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Retiring Justice John Paul Stevens's Impact On IP Law
Pickens writes "Corporate Counsel recounts the profound legacy of Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, author of the majority opinion in what some consider the most important copyright ruling of all time — the 1984 Betamax decision (Sony v. Universal City Studios) that established that consumers have a personal 'fair use' right to make copies of copyrighted material for non-commercial use. Justice Stevens's contribution to the ultimate decision in Betamax extended well beyond writing the opinion. The justices' initial debates in the case make it clear that Stevens was the only one of the nine (PDF) who believed that the 'fair use' doctrine gave consumers a right to make personal copies of copyrighted content for home use. It was his negotiating skill that pulled together the five-vote majority allowing home video recorders to be sold and used without interference from copyright holders. An IP litigator is quoted: 'The ruling that making a single copy for yourself of a broadcast movie was fair use ... that was truly huge, and was a point on which the court was deeply divided.' So the next time you're TiVo-ing an episode of your favorite show, remember to give a quick thanks to Justice Stevens; and let's hope that whoever President Obama appoints to replace him will follow in Stevens's footsteps and defend Fair Use, not corporate copyright interests." The review also touches on Stevens's "patent skepticism," which may be on display when the court delivers its eagerly awaited Bilski ruling.
"and let's hope that whoever President Obama appoints to replace him will follow in Stevens's footsteps and defend Fair Use, not corporate copyright interests."
That's what's going to happen.
It's probably a very good thing that Bilski is being written while Stevens is still there. He was involved in all the previous subject matter cases, and the Supreme Court never said software was patentable in those. They also said a bunch of useful things like that math isn't patentable, and that putting instructions such as software onto a computer was a "mere clerical" act.
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As a network analyst, I care more about the IP laws as defined by http://www.ietf.org/rfc.html
(TCP/IP in case anyone missed the joke)
Wouldn't it be great if real life laws were codified by RFCs?
Karma: Excellent. 15 moderator points expire sometime.
Last time I checked, the USA is supposed to be some kind of a democracy. Therefore, instead of hoping for a Wise Person getting appointed, why not use the democracy-ishness and get your stuff fixed?
Colorless green Cthulhu waits dreaming furiously.
... to make a "fair use" copy of Justice Stevens (non-betamax, of course) ;-)
I'd love to hear his take on DRM, ACTA and this crap.
JUSTICE STEVENS: I'm sorry. I must be awfully stupid.
Jews, also known as kikes, hebes, hymies, yids, gold niggers, oven magnets, hook noses, sheenies, swindlers, criminals, "firewood", and Arabs in denial are a subhuman species of reptilian extra-terrestrials and adherents to one of the world's oldest major religions, called "Judaism", otherwise known as "The Worship of Money" or "Eating Arab Babies".
Judaism was the world's first master race theory. The Jew religion teaches that Jews are the Chosen People of God and that there is a sacred mystical quality to Jew DNA. In olden times, Jew prophets would, under the command of YHWH, frequently lead the Jews on genocidal rampages against neighboring populations, and even today Jew leaders often cite Jewish religious ideals to justify their ongoing genocide of sandniggers. Judaism ironically found its mirror-image inversion in the anti-Jew Aryan racialism of the Nazis.
Despite only being 0.22% of the world's population, Jews control 99% of the world's money. Not only do the Jews control the world, but also the media, the banks, the space program, and LiveJournal's porn communities and Gay communities. All Jews possess the following features: an extremely large nose, fake boobs, curly hair that reeks of faggotry, one of those gay hats, a love of coke, a law practice, a roll of money, a small cock, or shitty taste in dental hygiene.
Jews invented both Communism and Capitalism. Karl Marx, of course, was a Jew, which was why he understood money so well, and in fact he was converted to Communism by another Jew, Moses Hess, the actual founder of Zionism, who ghost-wrote Marx's The German Ideology. Capitalism was created when Christian Europeans threw away their morals and decided to embrace Jewish practices like usury (see: John Calvin). Jews were the first group to create a sophisticated banking system, which they used to fund the Crusades in order to pit Christians and Muslims (both adhering to religions derived from and controlled by Jews) against each other to kill as many people as possible in a macabre human sacrifice to YHWH.
