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Lessig on Streamcast/Grokster Decision

Posted by Hemos on from the preaching-to-the-choir-here dept.

scubacuda writes "Lessig has an editorial in Financial Times regarding the recent court decision in favor Streamcast (which distributes "Morpheus") and Grokster. 'The wisdom of this rule is something innovators in Silicon Valley are increasingly coming to see. When courts intervene to maintain copyright's balance, the inevitable consequence is that innovation is harmed. If every innovator with technologies affecting content must bear the burden of a lawsuit before his innovation can be allowed, there will be many fewer innovations in the distribution and creation of content. That in turn will harm artists and technologists alike. Better to let the innovation happen, and then consider whether the change caused by the innovation is so significant as to require new legislation by the legislature.'"

4 of 187 comments (clear)

  1. sounds familiar by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Kinda like "innocent until proven guilty". Right?

  2. DMCA - Another Attack by Pavan_Gupta · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Interestingly enough, I do feel that innovation is what is truly being attacked when the DMCA "hammer" (or war drums) are beat upon all the time.

    On another note, and one seldomly discussed ... it's obvious that there is a problem here. We want more content, but when we steal it, the companies we love and hate so much won't be as willing to give it. Hence Palladium, DRM, etc.

    If people could throttle themselves, the problems that we have with content distribution wouldn't be problems at all. Sadly, we can't, so legislation is absolutely neccessary in throttling all those people that can't throttle themselves.

    That delicate balance between the rights of the societ and the rights of the owner of the content is dynamically changing, but it is definitely true that technology has given society the ability to very easily steal from the owner of copyrighted material.

    Everyone is to blaim. The RIAA, MPAA, Microsoft (in some cases), etc. are hardly in the 21st century. Sometimes I wonder why they complain so much since it's obvious that they should try to start a better music distrubtion model than what they already have. Sometimes sacraficing profits for common sense is a smart thing. We're also to blaim. People using Grokster, Kazaa, Morpheus, Gnutella2, etc. are thieves (for the most part). The last time I found a nice piece of uncopyrighted material on kazaa and not on Google was .. never.

    At any rate, it's a mess out there. The RIAA and MPAA are definitely stupid. They're planning on waging war with their entire customer base (or a large part of it). I'm not bussiness guru, but I definitely see a problem with that.

    Anyway, I feel like I'm rambling now. People should buy their stuff, and big companies need to take their heads out of their rear ends, and realize that their is money to be made where the biggest battles are being waged.

  3. Newspapers by BJZQ8 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I can imagine what the RIAA/MPAA would think if we were today debating the freedom of the press. After all, newspapers can be used to STEAL copyrighted works! This must be stopped! It's not the messenger, it's the message. So maybe Napster/Grokster/Morpheus are mostly used for infringing...but they in themselves are not infringing anything. If I make a telephone call to get my gang together to conduct a bank robbery, the law doesn't hold the phone company liable. I know about common-carrier laws, but this is a good comparison. It's the message, not the messenger.

  4. Those filthy filthy thieves... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Actually, just trying to head off at the pass the silly ignorant posts that do one or more of the following:

    call downloaders thieves

    call downloading or copying theft or stealing.

    Copyright infringement is never theft; it does not meet the definition of theft, especially the part about "taking" (if you create a new copy of an item, you are not taking the item).

    The argument "you are depriving artists of money" argument does not wash either, due to the fact that many, if not most, instances of copyright infringement involve situations where the copier would not have paid the artist in the first place.

    In the cases of bootlegs, mashes, or out of print songs being downloaded off p2p networks, there is never a loss of money to the company and artist: they refuse to sell the material in the first place!

    The connection to the artist's money is tenuous at best. If a copier is a "thief", then so is anyone who protests a business. In both examples, no actual theft takes place, but there is sometimes a loss of money to a business.

    It may be a crime, but it is not theft.