I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer
and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone.
--
Jack Valenti
President, Motion Picture Association Of America, Inc.
Congressional
Testimony, 1982
Is the Internet the end of the world as we knew it? Perhaps. For
sure, according to Doc Searls and David Weinberger, it's
The World of Ends:
The Nutshell
1. The Internet isn't complicated
2. The Internet isn't a thing. It's an agreement.
3. The Internet is stupid.
4. Adding value to the Internet lowers its value.
5. All the Internet's value grows on its edges.
6. Money moves to the suburbs.
7. The end of the world? Nah, the world of ends.
8. The Internet’s three virtues:
a. No one owns it
b. Everyone can use it
c. Anyone can improve it
9. If the Internet is so simple, why have so many been so boneheaded about it?
Porter's
barriers to entry
open vs closed, tight vs loose control of rights
privacy, secrecy, and security
The legal chess match
Do you understand the differences between the different kinds of
intellectual property:
patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets?
What is the law?
The U.S. Code TITLE
17 >
CHAPTER 1 > § 106.
Exclusive rights in copyrighted works lists six rights of copyrights
holders. The first is the broadest:
(1) to
reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords;
Note the limits of these rights in
§ 107 through § 112
Then there is a very long section, § 114.
Scope of exclusive rights in sound recordings, that singles out sound
recordings as a special case.
Digital Millennium Copyright Act
excerpt from section 1201
No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public,
provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device,
component, or part thereof, that...is primarily designed or produced for the
purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls
access to a work protected under this title.
This broad definition outlaws not just software that allows
digital piracy, but any software providing access to a copyrighted work in a
manner not intended or approved by the copyright holder.
US Government Policy
Sec.
230
U.S. Code - Title 47 - Chapter 5 - Subchapter II - Part I
The Congress finds the following:
(1) The rapidly developing array of Internet and other interactive computer
services available to individual Americans represent an extraordinary advance in
the availability of educational and informational resources to our citizens.
(2) These services offer users a great degree of control over the information
that they receive, as well as the potential for even greater control in the
future as technology develops.
(3) The Internet and other interactive computer services offer a forum for a
true diversity of political discourse, unique opportunities for cultural
development, and myriad avenues for intellectual activity.
(4) The Internet and other interactive computer services have flourished, to the
benefit of all Americans, with a minimum of government regulation.
(5) Increasingly Americans are relying on interactive media for a variety of
political, educational, cultural, and entertainment services.
It is the policy of the United States -
(1) to promote the continued development of the Internet and other interactive
computer services and other interactive media;
(2) to preserve the vibrant and competitive free market that presently exists
for the Internet and other interactive computer services, unfettered by Federal
or State regulation;
(3) to encourage the development of technologies which maximize user control ...
What would be the implications for your company's culture if
this Federal policy were also your corporate policy?
Hold
your legislator accountable (using the file sharing technologies that they want
to outlaw). P2P Congress
Congressional Internet Caucus
Digital Media Consumers Rights Act
legislatures:
Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)
Piracy Deterrence and Education Act
House panel approves copyright bill
by Declan McCullagh
CNET News.com, March 31, 2004
A House of Representatives panel has approved a sweeping new copyright
bill that would boost penalties for peer-to-peer piracy and increase
federal police powers against Internet copyright infringement.
The House Judiciary intellectual property subcommittee voted for the
"Piracy Deterrence and Education Act" (PDEA) late Wednesday,
legislatures: Copyright Term Extension Act (Sonny Bono law) and
Eldredge v Ashcroft
regulators: how is the
FCC
influencing the development of the Internet? Is it encouraging
innovation? Is it favoring the new or the old?
regulators: what about the FTC?
courts: how have they treated the new vs the old in
the ongoing struggles of the RIAA and the file sharers?
courts: what about the rest of the world? What's
the situation in Canada? Disc counterfeiting in Asia? WIPO?
Canada: Downloading music is legal
by John Borland
CNET News.com, December 15, 2003
"Canadians are legally free to download music from the Internet - but
not to upload it, the Copyright Board has found."
proposed laws
This list goes through mid-2003. What's the latest?
Senator
Takes a Swing at RIAA
RIAA
Tactics Under Scrutiny
Upload a
File, Go to Prison
Statement of
the Honorable Howard L. Berman (CA-28) on Introduction of H.R. 2752
“The Author, Consumer, and Computer Owner Protection and Security Act of
2003.”
The
Piracy Deterrence and Education Act of 2003
House
CIIP Subcommittee Holds Hearing on Piracy Deterrence and Education Act
other problems
Garage
Doors Raise DMCA Questions
Judges OK garage door openers in copyright case
by Declan McCullagh
CNET News.com, September 1, 2004
A federal appeals court has reaffirmed what might seem to be obvious:
replacement garage door openers are legal to sell.