The Jew banking system was based on fraud and lies, so when it inevitably collapsed, the Jews just pwned as many people as possible by unleashing the Black Plague on them. Later, Jews economically controlled medieval Venice (the first modern maritime trade empire), and then crypto-Jewish merchants economically controlled the Spanish Empire, including the slave trade. Openly Jewish bankers orchestrated the Dutch Empire and founded Jew Amsterdam (later Jew York). Later the Dutch Jews moved to London because they thought it would be a better base for a global empire, and actually brought a Dutch nobleman, William III, with them, who they installed in a coup d'état (more like Jew d'état, amirite?) as new King of the British Empire. For hundreds of years, Jewish bankers controlled global trade through their bases in Jew York City and London. European colonialism was, through its history, essentially a plot whereby Jews could gain control of gold and diamond mines in poor countries and increase their stranglehold over the global economy.
Jews also enjoy slicing up baby penises for fun, some even enjoy sucking them. See below.
Jews also created Jew search engine Google, so now they can find all Jew information on Internets.
Some suggest that we should use Jews instead of dogs to sniff out large amounts of concealed cash or anything else worth smuggling at airports due to their sensitive Jew noses. Obviously, this is a horrible idea, because the pay is bad, and the dirty Kikes would probably form a union and demand moar money, thus increasing the burden on taxpayers everywhere.
Well, Obama's first appointment, Sotomayor, was another corporate-friendly judge, so we can expect the same from his next appointment. Which, with Bush appointments gives the court a solid ant-citizen/pro-corporate majority. Expect more confirmation of corporate abominations like the DMCA and ACTA.
"Remember when I said I would never lie? Well, that was the first time."
Herve Leger
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I'm sure this will be said far better by others, but an unbiased, non-Corporatist appointment by Obama is a pipe dream!
Obama is a ardent Corporatist which you can see by his "Health Care" Bill, the bailouts and his undying advocacy for all RIAA, MPAA and Big Media causes (ACTA for one).
This Court is already a Corporatist court (Corporate Money = Free Speech ruling) and the next appointment will merely cement that.
I've been following US politics for ~ the last 2 years and have repeatedly observed that political change now occurs when Corporate groups buy off large numbers of politicians who then do their bidding.
Any Democratic or popular reactions / movements have to counter that especially if ANY of their goals are opposed by the Corporate lobby. I suspect this could be done either of 2 ways: the movement would have to represent an overwhelming majority, threatening opponents re-elections or the movement would have to be able to out spend the Corporations in buying politicians.
Any support a movement gets otherwise would only come from the goodness of the politicians hearts!
The people need the 21st Century Supreme Court to properly decide the correct balance between property rights and all kinds of other rights, like speech and other expression. And to decide correctly what is actual property and what is just a temporary government monopoly. To recognize that progress in science and the useful arts is promoted when our rights other than a synthetic "copyright" govern the market.
Or we can keep the 20th Century property privilege that the surviving old members of the Court find every excuse to protect.
We will see just how much change Obama truly brings. Or whether he's just a corporatist, who protects the only "right" a corporate person could possibly have: maximizing property and the power that comes with it.
--
make install -not war
I thought someone else had patented skepticism. Does he have a license to use it?
Consider that even when one might happen to simply mentally remember their experience of a movie, they are, in essence, creating a temporal copy of that experience for themselves, and quite arguably even a derivative work of it, yet under any notion that unauthorized personal use copies of copyrighted works would not be fair use, simply by _THINKING_, one can be breaking the law.
Regardless of the enforceability aspects that come into play with this sort of thing, I find that anything which might make what a person could happen to think against the law, even if only by technicality, or else a violation of anybody else's rights to be nothing short of an abomination.
As an aside, I abhor patents on computer algorithms for the same reason.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Those are constitutional monarchies where the monarch is a figurehead and the parliament holds all the legislative power, plus the power to establish an executive branch. So the effect isn't much different from a democratic republic.
Obama will replace him with someone anti "fair use". He was put on the throne by the media
How can one get elected to the office of President without support of the major TV news networks, all of which are in the MPAA?
