finished it yet, I just got it in the mail a few days ago) and this conference paper as well as Code to some extent, I get the idea that what you call for is not possible under the current political system. The distributors of the 20th century want to keep their hold on the right to distribute without competition from the common person and they will not support a politician that advocates a system that will challenge theirs. Generally it seems as if working within the current political system is not possible if we (the ones who will be benefited by the new "regime" as you call it in Ideas) want to protect the commons. In light of this, would you advocate starting a new political party with this as part of its platform? Or do you think that corporate money will always be in American politics and that the only way to protect the public domain will be for producers to mandate that their work goes into the public domain much like Open Source software does?
-Grant
|grant.henninger.name|
128-bit encryption is on the vast majority of internet-connected desktops now. There's absolutely no way that it's possession or use will be made illegal now ("Okay, Granny, we're putting the cuffs on. You should have downgraded your web browser, and you definitely shouldn't have clicked on that https:// link! What do you mean, you don't understand what you did wrong?"), and so any software that wants to escape monitoring can make it's communications indistinguishable from secure HTTP.
Just the first thing that came to my mind.
The tendency in the past has been for applications to do more and more, and have plenty of options. Now, companies aren't as concerned with what users want; they're more concerned with controlling that user's experience.
What stops Microsoft from altering IE so it doesn't show certain pages? What stops Microsoft from routing page views? Nothing. The browser is the choke point of the web.
It seems unthinkable that a company would alter its software to prevent users from accomplishing certain tasks, but it is entirely likely from where I stand. The functionality should be part of the commons. A browser should not influence the information. I suppose we could argue that Netscape did the same thing.
The final twist of the knot is the DMCA. If the browser architecture won't do what you want (no option to stop its search behavior, for example), why don't we just hack the app? You can't. That's a violation of the DMCA. So you're not allowed to alter your browsing experience. You have to take the one that's given to you.
I guess my point here is that functionality is a rightful part of the commons. We shouldn't be denied it by monopoly or anti-hacking law. Is there any chance that the right to do things is going to be recognized?
As it stands we are utterly at the mercy of Microsoft's next alteration of the browser interface...
I'm a first year law student, and I am very interested personally in computer-related law, copyrights, etc. I hope to specialize in some field along these lines, e.g. copyright litigation, once I finish school. Hopefully, I'll be lucky enough to be able to 'fight the good fight.' Unfortunately, I don't have the background in the hard sciences or engineering I'd need to even take, much less pass, the Patent Bar, which, as I know, is an important requirement of many IP firms. Given this, do you have any suggestions which might be useful in any way?
Thanks very much for your time
(And now, back to exams. Nothin' I like better!)
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
What are your views on societal transparency, as put forward by David Brin in his book - "The Transparent Society - Will Technology force us to choose between Privacy and Freedom".? (chapter one available online)
In this book, Brin argues that, given the existence and proliferation of surveillance technology, one of the few ways to avoid a "Big Brother" scenario is to make the surveillance networks real-time public-access, and "democratic"/all-encompassing, so that "The watched may watch the watchers". Brin then expands upon the possibly viable, perhaps even pleasant, social structure that might then evolve, rather than the usual dystopian vision of a police state.
(Of course, Popper covered the same ground, but Brin's more accessible, and deals particularly with the technological enabling factors of open societies)
Brin's observation that "In any situation involving a conflict between privacy and accountability, people demand privacy for themselves and accountability for everyone else", is particularly applicable, in my view, to the online-privacy debates. One core insight is that it is the asymmetric flow of information that often gives one group power over another.
Choice of masters is not freedom.
I've had to take a long hiatus from my project for various reasons, but now that the appeal was lost, I plan to restart it. On my list of things is to change from my style of translation to Jonathan Baccash's, which is better in several ways, while retaining my code's ability to deal with preprocessor directives (which Mr. Baccash's code lacks). If anyone feels like sending me diffs, I'd be much obliged.