In a case with important implications for the technology industry, the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Tuesday upheld a lower court
decision saying that certain garage door openers cannot be banned under the
Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
Needlepoint Outlaws (reprinted article from LA Times)
Skinner
Sisters
Skinner Sisters on
Copyright
Statement of Linn
R. Skinner in support of HR 2517 Piracy Deterrence and Education Act
The
Copyright FAQ for Knitters
Follow the money
What are the last four
jobs and salaries held by Mitch Glazier?
Infamous villain: Mitch Glazier
by Jorn Barger, September 2000
Bachelor of Science degree in Social Policy, cum laude, from
Northwestern University
1991 - Doctor of Jurisprudence degree from Vanderbilt University
law clerk to the Honorable Wayne R. Andersen, Judge, United
States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois
legal advisor to the House Judiciary Committee during the Clinton Impeachment
hearing
Chief Counsel to the Subcommittee on Courts and Intellectual Property, Committee
on the Judiciary, U.S. House of Representatives, salary $80,000 per year
2000 - RIAA chief lobbyist, salary reportedly $500,000+
Record labels' man in Washington
by Declan McCullagh
CNET News.com, September 3, 2004
Mitch Glazier is one of the most influential lobbyists
you've never heard of. ...
Q: Sen. Orrin Hatch has talked about prosecutors filing "tens of
thousands" of lawsuits. Is that what you'd like?
A: We would want the Department of Justice to use its best judgment in
prosecuting serious infringers.
Q: You wouldn't object?
A: No, of course not.
A completely new way ...
|
I think it would be very difficult for a company to
start up in this industry. Unless a company comes up with a completely new
way to market music through the internet, I don't think they will make a
profit or find the money in order to survive. |
I am constantly connected to the Internet through a
T-1 line and I use it everyday to do just about everything, communication,
research, daily news updates, etc. |
The two statements above were made last winter by the same
student ten
minutes apart.
What musical experiences can you provide?
When you're selling music, what are you really selling?
As Evans and Wurster point out in Blown to Bits, Britannica
wasn't really selling encyclopedias. It was selling assurances to parents that
their children would be able to compete in school. When computers came along at
about the same price point and offered the whole World Wide Web, it offered
parents the same assurances. And parents switched.
more on
privacy
RFID
Auto ID Center's
How
the EPC Network Will Automate the Supply Chain
Bits and
Atoms
========================
The RIAA says that without strong copyright protection,
musicians will stop making music. To help you understand that, here's an analogy
from Jessica Litman's book Digital Copyright:
Imagine for a moment that some upstart revolutionary proposed that we eliminate
all intellectual property protection for fashion design. No longer could a
designer secure federal copyright protection for the cut of a dress or the
sleeve of a blouse. Unscrupulous mass-marketers could run off thousands of
knock-off copies of any designer's evening ensemble, and flood the marketplace
with cheap imitations of haute couture. In the short run, perhaps, clothing
prices would come down as legitimate designers tried to meet the prices of their
free-riding competitors. In the long run, though, as we know all too well, the
diminution in the incentives for designing new fashions would take its toll.
Designers would still wish to design, at least initially, but clothing
manufacturers with no exclusive rights to rely on would be reluctant to make the
investment involved in manufacturing those designs and distributing them to the
public. The dynamic American fashion industry would wither, and its most
talented designers would forsake clothing design for some more remunerative
calling like litigation. All of us would be forced either to wear last year's
garments year in and year out, or to import our clothing from abroad.
Or, perhaps, imagine that Congress suddenly repealed federal
intellectual-property protection for food creations. Recipes would become common
property. Downscale restaurants could freely recreate the signature chocolate
desserts of their upscale sisters. Uncle Ben's® would market Minute® Risotto
(microwavable!); the Ladies' Home Journal would reprint recipes it had stolen
from Gourmet magazine. Great chefs would be unable to find book publishers
willing to buy their cookbooks. Then, expensive gourmet restaurants would reduce
their prices to meet the prices of the competition; soon they would either close
or fire their chefs to cut costs; promising young cooks would either move to
Europe or get a day job (perhaps the law) and cook only on weekends. Ultimately,
we would all be stuck eating Uncle Ben's Minute Risotto® (eleven yummy
flavors!!) for every meal.
But, you've heard all of this before. It's the same argument motion picture
producers make about why we needed to extend the duration of copyright
protection another twenty years; the same argument software publishers make
about what will happen if we permit other software publishers to decompile and
reverse-engineer their software products; the same argument database proprietors
make about the huge social cost of a failure to protect their rights in their
data.
Perhaps the most important reason why we have intellectual property protection
is our conclusion that incentives are required to spur the creation and
dissemination of a sufficient number and variety of intellectual creations like
films, software, databases, fashions, and food.
Of course, we don't give copyright protection to fashions or food. We never
have.
Cat and mouse games:
Banned IP Ranges
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