Aenesidemus' patent on patent skepticism has been expired even longer than Seth Boyden's patent on patent leather. Continuing to call it patented could get you in trouble for false marking.
Now more than ever, it's vital we pay attention to the candidates the Obama Administration puts forward.
In light of VP Joe 'Hollywood' Biden's unbridled support by and for media industries and the Administration's inability to take a principled stand against the financial, insurance or pharmaceutical lobbyists, as well as its apparent pursuit of unbridled Executive power, it's dubious that the candidates we see coming from this White House will be equal to the chair being vacated by Justice Stevens.
If you think Kagen is an acceptable replacement, you must read Glenn Greenwald's commentary on the nominations . . . We absolutely MUST have a nominee that will fill Stevens seat with the same dedication to the rule-of-law and sensible jurisprudence he provided.
This is just too important for us to get it wrong. Unfortunately, it will take an unprecedented show of public intolerance for inadequate nominees.
I see posts that are advocating legislation from the bench. This is not the purpose of the court. The court is only there to decide the constitutionality of an issue. They are not there to do anything more.
If you don't like the law, you need to petition congress... UNLESS the law is unconstitutional, then you can take it to the courts.
The justices' initial debates in the case make it clear that Stevens was the only one of the nine who believed that the 'fair use' doctrine gave consumers a right to make personal copies of copyrighted content for home use
That is a bit of an overstatement, don't you think? Recording an over the air broadcast for later viewing is not quite the same thing as exchanging bootleg copies of Photoshop, etc. There doesn't appear to be any indication that Justice Stevens endorsed the latter.
Just look at how many basic constitutional rights have been violated by "Herr" Obama. We no longer have free speech, or the right to have guns, and churches are being outlawed as we speak. Obama controls the media and it all but ignores the amazing tea bagger movement. Just look at how the price of gasoline has gone up, this is part of his plot to make us all walk or take the bus in order to make sure we are too tired to oppose him. The man would fit perfectly inside the communist fascist Nazi party. Not only does he want government control of everything, he also wants to give the United Nations authority over the USA and he has repeatedly confirmed that he intends to institute death panels to execute anyone who disagrees with these opinions. I have read that there are internment camps with gas chambers being built in secret locations across the country and that Obama has personally placed orders for thousands of chinese-made mobile execution buses.
WAKE UP AMERICA!
FTA: let's hope that whoever President Obama appoints to replace him will follow in Stevens's footsteps and defend Fair Use, not corporate copyright interests.
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!
I needed a good laugh. Thanks.
Stevens was also one of only two judges in Eldred v Ashcroft to reject the Copyright Term Extension Act as unconstitutional.
The Republic addresses the scaling issues of the Democracy.
The term Democracy is used because we tend to hope that the character of it remains as we address the pragmatic issues with implementing it for 300 or 500 million people.
I'd like the think that the Internet is one step on the way to making direct Democracy feasible again even with hundreds of millions of people. Perhaps we could all be "present to vote" virtually and make our voices heard directly.
It would be a huge undertaking, but I think it's a goal worth striving for.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law
Holy, cow. If the Supreme Court hadn't declared that we had the right to make a personal copy, then _Congress_ might have actually had to pass a law. Oh my gosh. How impossible!
We are screwed.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Okay, it's bad form to reply to ones own post, but I'm genuinely curious here... how does my above post qualify as a troll?
I'm not objecting to being modded down, per se, but I'm wondering what I said in the above post that somebody thought I was trying to troll.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Justice Stevens will be missed :(
Obama might find a liberal like Stevens who can replace his ideological position, but where's he going to someone with the negotiation skill, influence, and ...oh yes... seniority to make liberal opinions and liberal majorities happen?
Mr Roger's testimony also helped Stevens writer the majority opinion about Video Taping : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Rogers#Mister_Rogers_and_the_VCR
There's something funny about lamenting the resignation of an 89 year old judge because he's the only one that gets modern technology... :-)
Expert in software patents or patent law? Contribute to the ESP wiki!
There is a third way too. It tends to involve guns and people getting killed, but eventually it will probably have to happen for the United States to get back towards some sort of Democratic government.