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Lessig On Free Content, Copyright
Glyn Moody writes "In an interview with the Guardian, Lawrence Lessig explains exactly how he'd like copyright reformed, and has this to say about free content: 'I think it's going to be a more significant movement than the free software movement because whatever the importance of the freedom of coders, coders will still be just a tiny proportion of the public, but culture is ... much broader.'"
- 1) Ability to create content and distribute it , exclusively, for profit, for a period of time.
Supposing I write a significantly different story, using existing concepts in only a vague way, and develop (or discover) a market for that story, I should be able to tap into that market, exclusively, for a given period of time. The idea is "mine" (humanly speaking), and supposing the content isn't prurient (e.g. child porn), or a damn lie (e.g. telling you that the Olsen Twins are morbidly obese) or some other nasty damnable shite ("I murdered Bob's wife! Here's how & all the details"), I have every right to profit from it. 2) Ability to resell content previously purchased and "used" but not "consumed". If Joseph E. Schmoe buys my book & decides to resell it before, or after, he reads it, that's fine. I'd like to have a profit off of it, but I do not, and I should not. Joe sells it to Bookz By The Tunn, and they resell it. Perhaps I'll get some name recognition, but that at the most. 3) Ability to maintain the integrity of content. Joe's brother, Ed, cannot copy my book, change all of the "I have"'s to "I have not"'s or change the meaning in some other way and republish it under my name. 4) Parody Joe's brother can, however, quote some of the book and parody it. I may not like the parody, I may take it in stride, but I probably can't prosecute him.