Jonathan Zittrain On The Spiderweb of Copyright Law

Jonathan Zittrain, director of Harvard Law School's Berkman Center for Internet & Society, takes an unusual approach to critiquing copyright in this Legal Affairs article. He explains with an analogy to the bizarre patchwork of United States tax codes a reason that (in the words of one of Zittrain's colleagues) "all the cyberprofs hate copyright." It goes beyond simple indignation that current copyright laws often grant seemingly unfair monopoly powers, and into the tangled minutia of the laws themselves.

Comments

For those of you who can't read...

[__aagmrb7289]

Seems like most early posters didn't really read the article. Okay, a summation:

1. Copyright law was never meant to apply to the individual
2. It does now
3. It is way too specific in some areas, but not specific enough in others.
4. It often stifles creativity, but when used correctly, it encourages it.
5. Copyright law is NOT BAD, just our implementation of it.

so... conclusion:

Add some sort of "fee" to our taxes (maybe just on ISPs, more like on everyone) that allows us, as individuals, to use any copyrighted material we want, as long as we don't try to sell it, without robbing the owners of the copyright - cause we are paying them.

I like it...

By the way... read the damn article before posting. /. ain't for the ignorant, so stop letting yourself be excluded (aka ignored)!

Re:For those of you who can't read...

[PyromanFO]

but when used correctly, it encourages it.

He never actually says this, the closest he gets is that he believes in a moral obligation to recompensate artists.

Re:A new peer to peer model ??

[wfberg]

Now of course, I'm not suggesting that y'all start firing up windows, but I find this point really intriguing - filesharing using the SMB protocol over port 139 a'la redmond. What (c|w)ould the RIAA do about that ?

Has been done. A company called scour.com used to use SMB. It got sued by the MPAA and RIAA and NMPA and subsequently went bankrupt.

Re:Great article, but...

[Sydney Weidman]

Everyone knows that "people will still get off their asses and make stuff" even if we don't have IP protection; ... The real question is whether we can have *more* people get off their asses and make stuff if we provide IP protection.

The quantity of output does nothing to address the real need to which resources should be put. If you artificially force capital to move into certain areas, it will go there, but then that's no surprise, is it? The more important question is this: Will you get the results you need? A cure for cancer? What drug company has any incentive to create a *cure* for cancer. Isn't it a much better business model to just treat the symptoms? What you really want is a way to encourage the right kind of output, the needed output, not just blindly throw favours at some particular sector of the economy.

There once existed a means to achieve needed intellectual goods, namely the University, but that institution is now a mere handmaiden to market interests. Of course, with the creative output of academia now hobbled by "market relevance" and special interest lobbies, no engine of intellectual freedom is left. So of course, public policy has to shift toward strengthened intellectual property law. Hence as universities weaken and academic freedom erodes, there is a corresponding rise in the breadth and venom of intellectual property protection.

To cite one example, Richard Stallman created the Free Software Foundation as a reaction to the commercialization of academic research. Perhaps there would be no Free Software movement at all if our universities were as strong and free as they ought to be. Nor, of course would there be the current boundless monopolies in intellectual property that have moved in to fill the void left by the death of academia. The university has let its proper role in society be usurped by charlatans.