lawrence lessig's brief response to losing the eldred copyright case in the supreme court.
Hey, look at this character I just created!
*sound of prison door slamming*
ginsburg's opinion for the majority (pdf link on lessig's site) seems pretty cut and dried to me...
why shouldn't congress be able to extend a copyright that's already in place?
what's the difference between that and extending any other limited grant of public property (eg mineral rights, loans, spectrum allocations, etc)?
not that i'm entirely unsympathetic to lessig's general crusade, but this case didn't seem that strong...
Copyright isn't public property. It's a public protection (or removal of protection) of private property rights.
Duration of copyright is a totally arbitrary number of years, supposedly arrived at by balancing public and private interests. Coincidentally, as Congress has become more and more beholden to private capital, copyright duration has lengthened. And lengthened. And lengthened. This is not healthy for a vibrant intellectual economy.
An analogy would be the estate tax. It theoretically prevents large concentrations of capital from accumulating. Forcing people to give up their copyrights after a certain amount of time effectively does the same thing. Instead of tax revenue, it gives ideas back to the public.
cut and paste !
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- dave 1-15-2003 8:04 pm
Hey, look at this character I just created!
*sound of prison door slamming*
- tom moody 1-15-2003 10:00 pm [add a comment]
ginsburg's opinion for the majority (pdf link on lessig's site) seems pretty cut and dried to me...
why shouldn't congress be able to extend a copyright that's already in place?
what's the difference between that and extending any other limited grant of public property (eg mineral rights, loans, spectrum allocations, etc)?
not that i'm entirely unsympathetic to lessig's general crusade, but this case didn't seem that strong...
- big jimmy 1-16-2003 8:54 am [add a comment]
Copyright isn't public property. It's a public protection (or removal of protection) of private property rights.
Duration of copyright is a totally arbitrary number of years, supposedly arrived at by balancing public and private interests. Coincidentally, as Congress has become more and more beholden to private capital, copyright duration has lengthened. And lengthened. And lengthened. This is not healthy for a vibrant intellectual economy.
An analogy would be the estate tax. It theoretically prevents large concentrations of capital from accumulating. Forcing people to give up their copyrights after a certain amount of time effectively does the same thing. Instead of tax revenue, it gives ideas back to the public.
- tom moody 1-16-2003 9:32 am [add a comment]
cut and paste !
- bill 1-19-2003 5:10 pm [add a comment]