In the Constitution, the founders, products of the book-powered Enlightenment, naturally gave a special monopoly (copyright) to writers to give them a weapon with which to fight entrenched cultural interests. These monopolies only granted a fighting chance, however, as the capital required to publish was always greater than the resources of writers. So the Copyright Monopoly was created, and was reasonable, because publishing was expensive.
But, a few decades ago, technology made it possible for certain publishers (studios) to beat the creators -- analog recording (film and vinyl) required a studio not only to make copies, but to produce the work in the first place. The creator was stuck in the bind of having to have a studio to be heard and seen. The studios used this advantage to force creators of music and movies into a work-for-hire situation. The Copyright Monopoly was no longer reasonable, it now gave the creator no help. The beginnings of the cultural wasteland of the 20th Century were set.
About the same time, Congress found it necessary to ration speech by granting a monopoly over the airwaves to licensed broadcasters. The balance that held up for the first few decades was that the broadcasters did not produce the works they broadcast, and they were not consolidated. The Broadcast Monopoly was created, and was reasonable, because there was no other way to get broadcasting done, but to make it a public utility.
But then, starting a couple decades ago, the studios bought out the broadcasters, who after all were a competitive medium. So now the studios had both the Copyright Monopoly and the Broadcast Monopoly. Suddenly, the Broadcast Monopoly was a very bad idea, as it was not a public utility, but a private pipe for pumping the publishers' content. The cultural wasteland accelerated, and the political process was poisoned by the need to go through the broadcasters to get to the people.
Then you get the web. The web doesn't need the Copyright Monopoly, since publishing is cheap. The web doesn't need the Broadcasting Monopoly, as everyone can broadcast without interference. And finally, the web takes the uncopyable analog advantage away fromthe studios, so creators don't need them any more.
So the "problem" created by the web is only a problem in that it means that the power of the studios now serves no public interest, and only remains because of the obsolete legal monopolies they enjoy.
Doesn't this mean that our politics and culture won't be restored to health until these monopolies are not only contained where they are, but eliminated?
And further, how do we perform these miracles from within the system that's been corrupted?
"You can't get something for nothing." - my grandfather, on the stock market and Reaganomics.
What are your feelings about using the ideas behind the second amendment as a means to think about the right of encryption? I recognize the fact that the 2nd amendment is only about guns. However i do feel that in an information age where power is vested in information not physical things that in order to defend against a tyrnical government encryption will prove far more useful than a 45...
Douglas Calvert
In the name of Digital Rights Management, corporations prevent you from editing or saving stuff they have published to you. This is odd, and at at odds with the spirit of Copyright.
No-one can tell you how much of their book to read, or the order you can read it in. Why do they presume to do so with sound or video? Why must I look at a green FBI notice for 15 seconds at the start of a DVD? Why should I be forced to listen to the information-thin taunts the news programs interlev with the comedy I'm watching beforehand?
It is the act of re-publishing where the potential copyright violation occurs, not the act of viewing or editing.
Is my right to selectively view defended in law?
Its obviously foolish in practice to force me to make an 'all or nothing' decision; is it illegal too?
I guess you are tired of me by now, but anyway - here is a simple and practical question to consider.
You are wideley considered and acclaimed to be one of the most famous and prominent--and rightly so--legal scholars promoting free software. You are probably only surpassed by Richard M Stallmans pro bono legal counsel professor Eben Moglen of Columbia University.
So - why do you use Microsoft Outlook on your Macintosh?
In theory, practice and theory is the same. In practice, practice and theory is never the same. is this the case or something else?
Regards
Mikael Pawlo .-)
Pine and Eudora user - heresy is my middle name
Pawlo.com
You've written a lot about the sad state of copyrights, but what about the other government-granted monopoly: patents? Now that the MPEG folks are suing Compaq, it seems likely that cease-and-desist lawsuits against the developers or distributors of the variety of free MPEG software can't be too far away. The GPL and software/algorithm patents would seem to be completely incompatible. How do you see the proliferation of such patents affecting software and the Internet?